DoTs serve one main function - they allow a very high potency attack to be placed within a rotation, but because the damage happens over a period you're discouraged from spamming it.

I never saw Goring Blade as "maintain this DoT", I actually saw the visual indicator of the DoT on the target as being a kind of anchor point as to where I was in my rotation. Wasnt needed, and Goring Blade could as well have been a 600 potency attack on a 25 second cooldown and it would serve the same purpose within the rotation, but DoTs are just a nice way of doing that.

Also DoTs have the somewhat interesting gameplay choice when multiple targets are involved or adds join fights at certain points, and you have to mentally calculate whether its worth applying the dot or if the target will die too soon. Not exactly complicated, but little mini choices like that all add up to make a job interesting.

I'm not married to the idea that a paladin needs a dot, I'm just a bit concerned that they run the risk of making the rotation feel a bit TOO over simplified. I don't like the current paladin rotation - I mained Paladin until Endwalker but then swapped to Warrior as a main, so I'm keen to see if Paladin's changes make it more fun and make me swap back. But whilst I understand that a lot of players just don't like the idea of DoTs, I saw Goring Blade as a fun skill that served multiple purposes and gave an interesting set of choices and feel to the job that just a single big instant hit would not have.

It's the subtle nuances and micro choices that make a class involving, however small - look at SAM and how the removal of one single skill turned the kenki management from something that required a small bit of thought but was easy, into something that is totally mindless and spammy. I don't know if Paladin NEEDS the dot, but I hope they replace it with a more interesting ability than just a Single Big Hit.