Tanking Tips for Paladin

[Alerith]

Warning: This is a long post.

I was asked to post this here as well. I hope some people find it beneficial.

Hello everyone. I wanted to give some insight on my tanking pattern as it seems to have helped quite a few tanks in my FC and beyond. At around level 40, tanks will start to notice a HUGE increase in the amount of enmity their healers pull. Furthermore, Arcanist and its derivative job, Summoner, have incredible potential when DoT'ing multiple mobs, which will also present an enmity issue. I've had to adjust my tanking style many times, and finally found one that works after testing in Amdapor Keep. Please note that this assumes no crowd control is being used and that you are fighting more than one mob. This is from a level 50 perspective.

Tanking Multiple Mobs with a high powered Summoner/Scholar/Black Mage in the party.

1. Pull your primary target with Shield Lob, then use Flash > Circle of Scorn > Flash. You can Flash until you cut your MP in half, then you should move on to the next step.
(This ensures you get all mobs claimed, have a DoT on them to help you maintain hate and solidifies your hate against your healer on all non primary mobs for the next few seconds.)

2. Use a full Rage of Halone combo on your primary target.
(You don't want to lose hate on your primary target to the DD which should be focusing on it.)

3. Use Fast Blade and Savage Blade on your primary target, then Rage of Halone on your secondary target.
(This, again, keeps hate on your primary target for a while longer so the DD can keep on trucking. The Rage of Halone on your secondary target will drop your healer back down on hate, as they should be creeping high.)

At this point, if you only have two targets, you can repeat from step 2. However, if you have three, or even four targets, you should continue as so:

4. Perform a full Rage of Halone combo on your tertiary target. Repeat from step 2 on your primary target if alive or your secondary target if your primary is dead.
(If you have a third target, chances are your healers and Summoner will have very high enmity close to yours. You need to do this to shut them down again.)

When you reach this point in the game, Flash will no longer keep you at the top of the hate list on all mobs if you let your DD cut loose. You can spam your MP into oblivion, but with the high strength of heals and DoT power coming from Summoner, you're going to need more.

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Shield Oath and Sword Oath

By default, many people seem to think Shield Oath is better because of the damage reduction and increase in enmity. Realistically though, it's a stance highly suited for bosses and larger groups of mobs.

Shield Oath reduces damage taken by 20%. This is great, truly, but only really necessary on things that have high powered attacks. Furthermore, your outgoing damage is reduced by 20% which also cuts into your enmity. Shield Oath increases your enmity, but this is not an increase on top of what you normally do without it. This increase is to offset what you lose from the 20% outgoing damage loss. This is why you will see Paladin's with Sword Oath pulling hate from Paladin's using Shield Oath. Sword Oath will give you more enmity generation through damage than Shield Oath will. Because of this, Sword Oath should be used on most trash pulls and even some bosses. Shield Oath should be used for its damage reduction on harder hitting bosses such as Primals. Personally, I would run all of Amdapor Keep with Sword Oath only, if you have a good healer.
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Provoke

I see other professional PLDs stressing this and it bears repeating again.

Provoke places you at the top of the hate list. It does not boost your enmity. It will take whomever is at the top of the hate list and give you their enmity + 1. You should never use Provoke when you are already at the top of the hate list and it should only be used to pull when you need to for its range. Pulling with provoke in a normal circumstance will yield you exactly 1 enmity point, and the first person in your party to sneeze on the mob will take hate immediately.

When using Provoke, you should follow up with an enmity ability such as Shield Lob or Rage of Halone. In many circumstances, it would be worth building up a Rage of Halone combo to use right after Provoke.
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Abilities off the GCD

I specifically refer to Circle of Scorn and Spirits Within. You should be weaving these into your combos to maximize your damage contribution and hate generation. They can be used when your Fast/Savage/Rage of Halone skills are on the GCD without actually hindering your combo speed. Remember that every bit of damage you do is more enmity you gain.

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Regen and Adolquium

Who doesn't love regenerating HP? I'll tell you who, tanks and healers that have enmity issues because of Regenerating HP on a pull.

That's right. When pulling mobs, especially across distances or mobs that have a delay before attacking (Like gargoyles in Amdapor), you should CANCEL Regen and Adolquium if they are on you before pulling.

Regen adds to enmity on every tick, and if you pop some mobs but can't claim them right away, the moment that Regen ticks, the mobs are going to make a beeline for your healer.
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Knowing when to let a mob go and changing targets.

At some point, one of two things may happen. You'll either have enough enmity on a mob for you to focus on another while your DD finish killing it or you'll lose hate on a mob and it will be close enough to death where you gaining back enmity will be irrelevant. You need to be able to recognize these situations so you can spread out your own damage accordingly and also not waste time on mobs that are no longer a threat to you or your party, even if you don't have hate.

To put this in perspective; Is it really worth using a full Rage of Halone combo on a mob that is going to die to the BLM's next Fire when you could use that combo on the next mob he's about to drop a Flare on?
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Conclusion

This is my personal method for tanking and it has served me very well. That being said, I realize I am not the only Paladin in the game and I very much welcome input from other tanks on what can be improved upon or alternate methods they may have.

If you've read this far, thank you for your time and I hope this helps some people having problems.

[Steeled]

Provoke is nice for a ranged pull though, if you're comfortable with not needing it for the next pull. It has the same range as magic or bows.

It's amazing how far some plds get without realizing that flash is based on the radius around the caster (the paladin) rather than the target. It's a bit counter-intuitive but I don't know how people get that far without realizing it.

Sleeps - Healing enmity is not dealt to targets that are slept. This is useful at low levels and seldom used at higher levels, but still nice. For a fresh 50, if the blm is sleeping, he's doing the Paladin a favor. Flash still builds enmity, as does dots ticking, but healing done to the target does not.

[Jediman]

as for your "1. Pull your primary target with Shield Lob, then use Flash > Circle of Scorn > Flash. You can Flash until you cut your MP in half, then you should move on to the next step.
(This ensures you get all mobs claimed, have a DoT on them to help you maintain hate and solidifies your hate against your healer on all non primary mobs for the next few seconds.)"

This does not work since flash spell works like this 12sec then 6sec then 3sec most of the time on the mob.
Flash only when your timer for 1st flash you done thats 12sec on mob then after that do it again it will be 6sec and so on

After the 3sec you should wait a big gap------------------ then flash because most of time it will resist. You will see a pattern. (most tank don't know)

[shoultzilla]

This does not work since flash spell works like this 12sec then 6sec then 3sec most of the time on the mob.
Flash only when your timer for 1st flash you done thats 12sec on mob then after that do it again it will be 6sec and so on

After the 3sec you should wait a big gap------------------ then flash because most of time it will resist. You will see a pattern. (most tank don't know)

What you're referring to is the DR (Diminishing Return) of Blind. Some mobs build resistance to certain debuffs; Stun, Blind etc. Flash will still build Enmity, even if Blind is fully resisted, which is what he was saying.

I pretty much run my 46 PLD the same way. Shield Lob with Mark 1 - Flash x2/3 - FB, SB - RoH on second mob - repeat through mobs until back to target 1, which is usually dead by that time.

I usually weave in Flash on Bosses since Blind helps as a form of Mitigation.

[Jediman]

Blind does not build enmity if its resisted by the mob man are you on pills?

[shoultzilla]

Flash still builds Enmity since it's the basic function of the skill. Blind is just an additional effect. Even if Blind is resisted, Flash still builds Enmity.

[Steeled]

Flash still builds Enmity since it's the basic function of the skill. Blind is just an additional effect. Even if Blind is resisted, Flash still builds Enmity.

This. Easy test. I've done it, and it works though.

Get 2 paladins. The first needs to flash, let blind wear, flash, let blind wear, flash. The mob is now temporarily immune to the blind effect from flash.

Have the other paladin flash. Have him flash twice, you'll see he gains chunks of enmity.

[GramkarSilverpaw]

Blind does not build enmity if its resisted by the mob man are you on pills?

You get Flash at Gladiator lvl 8. It's an AoE enmity skill. At level 20 you gain a trait that adds the Blind effect. This does not remove or change the base functionality of the ability, it only adds a Blind on top.

[Alerith]

This does not work since flash spell works like this 12sec then 6sec then 3sec most of the time on the mob.
Flash only when your timer for 1st flash you done thats 12sec on mob then after that do it again it will be 6sec and so on

After the 3sec you should wait a big gap------------------ then flash because most of time it will resist. You will see a pattern. (most tank don't know)

You are describing resistance to Blind. The additional effect of Blind on Flash has no impact whatsoever on the enmity gained by Flash. Flash cannot be resisted. Only the Blind effect can.

Blind does not build enmity if its resisted by the mob man are you on pills?

You need to review your abilities. Flash itself builds enmity, not the Blind status effect. Even if Blind is completely resisted, Flash still gives enmity, as that is the purpose of its existence. You obtain Flash at level 8 without the Blind on it. If you were right, it would be a completely useless ability. You don't gain the Blind status effect on it until level 20, which still does not impact the enmity value of Flash itself.

Get 2 paladins. The first needs to flash, let blind wear, flash, let blind wear, flash. The mob is now temporarily immune to flash.

To be clear, the mob gains temporary immunity to Blind, not Flash itself. Flash will still produce enmity.

[Steeled]

I'll edit my post, that's what I meant. Thanks.