Give us back the old Paladin

[Tlamila]

I agree with OP and yes please thanks give us old PLD back, new one just efels so awful to play. But sadly we know there's no going back, all classes are just moving into the "do nothing for 2 mins and then spam all your stuff like you're on drugs". And not only it's not fun, but it also makes anything that's not raiding feel even more inefficient since people won't align anything in casual content.

As for DV I'm very ambivalent. Before the change I didn't want it changed, I'd find it fine as it was. But now after using the new one I can see the advantage to it. Sure it doens't feel as unique and interactive, but it sure feels easier to pop precisely when you need it. Although honestly, now that you just use holy spirit like this instead of having a magic phase, it'd be much easier than before to pop on demand.

Goring is the worst offender though. At least make it an ogcd cause the way it's now it just feels bad to use, even.

[Rithy255]

OKAY, unique is now a curse word. Both sides need to stop using it.

Your points about Veil are valid in a 6.2 PLD world, but our rotation changed.... in 6.3 veil can be up at any time with the 6.2 triggers. The longest I've seen any logical rotation go without pressing a self heal is 15s and Veil lasts for 30s.

Are healer bubbles bad because people can walk out of them? Would it be better if they followed a target for their duration?

You say you like meaningful differences in PLD but not Veil. What differences do you want then?

I don't think anyone likes PLD's gauge, and Clemency and Cover have no real use cases in any standard full party comp beyond playing for healer LB3.

If veil wasn't changed in 6.3 I think it would at least be a lot better because of how often you get holy spirit, but I'd still want it to effect self (also having a clear animation when going off), but I personally rather just Press the mitigation button right away to mitigate at that point if i can choose when it goes off, I still don't really find it that interesting to have veil proc by heals it's still just shake it off lol.

Pld's Gauge should be more interactive with the Job, Imagine lets say Holy shelltron is reworked and for successfully mitigating attacks under the hit you gain extra gauge, or even sentinel to also interact with you gauge a bit, have some reward for using your defensives by gaining extra gauge and more uses, would be a good change, I'd like to see wings reworked and put onto the gauge, I'd like gauge to be generally more interactive with your defensive kit this would give PLD a distinct feel defensively.

Clemency could be changed? I don't mind it as it is it's kind of just a weird unique solo ability or emergency button, but if you wanted to make it useful you could turn it into a ogcd or even have old clemency but it will turn into a ogcd by using spirits within/expiacion or something (so every 30s), being able to hold two stacks maybe? could be a separate gauge thing as well, I could see some Intresting ways of keeping old clemency but making it into something that you commonly use.

Cover needs to be generally reworked, if they put something meanful like passage on gauge then it could go off it again (or stay on), they should buff the range of it and likely let it do something Interesting, it's something that should be looked at

Just adding. I don't really even care for healer bubbles they're pretty bad and annoying to place down with how healers work, so I actually wouldn't really mind if they removed it, same with Ninja and drks bubbles.

[Gserpent]

I think the only thing to do with Clemency is just put it on Divine Might. Like Shield Bash and Cover, I'm perfectly fine with there being buttons that are "useless" in high end content. You can simply not bind them or not use them in that content. Little things like that really amp up class fantasy, so I'd love to see it happen to more classes. Like, hell, ranged have a bind and a heavy as role actions that are virtually never used in raids - but why remove em? It's flavorful for them and, who knows? Maybe they'll be useful in non-raid content somewhere.

Clemency being on Divine Might would fulfill class fantasy while also making the ability somewhat less cumbersome to use. Because it's a straight DPS loss (and a rather significant one at that) to burn DM on Clemency, I don't think it would impact raid balance meaningfully - it's hard to imagine a tank trading 450 potency to potentially save a healer GCD would ever be worth it, as even the highest healer GCD is over 100 potency lower than that.

[Riion]

I done some quick calculations...

I ran a 60 GCD simulation between a rotation where I dropped two Atonements and a rotation where I didn't. Found the latter was about 3.7 potency lower on average. It's good to know that the difference is arguably nominal, though dropping two Atonements does pull ahead, slightly.

[Corbeau]

No, new PLD is fantastic.

[ForteNightshade]

I cannot stress how awful this one feel to play versus the pre 6.3 PLD. Having separate physical and damage phases was fun and the consistent damage output worked wonders in most of the content in this game (especially in current dungeon formats where the buff could be rotated between w2w pulls to save waiting for CDs). There was no mind numbingly boring downtime which takes up 2/3rds of the rotation.it felt more structured and complex, and far more fun.

In terms of balance, the only content that matters is Savage and Ultimate because DPS checks actually exist. In both of those, Paladin's consistent damage rendered it woefully inadequate with the burst meta Square has insisted upon. So much, in fact, Paladin was actively locked out of higher end parties due to its inability to play into buffs. Even in casual content, your "magic" and "physical" weren't remotely complex. For trash, you threw up Req and spammed Holy Circle into Blade Combo then did FoF for 1-2 spam. All while throwing in oGCDs. That hasn't really changed now except you don't have FoF going.

While it has similarities to Gunbreaker, the two still achieve what they're trying to do differently much in the same way at a very basic level Warrior and Dark Knight are similar but if you actually know how to play them they aren't. At least not to the extent memes would have you believe. With that said, I do agree Goring Blade needs to be better intergraded into the kit. However, the potency difference is only 5. I wouldn't exactly being wangling my hands over it being "weaker". The overall potency of Paladin hasn't changed whatsoever. They just pushed numbers into other things to compensate. Which is a problem because both it and Warrior remain too far behind Dark Knight for what they offer but that's a separate discussion.

Hard disagree on Divine Veil. Why play an MMO if you want to have nothing to do with other players? It's like making Earthly Star as ridiculously big so you don't have to communicate anymore. Same with the 2 minute burst meta. Now all you do is press it when the fight starts and again at 2 minute intervals. Riveting.

Because it made Divine Veil entirely unreliable. Healers were never going to proc it because that meant taking a damage loss. Therefore, if you aren't in a magic window, you'd have to proc it with Clemency. Which no self-respecting Paladin is going to do. What this boiled down to is having a unique ability that entirely put Paladin at a disadvantage.

he feeling I get from Viel being easier to use probably is the same as simplifying a damage minded player's rotation. Imagine if Mudras were removed from NIN or if BLM infinite MP.

This is a ridiculous comparison that doesn't even make sense. Mudras are a fundamental competent of Ninja's entire rotation. If they were removed, the entire job breaks and essentially has to be rebuild into something new. Divine Veil is a passive defensive buff that has precisely zero impact on Paladin. You can't compare defensive utility to offense in a game where offense is overwhelmingly dominant. There was no "skill expression" here. You either had AoEs conveniently line up with your magic phase or you sacrificed DPS to proc an ability the other three tanks could do for free.

[Crimson1345]

PLD was fine before 6.3 Stop changing classes for the wrong reasons. I played PLD since 1.0. Was loving my PLD in SHB. Tanks shouldn't have to burst dps simply put there tanks not dps. DPS is the role to do dmg at high rates after all. Not all changes should be for endgame content. You have a lot of players that love playing for the story and other things. Its like SE is just breaking things that don't need fixing. Its like saying ok We'll take Ninja and give it a lot of def skills and saying ok now go tank. This needs to stop. Tanks are meant to tank dmg. Shouldn't have to rely on them to dmg enemies like DPS. Pld was easy to get into and now there keep changing things for the worse I feel. PLD feels dead to me compared how it Felt in SHB and in 6.0 till 6.3. Even in FFXI tanks are tanks. They didn't really need to push the classes on changes so much. I played older mmo's and still keep playing but now feels like I won't be tanking anymore since new changes feel empty compared to old PLD.

[Mikey_R]

1)Tanks shouldn't have to burst dps simply put there tanks not dps. DPS is the role to do dmg at high rates after all.
2)Not all changes should be for endgame content.
3)Its like saying ok We'll take Ninja and give it a lot of def skills and saying ok now go tank.
4)Tanks are meant to tank dmg. Shouldn't have to rely on them to dmg enemies like DPS.
5)Pld was easy to get into and now there keep changing things for the worse I feel. PLD feels dead to me compared how it Felt in SHB and in 6.0 till 6.3.

1) Damage is also part of a tank's role, just like damage is also part of the healer role. Everyone contributes to killing the boss, DPS just alot do more damage than the other roles. If you want PLD to go back you need either one of 2 things, the other tanks to drop their burst phase or the 2 minute meta to change.
2) But that is where the changes matter. If a job is not suitable for endgame content, it just is not taken, the job is effectively locked out. You could argue that it doesn't matter, but what about the person that wants to raid on that job, but the job isn't good enough? Is that fair on them?
3) Except it isn't. The damage a tank does is always compared to the other tanks. The tanks are not trying to be a DPS, they will never reach the levels of a DPS, however their contribution matters. A tank's viability is baked into both their defensive kit AND their DPS output compared to the other tanks.
4) Except the current model the game uses DOES require tanks to do damage, infact, tank DPS is taken into account (along with healer DPS) when generating a HP value for bosses. It absolutely is a requirement of the role.
5) It is still easy to get into, so easy infact you can't really go wrong. As long as you use all your Atonements and Divine Holy Spirits and keep your buff window every minute (fight dependant), you will do absolutely fine. This is compared to old PLD where any sort of disconnect could potentially completely misalign your whole rotation with everyone else and since PLD was buffed with either FoF or Requiescat for the majority of it's rotation, you had no chance to realign yourself. This is an incredibly flexible rotation that you really cannot mess up.

[Payadopa]

And yet again an ability gets dumbed down because communication is too much to ask for in an MMO or because you'd loose *gasp* a GCD or whatever.
I wonder how many more abilities need to be streamlined until people realise that not that much actual game is left. It's always 'this is an inconvenience!' while I'd argue that's... just playing a game? Isn't (good) cooperation also some sort of skill expressions? Apparently not. It would also be convenient to just have only one ability on every single job called 'Resolve'. You press it and you win. Every time. Easy to balance, you always get a perfect parse and everyone is happy. lol I know that's taking things into the extreme, but honestly, looking from 1.0 to 2.0 to now that's pretty much the current trajectory.

[nia_saeli]

2) But that is where the changes matter. If a job is not suitable for endgame content, it just is not taken, the job is effectively locked out. You could argue that it doesn't matter, but what about the person that wants to raid on that job, but the job isn't good enough? Is that fair on them?

I agree with the bulk of your points, but I feel like you can flip point number two around as well as "Plenty of people liked to play PLD before the changes, is it fair to them that they have to change how they play the entire game just because it was locked out of 5 (soon to be 6) instances of content?"

I get that people want to play their favorite job in all content (including savage), but these changes affected everyone across all levels in all content for the game. It may be unfair to have the community locking PLD out of some parties, but it's equally unfair to have PLD changed for all content to ensure that it works "better" in the two minute burst meta that only meaningfully matters in Savage and Ultimate Raids.

I want to be clear that I am not talking strictly about the DPS across all content (though SE absolutely gimped PLD below 68 for damage), I am referring to the more sustained damage rotation that was really satisfying. People -- myself included -- found that rotation to be really enjoyable. While there were spreadsheets for optimal rotations for each of the savage rights, that was completely irrelevant to 95% of the content in this game where you could just Goring Combo -> Atonement -> Goring -> Magic -> Atonement -> repeat.