How to fix pld as tank??

the only way i see pld becomeing a main tank again is by having them deal as much dmg as other main tanks. (thf nin)
Or having situation where tanking a mob requires abilitys that only pld has.

A "you must attack me for X seconds regardless of enmity" ability would bypass the enmity issue entirely as long as it isn't ridiculous, like lasts for 10 seconds on a 10 minute cooldown. It fits the class and as long as it is too high to sub or completely gimped as a subjob ability, it would be unique. It shouldn't be sustainable 100% of the time, but it should be a decent chunk of time. Making Cover work 100% of the time would help. The Merit could reduce recharge so that it helps you change who it is on more often. Adding an Accomplice/Collaborator ability would also make a difference. I'm not really sure why they are Thief abilities in the first place. I know Thief is supposed to specialize in hate control, but the original point was to transfer their hate to someone else. One weak variant, I can see, if there was also an alternate skill that transferred part of the Thief's hate to someone else. Giving two abilities to Thief, a class designed to do the exact polar opposite of what they do, is a little silly.

Between all three of those, a Paladin would be able to stop one party member from being attacked, regardless of enmity through Cover. Reduce another party member's enmity (regardless of problems with the system, this would at least temporarily keep them from getting attacked), and be able to temporarily ignore the enmity system entirely. None of this requires any special change to the core system and two of these abilities are already in the game.

Personally, I don't think making Paladin do as much damage as other melee classes is the right way to go. Yeah, it does help in the 2% of game content that is the only thing people play and expect everything to be balanced around. However, what happens when the next batch of endgame content comes out with its own unique mechanics? If Paladin is already in the same ballpark for damage, they could easily invalidate every other melee class in terms of usefulness. Even if they can't hold hate properly, having better mitigation, healing, and utility abilities basically puts them ahead of every other melee class if you get those without sacrificing much damage in the process.

The problem is that the core of the class needs to be fixed. Just trying to patch it to work well enough in one specific situation with special mechanics is going to cause problems down the line, not to mention in all the old content everyone ignores at this point when talking about balance. Paladin is supposed to specialize in holding a monster's attention and damage mitigation. The enmity system is not the only way they have to work with for that. On top of that, the fact Thief gets abilities that are clearly designed for tanks is also an issue. If you look at EQ2, the equivalent to Accomplice and Collaborator is a Paladin ability.

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Originally Posted by Zerich

Have all of the DD's pull back on their WS' and DMG, have SATA return, and only nuke on MB's!

Fixed!

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Boy, that is so right.

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Originally Posted by Daniel_Hatcher

Then the job becomes broken.. It basically would allow PLD to always tank, while the DD's have little to fear of dying outside of AoE. This is not the way it should be.

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Well this was the way before tho O.o

The job designed to tank and hold enmity should not be able to hold enmity. Hilarious argument there.

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Originally Posted by Caketime

The job designed to tank and hold enmity should not be able to hold enmity. Hilarious argument there.

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The job designed to tank and hold enmity should not be guaranteed enmity, but they should have to work for it. With that suggestion, PLD would not have try to keep hate on him full time, and that is a bad thing. You don't fix gameplay mechanics by eliminating those mechanics. If cures were broken, you wouldn't fix it by automatically disabling taking damage for the entire party just because a WHM is in the party.

When every boss uses 30' radial attacks with a hilarious combination of debilitating auras and alternate versions of status effects that can't be cured, any strategy other than "Let's drink fanny tonics and beat this thing stupid!" floats away like trash in the wind.

I understand working to maintain your job's role and wasn't suggesting a super trait or anything silly, but tanking has been phased out by design. Paladin can still take hits like a boss, but all content design for years now has revolved around putting out as much damage as possible before a timer expires, and Pally's more of a marathon runner than a sprinter.

Provoke has been broken since level 75,too much dmg being dealt to coincide with the small numbers Voke give.

IMO a great idea would be to utilize the Shield Bash that has ALWAYS been far too long a timer.
My idea would be to give the PLD the option to forfeit 100 tp for an added SB,200 tp and gives added SB that stuns for 5 secs and 15% bonus to attack[60 secs] 300 tp gives 7 second stun plus 25% bonus to attack/15% bonus to defense [60 secs]

Aside from that Provoke values need to be updated to coincide with the higher levels and higher damage.

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I understand working to maintain your job's role and wasn't suggesting a super trait or anything silly, but tanking has been phased out by design. Paladin can still take hits like a boss, but all content design for years now has revolved around putting out as much damage as possible before a timer expires, and Pally's more of a marathon runner than a sprinter.

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What their really wanting is a system where it takes super gear to be able to "tank" and anyone without it would be left out. It's an exclusionary position.

PLD just need a passive trait called absorb enmity.
AE 1 = 10% of other party members enmity from any action is transferred to PLD
AE 2 = 15%
AE 3 = 20%

Its an auto-cover trait that doesn't require positioning and means every melee action gives PLD enmity to keep up hate.
Does it allow other jobs to act without fear? Yes. Do they currently act without fear? Yes.
The only time melee back off currently is in the setting of terrible AoE which isn't altered by PLD being an effective tank. So it wouldn't break the job, but would allow PLD to actually do its job.

In fact you could lessen the AE trait and make some gear that enhances it so the best tanks are working towards an awesome AE build as well as -PDT and -MDT.

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Originally Posted by saevel

What their really wanting is a system where it takes super gear to be able to "tank" and anyone without it would be left out. It's an exclusionary position.

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Its hard to do it any other way really. Looking at Ochain and Aegis, if you can tank without them, your god with them, if you can not tank without them, you can probably tank with them. If they made it so just anyone could play a decently geared PLD that has no Relic/Emp shield, then someone with a Relic/Emp will be able to do it without even needing to do much. It may suck to know, but Aegis and Ochain are so high above other shields that I think they are part of what hurts tanking the most. Because SE has to deal with people who have these weapons somehow, they have to over power mobs so that the mobs are not weak enough to be made worthless through these means.

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Originally Posted by Demon6324236

Its hard to do it any other way really. Looking at Ochain and Aegis, if you can tank without them, your god with them, if you can not tank without them, you can probably tank with them. If they made it so just anyone could play a decently geared PLD that has no Relic/Emp shield, then someone with a Relic/Emp will be able to do it without even needing to do much. It may suck to know, but Aegis and Ochain are so high above other shields that I think they are part of what hurts tanking the most. Because SE has to deal with people who have these weapons somehow, they have to over power mobs so that the mobs are not weak enough to be made worthless through these means.

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That's very poor game design, VERY poor. You can not say "this job is only functional with these high end gears".

Now that being said, those two are not that much more powerful. Aegis is probably the only one that's job defining good and only because it lets you go over the 50% MDT cap. Brochain just has a stupid high block rate for melee hits, the most powerful attacks are stupid aoes which brochain doesn't do much for. In either case tanking is NOT about taking the least possible damage, I'm really tired of people jumping to that conclusion. It's about keeping the monsters attention focused on a predictable target so that it doesn't hit the soft mages in the back. Reducing the damage you take is just a nice bonus and should never take priority over keeping it's attention or even killing it.

Well part of the biggest complaints about tanking right now are AoEs. Were AoEs not a problem, Ochain would be able to reduce damage to stupidly low levels. Yes getting and maintaining hate are the most important thing, but what would that do if the AoE problem is still around? If you allow PLD to hold hate at the same time as eliminating AoEs, you effectively make PLD a god with super weapons if mobs do not hit incredibly hard, hard enough to get through these defenses. If AoEs remain, Ochain does not much good, but at the same time, neither does tanking, if you do not fix hate, same story. If both are fixed and damage is to low, then any Ochain PLD or Aegis PLD worth their shield would be able to survive effortlessly, if damage is to high, no job except Ochain/Aegis PLD can tank.

Its a problem created by these 2 shields which SE can not really solve without a nerf of some sort. While you are correct, and Aegis does much more for a PLD than Ochain, they are both contributing factors, because Aegis is a beast for anything to do with magic, while its great for melee, and Ochain is perfect for melee, but has no effect on magic damage. If some of the new NMs we see in SoA do not use magic, Ochain would be better than Aegis, and its possible that will happen, I myself find it kinda stupid that every type of NM in recent times has been a magic user of some sort no matter the race really. So if we see those, and hate/AoE problems are removed, PLD would become god unless mobs hit to hard for anything else to survive.

That is how I see it at least.

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Its a problem created by these 2 shields which SE can not really solve without a nerf of some sort

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And yet .... with these stupid "super broken" shields ... we don't use PLDs to tank...

Here's a hint, creation of large chunks of CE virtually eliminate the use of a shield. Aegis / OChain are defensive options on a class that's already built around defense. Them being able to actually hold hate won't be broken as the fight is not determined by how much (or little) damage your tank takes. There will still be AoEs, Level 1 goblin monsters have AoEs so we can be positive that level 110+ NMs will have aoes. There will still be a hate cap and melee's will still reach it and take hate / damage. So ultimately the existence of Aegis / OChain would have zero effect on NM design. It just gives the healer less stress.

Your really seeing the battle system and overall game design from the wrong point of view.

If thats the case from how you make it sound, problems with tanking we have right now will not be fixed anyways, making this entire discussion pointless.

Like I said, problems we have are mainly a tank keeping hate and the mobs spamming nothing but AoEs. If you eliminate those problems then you can see how Ochain and Aegis would be problematic. Saying things like...

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Originally Posted by saevel

And yet .... with these stupid "super broken" shields ... we don't use PLDs to tank...

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Is kinda obvious. Duh we don't use PLD to tank, because you cant tank right now, tanking is broken by AoEs and enmity, tanks cant hold hate in a way that allows them to hold the mobs attention away from the army of people beating it with sticks. If it were fixed, a hypothetical situation we are hoping to see in the future, we would also need AoE spam to be eliminated. Am I saying get rid of all of the AoEs? No, I am saying make it so that not every attack is an AoE, which is how it is right now, everything is conal or AoE with varying ranges some of which reach even max casting range. These types of things would have to be stopped. If you stop those 2 problems, PLD becomes unstoppable.

We do not use them now because they are worthless for tanking, because tanking does not exist. You want an example of their power though look no further than the difference of a PLD and any other job tanking adds or NMs in endgame. In Legion people use PLD to super tank, not any other job could tank them really, same thing goes for good old VW on NMs like Morta and Bismarck. Were it possible to supertank against normal mobs while people beat it to death, then you face a true problem of balance. If PLD can not hold hate off DDs, we are no better off then than we are right now.

I know there will still be a hate cap, and people will reach it, but if thats all people will do then the enmity changes are pointless anyways. If we are actually attempting to tank, then PLD will become invincible by compare to anything else. No job in the game comes close to being able to take the same amount of damage as PLD, thats why you can not really compare it.

I wont pretend to know the exact math behind it all, because I have never paid enough attention, but say blocking with Ochain is -75% damage, and you get hit with a TP attack that would hit a WAR in a Capped-PDT set for 800, with Ochain thats 200 damage with Phalanx, ~175. Against a WAR in a normal TP set thats 1600. If the mob hits for 500 on a normal hit, its 250 on a DD in PDT, 75 on an Ochain PLD, and 50 or less while Phalanx is up. So is it over powered and bad design to make mobs hit 1600 on a DD in a TP set? Yes, but its also equally bad design to have a job so strong in defense they are nearly immune to damage by compare to your average job. PLD rules in Physical and Magical, between reduction gear and their shields as well as Phalanx PLD is a near perfect job for defenses.

Can you honestly explain to me why or how PLD would be balanced with these shields if they fixed hate and stopped the current AoE spam we suffer from? I would love to hear a well thought out explanation, but for what you have said so far I think your just counting how it is now, which is not what I'm debating. Tanking how it is now is broken, I know this, but what I am trying to say is the problems these shields would create if the problems with hate were fixed.

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Is kinda obvious. Duh we don't use PLD to tank, because you cant tank right now, tanking is broken by AoEs and enmity, tanks cant hold hate in a way that allows them to hold the mobs attention away from the army of people beating it with sticks. If it were fixed, a hypothetical situation we are hoping to see in the future, we would also need AoE spam to be eliminated. Am I saying get rid of all of the AoEs? No, I am saying make it so that not every attack is an AoE, which is how it is right now, everything is conal or AoE with varying ranges some of which reach even max casting range. These types of things would have to be stopped. If you stop those 2 problems, PLD becomes unstoppable.

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And therein lies the misunderstanding. PLD is already "unstoppable", their a veritable brick wall. We just don't need a brick wall. If tomorrow a magic wand was waived and PLD could suddenly hold hate again would there be any change in a single event we do now? Absolutely not.

The real "tanks" are melee's with appropriate DT sets or other defensive counter measures. Those "tanks" are able to not only hold hate over the healers, their able to survive the attacks of NMs via very creative application of gear swaps. If the nm is really serious we just use a couple of SCH/BLMs interlocking their stuns to slow it down.

Your misunderstanding is that you thing the defensive ability of a job is what makes it a tank. We could give PLD a JT that gave it a permanent -90% DT naked and they still wouldn't be used. They simply can not dish out enough damage using sword + board to warrant a slot that would otherwise be given to a WAR / DRK / SAM / MNK / ect.. who not only dish's damage but can also mitigate enough damage.

The real culprit is the combination of high levels of MP sustainability and a large assortment of -DT gear. The only time MP ever becomes an issue is in low man events, the one place a PLD is still a viable option, provided they pull their head out their arse and gear properly for it. In party or larger settings the "tanks" only need to reduce damage enough to not die, something that's already within the reach of any dedicated DD.