A Paladin Proposal

[Reynhart]

The second is that these Shield choices would have to be relatively frequent or regularly accessible choices. This could be done by removing the on-block requirement from Swipe, instead improving it or refreshing its cooldown under that condition, and such things as the above "Guard" (Shelltron replacement) example.

Wouldn't it be easier to put Guard on current GCD, so you'd have to chose wether you do damage, stun, gain group enmity or activate your short-duration 20%+ physical damage reduction ?

Suddenly, PLD would really be the tank that will do less damage on the field for higher mitigation.

Parry could be adjusted to increase damage reduction on a block, Sheltron would just make your next block recovers MP and Bulwark would increase your mitigation by a small amount...or maybe recovering TP with each block for its duration. You could even get rid of shield items altogether and mix them with the sword, since block rate would be irelevant and block strength would be fused with with parry.

As a crazy idea, I'd even go as far as to remove damage modifiers (Dealt and received) from Shield Oath and instead make it doubles the damage reduction on bocks. No more passive mitigation and you'd reduce your damage simply by spending GCD on blocks.

[Shurrikhan]

Wouldn't it be easier to put Guard on current GCD, so you'd have to chose wether you do damage, stun, gain group enmity or activate your short-duration 20%+ physical damage reduction ?

Suddenly, PLD would really be the tank that will do less damage on the field for higher mitigation.

Parry could be adjusted to increase damage reduction on a block, Sheltron would just make your next block recovers MP and Bulwark would increase your mitigation by a small amount...or maybe recovering TP with each block for its duration. You could even get rid of shield items altogether and mix them with the sword, since block rate would be irrelevant and block strength would be fused with with parry.

As a crazy idea, I'd even go as far as to remove damage modifiers (Dealt and received) from Shield Oath and instead make it doubles the damage reduction on bocks. No more passive mitigation and you'd reduce your damage simply by spending GCD on blocks.

That's the thing though. I wasn't imagining a turtle spec tank from what I suggested — at most a tank that has that option more so than the other tanks, but would still be about as capable of damage-dealing. I wrote that it'd use some internal limiter as not to let Guard constantly be an option. But at that point I see nothing wrong with taking advantage of whatever Sword and Board procs or mechanics that might enter into the mix to better weave it in. Which GCD system, if any, it'd lie on is mostly irrelevant to me. I'm just looking for immediate and reliable mitigation options that could stand as something a bit unique among the three tanks, and would likely be introduced much earlier on. (In my example, Guard replaced Shelltron. You'd likely see an adjusted Bulwark (e.g. "Bastion") take the PLD 52 ability slot, instead.)

I would assume you'd simply convert excess block rate into strength. I would hope the same would be done with Raw Intuition for Warrior as well.

I can hardly call a removal of damage modifiers from Shield Oath a crazy idea when I've been looking for something to emulate the stylish offensive use of shields of the KotR ever since my first Vault run. Sword overwhelms you and cuts you down to size; Shield thwarts you, beats you to a pulp. Different ways of serving either function.

[Reynhart]

I can hardly call a removal of damage modifiers from Shield Oath a crazy idea when I've been looking for something to emulate the stylish offensive use of shields of the KotR ever since my first Vault run. Sword overwhelms you and cuts you down to size; Shield thwarts you, beats you to a pulp. Different ways of serving either function.

The "crazy" part is more the complete removal of passive mitigation from PLD, and the reliance only on CD to mitigate magical damage.