Paladin feels miles ahead of the other tanks in terms of overall play in this game.

[Tranquilmelody7]

Paladin was already a popular / practical choice in StormBlood, and have been elevated insane heights in ShB.
-Party utility is still unmatched across all tanks, making them a de facto pick for high end content
-While their personal mitigation is among the lower end of tanks, they have an party utility option for almost any situation - making them a very reliable option for PUGs
-Their damage is second best for both bosses and packs, making their overall DPS capabilities the greatest of all tanks(Gunbreaker's AOE KIT is not great)
-Their burst window has the lowest CD, the highest duration(The only one that seems to account for high ping)is ranged, and can substitute attacks for massive heals(Instant +50% Clemency for a party member and %25 for yourself)
-They have one of, if not the most powerful clutch GCD skills in the game.
While the skill doesn't have much of a place for speed running, it can salvage a myriad of disadvanteous situations, and allow them to perform feats in the game that literally no other class can.
-They have the only invulnerability skill with no drawbacks or prerequisites.
Inferior to Holmang for high end content, but fantastic for PUGS.

Do you want engage high end content? Your group will want at least one Paladin.
Do you want to Solo Eureka efficiently? You'll want to go Paladin.
Do you want to Solo Heavenward Extreme Trials? You'll need to go Paladin.
Do you want to carry a Pug group that frankly aren:'t playing well? Paladin is possibly you're only option.

I love Paladin, but several months into ShadowBringers, it's clear one tank received more attention than the rest.

[SamRF]

It's the reward for what paladins had to through in ARR rotation wise.

[fumofu]

You didn't said anything new. And guess what? I see plenty of people playing other tanks too, not only paladin. Even I myself prefer playing GNB or sometimes DRK. And you know why? That's because not all players are robots caring only about efficiency. Sure, it might be objective truth that PLD is best, but that doesn't means it's the only choice for all the content.

[Tranquilmelody7]

You didn't said anything new. And guess what? I see plenty of people playing other tanks too, not only paladin. Even I myself prefer playing GNB or sometimes DRK. And you know why? That's because not all players are robots caring only about efficiency. Sure, it might be objective truth that PLD is best, but that doesn't means it's the only choice for all the content.

I still hear 'Tanks are balanced in SHB' parroted.
I wanted to make a point that - Tanks - are not - BALANCED.

It's not just balance concerns either - I enjoyed playing DRK as the undergog in StormBlood.
Shadowbringers removed a great deal of what made the class fun to me.
It's also hilarious that possibly the most criticised skill of DRK's entire kit was left completely untouched after it's rework.

[Nedkel]

Have you played other tanks?

PLD is best tank in the things that in the grand scheme of things does not matter, because the tools he has are often unreliable and simply put not needed all the time.

Intervention and Cover for example will make no to little difference when used frequently, using those will hinder your deffensive abilities because they cost gauge.
Passage of arms is only useful in transitions where you cant attack your target, if you use it anywhere else its going to cost your team a lot of dps
Divine veil needs a heal and does not give you a shield as a caster, so who really cares if dps has 10% shield or not, its not going to help healers all that much to be significant, Shake it off is a lot better, does not need target, 15% max hp, does not require anything else.
Clemency is a pure DPS loss and you should avoid using it.

All those 5 support abilities he has have their drawbacks which makes them more of annoyance to use instead of a real advantage over other tanks.
What PLD is lacking is sustain which does not cost him his DPS.

His DPS is not all that higher than the DRK or WAR, its not even a 1% difference in dps.

Where warrior could heal himself to full for free and DRK could tank everything left and right all what paladin has is his 20% dmg reduction sheltron which cost gauge and lasts only 6 seconds. He is interesting to play but far away from being the best.

[Satarn]

I think that while PLD might be a bit stronger than the rest, mostly it's just that it's the only tank that has pretty solid design right now. It stayed consistent with SB while changing things that people who already enjoyed PLD mostly didn't like(casting phase). While I personally never liked the job, it does seem to actually cater to its dedicated playerbase, rather than trying to reinvent itself like DRK did for example.

utility bad

Most of this basically boils down to "I don't play savage" though. PLD utility is very useful, it just doesn't get much use in casual content because it requires a bit of planning. Even there though, it can often save runs, especially Clemency - just because it's not optimal, doesn't mean it's not useful. Deaths cost more dps than a couple gcds.

- You don't need to use Sheltron on cd and you get enough gauge that you can spend it on other things when needed. Intervention's not much different from using TBN/HoS on somebody else. It's especially good for double TBs, which we had a ton of during previous tier. Well timed Cover can save people from deaths when low on hp and can be used to cheese certain mechanics.
- Passage can be weaved at zero dps loss, you just need to cancel the animation and you'll still get the raid mitigation out.
- Veil is super useful. Raid-wides exist and those are more likely to kill your dps/heals than you most times, especially when you don't even have aggro at the time.
- Like stated above, well used Clemency can literally save runs.

I don't think that PLD is very overpowered, at best it is slightly ahead, tanks overall are balanced pretty well. That said, dismissing its utility like this shows a severe lack of knowledge.

[QT_Melon]

PLD...feels like Bard to me.

[Saefinn]

Out of the 4, PLD is the most fun I've been having with tanks. I'd just like to say, given I do much complaining about jobs from a healer main perspective, but one thing I feel I should praise them for is how PLD has evolved. I originally levelled PLD in 2.0 and it was mostly a 1..2..3 rotation, which was not so bad at first as tanking was still new to me back then, but it lost its novelty and could get very dull. But its design has just improved and I think they found a good balance in how it plays in SB and seemed to have improved on what they built there with ShB.

Whereas so far WAR & DRK feel like shadows of their former selves, but I'm not quite 80 on them, so I'm gonna cut them some slack until then. I mean, I don't find them boring, but just the reason I loved them before has gone, particularly with DRK, where I loved HW's version the most, it was janky, sure, but janky is fine if its fun.

[sexythaumaturge]

I agree, the no-drawbacks invulnerability and self-healing makes them the best and most durable tank for the majority of purposes.

I was considering going Paladin myself, but the 1-2-3 combo is way too flashy, a similar problem that Machinist has. It looked better before. They seem to be abandoning the good, subdued attack animations and keeping the bad ones.

[RadicalPesto]

Divine veil needs a heal and does not give you a shield as a caster, so who really cares if dps has 10% shield or not, its not going to help healers all that much to be significant, Shake it off is a lot better, does not need target, 15% max hp, does not require anything else.

Divine Veil gives 10% of the Paladin's skyhigh health pool as a shield. Shake It Off at baseline gives 15% of the target's much lower HP, not the Warrior's. They're roughly equal if WAR burns no cooldowns, but Veil needs the heal requirement removed by now. If you think Veil isn't significant you've probably never gotten to attacks like Light of Judgement in O8S a group mitigation rotation to barely survive.

What Paladin's utility really excels at is double tankbusters, which were everywhere last patch and there's at least a few in E5S (Add and Ramuh often do tankbusters simultaneously). Otherwise it's okay at everything but not amazing in any aspect besides the one mentioned.