What happens when.....

[Launched]

Case in point: I was actually farming Blood Dragons today and thinking of how my suggestions would come into play damage dealt wise. I figured the hardest I'll be able to hit for (all strength accessories) would be around 3200 on a critical hit with my combo finisher Royal Authority AND with Fight or Flight active at the time. I can't even hit for HALF the damage of other tank jobs when I'm trying, even with adding my suggested damage increase. It's no wonder Paladins are literally performing at half the potential...I remember a time in 2.x when Paladin and Warrior did competitive damage as off tanks and somewhat competitive damage as main tanks. This clearly isn't the case anymore.....

What? Are you seriously comparing a single Royal Authority hit to a single Fell Cleave hit? You have to be joking. PLD doesn't have the burst WAR has, and it never had it. PLD's damage is far more sustained: FoF is slightly weaker but lasts 50% longer and has no drawback. Your autoattacks are fast and Sword Oath adds a lot of unnoticeable damage to them. You have 2 DoTs: one that's very strong and another that's off GCD. The only "burst" PLD has is Spirits Within. Their sustained damage in Sword Oath with Storm's Eye/Dancing Edge is competitive with WAR, and their Shield Oath damage was NEVER competitive.

[RapBreon]

Case in point: I was actually farming Blood Dragons today and thinking of how my suggestions would come into play damage dealt wise. I figured the hardest I'll be able to hit for (all strength accessories) would be around 3200 on a critical hit with my combo finisher Royal Authority AND with Fight or Flight active at the time. I can't even hit for HALF the damage of other tank jobs when I'm trying, even with adding my suggested damage increase. It's no wonder Paladins are literally performing at half the potential...I remember a time in 2.x when Paladin and Warrior did competitive damage as off tanks and somewhat competitive damage as main tanks. This clearly isn't the case anymore.....

MNKs rarely crit above 4k; DRGs can crit for above 6k more frequently. I guarantee you DRGS don't do 50% more damage.

[Brian_]

I think people who are looking at major changes to PLD are taking the imbalances too far. PLD doesn't need any huge design changes in my opinion.

You start by looking at the primary reasons why DRKs and WARs are desired in progression content. It's really an issue with raid DPS, raid mitigation, and comp synergy.

So, raid DPS. You need to increase PLD's contributed raid DPS. Pretty straight forward. If you don't want to increase their individual DPS because of design flavor, then you need to increase their indirect contributions through raid support. I don't think it's effective or easily quantifiable to base this around the idea of PLD survivability increasing healer DPS. Also, whatever change you make has to have a larger impact on PLD MT DPS than their OT DPS because PLD OT DPS is not that far behind WAR and DRK.

Personally, I think shield swipe is an easy target for killing five birds with one stone and way too good of a candidate-for-change to ignore. First off, they need to readjust the skill anyways because it wasn't properly adjusted for HW. Secondly, any change you make to it will be inherently skewed towards MT DPS since you need to block an attack to trigger it. Third, it reinforces PLD's unique characteristic of having a shield. As is, you block an attack and don't really care. PLD's shield should mean something. Imagine getting excited about blocking an attack because you look forward to shield swiping. It also makes tanking more interactive with more reactionary skills. While pacification is a unique debuff it's clunky in application because of how selective its effect is and is largely a useless effect especially in raiding content where PLD is struggling. So, it's an easy debuff to change. Lastly, using Swipe more helps PLD's TP issues. It's the final skill you get from the gladiator quest line. It should feel like more.

As for PLD's raid DPS contribution in AoE heavy fights, if you don't want PLDs dealing actual damage because of design flavor reasons, then just change the debuff for Flash's trait to something more meaningful than blind.

Next, raid mitigation. This is another easy issue to address because there is one skill that is obviously under performing for this function -- Divine Veil. WARs have Storm's Path. If you look at the debuff from a different perspective, it's essentially a persistent damage shield equal to 10% of the incoming damage with really high up-time. DRKs have Reprisal and Delirium which are both similar to Path. Divine Veil is a stronger shield but with a tiny fraction of the up-time that Path, Reprisal, and Delirium have. The biggest advantage DV has is that it doesn't require a full combo or parry to apply but even that is complicated by requiring a heal to trigger.

In the end, you have the sworn protector of the people lagging behind DRK and WAR in their ability to protect their allies. If you want PLDs to be the defensive tank, then make them the defensive tank. Give them raid mitigation that is actually better than WAR and DRK. Give them raid mitigation strong enough to cover for WARs full DPSing instead of applying Path at a DPS loss, DRKs full DPSing with no need to upkeep Delirium, raid groups bringing NIN / DRG, etc.

[Dhex]

They need to equalize the raid wide utility of Paladin & Dark Knight to bring them in-line compared to Warrior in the OT slot.

Personally i195 PLD flat out in A1S P1 and A3S P1 I am just pushing 815-850dps MT in Sword Oath keeping hate requires I have a Ninja and be very confident in my healers - which I am but it certainly doesn't feel right and the increased damage I get from running like this is hardly worth being a hairbreadth away from losing enmity; having to be sure time & rotate my abilities exactly, to cycle through the appropriate combos in a precise order to even manage it. With all that - I personally can't maintain those numbers for an entire encounter either, I eventually have to swap into Shield Oath, it's practically unavoidable.

I have watched Warrior, and even played my own Warrior - we pull significantly more damage, have better tools, and we aren't laboring under any obvious deficiencies. On Warrior (which I have by no means mastered) I easily can push higher numbers than my absolute best as Paladin (which I have played primarily in raids since Twintania) with less gear. My Paladin damage is just insignificant while my Warrior sustains a higher output for the entire encounter without the accompanying risk or effort.

Personally I feel at loss when I read these forums - the imbalance seems pretty clear to me but maybe on a spreadsheet or in theory it balances out; but in practice it doesn't seem to work that way - at least not from my experience. The addition of a third tank and a raid with tight damage checks has really thrown the tank meta into a spotlight. There are huge flaws of concept with their Job design and encounter construction when you specifically need to avoid certain group combinations because they're impractical at best; See Dark Knight Paladin compositions. It makes little sense to have one Job with easy access to raid wide mitigation, slashing debuffs, and the highest potential damage because it is guaranteed to be included even required; Warrior shines because it has the most utility and fits the meta perfectly.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

What? Are you seriously comparing a single Royal Authority hit to a single Fell Cleave hit? You have to be joking. PLD doesn't have the burst WAR has, and it never had it. PLD's damage is far more sustained: FoF is slightly weaker but lasts 50% longer and has no drawback. Your autoattacks are fast and Sword Oath adds a lot of unnoticeable damage to them. You have 2 DoTs: one that's very strong and another that's off GCD. The only "burst" PLD has is Spirits Within. Their sustained damage in Sword Oath with Storm's Eye/Dancing Edge is competitive with WAR, and their Shield Oath damage was NEVER competitive.

I will politely offer my opinion that you are wrong. I've watched countless videos from reliable sources that prove your statements wrong when concerning competitive damage when performing raid mechanics and on paper.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTsVLBMAgsE
http://imgur.com/cEIx1I4
http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/120318-Paladin-VS-Warrior-Battle-of-the-Off-Tank-DPS

I also used to be in a raid group where the leader would embarrass and belittle me if I didn't even get in the ballpark of his numbers since he had ACT up constantly (keep in mind I, and others, left him in the dust because of that attitude and made our own FC.) I very intimately knew then and know now what Paladins face in the matter of where the job lacks what it needs. We do peanuts for damage, have an ability kit that does not have synergy concerning the direction we're forced, we can't make up for our own weaknesses, and furthermore we can't even help others make up for what we lack.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

MNKs rarely crit above 4k; DRGs can crit for above 6k more frequently. I guarantee you DRGS don't do 50% more damage.

I couldn't agree more, the numbers have been fudged at some point. When you take into account all the data logging services showing that Paladins aren't even close to doing competitive damage in Sword Oath/Shield Oath while having a Ninja or Warrior assist them in DPS/Aggro management, in addition to the issues with Paladin kit, the only thing you can do is shake your head in wonder.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

In addition to my posts thus far concerning today, I'd like to thank you all for participating and sharing your opinions on the matter at hand. I am happy with the discourse and maturity.


EDIT: I am of the firm opinion that even with slight modifications, the next raid tier will again, show Paladins falling on their faces trying to do the content. I am convinced the job needs more than just a little more in some places. I just have a feeling, and feelings like that are seldom wrong.

[Launched]

I will politely offer my opinion that you are wrong. I've watched countless videos from reliable sources that prove your statements wrong when concerning competitive damage when performing raid mechanics and on paper.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTsVLBMAgsE
http://imgur.com/cEIx1I4
http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/120...e-Off-Tank-DPS

What are these links meant to show? All I'm seeing is that OT parses were similar between PLD and WAR in 2.x, and that was the case when I compared my DPS to a PLD in my FC back around i180. The video also shows that a PLD in Shield Oath most of the time gets heavily outDPSed by WAR in Defiance most of the time. They just support what I said: competitive OT DPS, PLD gets destroyed in MT DPS.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

What are these links meant to show? All I'm seeing is that OT parses were similar between PLD and WAR in 2.x, and that was the case when I compared my DPS to a PLD in my FC back around i180. The video also shows that a PLD in Shield Oath most of the time gets heavily outDPSed by WAR in Defiance most of the time. They just support what I said: competitive OT DPS, PLD gets destroyed in MT DPS.

Funnily enough from the recent parsing I just did, this isn't the case anymore. I'm actually flabbergasted by how similar Warrior and Paladin DPS is in tank stance (I can attribute it to the second DoT and Royal Authority combo.) We were both in similar equipment down to the same slaying accessories and we were both at similar DPS (we only used our dps abilities.) The script has actually been flipped....he crushed me in DPS by more than 300 in our respective DPS stances instead. What this shows is that you aren't right when you say it's the same now. We just offhandedly had a level 54 warrior do a random fell cleave that hit for 2k with no slashing debuff....you're wrong on both accounts now and your DPS must have been while you were still learning. There's no possible way off tank DPS is comparable unless that Paladin greatly outgeared you.

EDIT: If you'd like to question the ability of that Warrior I had parsing with me, he's in Dancing Mad with Hadley Brightfoot if that means anything. The guy obviously knows what he's doing and even he admits that in order for a Paladin to now match a Warriors off tank DPS something wrong has to happen in the form of stats, equipment or ability.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

They need to equalize the raid wide utility of Paladin & Dark Knight to bring them in-line compared to Warrior in the OT slot.

Personally i195 PLD flat out in A1S P1 and A3S P1 I am just pushing 815-850dps MT in Sword Oath keeping hate requires I have a Ninja and be very confident in my healers - which I am but it certainly doesn't feel right and the increased damage I get from running like this is hardly worth being a hairbreadth away from losing enmity; having to be sure time & rotate my abilities exactly, to cycle through the appropriate combos in a precise order to even manage it. With all that - I personally can't maintain those numbers for an entire encounter either, I eventually have to swap into Shield Oath, it's practically unavoidable.

I have watched Warrior, and even played my own Warrior - we pull significantly more damage, have better tools, and we aren't laboring under any obvious deficiencies. On Warrior (which I have by no means mastered) I easily can push higher numbers than my absolute best as Paladin (which I have played primarily in raids since Twintania) with less gear. My Paladin damage is just insignificant while my Warrior sustains a higher output for the entire encounter without the accompanying risk or effort.

Personally I feel at loss when I read these forums - the imbalance seems pretty clear to me but maybe on a spreadsheet or in theory it balances out; but in practice it doesn't seem to work that way - at least not from my experience. The addition of a third tank and a raid with tight damage checks has really thrown the tank meta into a spotlight. There are huge flaws of concept with their Job design and encounter construction when you specifically need to avoid certain group combinations because they're impractical at best; See Dark Knight Paladin compositions. It makes little sense to have one Job with easy access to raid wide mitigation, slashing debuffs, and the highest potential damage because it is guaranteed to be included even required; Warrior shines because it has the most utility and fits the meta perfectly.

I agree with everything you've said. Are my proposed suggestions the solution? Most likely not, even I know this. Do Dark Knight and Paladin need more than just a little more? Absolutely yes, we need a toolkit that works with itself and other jobs similar to Warrior but in different ways. People lose track of the matters at hand and ruthlessly defend either in favor of or against certain things. Square-Enix will be able to make decisions on what to do with the feedback they're getting. What we're doing is offering ideas that can be molded, altered, and re-purposed to do what the community wants. For those reading this, I understand that my thread isn't THE solution. What my thread does is make the frame for the picture they see, it's a piece of the puzzle, one of the cogs in a timepiece if you will. Please don't take what I say personally, Square-Enix won't.