FINAL FANTASY XI Job Adjustments Manifesto: Paladin

[Neisan_Quetz]

Because all jobs should be useful in all content. PUP BST COR and DNC would like to have a word with you about that.

[AldielQuetz]

It would be really good to keep the focus on PLD instead of derailing the thread with idle commentary every other post guys.... I don't go into the WHM and RDM forum to argue with your desires.

PLD needs a spell this update and deserves a few tweaks, that's it. It's been neglected, the end.

[saevel]

Definitely give PLD +enmity bonus traits, make it tiered starting at 35/45 and working their way up.
Give Flash II, modify Cover to always have an effect provide the target is within 10 feet of you.
Give paladin provoke or another JA with similar effect, instant use and low recast timer.

[AldielQuetz]

Flash II >>>> Brilliant, more of this, with a side of this, for the win! Drain and Drain II, Flash and Flash II

Vote YES! For proposition 1337: Make a Paladin Smile!

[Morwy]

Hmmm Flash II /o/ with a one minute recast time ?
I'd love to see some reduction on Divine Emblem, i think someone had that idea at some point anyway.

[SpankWustler]

Honest question: What do you guys hope to accomplish by having significantly more enmity as Paladin?

I'm not trying to mess with anybody. I'm truly curious.

[Rorrick]

Considering Paladin's utility is and always will be prime on the hardest content in the game, everyone should have an Ultimate-class weapon or shield on it anyways. Paladin will never, ever be a casual content job. Sorry.

Edit: That said, Empyreans are stupid easy. Souls are annoying, and the shield/harp Abyssea trials are way worse than weapon Abyssea trials (I'd think because they bypass the crappy NM/VNM portions), but even those are being buffed next update. I dare say you can get over it if you actually want to play the job well.

I take mild offense to insinuating that laziness is the reason I lack Ochain. Expecting me to devote a week of my life to something that ultimately doesn't really fix the problem with Paladin is pretty bold, but to imply that my lack of one is due to laziness or ineptitude is ridiculous.

Getting online for an hour every other day to fulfil my linkshell commitments is pretty easy. Setting aside three or four hours a night every day for a month is an unreasonable expectation of any player. If you can devote than kind of time on a consistent basis, great, but don't assume that everyone else can, or should be required to in order to even approach usability. By myself, I can carry around two T3s with myself (on MNK, how ironic) and my WHM mule. T2 repops take anywhere from 10-15 minutes, on top of the three or four it takes me to kill the thing. Assuming I get every claim every ten minutes and kill in three (a pretty unfair hypothetical, because there's no way I'm getting every claim the moment the window it open, and for some reason people on Sylph don't like letting you pop just to get a conversion), and I get a conversion every time, that's eleven hours for 50 T3s (and in my experience, the double drop rate is less than that) under perfect conditions, and ignoring the time it actually takes to kill the T3 itself (I tend to stick to Brulo, as I've found he's not as heavily camped). For all intents and purposes, it'll take me about a month on my own just to finish the souls. Also consider I don't have WAR levelled (are you going to tell me to level, skill-up, and gear it now?), so I'd be farming plates on Paladin, which would probably take me another month's worth of weekends. I've got no experience with Azdaja, so you can fill that blank in on your own.

While I do all that, I'm not progressing with anything else in the game. And what's the reward? An item that doesn't solve Paladin's problem. Ochain is handy the first few times, until you figure out the gimmicks. Then you can adapt your strategy for damage dealing tanks to kill the enemy faster with minimal increase in risk. Damage dealers have potent damage mitigation at their disposal in addition to their often overwhelming offense. Eventually, this cycle of familiarity results in an environment where Paladin serves no purpose. This is the issue. Paladin contributes nothing in that environment, and this needs to be addressed.

If the above is what you consider an acceptable situation for a casual player to find themselves in (I think even expecting them to have WHM mules to be hilariously presumptuous), then fine, you and I are clearly using different lexicons. But don't have the audacity to assume that something is unattainable to me because I'm lazy.


Edit: Just to reiterate, enmity is a secondary issue. Addressing it and nothing else does not fix Paladin.

[Hayward]

I'll say it again: Requiring a Paladin to have both an Almace and Ochain only proves there is something seriously wrong with the job. S-E 's attempt at pandering to endgamers with these absurd Empyrean trials has done nothing to attract casual gamers who, more than likely, want nothing to do with endgame linkshells and the odious politics that accompany them. Laziness or whatever other talking points people spout onto these threads have nothing to do with the real problem, a job that is not truly balanced.

Game balance seems only to be a problem with certain jobs that want to play and enjoy the game as much as those who mindlessly gravitate toward the bandwagon jobs (these people know who they are). What, in fact, is so wrong about giving Paladins a bit more punch offensively? What would be so overpowered about letting paladins do their job without having to almost literally sell their souls (i.e. join an endgame LS) for two Empyrean items that won't even guarantee their usefulness?

S-E knows the answer to this situation. Let's see if they stop listening to the wrong people long enough to put it into action.

[DebbieGibson]

How would you balance pld so that it would be useful vs a monster that you can tank with sam or monk?

[Tsuneo]

How would you balance pld so that it would be useful vs a monster that you can tank with sam or monk?

You can't without increasing the offensive capabilities of PLD which SE said they weren't going to do. People are deluded to think that some magical enmity buff will solve all their problems, but they would be in the same situation of not being needed.