Which DPS is the Tankiest?

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

Riddle of Earth isn't 10%, it's a 20% reduction so the difference between Shade Shift and Riddle of Earth for taking a buster is even more Monk's favor in terms of the amount of damage it can mitigate. When you factor in that Monk gets 3 charges of it, that it lasts for 4/5 seconds up to 10 seconds if you don't attack and prioritize surviving and it regenerates on a 30 second cooldown then you start to realize that it's comparable to untraited Sheltron or Heart of Stone before they got their Endwalker giga traits.

The 10% number is what it was at the end of Shadowbringers, but in that case the defense percent scaled with the number of remaining Riddle of Earth stacks you had. Immediately after popping it Monk had a 30% defensive modifier meaning it actually used to be even stronger.

Forgive me going "akchually", but actually:

Pre-5.4 it was granting a 30s duration buff if you got hit, nullifying all direction requirements and granting -10% dmg taken for 30s.

5.4 it had the following changes:

The effects of this action have been revamped. Riddle of Earth now functions as follows:

• Reduces damage taken by 10% and nullifies all action direction requirements.
• Duration: 6s
• Maximum Charges: 3
• Recast time has been reduced from 60 to 30 seconds.

This was a duration-based effect, so nothing difficult to understand here.

5.5 saw another revision of the action:

The effects of this action have been completely revamped. Riddle of Earth now functions as follows:

• Grants 3 stacks of Riddle of Earth, each stack reducing damage taken by 10% and nullifying all action direction requirements.
• Duration: 10s
• Maximum Charges: 3
• Effect ends when time expires or upon execution of three weaponskills.

The difference is that the action now let you do 3 weaponskills without positional requirements based on stacks rather than duration. This allowed for some leeway for movement while retaining stacks, but also leeway regarding how long the mitigation lasts.

Individual stacks did not increase the mitigation however, it was consistent at 10%. It simply expired after three weaponskills. The final revision was moving the 10% mitigation to 20%, which is a consolidation of the Fist Stances (Fists of Earth in this case).