Break Blade / Onion Shield

Are either the Break Blade or Onion Shield viable options for Paladin? Neither of the weapons have Parry, but is that a viable reason to not use either of them (Ignoring the obvious that Allagan weapon is BiS)?

PLD will be my fourth job, but since I have spent all the myth on my main (WHM) that I want to (Just waiting for Coil/Extreme drops), I am splitting my myth tomes between SMN and PLD.

Can I use either the Break Blade or Onion Shield in a BiS list(without the Allagan weapon), or will I just need to replace them later and shouldn't waste my Rowena's Tokens?

Due to the fact that blocking prevents parrying (if a hit is blocked it will not be parried, only if it fails to be blocked it will then be parried) then the overall long-term effect of the Onion Shield makes it better than the Holy Shield Zenith.

I can't say anything about the Break Blade.

I believe most PLD consider Onion Shield BiS.

Break Blade sucks for stat allocation. If you are making accuracy cap and don't already have Zenith then might as well grab it though, Curtana Zenith isn't worth the myth investment unless its your main IMO, you are better going for PLD armor pieces.

Onion Shield is good, arguably BiS, so definitely worth it at least. Again, if you have Zenith (or Allagan shield) you might just go for a different Primal weapon until you run out of options you truly "care" about.

I use both Break/Onion for my PLD, but WAR is my main. It really just comes down to if you use PLD in coil at all, and keeping the Acc cap for it.

If you are never (or at least not in the immediate future) taking your Paladin into Coil, accuracy is a totally pointless stat for all content. i90 weapons beat i80 weapons hands-down, so I say it's worth using. Goes for all the EX weapons; savers of 900 myth is the main draw.

This is the results I can give you. With Holy Zenith I'm blocking 28% damage whereas Onion shield blocks 20%. If you prefer taking less spiky damage go for Onion Shield. Whereas if you're the type which only expect mitigation when you use mitigation shield, Holy Zenith is better cause you can expect better/stronger blocks off Holy Zenith.

My personal opinion would be Onion Shield is the better shield cause I prefer stability being that I run Gryphonskin Accessories. Don't even bother with Break Blade, it is just a OT sword where when you aren't expecting to take much damage and have excess of tokens. Which you should be by now, another 4 more weeks and I'd have nothing left to buy with those Extreme Primal tokens.

Onion shield is good for taking multiple mobs, its almost perfect blocks all incoming with constantly mitigation 19 - 20%

On others hands, Holy (+ skill speed, maybe its good pair with Break Blade for Skill Speed build) or even better, Allagan Round Shield (the best, + Acc) is good for tanking boss with high spike attack, you will need more higher mitigation 27-28% to make thing easier life... and its saved my ass many time now

Onion Shield is great

1) it looks like a nipple
2) it matches valor
3) it has a higher chance to mitigate attacks you actually want to block, like death sentence.

Break Blade looks neat but it's not really great. On the other hand, you don't have any other options without spending mythology. It's not really a "waste" of tokens, though, unless you play like 15 classes. If that's the case then you can go to heck! Stop rolling on everything, you jerk.

FYI onion looks HORRENDOUS in full allegan.

As mostly Off-tank, I definitely want that Onion Shield.

Onion works out to less mitigation over time via blocking, but because you block more often it also reduces parry opportunities, and you will mitigate more via parry than via blocking with the onion shield so this further reduces total mitigation over time.

IMO it really comes down to the fight mechanics of whatever encounter you're in.

Consider the Twintania fight:

What's a better situation on Death Sentences: reducing damage by 27%, 25% of the time (Allagan).... or reducing damage by 20%, 35% of the time (Onion)?

The amount of Parries will be marginally smaller with the Onion Shield, it's true.
But for every time you lose a parry (24%) you'd be getting a block (20%) and that severe spike of damage would still be mitigated, albeit by a smaller amount.

The above might not be the most "efficient" way of reducing the average damage, but it'd certainly make a healer's life easier if your HP didn't suddenly drop to "danger levels" quite as often. In that kind of fight, a healer would probably not really care whether you mitigated a Death Sentence for 20% or 27% or 24% of the damage, just that some extra mitigation kicked in and left you with enough HP to survive another autoattack after being hit by the Death Sentence.

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For hard fights where one or two spike hits of damage have the potential to kill you, I'm leaning towards the Onion Shield since it would "flatten" the curve and make the amount of damage you take (and the amount of healing you require) more predictable. It makes the Healer's job easier and the fight a little safer.

For hard fights where you're in no danger of dying to spike damage hits and just want to mitigate as much damage as possible over time (Primals?), I'm leaning a little bit more towards the Allagan Shield. Your blocks will kick in for more resistance and you'll get more use out of Parries, but your HP bar will be a bit more spikey. Healer's job is slightly harder but you'll likely take a little less damage over the course of the fight.

Combine this with the fact that the Onion Shield is the only one with a decent DPS stat on it (+11 Critical) so you should really be using it on Trash content over anything else.

TL;DR:
Onion for versus Spike Damage or when you DON'T know your healer.
Allagan/Relic for versus Damage over Time or when you DO know your healer.
Onion for DPS.

That said, I'd not complain if I saw anyone use an Onion shield or an Allagan for any encounter. They're both great options.

Current content it is Onion Shield wins almost all the time. Holy Zenith or Allagan shield is only when you wish your Bulwark to be a stronger Physical CD

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Originally Posted by Maelwys

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I like the way you think. It's the theory of relevant, or timely, mitigation. Taking Twintania into account, the hardest mechanic is DS. Why? Because DS always comes with a autoattack. If there isn't some form of mitigation on either attack, like a block, you're dead and there isn't enough gear in the game to change that. When the stars align and you're facing a DS with no CD's, no stoneskin, no virus, no eye for and eye, or no sch shield your only hope is a block or parry. With that knowledge, the onion shield is the only viable option really, it is just plain superior, that one 20% block is the difference between life and death. It's the same reason we just don't blow our cooldowns as soon as they come off timers, total mitigation is inferior to relevant mitigation.

I'd argue that onion shield is better for extremes though. Garuda has some big hits that I'd want a better chance to block. Titan's tank damage is fairly low except for MB, which you can mitigate through cooldowns, rest of the damage is unblockable. With ifrit you could not wear a sheild and not have much effect on your survivability (a joke, but so much of ifrits damage is unblockable).


I'd like to say one thing about Bulwark though, people claim it's better with Holy/Allag then onion, which I disagree with. Maybe for total mitigation, but I'm not concerned about that. Bulwark is a powerful mitigation tool yes, but its not reliable. It is possible for you to use it and not block that dreaded DS+auto. it is rare, but its possible. I personally would still say onion is better because of the increased reliability. This is all in context to turn 5 mind you.