[Armando]

Mal, don't be stupid. Beseiged has nothing to do with EXP, and EXP is kind of the entire point when Karinya brings up power creep. Or are you going to tell me DDs pre-2-hander change and pre-marinara pizza perform the same as after the introduction of both changes?

For every time the melees get stronger, the nukers fall even further behind in EXP.

[Yellow Mage]

Originally Posted by Malacite

That said, yeah, how about showing some PLD BLM BST & PUP love?

Hi welcome to 2009. Did you miss the massive buff sundae with the Reprisal cherry on top S-E has given Paladins over the past couple of years? Heck, they even made /PLD all the more attractive (to me) in the process!

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Yellow Mage

Hi welcome to 2009. Did you miss the massive buff sundae with the Reprisal cherry on top S-E has given Paladins over the past couple of years? Heck, they even made /PLD all the more attractive (to me) in the process!

That's funny 'cause last time I checked PLD still doesn't get invited to merit.

Originally Posted by Armando

Mal, don't be stupid. Beseiged has nothing to do with EXP, and EXP is kind of the entire point when Karinya brings up power creep. Or are you going to tell me DDs pre-2-hander change and pre-marinara pizza perform the same as after the introduction of both changes?

For every time the melees get stronger, the nukers fall even further behind in EXP.

There's going to be a shortage of players on the servers eventually and that's going to cause problems. And who said that SE can't strengthen the other jobs to balance things out?

[Balfree]

Originally Posted by Malacite

That's funny 'cause last time I checked PLD still doesn't get invited to merit.

Unfortunatly SE can't patch Idiocy.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

I don't see where PLD got massive buffs anywhere.

They got Auto-Refresh just before ToA, update to Rampart in ToA and Reprisal in WotG.

And people make a bigger deal out of reprisal than the other two, for reasons I can't even begin to comprehend. Yeah, more Shield blocks mean less damage taken and less damage lost, but additions and buffs to jobs external to PLD have helped PLD a lot more than direct buffs.

DNC's and /DNC Aspir Sambas, BRD's Pianissimo, SCH and SMN AoE defensive buffs, WHM and RDM's Haste, RDM's Refresh. A lot of this plays to the advantage of a frontline MP user, be they melees like DRK and BLU or a tank like PLD.

NIN isn't totally devoid of gaining these benefits, either. They benefit as much from Accession Stoneskin as anyone, if not the most. Some of them are so good they can keep that effect up til it wears off.

NIN's whole problem is Haste gear caught up with /NIN. We've already seen one slight nerf to equipable haste and different rules made for /NIN, but they still remain too potent and if SE were to mess with them further, they would never hear the end of it. Its something that went on so long it can't be changed.

And NIN, more or less, brought it on themselves. They got cocky, talked shit and eventually realized the subjob became too good for their own invites.

As for merit level, if I've said it once I've said it a thousand times - if your LS will not help your PLD, NIN, BLMs and others get the merits and capped EXP they need to fulfill their duties in events, then they are not a good LS to be in at all.

A good team looks out for its own and keeps each other strong. A bad team is every man for himself.

[Armando]

That's funny 'cause last time I checked PLD still doesn't get invited to merit.

Neither do BLMs, are they magically ineffective against HNMs because of that?

And who said that SE can't strengthen the other jobs to balance things out?

One, that's pure speculation, two, what does that have to do with the strength of an individual party? When you do get a party going, whether there's a shortage of players or not will be irrelevant to your kill speed. Well, not quite - if there IS a shortage of players, you won't have camp competition.

I don't see where PLD got massive buffs anywhere.

They got Auto-Refresh just before ToA, update to Rampart in ToA and Reprisal in WotG.

And people make a bigger deal out of reprisal than the other two, for reasons I can't even begin to comprehend. Yeah, more Shield blocks mean less damage taken and less damage lost, but additions and buffs to jobs external to PLD have helped PLD a lot more than direct buffs.

I think you're downplaying the impact of Auto Refresh. You're also leaving out Sentinel (which came with Rampart), Shield Mastery (came with Auto Refresh, free TP + no interrupts on shield blocks) and the change from parry-like shield blocking to the current system. You're also forgetting Atonement which is bar none one of the most ridiculous enhancements any job's gotten the ability to get. Being able to whip out 720 damage consistently on 100 TP no matter what the target while having the ability to close Light with it for an extra 720 damage's worth of hate under my name is insane. Mythic WS may not have been a job-specific update but it's pretty obvious not every Mythic WS was made the same.

That's not even going into the fact that shield proc rates were raised at the same time Shield Mastery was introduced, and only one job in the game consistently uses a shield in any sort of group setting. Most others only bother because it's silly to leave your sub slot empty. And recently they made all Circles better (+15% damage to everyone? Yes please!), so chalk up another indirect PLD buff. The only PLD JA that hasn't been improved yet is Cover, because Cover has always been awesome.

PLD has been buffed ridiculously. Every PLD update has been like Christmas. Meanwhile a lot of the other jobs were twiddling their thumbs waiting their turn to get a single update (how long did it take WHM again?)

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

I guess I just haven't forgotten how NINs were in both CoP and most of ToA. When haste and DD /NINs became more valued than they were, they started taking greater exception to PLD/NIN ability to outclass them as an endgame tank as well, even though PLD had always been doing that pretty well.

PLD updates and Group 2 merits by themselves didn't do a damn thing until external factors began to compliment and enhance them. Those combined with all our data on NIN tanking and the popularity of Haste took PLD and pushed it over the top. By the time Reprisal came around even you were saying it was icing on the cake.

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Armando

Neither do BLMs, are they magically ineffective against HNMs because of that?

BLM can at least solo for 10k+ and manaburn for 15+. Someone who's only 75 is PLD is pretty much fucked unless they have friends willing to sacrifice their XP/Hour in a merit pt.

[Armando]

I guess I just haven't forgotten how NINs were in both CoP and most of ToA. When haste and DD /NINs became more valued than they were, they started taking greater exception to PLD/NIN ability to outclass them as an endgame tank as well, even though PLD had always been doing that pretty well.

PLD updates and Group 2 merits by themselves didn't do a damn thing until external factors began to compliment and enhance them. Those combined with all our data on NIN tanking and the popularity of Haste took PLD and pushed it over the top. By the time Reprisal came around even you were saying it was icing on the cake.

I wouldn't know about the endgame scene at the time, but when I leveled PLD (pre-Reprisal) invites were through the roof. There never seemed to be enough tanks to go around, but I doubt anyone was going "there's a PLD, but let's wait a bit more and see if a NIN shows up."

And yeah, I was (and still kinda am) going "Wow wtf why am I getting updated again" when Reprisal came out.

BLM can at least solo for 10k+ and manaburn for 15+.

Highly irrelevant. You can't claim PLD hasn't been buffed to hell and back just because it doesn't fall into merit party setups. You also can't assert that a job's performance in a very specific party format indicates how badly it needs buffing. Otherwise you're asserting that WHM and SCH need to be buffed until they're as desired as RDM.

[hexx]

PLD may not get to merit, but it still pulls in a shit-ton of exp in Campaign if you go /dnc. I mean, the amount is ridiculous! In a single, long campaign battle, I pulled in close to 10k exp trading in my tags ever so often, so if a PLD cant dedicate the time to keep his/her buffer capped, then thats just laziness on their part, and really shouldnt be playing the job.

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Armando

Highly irrelevant.

No it's not, as (at least for me) the discussion is about the job's power level with relevance to EXP/Merits. 3 Minute Sentinel on a 4:10 recast would probably be enough to get PLD into merit parties, and make tanking in generally a lot easier (and make PLD less dependent on a healer class, something I've been advocating for a long time)

And any halfwit can max out their EXP in campaign if they put effort into. The only difference for PLD is they can old their own much better in a 1 on 1 scenario. It's easier for them to cap their EXP in campaign yes, but that's hardly something to write home about.

[Armando]

Mal: PLD does EXCELLENTLY 1-74. Everybody wants you. Then merit parties happen and suddenly no invites. What do you think needs to be fixed?

Also lol @ 4:10 Sentinel, that's not going to get PLD invited. People want DDs. You're just screwing with other areas of the game to fix a very specific phenomenon that doesn't need to be addressed with job re-balancing. It needs to be addressed by LETTING ALTERNATIVE PARTY SETUPS COMPETE WITH MERIT MELEEBURNS IN EXP/HOUR.

Your argument is comparable to "Wow, Ice Spikes is the shit, but it doesn't work on this NM. ICE SPIKES NEEDS MORE BUFFS."

Suppose you buff the fuck out of PLD (instead of buffing jobs that actually need help.) What then? The other jobs still aren't getting invited into merits and you probably broke PLD at endgame. Whoops.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

If all things become equal, then all things lose specialization. Mal, you're asking PLD to be buffed for a situation. Shit is situational. You don't fit the situation by normal means, so you have to find your own way of working around it. If your LS won't back your PLD, that's one problem, but the other glaring problem is your lack of making your own PTs.

I have a dirty little secret regarding BST, its partly why I don't make the effort to build PTs and deal with the lack of invites. See, that dirty little secret is that even though we've lost camps and get fucked in certain zones, we can solo in places with far more lucrative rewards than FoV can offer. Places that scare the shit out of most of you. Field caskets and gil rewards are nice, but I can live with slower EXP if I'm soloing things with better drops in dungeons.

BST is slow, but pays extremely well if you play your cards right. Its really the only reason I just sit back and take the rest of the abuse this job gets. I never have leveled a job that sustained its own armor and weapon needs this well (well I'll concede COR, RNG and SCH get a lot good quested/NM stuff, but it still helps tremedously). I've never had to BC up gil for BST specifically, which allowed me to use seals toward all of my other jobs. BST has been the breadwinner.

This is likely why we BSTs are a lot more quiet than SMNs about our numerous issues. So long as your inner-loot whore is sated, its amazing how much shit you can put up with. That's where the scales balance out for me.

If you absolutely cannot find a place that works for your PLD and satisfies you, then perhaps its time to give PLD up.

[Vevau]

As someone with rdm and blm levelled I can see some interesting evolith based augments if the SE let the people who designed the Fey stuff out of their cupboard again.

On the more fun topic, Pld is more than powerful enough, hence why it has retaken the endgame tanking crown from nin/drk and nin/rdm. Though why SE used rdm/nin tanks on AV I suspect we'll never know. The lack of invites at merit level is a bit of a problem but frankly, unless you are a sam, war, drg (sometimes), brd, cor or rdm (sometimes) merit parties don't seem to want you. With Campaign and Level Sync and/or a few friends, pld is more than capable of keeping a respectable buffer and I'm relying on my experience as rdm in Campaign dealing damage, taking it and curing all of which pld/dnc frankly does better.

[Electricity Gone Human]

I lol'd hard.

Just had to do it.