PLD speshul taktics: Cover in O3S

[ArianeEwah]

Hello everyone,

I have got a question to all of you Paladins out there who tanked O3S.
Ever thought about constant tank swaps to maximize mitigation on Critical Hit-tank buster with Awareness?
Or did you OT and asked yourself how to help your MT mitigate the tank buster damage?
Have you ever used Cover to achieve that?

A story behind those thoughts: MT (PLD) in my raid group got his PC crashed and was gone for good, through he said he might come back after some weeks. A DPS in our group agreed to swtich to tank (WAR) for the meanwhile. So, I had to either DRK or PLD, my first pick was DRK. Mitigating tank busters in progression appeared to be rather difficult, caused by many deaths, resulting in less heals and lower mitigation, as MT or OT had to take over and had many skills on CD.
So I thought of maximizing mitigation by using as many defensive CDs as possible (from both tanks). With DRK and WAR, the only solution was tank swap. As DRK, I picked up both first adds after 2nd tank buster on me (with Awareness, ofc) and tank swap, because DRK has awesome magical damage mitigation with Dark Mind. And both the white orb and the dragon used hard hitting magical attacks. Our progression became easier, but still wasn't safe enough and I felt pretty insecure in my DRK play.
I switched to PLD. I remembered that our MT would return in a few weeks and I tried to think of a solution to make this whole 'tank swap' thing easier than before. Then Cover came to my mind.
I became OT, and used Awareness, Cover and Sheltron every second tank buster on MT. Cover itself provides 20% dmg mitigation with the new trait, block another 24%.
This solution made our progress easier than ever and both tanks could make full use of their CDs on boss and adds at the same time. Also pretty easy to teach, should our MT ever return. (In the end, he didn't.)

What do you think about this tactic?
Does this sound rather difficult? Would the extra mitigation be worth it for you to learn this strategy?
How often do you use Cover in general (just curious)?

[Freyyy]

That's exactly what we do. I MT as DRK, and my PLD buddy covers the second Critical Hit with Sheltron and Awareness while staying in SwO. The 20% mitigation from Cover acts as a free CD, it's really sweet and by doing so we never have to tank swap in the fight. I LD the first Critical Hit so that healers can go balls deep in the opener (only popping bene at the last second on Walking Dead, right before Spellblade Holy), and LD another Critical Hit in last phase. Everything goes very smooth by doing so. I only have to mitigate 3 Critical Hits with my CDs other than LD in the whole fight. I can then use my CDs to smooth auto-attack damage and other mechanic damage. O3S is actually the only fight where my tank buddy stays PLD. He switched to WAR two weeks ago for the other 3 fights, but PLD is just too good as OT in O3S.

[MahoSenshi]

Our DRK MTs all fight w/o swaps and have some mitigation for all tbs. I use Cover on DPS in add phases, esp. White Flame, and Intervention on tankbusters.

[MyaValentine]

you really, reaaaally don't absolutely need any of this clusterfuck, if you use your cd properly you will have a cd for every single tankbuster, V3 requires no tank swap and much less make the OT losse GCD to cover the other tank or take the boss or anything at all. use your CD appropitely if you are raiding at this stage you should know the timing of your abilities and work around it. if you need the assistance of another tank either you or the healers are doing it wrong.

edit: also if you are having so much problem mitigating stop following the hive mind and meld yourself tenasity it's infact helpful despite what everyone likes to preach and you will do almost as much damage as a dh build.

[konage]

Your war can solo tank the fight. Holmgang every other critical

[Nabian]

I main DRK and never tank swap that fight or use cover from PLD. Awareness + Rampart + TBN for one buster; Shadow Wall + TBN for others. I use LD on the 3rd Critical after the dragon dies and again during Ninjas. I drop tank stance after the first critical and never turn it back on. I have MORE than enough mitigation to comfortably survive all of the tank busters.

[Fernosaur]

If you use Awareness 13-14 seconds before the pull Awareness will be back up again for the second Critical Hit. Little tidbit of info that some people don't know :P That makes it so there's no need for tank swaps either.

Cover is still a nice free CD, tho, so if it's working out for you guys keep doing it!

[ArianeEwah]

snip

This sounds like we would have problems in O3s, but it's not! (I have already cleared O3s multiple times.)

As I said in the OP, this idea came to my mind when we did progression and I guess you figure that many people die there, or make some mistakes which needs additional healing. So ANY extra migitation helped. And c'mon, Cover is one of the most underused skills right now. Yet it's actually pretty awesome 'cause you get EXTRA 20% migitation, just by using it. Add Awareness and Rampart, you don't even drop to 50% OFF STANCE. (No Crits, and 36% mitigation!)
MT (WAR in this case) can also use its CDs for constant mitigation, not just tank busters.

Ofc I know that it is possible to solo tank the boss in O3s, never doubted that, yet I like to take every little burden from healer if there is an opportunity. Especially in progression.

edit: You don't need to clip a GCD to use Cover, Provoke or Shirk! (Where did you get that idea from anyway?)

[Freyyy]

Of course using such strategies isn't needed, but it's free and it helps. It makes the fight a lot smoother by allowing you to use extra mitigation on autos and other mechanic damage instead of keeping them for tank busters only. Cover is an extra free 20% mitigation CD. Why not use it ? It's not like you're sacrificing DPS for doing so.

[Mirateski]

I use cover during apanda, because I use hallowed for the crit hit but there's raidwide heals going out anyway, so it helps. But I mt the entire fight aside from the first crit hit, and that's just to ensure aggro with a quick voke-shirk swap.

There's so many adds that I think I'd actually find it more confusing to do tankswaps now I'm used to having her for the whole fight.

maybe one day my almost static will be able to pug a melee that doesn't drop a book on me so I can clear...