PLD tanks Vs. MNK tanks *Ding* FIGHT!

[TheDirtyHobo]

You guys are missing the forest for all the trees. There are 3 components of tanking, and most of you are only considering 2 of them.

1. Establishing/maintaining enmity
2. Mitigating damage
3. Dealing damage.

Contrary to what people seem to think, a good PLD would actually be the better than MNK at #1, if they were better at #2. Sword and Shield, with proper haste buffs/gear (BRD with march+1 hands, haste spell, 25% gear), will actually have shorter attack round intervals than a MNK (PLD: 227 * 0.36 =~82 delay, MNK: 531 * 0.2 = ~107 delay). This leads to it 'refreshing' its VE the more often, and theoretically keeping hate better. However, because having hate leads to the mob hitting you, you lose VE and then take a few hits to knock it back up. However, MNK mitigates damage better (counterstance, dodge), and if it does get hit, it also does much more damage to gain its VE back faster.

So, some people see this and leads to the next logical step, "what can we do to make PLD mitigate damage better?", which is a good start, however, very few continue on to the questions that come after. Say you decide to increase shield block damage reduction and block rate, and tweak it to a rate where PLD can sufficiently keep hate over a MNK. This is the point where a lot of people get off their train of thought and declare PLD as 'fixed', but what exactly does this accomplish? Everyone will still bring a MNK because a MNK will kill the mob twice as fast.

The problems PLD faces are not for any lack of job mechanics, but just being pointless in the current state of game content. With 99% of the game revolving around strictly-timed content like abyssea, salvage, dynamis, or einherjar, people don't have the luxury or taking twice as long to do something. Honestly, the only way I can foresee PLD becoming relevant again is by brute-forcing it through creating mobs with some sort of "only PLD has the slightest chance to survive this" attack/mode, but even then, people will very quickly find exploits and ways around it.

[Satyr]

So many of the suggestions in this thread are either completely counterproductive or too complex. The solution is not to nerf the other tanking jobs or create mobs that only PLDs can tank. The solution is to fix PLDs. To do this we must identify the key issues...which are:
How can PLD damage mitigation be brought in line with the other tanking jobs?
How can PLD damage be brought up to par in terms of being a favorable tank for kill speed as well as keeping high enmity?

I suggest the following very easy tweaks that would address both of these issues:

1. Bring PLD Parry skill up to A+.
-I do not understand why a job that is meant to be "the" tank does not have an A+ in defensive skills, and in the case of parry PLD gets a C rating. Parrying is something that (in the real world) is an integral part of swordsmanship. In FFXI PLD has an A+ in sword, thus using a little real world logic they should have an A+ in parry also. And like I said...they are "the" tank of FFXI...they should get A+ defensive skills. Parrying more helps keep enmity high as well as reduce damage taken.

2. With the above change, give PLD the Tactical Parry Trait.
-It just makes sense and fits the job.

3. Bring PLD Evasion up to higher than a C.
-I am not asking for an A+ here just improve it a bit. It is a defensive skill and thus should be higher for that simple fact.

4. Make Defense Bonus III and up significantly reduce the amount of enmity lost from taking damage.
-Something like Defense bonus III reduces enmity loss by 10%, IV by an additional 15%, and V by an additional 25%, thus a lv 90 PLD would have 50% less enmity lost from taking damage.

5. Give PLD the Fencer trait.
-The fact that PLD does not have fencer boggles me. It is a trait that seems as though should have been designed for PLDs and only for PLDs. They are the one job in the game that is known for being the "sword and board" job. PLDs should get Fencer I around lv 30-35 and by LV 90 should have 5 ranks of it.

6. Boost bast PLD HP up slightly to where they would have only a little less Max HP than MNKs.
-Any class designed to blood tank should not have less hp than a class that was originally designed to DD. That being said I am only asking for more base HP while allowing MNK to still have the highest.

All of these are fairly simple changes that could help to bring PLD up to par with NIN and MNK with regards to tanking.

[Khajit]

This fight was over before it even began. Even lolpup has become a better tank than PLD and not much is going to bring about any changes other than to make pld a good solo job.
You just have to look no further and see all the people with ochain still sing non pldjobs for tanking unless they want to solo.

[Cream_Soda]

3. Bring PLD Evasion up to higher than a C.
-I am not asking for an A+ here just improve it a bit. It is a defensive skill and thus should be higher for that simple fact.

They should get guard skill too while they're at it.

[Zagen]

Contrary to what people seem to think, a good PLD would actually be the better than MNK at #1, if they were better at #2. Sword and Shield, with proper haste buffs/gear (BRD with march+1 hands, haste spell, 25% gear), will actually have shorter attack round intervals than a MNK (PLD: 227 * 0.36 =~82 delay, MNK: 531 * 0.2 = ~107 delay).

Where are you getting these numbers? I can't figure out how you're getting these numbers. Joyeuse and Emp weapon have 224 delay dunno what 227 is supposed to be and MNK has 280 base delay at 82+. Also are you taking Kick Attacks into account? How about the fact 1 punch typically does more damage than a sword swing?

Also what is 0.36 and 0.2 supposed to be? I mean if that's "Haste" then you should be giving the same amount to both jobs since the goal is to replace MNK by doing a better job when they have the same buffs

[TheDirtyHobo]

Where are you getting these numbers? I can't figure out how you're getting these numbers. Joyeuse and Emp weapon have 224 delay dunno what 227 is supposed to be and MNK has 280 base delay at 82+. Also are you taking Kick Attacks into account? How about the fact 1 punch typically does more damage than a sword swing?

Also what is 0.36 and 0.2 supposed to be? I mean if that's "Haste" then you should be giving the same amount to both jobs since the goal is to replace MNK by doing a better job when they have the same buffs

The numbers were a little rushed and inaccurate, but their relationship still holds. 227 was a mistype, it should've been 224, you were correct. 0.36 is a PLD's delay after haste modifications, so the fixed delay is 224 * 0.36 = 81. MNK is more complicated to account the delay for, it would actually be (260+51) * 0.36 = 112, but MNKs delay reduction will cap at 80% reduction before martial arts is taken into account, which is (480+51) * 0.2 = 107. I had assumed 64 haste and native martial arts skill was enough to floor delay without calculating it, but I was wrong. No, I'm not taking into account kick attacks and the extra damage that h2h does over sword, as they only have an effect when your hate isn't capped. It takes about a minute at most for either job to do enough damage to cap their hate, so it's negligable either way, aside from a 10-15 second period where MNK is capped but PLD is still building.

What I'm saying is, if you discount the enmity lost from taking damage, a PLD has attack rounds more often, therefore refreshes their natural VE decay more often, and therefore would actually 'hold hate' over a MNK. Aside from red-staggered NMs (or blue-staggered, if it's an ironclad type), this situation does not happen.

[Zagen]

Ah ok that clears it up a good bit. I'd still have to disagree with "refreshes their natural VE decay more often". I agree that a PLD could slightly attack faster (disregarding Double Attacks/Kick Attacks/Etc. just accounting for single attack rounds) but it still doesn't account for the damage difference a MNK does over a PLD.

I'll be honest my PLD is probably a little gimp so numbers might be low for a good PLD but if I remember right I was doing about 130-140 on average vs. exp mobs in abyssea, my MNK does about the same with each fist. Rough rounding a PLD gets 4 rounds to the 3 rounds a MNK would get, so my PLD does 560 damage wile my MNK does 840. Dropping punches to 100 per hit would still beat my PLD's numbers with 600 vs. the 560.

[Greatguardian]

He's working under the idea that both jobs will be sitting at capped TE, and the damage each job deals per strike only needs to make up for the natural 60VE/second decay all players have. Even if a MNK does more damage per round, the excess Enmity-from-damage is irrelevant as long as TE remains capped. In this case, it's a solid assertion. PLD can "keep hate" off a MNK assuming that the PLD is not losing their CE to damage taken.

[Zagen]

He's working under the idea that both jobs will be sitting at capped TE, and the damage each job deals per strike only needs to make up for the natural 60VE/second decay all players have. Even if a MNK does more damage per round, the excess Enmity-from-damage is irrelevant as long as TE remains capped. In this case, it's a solid assertion. PLD can "keep hate" off a MNK assuming that the PLD is not losing their CE to damage taken.

Hmmm didn't think of that being the assumption well if that is the case then I also agree in that situation a PLD would be able to keep hate better than a MNK.

I was assuming both PLD and MNK would get hit for the same amount so they would have equal CE loss (excluding counter/shield procs)

Edit: Had a random thought... If shield procs had 0 hate loss like counter wouldn't that be a decent step into the right direction?

[Greatguardian]

It would definitely help. Though I'm not sure either job really needs much help in the Enmity department. Both jobs can keep hate off the backline, which is the end-goal of any tank class. Most other DD classes capable of capping hate should also be able to swap into proper defensive gear if need be as well.

Personally, my only issue with the PLD job is the fact that it lacks active offensive abilities. It may be a defensive-oriented class, but it doesn't really offer much more survivability over other DDs with equivalent defensive gear (PDT/MDT/etc). Heck, Counterstance reduces more damage than Shield procs (And caps at a higher proc rate). Giving it a boost to attack or Crit dmg/hit% would be a step in the right direction, as Chant du Cygne is a fairly powerful weaponskill in its own right.