Quote Originally Posted by Coramac View Post
Regeneration is a non-factor. The Paladin damage reduction increases the effectiveness of their regeneration by 25%. It's a wash. Additionally, the break point for efficiency for incoming heal amount for a Paladin vs. Defiance (average uptime) is ~5800. This is before we get to their additional block defense.

As it stands, the numbers seem to indicate that the Paladin would be superior in all tanking situations that are not a DPS race. That might also be false depending whether or not the healer could add additional damage to compensate.
Had a bit long post typed up. And lost it so just will give the shorter version.

1.)This post you quoted had NOTHING to do with comparing PLD to WAR. It was comparing what WAR gained from holding on to stacks of wrath vs what they gained by using them on Inner Beast. Which boiled down to, if you can get more than 3k health return on your Inner Beasts or close to it. It is better to use Inner Beast. Which naked no buffs was not worth it, with Main and Storm's Eye, it got close. And that was factoring the LOW end of the spectrum with 600 health return from Inner Beast. Most WAR's can get an 800 return in their sleep.

2.) People are thinking too linearly they see PLD's tanking stance and WAR's tanking stance and automatically think they should function similarly towards the same purpose and they DON'T. Warrior's main mitigation tool is NOT Defiance. Defiance is WAR's hate management tool but Inner Beast is what mitigation the most damage for War. So its not a really about Defiance vs Shield Oath. But Inner Beast vs. Shield Oath. Which automatically means to things:
a. Warrior is more gear dependent than PLD. A PLD really only needs to stack defense and let their mitigation do all the work. WAR needs to bolster both their defense and offense to get the most out of their skills.
b. Warrior has healing coming in from TWO sources. If a PLD is over-healed that is not such a big deal since their mitigation is always at work. A WAR's self-heals and a healer's heals can 'step on each other's toes'. If the healer cure bombs before Inner Beast, all that damage Inner Beast WOULD have mitigated via recovery gets flushed down the toilet. If the WAR Inner Beasts before the heal, the MP the healer used to cure that heal gets wasted. So its not that WAR requires more healing but requires more precise healing.

3.) To go through the rest of the skills in a blow by blow:
-Sentinel pretty much = Infuriate. Sure the damage reduction is huge but it only has a 10s window. Infuriate has the same recast and depending on the situation will heal for as much damage as Sentinel Mitigates. In some situations the spike damage will be large enough to give Sentinel the win. In others a lucky crit or lower in-coming damage will give Infuriate/Inner Beast the edge.

-Bulwark pretty much is answered by Featherfoot. Both skills have 15s durations. But one has a 90s recast and the other 180s. So in the time a PLd uses Bulwark once a WAR could have 30s of Featherfoot. Which there are two things to consider a block will negate partial damage while a dodge will take no damage at all. And if a hit can be blocked it can be dodged. So they pretty much balance out here.

-Convalescence and Foresight is a skill they both share. And I will see these both as being balanced. PLD has 10% more healing but WAR has Wrath and/or Mantra at their disposal to balance it out. And while WAR has a 30 second less recast time on Foresight, PLD's native 20% damage mitigation means the added defense has more effective value while its up. And you can throw Awareness in here too. I mean really... 5 second difference is not a lot to write home about.

-Rage of Halone is met by Maim and Storm's Eye. Once negates 10% damage one ensures roughly 30% bonus to your Inner beasts.

-Shield Swipe is a bit of a toss up. In comparison it is matched by Haymaker. But what gives SS the edge is that it is a unique debuff ONLY the PLD can inflict where as with slow both DRG and BLM can inflict the same status. But if neither are doing so, Haymaker does a better job of lessening damage over time and SS does a better job of lessening spike damage.

-Fight or Flight vs. Berserk is also balanced. 30s up time 180s recast vs 20s up time and 5s Pacification and 90s recast. Berserk still has the edge here for two reasons. One 20% more damage and two, it grants an additional stack of Wrath. Meaning your next Inner Beast can be done in 15 seconds rather than 20.

-Which brings us to the big one. Rampart. This is the reason why WAR has to work harder than PLD. Great up time, great mitigation, and a relatively short recast at 90s. Then I'll lump in Cure, Stoneskin, and Flash. Flash is just a great tool not just for hate but the blind adds to mitigation. Cure and Stoneskin by themselves are kind of weak but if you pop Rampart or Sentinel on a target you already have Rage of Halone on. Well during that time the eHP of those skills skyrockets. But if you are noticing a pattern what makes WAR strong is not the upfront value in their skills but the frequency in which they can use them. What WAR has is every single one of their self-heals has a chance to crit and that chance can be augmented for 15s every MINUTE. They have a higher natural regen because of their max heal, so with a different of 1000hp that WAR is getting 400hp a minute for free. And yes, Storm's Path is a small heal but even small heals add up the more you use them. Then you have Second Wind and/or Thrill of Battle. You have an entire 15 seconds more up time of Blood Bath. If you time Berserk right in your rotation you can land 2 'zerk Boosted Inner Beasts before its duration runs out. If Berserk is down you have Vengeance which is often overlooked but is good for another free application of Wrath.

And when you get down to this level of intricacy of gameplay elements that it no longer becomes the effectiveness of a skill that determines its usefulness but the effectiveness of how the skill is used by the person using it that really dictates its value.

And that should be it in a nutshell. I left out Hallowed Ground because I believe WAR should have no answer for that. That is PLD's skill so when WAR's start to get too uppity they can remind them why they are the kings (...and queens) of straight up damage mitigation. If you like active always on the edge of your seat combat roll a WAR if you like to be in control of a fight and tackle content at your own pace forgoing a little action in place of more security roll a PLD. And remember in situations with more than one tank its not about how much one can out perform the other it is about how well they both can work together.

Now if I left anything out feel free to point it out. But I think I covered all the important skills that pertain to tanking efficiency.