Sheltron is not as strong as SE thinks it is.

[phantomr23]

Sheltron is weak, yeah. That's a good thing, Paladin is already outputting great damage with a lot of unique and incredibly powerful tools while also bringing the best invuln skill in the entire game - having slightly less mitigation is a tradeoff for that. Besides, even if it is weak comparatively it's still incredibly useful and flexible, it absolutely doesn't need a buff. You talk about it having a chargeup time but there is literally not a single current fight where that matters; of course it doesn't work on Gravity, Gravity is a flat 75% damage that nothing can mitigate, the only skill any tank has that could even slightly counteract it is TBN and we already know TBN is insane.

I'm a 100% PLD main and even I think asking for PLD buffs is an incredibly stupid idea right now - all the tanks are in a great place.

[Sylvain]

of course it doesn't work on Gravity, Gravity is a flat 75% damage that nothing can mitigate, the only skill any tank has that could even slightly counteract it is TBN and we already know TBN is insane. .

wasn't it 80%?

[phantomr23]

To deal with gravity WAR has Thrill of battle and shake it off it can also help with the recovery with nascent flash, DRK has TBN. GNB doesn’t have anything that counteracts gravity but it does have 15% and 10% mitigation with an increased chance to parry the following autos readily available that it doesn’t need for anything else. PLD doesn’t even have sheltron for the autos at that point and even if it did it’s not as strong as the other tanks options. But the point there is the other tanks have their other options that do work while PLD only has the one option that doesn’t, so sheltron lacks the versatility that, say, WAR has with its multiple forms of mitigation from shields to self heals to flat mitigation.

Thing is that weakness isn't a bad thing, various tanks having to adjust to different mechanics in various ways is a good thing in my eyes, and it's not like we don't have tools to make things easier. Smart timing means we can cover the three major threats (autos after Gravity, tank lasers and Spear of Paradise) with just two cooldowns, and there's a swap right after. If that isn't good enough, we can use Hallowed to completely ignore Gravity if we want - that's what I started doing in early weeks when healers struggled to keep me alive. I feel like a lot of arguments in this thread are founded on the idea that Sheltron being weaker is a huge issue, but I feel like it's one of the things keeping PLD particularly interesting for me. When we have less mitigation tools we have to find unique ways to use what we have, and there's certainly no situation in the current tier that can't be mitigated properly with good play.

Like? The skill that has no net decrease to damage taken yet comes at the cost of your on-demand mitigation skill's worth of gauge? The %HP raid shield that puts out less mitigation over time than the one that doesn't require additional triggers? The percentile raid shield that's 50% stronger but takes 33% longer to recharge AND requires that your raid stack behind you? None of which gives you a second minor CD as afforded to the other jobs?

We have two particularly strong niche uses for our gauge, in both the best OT skill in the game (Intervention is absolutely absurd in moments where both tanks are taking damage) and one of the most abusable skills in the game (Cover is perhaps a little too weak now but I've saved my share of runs with it in scenarios where nothing else could). Divine Veil is... admittedly a little finnicky, I don't like the activation requirements much, but it's an incredible source of raid mitigation if you plan around it. Also, if I'm thinking correctly, it works out stronger than Shake if Off on a lot of classes. As for Passage, that has a long cooldown because it's absolutely ridiculous when you realise you can just flash it on and off as an oGCD; turns out requiring the party to stack isn't a huge problem in Savage when everybody stacks anyway. So yeah, I'd say having the most variable toolkit which can cover nearly any situation if you play well is worth the loss of a minor defensive tool when we already have the best invuln skill in the game.

wasn't it 80%?

Could be, I've never actually been able to find the specific number since everywhere I've asked has said either 75% or 80%. 75% sounded nicer so I went with that, but it could be wrong.

[Cabalabob]

Thing is that weakness isn't a bad thing, various tanks having to adjust to different mechanics in various ways is a good thing in my eyes, and it's not like we don't have tools to make things easier.

That’s the thing though, PLD doesn’t have the tools to adjust. It’s put all its eggs in the one basket, flat mitigation, and that flat mitigation isn’t even higher than the flat mitigation the other tanks bring outside of hallowed which has the longest cooldown. If divine veil effected the PLD or if it had some kind of small hp shield (like giving it stoneskin) giving it an option for additional mitigation where flat mitigation doesn’t work like gravity, or its mitigation tools could actually be significantly stronger than the other tanks to make up for the fact it’s all PLD brings (bringing back bulwark as double block strength) then PLD would have the tools to adjust to mechanics. But all PLD can do is sheltron, it’s a one trick pony.

[Kabooa]

That’s the thing though, PLD doesn’t have the tools to adjust.

What.

It's literally the only tank who does have tools to adjust to all the bad, niche scenarios.