If Paladin is "specialized in defense" shouldn't its defense be better always?

According to Live Letter XXIII, when asked about Paladin and Dark Knight DPS the response was:

As an off tank, dark knights can also utilize the benefits from this debuff’s effect and that will also allow them to output similar amounts of damage. Paladins are specialized in defense so their damage output is a little bit lower.

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If Paladin has lower damage than the two tanks in an extremely high-DPS check environment shouldn't it -always- be the strongest defender? Whether it be Magic or Physical? I mean, if it's the king of defense and all I believe it should fulfill that role better and not be edged out under any circumstances in that department.

Here's an A1S video with the Paladin at 442 and the Warrior at 633. Both tanks mitigate the same damage one deals 35% more damage doing it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6DwKeAkKX0

between V1 = 442 and V2 = 633

( | V1 - V2 | / ((V1 + V2)/2) ) * 100

= ( | 442 - 633 | / ((442 + 633)/2) ) * 100
= ( | -191 | / (1075/2) ) * 100
= ( 191 / 537.5 ) * 100
= 0.355349 * 100

= 35.5349% difference

Um...SHIELD.

PLD has Hallowed, and 99% of enemies have physical attacks that you have a chance to block. There's no huge difference in mitigating tankbusters.

I'm not saying PLD is in a good spot. In fact, because I dont have a PLD I tend to stay out of those discussions. But DRK doesn't have nearly the same dps as WAR does even with debuffs applied. If anything War should be the one with inferior defense while pld focus on physical and drk on magical defense.

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Originally Posted by Marveth

I'm not saying PLD is in a good spot. In fact, because I dont have a PLD I tend to stay out of those discussions. But DRK doesn't have nearly the same dps as WAR does even with debuffs applied. If anything War should be the one with inferior defense while pld focus on physical and drk on magical defense.

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The DRK can keep its damage buff running while tanking though.

There's a reason the world first A3S group had DRK and WAR.

If not always better, at least never the worst. I'm looking at you, magic damage <_<

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Originally Posted by Anger

The DRK can keep its damage buff running while tanking though.

There's a reason the world first A3S group had DRK and WAR.

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So can Warrior/Paladin.

Maim
FoF

Paladin and Warrior are fine.

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Originally Posted by Launched

PLD has Hallowed, and 99% of enemies have physical attacks that you have a chance to block. There's no huge difference in mitigating tankbusters.

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There's a huge difference, considering the prevalence of Magic-based tankbusters. The difference between healing a DRK MT in A4 and a PLD MT in A4 is pretty well night-and-day, speaking from personal experience. I'd gladly toss Hallowed Ground in the garbage if it meant I could get 30% Magic DR every minute.

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Originally Posted by Nektulos-Tuor

So can Warrior/Paladin.

Maim
FoF

Paladin and Warrior are fine.

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Fight or Flight is a 30s duration on a 90s cooldown. The DRK can keep DarkSide running the entire time.

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Originally Posted by Adrasteia

There's a huge difference, considering the prevalence of Magic-based tankbusters. The difference between healing a DRK MT in A4 and a PLD MT in A4 is pretty well night-and-day, speaking from personal experience. I'd gladly toss Hallowed Ground in the garbage if it meant I could get 30% Magic DR every minute.

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That's exactly what I'm getting at. If all we're bringing is "superior defense" and have less damage than the other tanks, at no point, should they be able to "out defend" us.

It's amusing that 100% of the time, if played correctly, they can "out damage" us, though.

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Originally Posted by Anger

Fight or Flight is a 20s duration on a 90s cooldown. The DRK can keep DarkSide running the entire time.

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It is also 30%. Its also 30 seconds not 20. That means you can use it and do other things like heal and use it for damage when your doing damage. That is why its good for a Paladin because paladins can do other things that other tanks cannot, like cast clemency for healing. So they have their damage when they need it.

Maim can also be up 100% of the time, and its 20%.

Darkside is only 15%, and it has a VERY high cost attached to it.

Sorry. I am suprised you play a Paladin when you didn't even know about its duration.

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Originally Posted by Adrasteia

Have you ever played Dark Knight? Keeping up Darkside 100% of the time is a non-issue.

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When your mass pulling and spamming AOEs it is hard to keep it up. However, when your facing a mob one on one you can keep it up forever. You should know this. I mass pull entire rooms however.

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Originally Posted by Anger

I corrected my mistake shortly after. Watch Savage videos from DRK perspective. They don't drop Darkside, the cost isn't as high as you think, it played correctly.

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Correct, but that isn't mass pulling. You can't Keep Dark up if your constantly pulling 6-7-9 monsters and moving room to room fast. It is very hard, and you get more damage just spamming your aoes without it since each tick takes 1/3 of an aoe. So its a 33% loss rather then 15%. However, if your one on one doing the former and keeping it up 100% of the time is better.

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Originally Posted by Anger

I agree, I think Clemency should be similar to Equilibrium in that it casts instantly but has a long cooldown.

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No, that would kill the flavor of the class. It should be 2.5 second cast like other healing abilities.

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Originally Posted by Nektulos-Tuor

Darkside is only 15%, and it has a VERY high cost attached to it.

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Have you ever played Dark Knight? Keeping up Darkside 100% of the time is a non-issue.

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Originally Posted by Nektulos-Tuor

When your mass pulling and spamming AOEs it is hard to keep it up.

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No. Unless I have a WHM chain-casting Holy, I can spam Abyssal Drain for the duration of Blood Price. It's certainly more potency-per-GCD (even if I do run out of mana) than Paladins, who can maintain a whopping 23.333~ AoE potency per GCD at the absolute maximum.

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Originally Posted by Nektulos-Tuor

It is also 30%. Its also 30 seconds not 20. That means you can use it and do other things like heal and use it for damage when your doing damage. That is why its good for a Paladin because paladins can do other things that other tanks cannot, like cast clemency for healing. So they have their damage when they need it.

Maim can also be up 100% of the time, and its 20%.

Darkside is only 15%, and it has a VERY high cost attached to it.

Sorry. I am suprised you play a Paladin when you didn't even know about its duration.

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I corrected my mistake shortly after. Watch Savage videos from DRK perspective. They don't drop Darkside, the cost isn't as high as you think, it played correctly.

No matter how you look at it, the DRK and WAR - played correctly - will always out do the Paladin in damage.

The Paladin will be beaten in defense as well in some cases too. That's what I'm trying to point out.

I also want to address Clemency while we're here: it is useless outside of a few niche scenarios (mostly leveling dungeons, soloing, and some phase transitions). Unless you are in a highly coordinated group, healers with faster heals are likely going to bring your target to full before you have the opportunity to. Self-casting it as an ersatz defensive cooldown is an incredibly dicey proposition, given how uneven the spellcasting interrupt mechanic is. You may end up wasting several GCDs just to get one Clemency off. Again: give me Equilibrium any day of the week.

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Originally Posted by Adrasteia

I also want to address Clemency while we're here: it is useless outside of a few niche scenarios (mostly leveling dungeons, soloing, and some phase transitions). Unless you are in a highly coordinated group, healers with faster heals are likely going to bring your target to full before you have the opportunity to. Self-casting it as an ersatz defensive cooldown an incredibly dicey proposition, given how uneven the spellcasting interrupt mechanic is. You may end up wasting several GCDs just to get one Clemency off. Again: give me Equilibrium any day of the week.

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I agree, I think Clemency should be similar to Equilibrium in that it casts instantly but has a long cooldown.

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Originally Posted by Adrasteia

There's a huge difference, considering the prevalence of Magic-based tankbusters. The difference between healing a DRK MT in A4 and a PLD MT in A4 is pretty well night-and-day, speaking from personal experience. I'd gladly toss Hallowed Ground in the garbage if it meant I could get 30% Magic DR every minute.

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I've healed A4 too. There isn't much of a difference. Thanks to diminishing returns on mitigation, Shadow Wall and Dark Mind is 51% mitigation while Sentinel is 40% by itself. That doesn't make any difference to healing, and PLD can use Hallowed to completely mitigate one set of tankbusters.

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Originally Posted by Nektulos-Tuor

Correct, but that isn't mass pulling. You can't Keep Dark up if your constantly pulling 6-7-9 monsters and moving room to room fast. It is very hard, and you get more damage just spamming your aoes without it since each tick takes 1/3 of an aoe. So its a 33% loss rather then 15%. However, if your one on one doing the former and keeping it up 100% of the time is better.

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You didn't specify mass pulling and I don't think "mass pulling" is something we're really concerned about here. This is more directed towards Savage.

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Originally Posted by Launched

I've healed A4 too. There isn't much of a difference. Thanks to diminishing returns on mitigation, Shadow Wall and Dark Mind is 51% mitigation while Sentinel is 40% by itself. That doesn't make any difference to healing, and PLD can use Hallowed to completely mitigate one set of tankbusters.

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10% is a pretty significant extra piece of reduction (see: Storm's Path), especially in a fight with a tankbuster chaining into party-wide damage. The key point is that Dark Mind on its own is still 30%, and can be used every minute, whereas PLD has two consistent options to deal with Magic damage (one of which DRK has a literal clone of). This wouldn't be such a big deal if the majority of tankbusters in the content released thus far weren't Magic-based... but they are, and that leaves the tank with the on-demand Magic DR ahead in defensiveness.

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Originally Posted by Launched

I've healed A4 too. There isn't much of a difference. Thanks to diminishing returns on mitigation, Shadow Wall and Dark Mind is 51% mitigation while Sentinel is 40% by itself. That doesn't make any difference to healing, and PLD can use Hallowed to completely mitigate one set of tankbusters.

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I'd still rather take the tank that can shrug off magic damage and annihilate a Paladin in DPS instead.

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Originally Posted by Anger

It's amusing that 100% of the time, if played correctly, they can "out damage" us, though.

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this is exactly the current problem with Paladins and the reason why we have a threat with 300+ post discussing what's wrong with pally

(PALADIN MIGHTY DEFENSE IS NOT SO MIGHTY, don't tell me we have shield,hollowed ground more "cd" or just better defense) paladin has the same chances of survival than the other tanks, and the other tanks even better chance of survival since they have their defense stronger and on a "ready to use all the time" situation

all this has already been discussed on other threats and it's just clear as water that there's a huge balance issue when it comes paladin.

What I'm reading is "if your a pld just unsubscribe because the more we talk you down on the forums the more groups will refuse to use you." Am I wrong or not? Cause that's how all the anti-pld propaganda feels to me anymore

Personally I would just like to see some small changes here and there for Pld. One either by giving Pld a small dps boast especially in aoe, or the other to actually make it the qoute in qoute better tank in defense, so there is more leeway for healers to contribute to dps. But things that do need to change imo is making Clemency/Stoneskin a 2.5sec cast time, making it where Divine Veil cast shielding on allies without the need of a heal, and make Shield Swipe a actual useful skill again.

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Originally Posted by Nomad-phx

What I'm reading is "if your a pld just unsubscribe because the more we talk you down on the forums the more groups will refuse to use you." Am I wrong or not? Cause that's how all the anti-pld propaganda feels to me anymore

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You kinda need to understand how communities work, we are not trying to bash a class so people hate it, we are speaking openly to the community for the devs to get the feedback, they just not sit there and start looking at every class they look for the community feedback to fix what we all think it's wrong it's not about ANTI-JOB propaganda is about FEEDBACK or do u thin WAR 2.0 got the incredible 2.1 buff because we all loved that class?

Well you can call it feedback or whatever you'd like. The ppl actually playing the game see these kinds of threads and stereotypes are born. I already stopped queing for Alex normal from seeing "BOOOO pld" every time and its happening more and more in expert roulette now.

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Originally Posted by Nomad-phx

What I'm reading is "if your a pld just unsubscribe because the more we talk you down on the forums the more groups will refuse to use you." Am I wrong or not? Cause that's how all the anti-pld propaganda feels to me anymore

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The majority of the people pointing out that Paladin doesn't fit the current tank meta for high-end raids are people who play Paladin.

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Originally Posted by NFaelivrin

The majority of the people pointing out that Paladin doesn't fit the current tank meta for high-end raids are people who play Paladin.

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Even the ones in game that only want DRK and WAR in their statics? Or the duty finder groups that get upset when a PLD is what they got "stuck with"?

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Originally Posted by Anger

Even the ones in game that only want DRK and WAR in their statics? Or the duty finder groups that get upset when a PLD is what they got "stuck with"?

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They don't have time to be upset with getting paladins because they keep getting stuck with double astrologian.

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Originally Posted by Nomad-phx

Well you can call it feedback or whatever you'd like. The ppl actually playing the game see these kinds of threads and stereotypes are born. I already stopped queing for Alex normal from seeing "BOOOO pld" every time and its happening more and more in expert roulette now.

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I mainly play pld myself, and I haven't ran into this yet, but I have not done expert since 3 weeks in HW, but I still do Alex, and I really do everything I can to push my own dps, and mitigation as a tank that I can atm. But yeah, I had a friend last night that got made fun of because of their low dps as a pld. It really is mmo meta as a whole, more dps is always thought of as better, and with alex savage out it just stresses this idea even more so with it's strict dps checks. So now people are always comparing eachother, and why plds are pushing this issue dps/best def tank issue. I can careless I have a rng shield to increase mitigation when it's unpredictable, and only blocks physical attacks, Rng mitigation DOESN'T make one tank better then another when the REAL DMG YOU NEED TO MITIGATE COMES. Hallowed Ground is great and is the best def cd in game, but also has a 7min cd makes it one of the worst, so 10secs of no dmg for 1 raid run. I rather it be replaced by a weak % mitigation move on a short cd. But yeah, either plds need a slight dps upgrade or a increase in def to really make it matter so other party members can do the dps for us, when we can't.

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Originally Posted by NFaelivrin

The majority of the people pointing out that Paladin doesn't fit the current tank meta for high-end raids are people who play Paladin.

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specially pally that have been rejected from raids groups because the community think is not strong enough right? yeah...

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Originally Posted by Isius

But yeah, I had a friend last night that got made fun of because of their low dps as a pld.

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Leave Valkyrie-Amber out of this. But seriously though, there's a big difference between having low dps because the class sucks and having low dps because the player sucks.

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Originally Posted by HoodRat

Leave Valkyrie-Amber out of this. But seriously though, there's a big difference between having low dps because the class sucks and having low dps because the player sucks.

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The PLD is pretty straight forward DPS wise. It just doesn't put out the same as DRK and WAR - ever.

Pallys be mad they aren't the go to main tank anymore.

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Originally Posted by Lone-wolfe-02

Pallys be mad they aren't the go to main tank anymore.

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Moreso, we have little-to-no purpose.

Dunno about end game cause I work o n a schedule that prevents me from participating in things like that. But for everything else I love having a Paladin. Dark Knights tend to think they are dps classes and it doesnt matter if I'm dps or healer, I end up tanking a lot.

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Originally Posted by HoodRat

Leave Valkyrie-Amber out of this. But seriously though, there's a big difference between having low dps because the class sucks and having low dps because the player sucks.

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LOL Maybe, I get it with player skill, especially when I was with a static for a short time with a War only pushing..120dps MAX back in FCOB progression...

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Originally Posted by Anger

The PLD is pretty straight forward DPS wise. It just doesn't put out the same as DRK and WAR - ever.

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Lol I like how that makes you think people will still know how to play pld. I still see people trying to use fracture. And yes, pld does do less dps than war and drk. However, I'm fairly certain that's not why your friend was being made fun of.

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Originally Posted by HoodRat

Lol I like how that makes you think people will still know how to play pld. I still see people trying to use fracture. And yes, pld does do less dps than war and drk. However, I'm fairly certain that's not why your friend was being made fun of.

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I never said my friend was being made fun of. That was someone else.

PLD should be the undisputed defender of the world. Its not. If it cant put out the damage of the other tanks and im fine with that then it should at the very least use its "shield" more by having a higher block rate if anything. Of course there has to be caps to all things as blocking 100% of the time isnt what im looking for but something needs to be done to separate it from the other tanks.

The problem here really isn't a problem with Paladin. The problem is they gave Warrior everything and then left PLDs and DRKs to fight over the second tank spot.

DRKs current place in raids over PLDs is completely dependent on current endgame design. If all of the Alexander Savage bosses used physical tank busters rather than magic ones, DRKs would then be in the exact same poor position PLDs currently are in (arguably worse even since they don't bring any party support unlike a PLD currently does.)

But you really cannot design a fight that will put a current Warrior at a disadvantage compared to the other tanks and that is the real problem here. PLD and DRK are pretty interchangeable right now in parties with the advantage coming from the specific fights mechanics. That is actually decent balance right there. The problem is that Warriors are not interchangeable with the other two tanks. They are simply too good and you create yourself a massive disadvantage in EVERY party by not having one in it. This will continue to be a problem until Warriors are brought more in line with the other two tanks and all three are interchangeable with each-other.

^Generally speaking SE prefers to buff classes rather than nerf them and there'd probably be a pretty big uproar if Warrior was nerfed, so the most likely solution is that they'll bring PLD and DRK up to WAR's level. DRK fits the current meta quite well given that its higher damage than PLD and most of Savage is magical damage, but this hasn't erased issues such as DRK being kind of miserable as an OT, having massive TP issues out of Grit, and having unnecessary button bloat, but the latter is more of a personal opinion.