PLD theorycraft?

[dramamine]

As a tank, the only things that ever threaten your HP total are huge attacks like Mountain Buster, Death Sentence, Ravensbeak etc or a bunch of attacks from multiple enemies intended to be tanked separately (T7 Melusine+adds, T8 Avatar+Dread, T9 Boss+Ghost) or a big dungeon pull.

Those things aren't really comparable. You're right that Parry doesn't really do anything for big single attacks, but parry's definitely worthwhile during a big dungeon pull or any time you're tanking multiple enemies, because that's where average damage dominates. That's also the sort of situation where extra DPS stats are the least worthwhile (at least as a PLD).

I think you're looking at it from the wrong direction. You don't stack parry because you're expecting a single parry to make the difference between life or death. You stack parry because the benefits of stacking DPS stats are extremely marginal for a tank in tanking stance, and parry decreases the amount of damage you take over time.

And a healer most certainly can underheal in anticipation of a block or parry. It's called staying in cleric stance and using abilities like stone skin, lustrate, benediction, regen, and so forth as the primary means to heal the tank rather than relying on cure/physick. If you take less damage over time, that becomes easier to do. Obviously they still need to top you off before big hits and that sort of thing, but it's not like there's zero benefit to increasing your mitigation over time as a tank.

[SeraviEdalborez]

If a parry or block made the difference, your healer is a goddamn robot.

[Cadwgan]

This is not what I had in mind. I'm looking for more solid evidence if parry isn't the way to go. I'd like you to back up your arguments with some parsers if possible. Also, why would parry be useless stat? It's migitation after all..

Unfortunately all you'll really find on the subject is a debate, as others have said while parrying is a source of damage mitigation it only works on direct physical damage, it becomes completely useless vs mobs that do not have physical attacks (T2, ultima, avatar laser shower), and vs physical damage is unreliable at best. You will always be dealing damage while you will not always benefit from an increased parry rate, if it's a parry that stands between you and kissing the floor, you'll be looking at your healers, not the deities of RNG.

[Judge_Xero]

Dex is sooooo bad. Worse increase in parry than parry points are.

But i90 crafted strength accessories are great. Get ruby and meld in vit, accuracy and det.
If you buy iolite you're dumb...there just isn't much else to say.

I guess if you wanted to use DEX and didn't want the crit than the Topaz Rings with Parry would be a better choice.

Yeah, the Ruby accessories are great, as extra damage/enmity is always welcome even for PLD.

DEX for PLD is better than parry as you gain Block and Parry.

~0.066% per DEX into Block/Parry
~0.076% per Parry Stat into Parry

so about 4.5% extra block or parry. Also, block % is higher than parry % - and Block takes priority during frontal damage.

Not great but it's something. That's why I'm hoping we get new accessories with both stats, so you can have the extra damage, vit, and small % to Block/Parry.

[Alistaire]

I did some digging, from a guy on reddit that did tests it took about 2.6 DEX to equal 1 parry stat. I had DEX-melded some heavy wolfram, with 21 parry and 13 DEX on the helm it was effectively the equivalent of 25 or 26 parry.

Parry's not horrible for dungeon running though, more small hits you're taking the more it'll even out. But definitely for endgame content don't go out of your way for it.

And as far as DEX rings for PLD because of parry/block rate, STR boosts the damage lessened by those parries and blocks so that argument's a moot point. Do not wear DEX rings on PLD. The only time you'd consider DEX on accessories is if you were so keen on parry despite what everyone's said, that you'd get topaz accessories and meld STR, then DEX. Even ruby you'd meld VIT, then parry before you'd even consider DEX. Which, bringing it all back to "parry is a bad stat", you wouldn't.

[dramamine]

If a parry or block made the difference, your healer is a goddamn robot.

A single parry, probably not. But many parries can add up, especially when the bulk of your healing is from HoTs or mitigation buffs rather than straight healing casts. Those little bits add up over time. You have to stop thinking about it as if a single parry/block matters, and think about parry/block as a "critical defend". You wouldn't criticize a DPS for stacking crit because "If you're relying on a single crit to make the kill, you're doing it wrong." or something along those lines. You'd say "Is that the best way to increase your DPS?"

I'm not saying parry's always absolutely the best secondary stat for tanks. I'm just saying that it's not as worthless as some people here are saying it is, and that there are times when it's significantly better than DPS stats (like, as I mentioned earlier, during big pulls in dungeons where there's zero benefit to increasing your DPS, and statistically, all the parries will add up to a significant amount of damage mitigated over a short period of time).

[Remn]

Parry is good when you speed run or undergear the content you doing.

as you gearing up, parry start to lose it usefulness. (T9 ilv110 max parry will mostly lead to Over Healing in most case.)
most end game healer that I saw will pre-cast heal so it hit the tank right after big atk. I never saw end game healer wait for tank to take big atk then decide which heal to cast.. just so they can use cure1 instead of Cure2 ;P

[Miyaka_Vigiles]

I have 438 parry on my PLD and will start working on Nuvos soon. I was wondering how much parry % or mitigation % will I get if I meld 44 parry?

My other option is going something like det/crit/acc. Will this affect my DPS or aggro by a noticeable amount?

I would love to hear from a guy who actually used those meld setup in coil 2.

[Alistaire]

A single parry, probably not. But many parries can add up, especially when the bulk of your healing is from HoTs or mitigation buffs rather than straight healing casts. Those little bits add up over time. You have to stop thinking about it as if a single parry/block matters, and think about parry/block as a "critical defend". You wouldn't criticize a DPS for stacking crit because "If you're relying on a single crit to make the kill, you're doing it wrong." or something along those lines. You'd say "Is that the best way to increase your DPS?"

That is the worst logic...dps crits actually do more damage. Healing for more than is needed doesn't raise your tank's HP beyond its max.

And yes you do have to keep thinking about it as if a single parry/block matters, because that's how healers learn a fight and learn what big hits to prepare for.

[Rilla]

Thank you for the posts, it seems like this is not going anywhere, it's just another debate. It just feels so weird coming from another mmos where migitation/survival stats actually matter'd. Time to start collecting own data then And once again, thanks for the posts..