The Definitive State of Paladins Thread

[7hurricane]

A4S isn't the only fight in the game where PLD is suboptimal, I think you'd be more correct to say that A2S is the only current raid fight where PLD is even viable.

My static runs A1S to A3S with PLD and WAR and clears are not an issue. In fact, before I had a static, I never saw DRK in savage at all. This is, of course, only my opinion, but PLD perform just hunky dory, and our PLD has never expressed concerns about his ability to do the content.

That said, you may be right about PLD being sub-optimal, but it is definitely more than capable for the first three turns of savage. In all the PLD threads I've read, very few people seem to be complaining about anything but A4S. Many guides and videos also show PLD performing the first three turns just fine as well. Hence why A4S is the only content (current or historic) in the game where PLD is considered by the majority of the community to be not optimal.

[SpookyGhost]

PLD was sub-optimal for A1S-A3S, but still viable. It only became completely unviable in A4S at lower gear levels - obviously, with some gear, PLD was perfectly able to clear it but therein lies the problem. I like Sapphidia's suggestion of buffing Shield Swipe however I think this would be a problem in fights like A4S where there's nothing to Shield Swipe. Whatever increase they do give to threat should result in higher PLD MT DPS anyway due to not needing to use RoH as much and if something else were tweaked slightly we'd probably see PLD coming in line with DRK.

Anyway, my thoughts aside, this is a good thread as it highlights all the issues really well. Hopefully if SE isn't already aware of the specifics, they are now. It's unfortunate that 3.1 is so far away, I'd love to know what they have planned - hopefully we'll hear word about it next/this month.

[Ercapote]

snip.

when did you specifically clear SAVAGE? I'm asking because even pre buff astrologian was able to clear, and at this point is a no brainer since we are further away already and gear lvl makes any class work "without" problems, meaning at this point, you can tell me PLD can push over 900 dps making the older problem of not doing enough dps not a thing anymore, the problem comes with paladin needs to wait a month extra to perform just as good as the other tank job till they are geared enough...when it should be not a thing all tanks should perform just as good as any other tank job... but that wasn't a thing since they beat A4S there wasn't any clear recorded that was from a PLD all the clears where WAR,DRK almost a month after I've only seen 1 video clear with an actual PLD... so yeah I'll let you think about that.

[Zeyn]

I just have one comment. I somewhat disagree with the idea of "Bring the player, not the job." I think job disparity is a good thing, and tweaking the party composition for different encounters can be an engaging metagame. It can also be rewarding for people to level and gear multiple jobs and have them be useful in different ways and different parts of the game.

But that is the thing. Each job has to have SOME role. Even if you want to make Paladin the "defense tank" and Dark Knight the "magic tank" that is entirely valid. They don't both have to be exactly as useful for all bosses. Unfortunately, right now Pld fails in every encounter.

In the spirit of this thread I'm not going to suggest a solution, just present the problem in a different light.

[Violette]

snip

I agree with your idea that classes should have differences, but unfortunately that doesn't entirely work given SE's gear policy.


I.E. If a raid had 2 bosses (ala Oppressors and T1), one doing heavy magic damage one doing heavy physical that swapped randomly (but more than 30 seconds apart), we might see a Paladin/Drk composition being viable. The problem can only be fixed (without homogenizing war/drk/pld's damage and defences), by unique aspects brought by the class. I.E if divine veil was better, if cover was a bit better, if delirium gave a different debuff to dragon kick and last victim worked like a mini trick attack, we could see a bit more change in the tanks. Until then DRK/PLD + War ftw.