Paladin vs Warrior - ARR better set roles!

[Abriael]

warrior's DPS is actually really, really bad comparatively.

Compared to a Paladin, no, it's not.

Those that say that PLD and WAR should be equal in tanking capabilities completely forget the most basic idea of balance.

Paladin is a specialized job.
Warrior is a hybrid job.

A specialized job can only do one thing, and needs to be better than any hybrid job at doing that thing, or it will be undesirable (exactly like it was in 1.0).

Unless you nerf warrior's damage into oblivion, and to be precise to the same level of paladin (which simply wouldn't make sense, and would confuse people, with a class wielding a giant axe turning into one that hits like a pansy) their defensive abilities shouldn't in any way be comparable to those of a paladin, as balance dictates that the sum of two classes' abilities needs to be equal.

If a warrior can tank as well as a paladin, but deals more damage, warrior will almost always be preferred to paladin unless specific mechanics situationally push the other way (and that's not enough of a balancer) to anyone that cares about efficiency. If two classes have the same defense and one has better attack, you chose the latter, because it makes for a faster fight, and a faster fight means an easier fight.

Higher attack and better versaitility need to come with a tradeoff (everything needs to come as a tradeoff, Paladin's tradeoff for having the best defensive abilities comes at the price that their attack sucks), and the omly possible tradeoff is less defensive abilities.

It's really pretty simple. In a game in which there's only space for one main tank every eight people, having two main tank classes is excessive, and means that one of them will struggle at finding room.

Warrior's desirability can be preserved simply with coding encounters making dynamic offtanking a necessity.

Paladin should be the kings of main tanking in every situation.
Warriors should be the kings of off tanking, with good snap-aggro abilities and good (but not exceptional) defense, able to double up as a damager if there's the need for it, or as a situational main tank if there's no PLD available, with the tradeoff of more strain on the healers.

If encounters require dynamic off tanking, both classes have their roles, both classes are desirable.

If PLD and WAR have the same defensive abilities but differing offense, the one with the higher offense will generally be the most desirable, pushing the other out of the picture. That's an iron-clad equation and it's not acceptable in any MMORPG that holds class balance in any value.