So... Patch 3.2...

Yeah... I haven't been posting much, as I've had a lot of other things wrapping up my time, and there hasn't been much to talk about.

Then there was the most recent Seal of Vengeance change.

The good news! I have something to post about!
The bad news: I'm afraid my goggles are no longer quite so rose tinted.

I'm not going to talk explicitly about the seal change, however. More overall how things are beginning to look.

Early into the changes, Ghostcrawler made a post asking for new ideas to change the Retribution combat system. I was thrilled when I read his post, and immediately began posting up a frenzy of ideas and threads trying to rally support of new ideas of my own and other posters. I even came up with my own crazy combat system, complete with a revamp of several skills.

The changes?

Crusader Strike is now on a 6-->4 second cooldown, costs 8-->5% base mana, and deals 100-->75% weapon damage.

Seal of Vengeance now hits really hard. With the most recent changes, though, it takes 15+ seconds before Seal of Vengeance does anything beyond apply a DoT though.
Seal of Command hits slightly less hard, but on every attack, and has a shiny new glyph that gives us more mana.

...

I'm really, really, really dissapointed. The only thing keeping me holding onto my Paladin at this point is the Paladin Q&A:

Q. Do we have plans to introduce a stand-alone interrupt ability for paladins?

A: We would like to add this kind of utility to paladins. First we have to get the burst damage under control so that Ret paladins are not winning PvP encounters by blowing players up. When we accomplish that, we’ll look at finally giving them more tools.

Paladins have had their burst gutted, and this time it was hit so hard even the PvE Retribution Paladins are curled up in the fetal position crying for a medic. Now let's just hope that the surgery is finished before the morphine wears off and we sit up to find our intestines in our lap.

I know, this post is a lot more QQ than feedback, and for that I'm sorry. But, for the sake of keeping my blog at a higher level than your average pointless rambling, I'll post an idea that I caught in a post that went largely unnoticed.

Perhaps Blizzard is onto something with the only-on-auto-attack application of Seal of Vengeance. Perhaps by changing our seals from straight damage to utility, they could begin to rework our combat system, ramping up the skill cap and bringing some interactivity to it. Something beyond "Press button, damage happens." (Which is now "Press buttons slightly faster, slightly less damage happens... but slightly more often.")

TL;DR: I'm dissapointed, but still have hope (Whether I'm optimistic or stupid is up to the individual reader).

Suggestion: Using seals to enhance to our combat mechanics, rather than our combat being centered around seals.