The Problem with Paladin

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Originally Posted by TirionCrey

I hope both of you are able to see the one and only flaw in your examples...

PS: Little hint...if PLD is not the main tank in the fight, there is no reason he should be there.

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I've been running as off-tank in AV and DH, not CC yet. It is not a bad setup. You do not need a second WHM if you have a good paladin. To each their own though. Not many LS are willing to experiment will group builds.

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Originally Posted by Klive

They did kind of... outmaneuver + divine veil. You'll block every time getting some mana back. With the hight block rate comes less damage, so you will have to spam less heals. You are not going to get the returns from sanguine rite, but still better than nothing.

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Outmaneuver mp return is gone with 1 Holy Succor. I rather something more potent that trades TP for MP.

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Originally Posted by TirionCrey

I hope both of you are able to see the one and only flaw in your examples...




PS: Little hint...if PLD is not the main tank in the fight, there is no reason he should be there.

PPS: In order for the AoE Regen of Divine Veil to be useful, it should be granted on the person casting the Cure on him and the people surrounding THAT person, cause if you're close enough to the PLD to get hit by it, you're doing something wrong...

It's so simple to fix the shit, but Se is just not able to see it...I just don't get why...

PPPS: Forgot to mention...who the fuck wants a Cover on BLM before he AoEs, when WAR can just Collusion, which will actually take the BLMs hate of his AoE to you, instead of just taking hits for him until Cover is down and the BLM gets hit after...

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Because a paladin with divine veil up would take way less damage than a warrior. O_O
Because collusion doesn't last 15 seconds like cover does. O_O
Because divine veil was probably designed to get regen on melee dd jobs because you know... they tend to take more damage than ranged dd. O_O

Now I feel more comfortable thinking of Pld in terms of a job. Pair a PLD with a bard, MP is taken care off. Run in to sing after the BIG ws, and while you're in melee range you can even have the PLD use cover on the little singy person! Dun worry squishy person, i love your singing voice so much that i'll cover you while you sing! (that should help out some mnks too in case they are havin a bad sucker punch day)

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Originally Posted by FraenirVolsung

I look at that list of changes and the first thing that comes to mind is SE saying, "what are the simplest adjustments we can make that require the least amount of testing and we can realistically implement in a week." I have to believe that SE will be making further adjustments in 1.22 because these changes look more like trying to reattach a severed limb with a band aid than they do an actual fix. I like the lower cooldown on Spirits Within and the changes to Divine Veil, but this is hardly a fix. Still can't understand why Steel Cyclone gets a 30 Sec cooldown while Spirits Within is still stuck at a minute.

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Well, that one is pretty easy. WAR's enmity combo is Heavy Swing + Skull Sunder (this one being the actual WS that grants an enmity bonus) + Steel Cyclone. It also costs 1000 TP. Steel Cyclone is mostly a DD AoE WS that happens to give you survivability... granted that you crit and activated Rampage, which works a lot on even strength or trash mobs, and not as much on bosses.

Spirits Within has a recast of 1 minute, but it also only costs 250 TP, granted you block in the first place. While it's true we do not block as much on bosses, no one knows for now exactly how the "Blocks all physical attacks from the front" effect from Divine Veil works. Neither do we know, for now, how the enmity spike from Spirits Within compares to Steel Cyclone's. I'd ask people to please TEST the new feature in a few situations before making assumptions whether or not this helps.

On another note, let me remind you that WAR has ONE WS combo that increases enmity : the one I described above, which comes from MRD. PLD will get TWO such combos : Phalanx + Spirits Within, AND Fast Blade + Flat Blade (this WS being the enmity spike one), on a TEN second recast, given to them from GLA. Last I heard, unless you wear ACC gear, WAR does NOT have a naturally better ACC than PLD.

As for the MP regeneration effect, once again, I'll have to wait and test it, but I don't have a problem, at first glance, because I haven't seen anyone complaining about having to activate both Rampage and Steel Cyclone in order to do massive HP regen, right ??? Nothing wrong at all with combining abilities to increase efficiency, thank you very much.

Also, which piece enhanced Divine Veil, already ? And which piece enhanced Cover ? What were the enhancements already ? Right... increased duration for Divine Veil, AND decreased damage for Cover. Guess that makes AF slightly more useful, too, right ?

All in all though, I'd ask the whiners to PLEASE WAIT and TEST the features before complaining it didn't "fix" anything. While this is not what I'd expect them to do, at first glance we can agree that something is at least attempted to be done.

Don't even waste your time telling me whatever argument you will invoke for believing this has fixed nothing until at least a bit later this week and some testing. I'll get back with my opinion on these changes once I've done some testing myself. Thank you very much.

^^ Listen to that guy.

I made this post in the battle sub-forum if you guys could take a look and support it or make suggestion would be good.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...Block-Paladins.

No reason to wear block rate gear with 100% every 20/60 seconds, better to focus on block value if that actually does anything.

I don't really worry about physical attacks though, it's the 2000+ WS attacks from chimera that worry me if I get animation locked. Also taking two mandible bites from the princess and marshall at the same time hurts bad if I'm stuck in animation which kinda makes me want PLD but then I remember I'll probably never be able to cure myself and probably won't be able to hold aggro on both of them :(

I really hope they have more plans for adjustments and just rushed this out to shut us up for awhile.

I am so in love with this update. Good start. Definitely will need some adjustments after players get a hold of it all but I'm glad to see some decent changes have been made.

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All in all though, I'd ask the whiners to PLEASE WAIT and TEST the features before complaining it didn't "fix" anything. While this is not what I'd expect them to do, at first glance we can agree that something is at least attempted to be done.

Don't even waste your time telling me whatever argument you will invoke for believing this has fixed nothing until at least a bit later this week and some testing. I'll get back with my opinion on these changes once I've done some testing myself. Thank you very much.

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You make a lot of great points. I really and truly hope that you are right, and after some testing and play time with the adjustments we can all say that SE nailed it or at the very least took steps in the right direction. I will gladly eat crow the first time someone actually asks me to come as a PLD over WAR. I think that's what us so called "whiners" are worried about.

In order for PLD to be useful it has to be the best tank for at least half the content in game. It has to excel at something. It's never going to be invited as a DD when WAR, MNK, DRG, and even BRD can out do it. It's never going to be invited as a healer/back up tank when WHM heals infinitely better. PLD is going to be invited because it is the best tank for the battle at hand. I love PLD, always have. I hope these changes are as great as they might prove to be after some testing. I look at the list of adjustments and don't see enough to turn PLD into the best tank for any battle. But like I said, I hope I'm wrong and I'll gladly eat crow the first time I'm asked to come PLD instead of WAR.

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Originally Posted by Treach

No reason to wear block rate gear with 100% every 20/60 seconds, better to focus on block value if that actually does anything.

I don't really worry about physical attacks though, it's the 2000+ WS attacks from chimera that worry me if I get animation locked. Also taking two mandible bites from the princess and marshall at the same time hurts bad if I'm stuck in animation which kinda makes me want PLD but then I remember I'll probably never be able to cure myself and probably won't be able to hold aggro on both of them :(

I really hope they have more plans for adjustments and just rushed this out to shut us up for awhile.

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What is this "animation locked" thing that you are taking about ? I don't quite understand what is it you mean. I'm looking at both the english and french patch notes and nowhere does it say that we'll get "locked" from doing anything else when Divine Veil is up ? Unless I'm not understanding what you mean ?

On a site note, I would so much have loved to see Divine Veil's regen effect activated by our own cure spell. I really feel like it wouldn't have been game breaking, but since I so did not expect the block effect, like I said, I'll reserve my judgement for after I've done testing...

Geez, and that maintenance is eight hours ? LOL

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Originally Posted by Evaddaragon

What is this "animation locked" thing that you are taking about ? I don't quite understand what is it you mean. I'm looking at both the english and french patch notes and nowhere does it say that we'll get "locked" from doing anything else when Divine Veil is up ? Unless I'm not understanding what you mean ?

On a site note, I would so much have loved to see Divine Veil's regen effect activated by our own cure spell. I really feel like it wouldn't have been game breaking, but since I so did not expect the block effect, like I said, I'll reserve my judgement for after I've done testing...

Geez, and that maintenance is eight hours ? LOL

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You know when you use an ability it stops you and you either squat like you are pooping or you wave your hand? Pressing both divine veil and outmanuever right as chimera is readying a WS will make you eat it.

It's the same thing people complained about on ifrit when they die to cracks, can't move out of it if you are stuck in the animation of an ability.

It just makes you use better sense and timing with your abilities. Unless you catch a rare occasion where you use an ability and its animation doesn't go off til 5 seconds later, it happens less often now to me, but it still happens. I like animation lock, it makes people pay attention to timing or die.

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

It just makes you use better sense and timing with your abilities. Unless you catch a rare occasion where you use an ability and its animation doesn't go off til 5 seconds later, it happens less often now to me, but it still happens. I like animation lock, it makes people pay attention to timing or die.

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Have you done the cyclops in AV yet? That thing is practically impossible to avoid if you use even one ability, you pretty much have to be psychic to avoid 100 ton swing and he doesn't follow TP patterns like ifrit or chimera, can do back to back swings.

Can't wait for 2.0 and the promise of WoW equivalent server response time.

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Originally Posted by Treach

You know when you use an ability it stops you and you either squat like you are pooping or you wave your hand? Pressing both divine veil and outmanuever right as chimera is readying a WS will make you eat it.

It's the same thing people complained about on ifrit when they die to cracks, can't move out of it if you are stuck in the animation of an ability.

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I don't quite encounter that problem. >.> Guess I, like Pepper said, have a better sense of timing.

Also, can't two abilities be put in a single macro ? Wouldn't that solve your problem ?

Also, is Chimera's WS considered physical, or magical ? Since my LS tanks Chimera with WARs right now, I haven't bothered to check it out. If it's physical, like, you know, a WEAPON skill would suggest (otherwise it would be a magic skill ^^), chances are the new and improved Divine Veil will take care of it in the first place. Once again, testing is in order I'd say. ^^

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Originally Posted by Evaddaragon

I don't quite encounter that problem. >.> Guess I, like Pepper said, have a better sense of timing.

Also, can't two abilities be put in a single macro ? Wouldn't that solve your problem ?

Also, is Chimera's WS considered physical, or magical ? Since my LS tanks Chimera with WARs right now, I haven't bothered to check it out. If it's physical, like, you know, a WEAPON skill would suggest (otherwise it would be a magic skill ^^), chances are the new and improved Divine Veil will take care of it in the first place. Once again, testing is in order I'd say. ^^

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When I'm doing speed runs I don't like sitting on TP or abilities I can use just to avoid an attack that can be healed up, but is just wasted mp and enmity for the healer, just seems like a bad game engine compared to WoW where you can move and kite things while using abilities, at least to me.

Seeing as you can't parry any of the WS with foresight, I think it's safe to assume all magical. Also lots of mobs have magic/elemental based weaponskills.

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Originally Posted by Treach

Seeing as you can't parry any of the WS with foresight, I think it's safe to assume all magical. Also lots of mobs have magic/elemental based weaponskills.

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I wouldn't go that far. Foresight only increases parry rate, and not even as much as Featherfoot increases evasion, seeing as the former says "increases" and the latter says "greatly increases". Still, it is entirely possible that they're magical and Divine Veil won't help you. In which case, since we seem to like to stack BLMs, wouldn't Thundara's stun effect take care of that ?

Why do people rage over needing to shield block for the Phalanx > Spirit's Within combo?

Aegis Boon is a 100% physical block that you can use at will. Wait for a physical attack or physical TP move, pop Aegis Boon, recover the HP from it's effect, use Phalanx, use Bloodbath, use Spirit's Within.

With the new low cooldown on Spirit's Within and the already nice cooldown on Aegis boon, coupled with the non-existent cooldown on Phalanx, it's not bad, or hard, at all.

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Originally Posted by Evaddaragon

I wouldn't go that far. Foresight only increases parry rate, and not even as much as Featherfoot increases evasion, seeing as the former says "increases" and the latter says "greatly increases". Still, it is entirely possible that they're magical and Divine Veil won't help you. In which case, since we seem to like to stack BLMs, wouldn't Thundara's stun effect take care of that ?

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I'd be willing to bet 5m lion is fire, ram is ice, dragon is thunder, chaotic is dark or whatever scourge was and god help you if make it use posion tail.

The shortened recast times were definitely needed.

Spirits Within change was well done. Having that move whiff and waiting 2 minutes for an ability that was only good as moderate single-target spike damage was terrible. Increasing the accuracy and granting an enmity bonus will definitely make it easier to hold hate on bosses.

Cover I can actually see being useful in cases such as the Myrmidon Princess fight where WHMs get swarmed by ants. The recast timer makes it so that you can use it at least once every guard pop.

The whole regen effect on Divine Veil is just odd. It basically requires you to have a WHM to make use of it. If it simply granted the Regen effect on everyone around you upon activation, it would be much more useful in small groups that don't have a WHM. The guaranteed blocks almost certainly means that it will NOT completely negate physical damage. That's what Hallowed Ground is for. This ability would actually be good if blocking significantly reduced damage. Hopefully there is an update in the future that fixes this. Honestly, they should tack on the guaranteed blocks onto Outmaneuver and revamp this ability entirely to address either damage reduction or MP issues.

I don't think the buffs are enough to see PLD as the better tank in any endgame situation though. While it got some boosts to holding hate against single targets and some utility, it still has neither the tools to reduce damage nor the HP to survive against powerful attacks. MP is still a problem, cast interruption is still a problem, AoE tanking is still a problem.

I would like to see Holy Succor receive a faster cast time. Hell, they should make it instant cast. At least that would make it more likely that you land your heal before the WHM and actually receive the benefit of Cure enmity. It would also justify the poor MP efficiency of the spell, solve the cast interruption problems, and give you more time to focus on dodging enemy attacks.

PLD still needs some work.

Well I haven't tested it yet, but I don't see why "Blocks all physical attacks from the front" would mean it doesn't negate 100%, or else it would say "PARTIALLY blocks all physical attacks from the front". We do see the difference in our battle logs, you know it as well as I do.

And to those who say it can't work because it works like Hallowed Ground : It doesn't. Divine Veil would block physical attacks from the... wait for it... FRONT. Hallowed Ground blocks all physical attacks... from ALL angles. It's meant as a "oh-shit" ability, but it can also be used for... oh, I don't know, big AoE pulls ? Is it that hard to think outside the box ?

I'm really amazed at how many people can, just from reading a short paragraph, make assumptions that "it won't change" anything. These people sometimes are making me believe that, no matter what SE does, they'll still stick with their opinion.

Like I said again, could you please wait and test the changes before saying it's not nearly enough ? Is it that hard to do ?

And even if it doesn't "fix" PLD, at the very least I have to say that making these kind of changes merely two weeks after the patch is quite amazing on its own. We used to wait for months, sometimes years, to get such changes in FFXI.

I'm leaning toward it causing you to block all attacks as in: reduce their dmg based on your shield's mitigation.
We'll find out later.

Hallowed Ground: Renders you impervious to physical attacks

Divine Veil: Blocks physical attacks from the front.

What do you block with? A Shield. Therefore, it will cause you to shield block for a solid 20 seconds. Not render you immune to physical damage.

Alerith you can't just go by help text. Aegis Boon blocks an incoming attack and restores HP in proportion to damage taken, except you don't take any damage on the hit AB procs on. If we want all text to be literal it would have to say "restores HP in proportion to damage mitigated".

This has nothing to do with whether I agree with you or not.

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

Alerith you can't just go by help text. Aegis Boon blocks an incoming attack and restores HP in proportion to damage taken, except you don't take any damage on the hit AB procs on. If we want all text to be literal it would have to say "restores HP in proportion to damage mitigated".

This has nothing to do with whether I agree with you or not.

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Indeed, but the game has to register the damage of the attack to justify how much it heals you for. If you still took damage but it returned that damage as HP, then the whole effect would simply be "Negates a melee attack used against you."

I suppose we can both be right and it's just an argument of semantics, but everywhere I see "Block" from SE, it refers to the action of intercepting an attack with your shield. (Not saying you're disagreeing, just stating my view.)

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Originally Posted by Peptaru

Alerith you can't just go by help text. Aegis Boon blocks an incoming attack and restores HP in proportion to damage taken, except you don't take any damage on the hit AB procs on. If we want all text to be literal it would have to say "restores HP in proportion to damage mitigated".

This has nothing to do with whether I agree with you or not.

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If Aegis Boon works like that, chances are Divine Veil will, too... But once again, I'm only making assumptions, I'll have to test it.

Really don't see PLD getting permanent aegis boon blocks minus the heal for 20 seconds every 60 seconds.

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Originally Posted by Treach

Really don't see PLD getting permanent aegis boon blocks minus the heal for 20 seconds every 60 seconds.

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It certainly will not. Aegis Boon specifies that you get a return in HP. Divine Veil simply says "Blocks" which means it should function that you have a 100% block rate for 20 seconds.

This does NOT mean you will be taking zero damage or getting any kind of HP/MP return, unless you also use Outmaneuver.

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Originally Posted by Treach

Really don't see PLD getting permanent aegis boon blocks minus the heal for 20 seconds every 60 seconds.

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But why not ? Has someone tested it yet ? Wait, no we didn't. We're still on maintenance.

Let's say it does. Would you finally think PLD has some uses ? It would mean PLD takes 33% less physical damage than a WAR tank. Why wouldn't it be possible ? No one wants to believe SE might have done something right ? I'll concede it's also possible they didn't, but would people simply wait to test the new feature before saying it works or not ? I keep repeating myself here because NO ONE is actually answering that argument.

Would allowing the PLD take 33% less physical damage than WAR be overpowering ? Let me remind you they have a lot less HP and deal a lot less damage. And if you're worried that WAR will do more enmity because of damage, let's be reminded PLD will now have TWO combos to build enmity, one that's guaranteed to go every 60 seconds because Spirits Within now has the same recast then Aegis Boon. Aegis Boon + Phalanx + Bloodbath + Spirits Within = Great single enmity increase AND HP regen, which (gasp !) is pretty much what makes Rampage + the Steel Cyclone combo so awesome in the first place. The WAR option might still be better for multiple targets, but on bosses, they'll pretty much be equal, the PLD might even get the upper edge since the block will be guaranteed whereas the crit from WAR won't.

Sure, the Steel Cyclone combo can be used faster, but you also have the Fast Blade + Flat Blade combo to compensate for enmity spike. If Divine Veil works like I think it could, you won't need to HP regen as much as the WAR will.

Last, and not least, I've seen you comment on the other thread in general discussion about how the benefits that we see are nothing but "fanboy based opinions". Please. I also have a 50 WAR, and I love it very much. Just because we don't seem to agree with you in no way means we are fanboys towards the PLD job.

Hence why I don't bother repeating myself in the other thread. I see no need in posting the same things twice. ^^

MFW
http://i42.tinypic.com/1ttuuh.gif

Well they are supposedly adjusting some stuff with PLD with this patch 1.21a tonight, but what kills me the most is this here I copied off the patch notes:

Divine Veil - Recast time reduced from 120 to 60 seconds.
- Effect duration reduced from 30 to 20 seconds.
- Blocks all physical attacks from the front.
- Healing over time effect granted by Cure and Cura now stacks with the white magic spell Regen.
* Healing efficacy reduced in exchange for longer effect duration.

not the typo since this was copied from the patch notes, but what it is intended to mean is what is hilarious, it says on line 2 - Effect duration reduced from 30 to 20 seconds. so you lose 10 seconds of the effect, and the last line in red is what makes it oh so baffling * Healing efficacy reduced in exchange for longer effect duration. Where is the longer effect? You are losing 10 seconds of the effect plus healing efficiency? I could be off here but I know I am reading this correctly.

They cut recast in half, but didn't cut the duration in half. This extends its active duration over the course of a fight. It could have been phrased better. Now it can be active 33% of the time instead of 25% of the time, and the boost to block (i pray) will be a blessing.

Maybe the regen lasts longer then the block increase?

Pepper is right... or better yet, both Treach and Pepper may be right. ^^ Boy would that be great. lol

One issue I see with the Divine Veil regen effect:

How long does the regen last?

If a WHM cures you when you have 19s left does it last for 19s? If they cure you at 5s left does it last for 5s? If this is the case, that part of the ability is quite useless. I haven't been able to test pre-this-patch since I unlocked PLD, saw how sucky it was, and switched to GLA but maybe someone can shed some light on the subject.

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Originally Posted by Phobos

One issue I see with the Divine Veil regen effect:

How long does the regen last?

If a WHM cures you when you have 19s left does it last for 19s? If they cure you at 5s left does it last for 5s? If this is the case, that part of the ability is quite useless. I haven't been able to test pre-this-patch since I unlocked PLD, saw how sucky it was, and switched to GLA but maybe someone can shed some light on the subject.

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I was testing Divine Veil yesterday before I knew about the update.

Divine Veil Regen overwrote itself and WHM Regen.

Also, WHM Regen overwrote Divine Veil Regen.


With the update, they can now both be in effect at the same time. Since Divine Veil Regen overwrites itself, the duration is reset upon each cure.

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Originally Posted by Alerith

I was testing Divine Veil yesterday before I knew about the update.

Divine Veil Regen overwrote itself and WHM Regen.

Also, WHM Regen overwrote Divine Veil Regen.


With the update, they can now both be in effect at the same time. Since Divine Veil Regen overwrites itself, the duration is reset upon each cure.

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We're getting into speculation territory here, but I'll be happy if that's the case. It should be as long as a separate Icon gets placed when you receive a cure (I assume that getting cured caused the Regen Icon to pop up?). So if all goes well, we'll just have two separate Regen icons when we have both active.

Could have sworn I had DV and regen up at the same time doing job quests, oh well.

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Originally Posted by Treach

MFW
http://i42.tinypic.com/1ttuuh.gif

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This. So much this to most of what is said about the pld class. Funniest thing I've seen all day.


Ps, as Treach and a few others are laboriously trying to point out, it doesn't do much good to be immune to physical damage a third of the time if A) most of the damage isn't physical anyway and B) you still aren't taking on pld cus your threat still sucks. B is based mostly on the fact that there is little confidence that the spiritswithin change will magically make up the massive gap between pld and war, which I think is a rather reasonable assumption. Then again, Spirits within could hit for over 9000 every 60 seconds now and generate +800% threat, and then it'd be totally enough.

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Originally Posted by PiedPiper

This. So much this to most of what is said about the pld class. Funniest thing I've seen all day.


Ps, as Treach and a few others are laboriously trying to point out, it doesn't do much good to be immune to physical damage a third of the time if A) most of the damage isn't physical anyway and B) you still aren't taking on pld cus your threat still sucks. B is based mostly on the fact that there is little confidence that the spiritswithin change will magically make up the massive gap between pld and war, which I think is a rather reasonable assumption. Then again, Spirits within could hit for over 9000 every 60 seconds now and generate +800% threat, and then it'd be totally enough.

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PLD hate control doesn't suck. WAR just currently does it better. I've never had hate issues as PLD.