Shield Skill

[Rai]

Is it just me or do any of you feel Shield Skill is somehow broken. We PLDs have an A+ in Shield yet no PLD I know has capped it at any level. I'm sure after level 75 it must cap sometime.

Do you know of any other job that has an A+ skill that goes uncapped?

[Laehn]

I know someone who spent like a month capping his shield and parry skill. Best pld i ever partied with. It helped a lot, he never needed much healing aside from what he could provide himself with the help of ballad.

I think SE had in mind it being more difficult to lvl making it easier to cap those combat skills. Whms have the same problem with healing and divine magic to a degree, at least i do when lvling mine.

[ZQM]

I feel your pain, I've been leveling Parrying up on my WAR for my NIN, and got a whole .7 in 2 days (with +32 Parrying Skill equipment and ~+10 AGI).

However, you don't know horrible until you try leveling gaurding. :p

[modnar]

Originally posted by ZQM

However, you don't know horrible until you try leveling gaurding. :p

AMEN!!
At least a Paladin USES the shield while in an exp party. A Monk is almost never a tank and therefore does not get to use gaurd...

Oh my ... flashback to some of the most extended "training" I went through trying to lvl my Monk's gaurd....

[Leon]

On an old PLD char of mine i never had any trouble keeping shield capped, that accnt died @lvl51 so anything after that i dunno how fast itd go...

on a side note....


75 whm with shield capped D:\ :sweat:

[Cedric]

Just load up on evasion - eq when you go for skill up pts. I have like -27 or something in evasion loss equipment and pretty much gets rid of me evading attacks. Without having to worry about evasion you increase your chances of a parry/sheild check so it helps quite a bit for skill up. Then again, the mages have to heal you more, but screw them.

[Azurea]

I agree, shield skill is vrey hard to try and cap

[perry]

Originally posted by Laehn
I know someone who spent like a month capping his shield and parry skill.

If you know how he did it, share with us. Specifics please.

[Justarius]

Shield skill is useless in most HMN fights, unless you can figure out how to hold a Staff in one hand and a sheild in another.... actually, I could do that IRL :rolleyes:

[Ariesknight]

Hehe, my Shield is nowhere near capping, but I do shield block relativly often in xp PT's. My Divine went from 17 skill lvl at lvl 37----->capping by lvl 55 at 173 or something. The wonders of Flash. Sadly Protect III doesn't do any wonders for my Enhancing skill of 18. ;_;

BTW Is Holy worth getting @ 30K a scroll? What is it's damage like for a PLD with capped Divine on xp targets? Does it produce significant hate?

[Vavara]

Originally posted by Ariesknight
BTW Is Holy worth getting @ 30K a scroll? What is it's damage like for a PLD with capped Divine on xp targets? Does it produce significant hate?

Against XP mobs, its not worth the MP. You'll deal a most 150 Damage for 100 MP, and you could generate a hell of alot more hate with cures with the same amount of MP.

Its for show only.

[Asherek]

Originally posted by Justarius
Shield skill is useless in most HMN fights, unless you can figure out how to hold a Staff in one hand and a sheild in another.... actually, I could do that IRL :rolleyes:

I've seen a video of a 75 PLD with near capped Shield Skill tanking Genbu with Sword+Shield, he was literally Shield Blocking/Parrying so often that I can see using that over using an Earth Staff if you have them capped or near capped.

[LordBiGGs]

my shield skill is pretty high. i played thf to 18 when i first started using a dagger and shield, not that i was really tanking or anything. i played war to 30 using sword and shield. as a pld i've used sword and shield the entire time (a little bit of earth staff but not much.)

the main reasons why my shield skill is pretty high is i'm constantly helping people with quests and from lvl 50-55 i kept getting really bad parties and dying a lot. i would die like 3 or 4 times a lvl increasing the amount of battles and skill ups...not that i wanted to do that or would suggest it.

my main suggestion is help people with quests. not only will they probably help you when you need it, but if the enemies are a decent lvl, you can skill up.

[Tifa]

Some skills are just ridiculously hard to cap out. I've been lv75 Whm for over 3 months now, and just 2 days ago I finally capped Healing Magic. Ridiculous. I imagine Pld shield skill is the same or harder than healing was for me.

[Soraan]

I think my shield is like 20-30 away from cap still @75... I need to check... I block and parry with Fafnir a good bit (as well as intimidate him some), but I know it's not capped. Is it like weapons in that it has to be EP-DC+ to skill shield up? Or can you do it on any ole mob?

[modnar]

It has to be done on a mob which is greater or equal the lvl you would be to have the shield capped at where the shield skill is right now...

Did that make sense?

Like lets say you are lvl 40, but your shield is at combat skill 63. The cap for combat skill 63 is at lvl 20. So any mob that is lvl 20+ will bring your shield up.

Hope that made more sense.

Btw: If you are lvling Shield/Parry, may I suggest using a lvl 1 subjob. That way your AGI will be as low as it possibly can go. And Monk has the lowest AGI statistic, so ...

[ClydeArrowny]

Actually, I'm pretty certain AGI affects shield/parry rate.

[Balgas]

:o
As we all know, if you're going to make a thesis statement, you must have sufficient evidence or research to back up your claim. The before statement has neither.

Please, I beg of you, no more one liners that contribute nothing but assumptions and rumors. :rolleyes:

[Grizzlebeard]

The moon is made of cheese. :p

[ClydeArrowny]

As we all know, if you're going to make a thesis statement, you must have sufficient evidence or research to back up your claim. The before statement has neither.


Btw: If you are lvling Shield/Parry, may I suggest using a lvl 1 subjob. That way your AGI will be as low as it possibly can go. And Monk has the lowest AGI statistic, so ...
In above statement modnar is implying shield skill rates will raise if you lower AGI without showing any evidence.

Actually, I'm pretty certain AGI affects shield/parry rate.
The above statement is something every pld in my LS I've discussed it with has noticed. On my thf, I notice a big difference in these rates between +0 and+40 AGI when fighting mobs that give ~72 exp solo. I have not run any tests on this, but I doubt the above poster has run tests on lowering AGI to increase skill up rates.
I figured stating this might prevent someone from just blindly following the above poster's assumption that lowering AGI will increase skill ups and possibly determine on their own what works best since he did not show clear evidence himself. I'm personally not up to running tests though as im running a high fever with the flu and have been the past few days.