Quote Originally Posted by Cenewulf View Post
I like the later as well. Paladins in almost every MMO have had the role of being on the front lines taking the all the damage while everyone else with their axes and pew pews take down the bad guys. Basically its supposed to be like a small war: You dont go up against an army (in a medieval or medieval fantasy) setting with no shield wall thats just dumb. Paladin is meant to be that shield wall that keeps them busy while the spears and archers (dps classes) are busy firing and stabbing away.
Likewise, the paladin can use their combination of holy magic and melee prowess to kick ass and take names. Granted, I don't expect a Final Fantasy paladin (not named Agrias) to be anything like that, but it is potential that should be kept in mind.

Aye, like I said in my post on the previous page that gap in base damage is growing. Part of PLD's hate gaining abilities are attributed to the damage it can deal on Spirits/Flat Blade combos, weak damage = weak returns no matter the modifier. Hate gaining JA's are static so they're gonna grow weaker against DPS's Damage as levels rise, and if FFXI has taught us anything about game mechanics is static values can't compete after a point in the game. So the only thing you can do without overhauling the system itself is boost the overall base damage of a weapon to a comparable level with other weapons so at least a job with no DD abilities can at least function at an appropriate level and allow GLA who has access to DD capabilities to become a somewhat competent DD.
Pulling something from my years spent tanking in WoW, I remember that pally tanks had more attacks with additional effects and a lot of the stuff they did to hold aggro involved holy magic. A warrior had to spam Sunder Armor to get 5 stacks, Heroic Strike as a TP/Rage dump, Revenge/Phalanx after any dodge/block/parry (Hint hint...), and Thunderclap/Circle Blade (hint hint hint...). Pally's had to use Consecrate, Holy Shield (kind of like a version of Punishing Barbs, but procced only on shield blocks), and Hammer of the Righteous (think Fast Blade cooldown, but could hit up to three targets in front of you).

What I'm getting at is that if WARs DPS while tanking comes from physical sources, then maybe PLDs DPS while tanking can come from more magic-related things. I'm beginning to formulate a redesign of GLA, and as soon as I'll finishg it I will troll the GLA forums with that. =P