Is Paladin in a Bad Spot?

[Phoenicia]

Stuff.

I do not see anywhere in my post where I mentioned tank busters happening before every IB is available or that prolonged CD durations are what makes PLD "special". What prolonged CDs offer is "easier timing" and "easier healing". Pop rampart and you're set for 20 seconds. Pop Hallowed Ground and EVERYONE is set for 10 seconds. WAR is no where close. Add the required GCD for IB and you can see you cannot tunnel vision in a fight as WAR. You CAN mistime IB (pop too early, pop too late).

Most Busters are preceded or followed by a moderately high hitter. Death Sentence had Plummet. Raven's Beak had Raven's Claw (the cleave, whatever it was called). Titan Extreme does a rock buster before mountain buster. Flatten is preceded by Flare Breath. Blinding Blade is preceded by Atma Linga. Taking these into account when timing CDs can make a huge difference.

A clear example how it is easier to time is Akh Morn in T13. PLD can mitigate ANY of the Akh Morns with HG. WAR's best attempt is the third Akh Morn. And WAR could not do Holmgang on the fourth. It just doesn't last long enough.

Another example, also from T13, was when a PLD Rampart was enough to mitigate the Flare Breath before Flatten, ALONG with Flatten and all three Flare Breahts following Flatten. WAR's Inner Beast alone doesn't. WAR actually pops IB to mitigate Flare Breath, then infuriates, pops a CD and IB again for Flatten and IB won't be up for the last 1-2 Flare Breaths. Do not neglect CD duration because some busters are one hit per x minutes/seconds.

Also if you read carefully you will see that I said "All three tanks are equally good in mitigation". With WAR pumping its EHP the highest.

Another thing is DRK has the same "theme" as PLD when it comes to major CDs. Lasting the same duration on the equivalent CDs (Rampart vs Shadowskin, Sentinel vs Shadow Wall). Why does that put PLD in a bad spot but not DRK? As a matter of fact, the short CD durations is a WAR-only "disadvantage" if anything.

For me I don't think pld is terrible but I do have to ask, how is drk not just a better pld? They have essentially the same cooldowns except drk has an extra magic defense one, the same tanking stance, drk has more damage, better threat, and some self healing they can use as part of their normal damage routines.

PLD has better physical mitigation than DRK. That much is clear. PLD handles magical damage better than DRK handles physical damage.

PLD is still "safer" than DRK by a bit. specially when using Hallowed Ground, which is a LOT cheesier than Living Dead.

The extra DPS is somewhere between 50~100, means NOTHING in the grand theme of things. Raid DPS is what? 7k? what's 50 gonna do to that?

Threat, while behind the other tanks, doesn't matter as long as it is ahead of all the DPS?

As I mentioned in my OP, DRK and WAR self healing make up the lack of shield (and 2% deficiency in effective healing in the WAR's case).

It is not Black and White as to who the better tank is.

I personally prefer WAR MT over both DRK and PLD. I also prefer DRK over PLD because I do not see the need for that much safety. If a repeat of T5 happens (where tank buster has a higher rate of 1 buster per 40 seconds), WAR is obviously the best MT. If a repeat of T4 or T1/Shiva (where boss gains damage stacks over time and high damage streams for prolonged periods), PLD will be the best tank. But that's a whole different story.

[Yorumi]

Why does that put PLD in a bad spot but not DRK? As a matter of fact, the short CD durations is a WAR-only "disadvantage" if anything.

Because drk has more advantages on top of that. More damage, more threat, an extra cooldown pld doesn't get, and self heals. Don't give me clemency, if healers arn't dumb it's almost always overhealing with long cast, not to mention you have to give up even more damage to heal unlike a drk who heals while doing damage. Again I don't think pld is terrible but how is drk not just a better pld?

[Sleigh]

Because drk has more advantages on top of that. More damage, more threat, an extra cooldown pld doesn't get, and self heals. Don't give me clemency, if healers arn't dumb it's almost always overhealing with long cast, not to mention you have to give up even more damage to heal unlike a drk who heals while doing damage. Again I don't think pld is terrible but how is drk not just a better pld?

Shield, more consistent STR down debuff than Reprisal, better CDs when talking about purely physical attacks, Clemency/Protect/Divine Veil, Hallowed Ground.

PLD is more survivable, in virtually every fight in the game (including A3S, which yes world first put PLD out of in favor of DRK's higher MT DPS and Reprisal to ease mechanic damage), mainly from their shield but also core things like Sheltron and better Sentinel/HG. You'd have to put them in a fight like Ramuh where you can argue DRK is just plain better, otherwise there are advantages and disadvantages to both (and I'd argue most fights highly favor PLD's advantages).

[Faytte]

Shield, more consistent STR down debuff than Reprisal, better CDs when talking about purely physical attacks, Clemency/Protect/Divine Veil, Hallowed Ground.

PLD is more survivable, in virtually every fight in the game (including A3S, which yes world first put PLD out of in favor of DRK's higher MT DPS and Reprisal to ease mechanic damage), mainly from their shield but also core things like Sheltron and better Sentinel/HG. You'd have to put them in a fight like Ramuh where you can argue DRK is just plain better, otherwise there are advantages and disadvantages to both (and I'd argue most fights highly favor PLD's advantages).

STR Down is compared to Int Down
Reprisal is a burst mitigation power, which with skill (and dark dance bait) can be added onto important mechanics (like A1S).


Clemency is not a great power outside of the OT role. Casting it as an MT is a challenge at best (in all the hours I watched A3S Paladin almost never used it ever--you just cant, its too slow). Protect---Do you mean Cover? I guess you can cross class Protect but I think you mistyped?

Divine Veil is nice--its not the world. Lets get that out of the way--its 1700 ish health every 3 minutes, useful at certain points.
Hallowed Ground--The reason you still play paladin.

[Sleigh]

STR Down is compared to Int Down
Reprisal is a burst mitigation power, which with skill (and dark dance bait) can be added onto important mechanics (like A1S).


Clemency is not a great power outside of the OT role. Casting it as an MT is a challenge at best (in all the hours I watched A3S Paladin almost never used it ever--you just cant, its too slow). Protect---Do you mean Cover? I guess you can cross class Protect but I think you mistyped?

STR down is not necessarily compared to Delirium Blade, as STR down is unique to PLD. DRK lets you have the INT debuff while keeping MNK out of your comp if you so choose, but if you have a MNK it is of little/no value. For general tank mitigation, RoH is better than Delirium (as my team noticed switching to DRK in A3S, where the first half of the fight has Reprisal as roughly the same value as RoH but without high upkeep). Yes, Reprisal's great for mechanics/tank busting, but in most scenarios where there are largely physical attacks, it is merely a poor man's RoH since it has less uptime, although A1 and A3 both benefit from Reprisal's magic damage down - that said, both A1 and A3 greatly benefit from RoH's 100% uptime too.

Basically what I meant by saying that's an advantage is that RoH is more consistent when you want it, both in an OT role and with permanent uptime. It's not to say RoH > Reprisal.

Clemency, Protect (yes I meant Protect, it's an option to Protect raised players now situationally in a raid scenario, mostly to save healer MP), Cover, and Divine Veil aren't necessarily game changers but they're sure handy, and DRK gets nothing even similar to them in raid healing/utility. All DRK can do is attack enemies, which is fine, but all things being otherwise equal having those tools is great.

I should reiterate that I'm not saying PLD > DRK, just responding to a post asking why even use PLD over DRK.

[SpookyGhost]

Because drk has more advantages on top of that. More damage, more threat, an extra cooldown pld doesn't get, and self heals. Don't give me clemency, if healers arn't dumb it's almost always overhealing with long cast, not to mention you have to give up even more damage to heal unlike a drk who heals while doing damage. Again I don't think pld is terrible but how is drk not just a better pld?

PLD brings a shield, Hallowed, Sheltron, Divine Veil, Clemency, etc.

DRK isn't better, it just brings different things, as does PLD.

Also WAR has IB up for every Flare Breath, and a combination of IB + large CD for every Flatten + Flare Breath after (3x Flare Breath only lasts the first phase, so it's pretty irrelevant, and you can have Vengeance up for them anyway). WAR was fine for mitigating the extra fluff damage packed on with the tank busters.

For farm content/DPS checks, WAR/WAR or DRK/WAR is certainly the most optimal way to go (as evidenced by WF A3S), but if that DPS check can be easily met with WAR/PLD or DRK/PLD then there's no reason to exclude PLDs (WF A1S, WF A2S). If you can still clear the thing in plenty of time then tank choice doesn't matter.

[Phoenicia]

DRK isn't better, it just brings different things, as does PLD.

Also WAR has IB up for every Flare Breath, and a combination of IB + large CD for every Flatten + Flare Breath after (3x Flare Breath only lasts the first phase, so it's pretty irrelevant, and you can have Vengeance up for them anyway). WAR was fine for mitigating the extra fluff damage packed on with the tank busters.

My point is that due to CD duration, WAR has to work around while the other tanks just press 1 button. However, what you mention is that how EVERY tank can handle all fights. They just do it differently. Neglecting CD duration and frequency of use in how to mitigate damage is beyond foolish. The whole party should know that and plan around their tank.

In T13, monks knew PLDs can cover them to negate the whole puddle thing in Earth Shaker to increase their DPS for example. Healers can pop cleric stance when they know it's time for Hallowed Ground on the next buster for added DPS. Those traits are PLD exclusive.

Those jobs play differently, as a result they perform the same things differently. Knowing your tools as a whole raid is what matters. Not what 100 or 50 DPS difference does. If your PLD also has DRK leveled, then there is no reason not to bring the better job for whatever you are trying to accomplish. But that 50 DPS loss is DEFINITELY not the reason to drop PLD from your static.