Noct Hoplon

[PROBOUND]

Its been stated by many engame T9 cleared tanks (including BGs world first PLD Junpei) that Noct is BiS for a PLD in a progression scenario. In a progression scenario, parry is the most important stat for a PLD (after VIT). If you are prioritizing parry by this logic, an endgame PLD will have roughly 604 Parry (approx 46% parry rate/chance).

The Noct hoplon is not only BiS due to the way Bulwark effects it (Noct + Bulwark = Sentinel II) for hard hitting moves like Raven's Beak in T9, but also because of the way it values a high parry build. Since less blocks opens up room for more parry, But when you do block, its huge.

There is alot of missinformation in this thread. I recommend everyone does their research on how Parry/Noct compliment eachother as well as the reasoning behind the Noct hoplon being BiS in a progression scenario (hands down).

MT Progression = Noct BiS
T9 OT/Farm = H.A Kite (STR,DET DPS increase)

If you dont prioritize parry at all (you should unless ur on farm mode), then the choice is rather obvious.

[stoxastic]

The Noct hoplon is not only BiS due to the way Bulwark effects it (Noct + Bulwark = Sentinel II) for hard hitting moves like Raven's Beak in T9, but also because of the way it values a high parry build. Since less blocks opens up room for more parry, But when you do block, its huge.

I actually don't think Bulwark adds a flat 60% rate of blocking to Noct Hoplon to make it funcitonally equivalent to sentinel (total of something like ~80% block rate). I think it just multiplies the block rate number on the shield by 1.6 and that is the new block rate. I'm not 100% sure on this but I'd be surprised if bulwark just added a flat 60% increase.

[SeraviEdalborez]

If you dont prioritize parry at all (you should unless ur on farm mode), then the choice is rather obvious.

If you prioritize parry even in progression mode it emphasizes a lack of faith in your healers, because if you had to rely on Parry or a non-Bulwark block to survive a hit, you rolled the dice against very bad odds and got lucky. The stacking of say 60 extra parry would not have mattered in most cases.

I would never have wasted 390 soldiery and an oil on a sidegrade when I was lucky enough to just have HA kite shield drop early on.

I don't care if you believe parry is statistically better; mitigating what essentially amounts to 10-20 full autoattacks over the course of a fight is generally meaningless.

[dramamine]

If you prioritize parry even in progression mode it emphasizes a lack of faith in your healers, because if you had to rely on Parry or a non-Bulwark block to survive a hit, you rolled the dice against very bad odds and got lucky. The stacking of say 60 extra parry would not have mattered in most cases.

I think that's the wrong way to look at it.

It's not about expecting a parry or block to save you. It's about maximizing your role in a party. A tank in tank mode, at it's absolute best, pales in comparison to an equivalently geared healer in DPS mode. So your stat choices should probably reflect that, especially if you don't always run with healers you know you can count on. It's win-win, good healers can do more damage, and an iffy healer is less likely to cause a wipe. Additionally, the benefits of mitigation stats are increased substantially if you switch to sword oath while tanking.

So don't think about it as "I'm expecting that stacking vit/parry/block str will mean the difference between surviving a big hit or not" and think about it more as "I'm expecting that stacking vit/parry/bock str will allow me or my healer a greater buffer while DPSing."

And whatever argument you make about how meaningless a tiny bit of damage mitigation is from stacking defensive stats can also be made about how meaningless the tiny bit of damage output you get from stacking offensive stats.