PLD improvements

[Tranquilmelody7]

Shield Bash and Cover are going to be simply removed next expansion, feel free to quote me on this

[reckless76]

I'll add my voice to the idea of letting veil proc on its own after 30 seconds. I'm so tired of watching the thing uselessly fade away cause I was healed "wrong" for the duration. And that panicked clemency when I realize it won't be proc'd in time for the raid wide is annoying too, especially when I don't make it in time. Wasted up-time for nothing.

[Bright-Flower]

For me, PLD is in a really great place right now. It'd be nice to have something offensive to use oath gauge on when doing quests. Or to have divine veil just proc the shield instead of the weird middle man of getting a heal to proc it. But those are minor things for me and all in all, the job feels complete to me.

[Khalithar]

Changes I want:

Veil: This is the big one, I'm fine with it not applying a shield to me, I'm a tank so my hp will let me survive most AoE fine anyway.

Atonement: Shouldn't break your combo. Purely personal opinion here.

Requiescat: Weird request but I kind of wish that instead of being a buff with a duration, it instead gave us 5 stacks with 20-30 second duration that we can spend how we see fit across a longer period of time.

[Brandedblade]

Requiescat: Weird request but I kind of wish that instead of being a buff with a duration, it instead gave us 5 stacks with 20-30 second duration that we can spend how we see fit across a longer period of time.

This I like.

[Jpec07]

1. Goring Blade => Weaponskill/Instant/60s Delivers an attack with a potency of 300. Additional Effect: Damage over time. Potency: 90. Duration: 30s.

I could get on board with the PLD DoT becoming a one-button thing instead of tacking it on the end of a combo. That always felt a little clunky to me. This would also make multi-dotting in dungeons a thing.

2. Shield Bash => replaces Goring Blade in the combo and reduces damage taken by 5/10% for 21 sec instead of applying stun

Why though? We don't need more mitigation, since our shield provides it.

3. Atonement => each combo with Royal Authority will apply a Sword Oath stack. At the third stack they can be used to launch it. 600 damage and recover MP (1500)

I'd be okay with some kind of change to the Royal Authority => Sword Oath => Atonement interchange, but I don't think this is it. Of all of the changes they could have applied in Shadowbringers, adding a "spam this button three times after your big combo" mechanic felt kind of underwhelming (especially when we already had a "spam this button five times" mechanic added in Stormblood). It's not a bad mechanic, but it definitely makes PLD gameplay feel incredibly monotonous.

4. Confiteor => consume all Oath to be cast. With 50 base damage if used with 100 it increases the damage by 50%, as if it was used under Requiescat

I like where the confetti cannon is currently, but I'll agree with this: 90% of the time, the resource you accumulate in your Oath Gauge just sits there. We need something we can dump Oath Gauge into that isn't situational or utility.

5. Spirits Within => Delivers an attack with a potency of 220. Additional Effect: Restores MP. Additional Effect: Increases healing magic potency on self by 25% if current HP is at 50% or lower. Duration: 12s

Don't think we really need this, but it's a neat idea in keeping with an attack that deals less damage the less HP you have.

1. Divine veil => it also applies the effect on themselves and/or there is no obligation to be healed to be triggered

Yes please. No other tank has that kind of clunkiness in their group utility mechanic.

1. Sheltron => When under Sheltron's effect, damage is dealt to the attacker each time damage is blocked

No. We don't need thorns. That's WAR's thing.

1. better animation for Holy Spirit and Clemency

Eh, these are alright. PLD has always felt kind of underwhelming to me from a visual perspective, but I think that's just because the swordplay animations tend to get hidden inside spell effects from other party members because I don't want to turn those off.

2. Intervention renamed to Holy Shield

I mean, sure. Why not?

---

Ultimately these are some interesting ideas. It's always neat to see what other people would change in a given class. I've always felt that PLD gameplay is really monotonous, and these changes would fix some of that.

What I agree with:
- Give us an oath dump. Most of the time, our Oath Gauge is useless. It still feels like it was added to PLD so we wouldn't feel left out, but like the devs didn't really know what to do with it.
- Divine Veil must be changed how you described.
- Goring Blade would be pretty neat as a 1-button move instead of tacked onto the end of a combo.

[E4EO]

The only things I can agree with here are Divine Veil and maybe shield bash, Divine Veil because it’s silly it doesn’t get applied to the PLD who casted it, and shield bash because it’s very situational and maybe they could do something that makes it more viable, but putting it in a combo that gives you a defensive buff? I’m not 100% sold on that, PLD has plenty of defensive tools just like all the other tanks plus it has sheltron, so it seems kinda unnecessary to give PLD another defensive tool, maybe they could make it a oGCD or make the recast timer shorter than the rest of its kit.

But for the other suggestions, why? PLD plays great when weaving between Fight or Flight and Requiescat, all the skills feel impactful, why does goring blade need to be changed into a oGCD when it fits perfectly 2 times into the 25 second window and replaced with shield bash? As I said PLD already has lots of defensive tools so that seems unnecessary. Similarly with Confiteor, it fits perfectly into the 12 seconds of Requiescat once you use 4 Spirts/Circles. And Spirits Within boosting healing potency likely wouldn’t do much, I don’t have a hard time healing PLD’s as in when they do big pulls in dungeons or are MT in a raid, especially with Seltron and other defensive oGCDs.

Idk, just my two cents, didn’t mean to burst your bubble, but maybe you just haven’t figured out PLD yet? Maybe it’s not for you at all? I would share my rotation to see if that helps, but I need to go make something to eat lol, getting hungry

[Burmecia]

- Goring Blade dot used to be 24sec, right? I kinda understand why that 3 seconds was shaved off of it, but my personal flavour of OCD would actually welcome that24sec dot back.
- Shield Bash is beautiful and valid as it is.
...
- Veil idea is ok.
...
- Only thing that need new animation is Confiteor. What has been seen, and by that I mean Carebear Stare, cannot be unseen.

[Kirth]

I think the only thing I don't like about PLD currently is how Rage of Halone turns into Royal Authority. I miss seeing that great animation in my rotation. Flying twirly sword slash just doesn't feel very Paladin-y. I wish they had re-purposed the RoH animation for Atonement instead.

[Allegor]

Requiescat: Weird request but I kind of wish that instead of being a buff with a duration, it instead gave us 5 stacks with 20-30 second duration that we can spend how we see fit across a longer period of time.

I like this change. Personally I was never a fan of the Requiescat phase, it just feels...clunky, even if thematically fitting - just stand there casting Holy Spirit to the boss' face, and only 10 levels later does it even become instant while Requiescat is active. That said, Holy Spirit would need to be turned into an ability to not waste gcd using it, and I'm not good at theorycrafting to guess how would that affect the job's overall performance.