Is Paladin in a Bad Spot?

[Faytte]

However, world first A1 and A2 had PLD in the group. They obviously did not fail the DPS check nor felt the need to change their MT to something not PLD.



Even in farm groups. 100 DPS is not a factor to drop any job. Also PLD CDs can be planned around to increase raid DPS.

Based on that logic people should drop monk, ninja, BLM, SMN, BRD and MCN for the sake of DRG since it does the most DPS. DRG does 200 more DPS than SMN and 300 more DPS than BRD!! Ideal set up will be WAR x2, DRG x4, any healers.

World First A3 had to swap out their paladin for a dark knight. Lucrezia probably would have cleared faster with two wars or war/dark to be honest. You cannot blame them for predicting class balance when they started equipping and picking classes before seeing savage content.

[Faytte]

Okay that sold me on wanting to level pld after I get my smn to level 60 seriously that was awesome!

Watch the video---that rage of halone spam. The dragoon that stayed on his ass the entire fight in aggro. You can find far cleaner tanking on warrior videos frankly, and they are not having those issues when out of their 'tank stance'.

[Seku]

It is far from the typical behavior of the average player.

Did you miss the part where I said "Hard core" tanks? I think you did.

[Faytte]

Because their cool down's are easy to use and don't need as much timed use.

They have a 15 and 10 second damage reducer (other tanks have their own versions of both)
Then they have bulwark. Other than that, they share basically every notable cooldown with the exception of sheltron. Its kind of a myth that a paladin has 'all these defensive cooldowns' they can cycle through. When you consider cross class, and the fact most of the paladin traits arnt super massive, its not that different.

[Seku]

They have a 15 and 10 second damage reducer (other tanks have their own versions of both)
Then they have bulwark. Other than that, they share basically every notable cooldown with the exception of sheltron. Its kind of a myth that a paladin has 'all these defensive cooldowns' they can cycle through. When you consider cross class, and the fact most of the paladin traits arnt super massive, its not that different.

Considering that you need to time IB's and pair them up with another CD at times, I'd say it is. Same goes for DRK due to some of their enhanced defensive cool downs being tied to their MP, mainly Dark Mind. Where as with PLD you just need to simply hit Rampart and you're fine and passive mitigation (shield) takes over. The only time this isn't the case is in magic related fights (current fights that matter). It's my theory why a majority of DRK's are considered squishy in the first place, lack of active pairing and timed CD use.

[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.

[Faytte]

Considering that you need to time IB's and pair them up with another CD at times, I'd say it is. Same goes for DRK due to some of their enhanced defensive cool downs being tied to their MP, mainly Dark Mind. Where as with PLD you just need to simply hit Rampart and you're fine and passive mitigation (shield) takes over. The only time this isn't the case is in magic related fights (current fights that matter). It's my theory why a majority of DRK's are considered squishy in the first place, lack of active pairing and timed CD use.

Timing IB is not rocket science. A basic understanding the fight allowed for you to have it up for every important mechanic. You even have a fail safe in the method of infuriate if you need to use it.


AS1:
#1 Buster casts----vengeance (lasts 15) then Ib
#2 Buster casts ---vengeance (half way through) then IB
#3 Buster casts---- use IB (half way through cast) then vengeance as it comes up with about 2 seconds to go.

Also in your example....your comparing Rampart to Shadow Skin (needs no thought). Sentinel to Shadow Wall are the same (needs no thought). Only their enhanced cds require any extra thought and that is strictly dark mind---to which, Dark Knights at that level (savage) do not run out of mana like newbs?

We arnt comparing tanks in the hands of Expert Roulette Daily players, but in the hands of raiders, and using IB at the right time takes no more skill than knowing when to pop hallowed ground (especially given the really annoying 1 second spin up between hitting the power & the cd going off, and until the actual -immunity- kicks in).

[Seku]

We arnt comparing tanks in the hands of Expert Roulette Daily players, but in the hands of raiders, and using IB at the right time takes no more skill than knowing when to pop hallowed ground (especially given the really annoying 1 second spin up between hitting the power & the cd going off, and until the actual -immunity- kicks in).

You may not be. Other people are. And while it's not rocket science, strangely enough people STILL fail at it (raider's included). Strange how that works, but it does. And I can tell you now, a majority of these people on these forums aren't doing savage.

and no. You still have to keep 5 stacks up or have infuriate ready. While HG can be used if there is a cast bar determining when a move is about to come. That's still more fine timing on the War's end. Or basically resource management, which PLD has none of, meaning quite literately anyone could pick it up and be decent as long as they know how to set skills to their hot bar and use them.

[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.

[ReyShinkirou]

Cover is awesome. It has had its uses since early 2.0. Examples:
- T13 you can cover MT and pop HG to fully mitigate Flatten + Flare Breaths.

Did I misunderstand something here or I havent played the class right ? Cover wont help with magic damage like Flame Breaths.