One of the topics I want to start to cover in this blog is surrounding "party behavior based on role". I am looking to write this stuff up for my own benefit (as with most of this blog), mainly, so I can work through some issues I have as a Guild Officer of a small levelling guild, with the ultimate goal of helping new players who are interested in improving as well as building a stronger Friends list of folks who work well together in a group situation handling dungeon instances and the likes.
There's always great discussions going on in the alt.games.warcraft newsgroup on Usenet surrounding various classes, their strengths and weaknesses, and the personal experiences folks have had when playing as or with others who did well or did poorly. I'm very thankful for the dynamic nature of that newsgroup, I've learned a lot from it.
Being on the Horde side, I haven't had much experience with Paladins. I've got a level 10 one myself but right now she's parked as a bank toon while I level my Mage and Priest each to 35 (so I can improve upon my professions). I certainly haven't performed any duties as a Paladin in a dungeon party situation. I won't be able to make useful comments on Paladins for a long time.
But, today on the Official WoW discussion forums in this thread, someone posted a link to their "Paladin's perspective" blog, and a particularly useful post about a Paladin's role within a raid situation. A quick summary is posted up-front in the blog entry:
A paladin's responsibilities in a raid are, in order of importance:Cleanse
Keep the tanks alive
Keep the party alive
Buff
Judgement of Light / Wisdom
Add extra damage
Check out the full entry here!