Pld, More Than Just Mitigation. (sticky please =P)

[LordBiGGs]

pld, is definitely not a simple job. anymore i do find it easy, but not simple. it definitely takes some getting used to and it is incredibly important for a tank to be skilled and wearing fully upgraded gear.

most pld's realize that damage mitigation is obviously very important. lessening the damage you take is a major responsibility. using food wearing and good gear can easily help lower damage taken.

damage mitigation isn't what pld's have a problem with, but that is only half of the job. the just as important, possibly more important part of the job is hate control. this is also the much more challenging part of the job. provoking is simple, casting flash also simple, defender, rampart, sentinel all simple, but pld's can't forget the importance of healing themselves. healing is used to take some hate off the mage and put it on you, not just for the HP itself. if you notice a mob never turns from you, you may want to try healing less so you lower downtime, but only lessen it to the point where you heal the least while keeping hate. i personally have cut back on healing myself simply to keep chains going longer.

another aspect of hate control many pld's simply dont realize is acc+. in exp parties, once a pld has his AF, the enmity+ is very helpful. the easiest way to make enmity+ kick in more is by hitting more often. if you miss an attack the enmity+ doesnt work, however if you hit for 1 you still get that same enmity+ as hitting for 100 (not including hate from damage.) so many pld's simply dont understand this. they wear their iron muskateer gorgets and royal knight belts thinking thats the best. they dont realize a life belt is far beyond a RK belt and a royal guards collar or mermans gorget is far beyond an IM gorget.

i've even switched out my drone earring for an assault earring. i havent noticed much of a difference in the criticals i take. the 3 def loss basically nonexistant, as is the evasion -2. the attack+ lower the chances that i will hit for 0 and acc+ means enmity+ will kick in more.

remember, even if the acc+ makes you take a little more damage (usually very very little) it is much better than a mage getting it, a mob turning on a SATA or the mob running away in the middle of a skillchain. Pld isn't a just great because of its damage mitigation, especially since nin's can out do us in that department, we're great because mobs stick to us.

[JP_Ikari]

I think a lot of people has said that accu is the issue once we get to the Torama's Lord Biggs, but it's always nice to see people reminding it to everyone that's below 60 (like me). But again, I wanna play around with the RK collar and IM Gorget cause the Gorget gives me 15HP too, not just VIT.

JP

[Asherek]

Originally posted by JP_Ikari
I think a lot of people has said that accu is the issue once we get to the Torama's Lord Biggs, but it's always nice to see people reminding it to everyone that's below 60 (like me). But again, I wanna play around with the RK collar and IM Gorget cause the Gorget gives me 15HP too, not just VIT.

JP

For regular exping, HP shouldn't be as much of a concern as either damage mitigation (DEF/VIT) or Accuracy/Attack (to keep hate better) for a Paladin.

[Anakron]

Originally posted by LordBiGGs
i've even switched out my drone earring for an assault earring. i havent noticed much of a difference in the criticals i take. the 3 def loss basically nonexistant, as is the evasion -2. the attack+ lower the chances that i will hit for 0 and acc+ means enmity+ will kick in more.Although I see your point, I'm not sure I agree with your argument. Basically, you're saying that the drawbacks from the Assault Earring aren't noticeable, whereas the extra attack and accuracy will help. Well, I'm sure the benefits from the attack and accuracy are there, but then again, so are the drawbacks.

The question you should ask is "But do I notice that I hit for 0 less, and that I hit more often?" And I don't think anybody can really see a difference, outside of a parser.

Generally speaking, you're saying "I don't care much about the drawbacks, because I don't really notice them. But the benefits are definitely good, because they're there."

My point is that the benefits probably aren't noticeable either, and that the drawbacks are definitely there as well.

I'm not debating whether an Assault Earring is better or worse than a Drone Earring, I'm just saying that your analysis and reason for using the Assault Earring is inherently flawed, and that one should not think like that while debating between gear choices.

[Ridill]

Assault Earring isn't worth it imo. The difference is too hard to notice unless you parse.

Also, the races that would need Assault Earring are coincidentally the same races that need Drone Earring. So unless assault earrings are dirt cheap, I'd advise to those considering purchasing one to stick with Drone Earring. Life Belt and Royal Guards collar are good enough to give a decent hit percentage, of course, I haven't tanked torama's yet either.

[JP_Ikari]

Originally posted by Asherek
For regular exping, HP shouldn't be as much of a concern as either damage mitigation (DEF/VIT) or Accuracy/Attack (to keep hate better) for a Paladin.

I'm agreeing with him in a lot of things Ash, but that's why i said I wanna play around with both IM gorget and RK collar. I mean, IM Gorget gives me Def +15 (granted, def isn't as vital as VIT since VIT is the one that determines damage mitigation), but it also gives me +1VIT, +15HP while the RK collar gives me +6DEF, +4accu and Atk. That's why I said, I will play around with both just to see if it will help me on it. I pointed out the +hp cause I like that as much as I like the +vit part (even though I was hoping it's +2 more than normal).

JP

[LordBiGGs]

IM gorget is only 7def, but yea...

for assault earring i look at it percentage wise. lose 3 def (without any buffs whatsoever, thats less than 1%, about .9%) get attack +5 (with no buffs thats about 2%).

with defender on 3 def becomes about .6% while attack+5 is about 2.5%.

evasion -2 is about 1% of my evasion, while i cannot see my acc stat i think 2 acc is more than 1%.

this is really just speculation. i feel drone earring is a very good choice and if you dont have a bunch of extra gil, the better choice (mercenary earring is definitely my choice for earring 1). the assault earring is in no way my focus in this thread. however, i would like to thank those that have replied for having a nice discussion, free of flaming or comments with no support.

[Anakron]

Originally posted by LordBiGGs
evasion -2 is about 1% of my evasion, while i cannot see my acc stat i think 2 acc is more than 1%.Paladins have a higher sword skill than evasion skill, so for a constant c, c accuracy will constitute a lower percentage of total accuracy than c evasion will total evasion. For example, my sword skill is 178, whereas my evasion skill is 166 (both are capped). Therefore, the 2 accuracy will be around 1.1236% of my total accuracy (less if you count my life belt). 2 evasion is about 1.205% of my total evasion.

The attack bonus from the earring will most likely be a higher percentage than the defense lost, though.

Not trying to nitpick here, just want to clear things up.

EDIT: I assumed evasion and accuracy are directly related to their respective skills.

[modnar]

Originally posted by Anakron

EDIT: I assumed evasion and accuracy are directly related to their respective skills.

I would think it was Evasion vs. (Skill of Weapon being used), rather than Evasion vs. Accuracy...

[Anakron]

Originally posted by modnar
I would think it was Evasion vs. (Skill of Weapon being used), rather than Evasion vs. Accuracy... Yes, but accuracy is determind by the weapon skill (I read somewhere that it's 0.75 accuracy before a certain skill level, and then 1.00 accuracy for every skill level after that. In the above example, I assumed 1.00 for every skill level). And the earring reduces evasion, not evasion skill; the latter is supposedly better.

So...I was most likely wrong in my post above. :p

[SonRyoga]

At level 75, with my equipment being my HNM equipment with a few changes:

Koenig Schaller
Adaman Cuirass
Koenig Handschuhs
Adaman Cuisses
Crimson Greaves
Behemoth Mantle
Fenrir's Stone
Cassie Earring
Bloodbead Earring
Bomb Queen Ring
Jelly Ring
Joyeuse
Koenig Shield
Forest Sash

I can sit in an EXP party in King Ramperres' Tomb without doing anything extensive to boost my accuracy to hold hate. I take, generally. 70 points of damage or less per shot. Also, if I'm wanted in a skillchain, I can also simply change my equipment slighty, putting on my Scorpion Harness, Life Belt, Optical Hat, AF gloves and gain 35 (I gain my -10 dex back) accuracy, and my damage taken jumps up by an entirety of 10-20, making my per hit taken still less than 100. However, I don't miss often with the +35 accuracy, and my joyuese double attack ratio is upwards of 50%. My TP is easily ahead of most jobs, and I can open darkness or light skillchains. I just feel that at lower levels, you can't really get away with the changes I was using, but I would definately tell every PLD to use a Life Belt before 75/HNMing. I would not tell them to put on an assault earring, simply because its more money than its worth for PLD.

Your first priority is to hold hate - someone else can cure you, but you can't have someone else hold hate for you, THF and /THF don't give you enough hate to last the whole battle unless the fight is abnormally short. Curing yourself for hate is always a good idea, but when you don't take much damage, its a little bit harder to do, cure others with that MP of yours if you're having hate issues, many monsters use AoE.

I'd like to think that good PLDs shouldn't need to rely on +emnity and THFs though...I'm holding hate fine with just the emnity from my pants and adaman body...and I often take off the adaman cuirass in EXP groups when I'm fighting the VTs in KRT or Ro'Maeve.

[savant]

another thing you missed is mp control. as pld you should also keep your MP balanced with your main healer. if your main healer drops you should spend more. and also control your mp and use tp to control chains. what i use to do was save 200+ tp for chain2 and 5 to help kill a bit faster.