I think two things are happening here: First, a lot of the discussion is actually covering two different aspects of PLD design, which are I conflict: what PLD currently is ("the generic tank"), versus what people want PLD to become. And that second point is where there is a lot of confusion and contention; because we don't have anything to go on for PLD identity, everyone wants something different out of it. Some want another damaging tank, some want a healing tank, and some want a support tank. And because SE has done nothing to clarify what makes a PLD, people are forced to come up with their own vision for the job. And since no two people think exactly alike, everyone comes up with a different vision, which is why people refute one another's points and argue.
And this is exactly why we need SE to give us our identity. There is no consensus among players right now around what PLD is supposed to be, and so our visions clash. But if we had a clear identity and a clear vision from SE, then we'd be able to unify our vision and get on board with something.
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A dungeon party with two summoners always makes me egi.
Beginner's Overview to Tanking in FFXIV: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/352455
Learn to Play (it's not what you think): http://www.l2pnoob.org/
How would Clemency work as a HoT or a direct heal then HoT? Or give it some synergy with Cover or other skills. Making Cover better would be really nice too. I'm not sure PLDs should get a Raise, but I really do think they should have better healing or something like that.
Clemency probably has the coolest casting animation in the game.
Well, technically, they have clarified what PLD is. It's the "mitigation" tank. The fact that this vision is absolutely flawed is the root of the problem.
Since they've specifically said that WAR is designed to be THE damaging tank, I think it's worthless to ask for PLD to be one. And if SE abides that, it would make WAR lose a lot of its identity too.
The problem is not that there is no consensus about what PLD should be, but there is a clear consensus about what PLD shouldn't be.
You can go to every thread about PLD, and you'll always see people claiming that any change on PLD would make it broken, OP, or will probably destroy the fabric of reality...
What level are you? Because it seems to me that you pretty much proved my point of what I said. Unsync'd lvl 58 (what I'm currently at) is going about 300 (its above it, but not a huge amount). From looks of the pic, you're fully upgraded and leveled, meaning that of course, the numbers would go up pending your stats. I never said anything about Sheltron because I haven't used it enough for the MP recovery aspect to really talk on that point. Nice to see it's 700 for a fully leveled and geared PLD. Not sure how much MP you use either for those 2 moves (as they scaled based on your lvl). I would assume, the overall is pretty much the same though. Raise will take over half your MP (unless you for some reason stacked some stats into piety) and Clemency will take 2/5 of your MP per use. By no means would we be spamming out these moves like crazy.
Fair enough. I think it's just semantic at this point, but we both agree: SE has done a horrible job defining what PLD is supposed to be. I'd argue that if they gave us an actual definition, one with good lore and a clear direction, we'd see a great deal less discussion of what PLD shouldn't be, and a lot more discussion about what it should.
The difference here is that the WHM trope has a very clear definition and identity. All of their spells revolve around an advanced, restricted, specialized form of CNJ (which is less about submitting to the elements' will and more about imposing your will upon the elements). And the story follows along with this, and the spells all reflect this. Paladins, on the other hand, are not well defined (go read the first post to see why I say that). We have a stated identity of "the defensive defender," but this does not reflect in the job (all of our "defensive" actions are either shared with other tanks or outperformed by other tanks), nor the traits (we have swordplay traits and some pseudo-CNJ stuff), nor the story (I won't get into that here). So yes, PLD is stated as the "generic" tank, but we don't get any direction as to what even that means, which also means PLD is incredibly unspectacular.
Obviously you're not going to be spamming Raise because hopefully someone isn't dying every 10s. But with the MP regeneration from Sheltron and Riot Blade you could easily have enough MP for a Raise at any point in the fight, and you don't suffer for it at all apart from losing a few GCDs of DPS. It gets rid of the party penalty of losing a big chunk of healer MP and having to conserve the rest when someone dies. A PLD losing one combo is nothing compared to making SCH/SMN blow Aetherflow stacks on Energy Drain instead of Lustrate/Indomitability/Bane/Fester/Painflare, or making a WHM be more conservative because Shroud and Assize doesn't cover using every GCD to heal/DPS on top of Raise.
it's a shame that I can't hit the like button "more."
this... this is what I've always though about my cripple pally since the day I picked up in 2.0 and main it like a true knight till I gave up in 3.0 and let the wrath of my inner beast take over me because I could not enjoy the class no longer...I really hope Square Enix and Yoshi-P read this... if this was my game and I see something like this I'd in shame for such a bad work. agree with every single point
.no clear identity
.not the best mitigation
.lowest dps
.most irrelevant utility (situational)
.worst lore
.worst animations.
.worst gameplay mechanincs (boring/simple)
.worst cross class abilities ("gather" not "given")
.worst TP management
.Worst aggro multiplier
.worst abilities tool kit (mostly situational BS)
almost everything about paladin is just completely bad, yeah. you can go around and play the class and be somewhat decent, A3S savage here, nothing you can tell me I don't know, got all 3 tanks max out, PLD is just bad on every aspect. whether your opinion agree or not, the fact is that compared to the other 2 tanks all those points on top are true.
Not other class on this game has this so bad, not even dragoon pre 2.4 was this bad, the class lacks on every aspect and when it came to down end game content all of us PLD needed to wait extra weeks of your static gearing to compensate for the lack of this class.
the fact that I needed a fully pentameld set, pots, extra gear and a ninja to hold aggro properly and do decent damage like a DRK or WAR did with much...muuuuch less effort and less gear was a joke by itself.
but yet you will always find and always will come this ignorant people "defending what they don't know" most of them haven't touch savage, most of then haven't fully leveled and expirienced all 3 tanks at max performance to notice the different between the 3, most of them are even clueless of what's wrong with paladin cuz they just roll with the class, and haven't done anything that requires them to fully dedicate themselves and invest time learning what this class is about, or tanking in general.
- as OP said, it's not about numbers or dps, is not about being the MT, is not about to see who has it bigger, is about BALANCE, is about FIXING a CHAOTIC class, is about having a IDENTITY, having a well crafted class that's fun, engaging, and can perform just as good as the other 2 tanks on end game.
and honestly before even thinking of adding a new tank, they should focus more on fixing the current one.
and forgot to add, I almost forgot about this, because PLD didn't have bad points already
.doesn't have AOE dmg
that I still fail to see a single class in this game that doesn't have spamable AOE attacks... and if we compare it to the other 2 tanks... it's sad.
and if you dare to tell me we have scorn/flash....I will kindly tell you to get out.
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