The Paladin's vocation is to protect his team by attracting enemies to him. He should therefore expect to take punches and show courage and patience throughout his career.
Informations
The role of the Paladin is to Thoughts.
You can get the Paladin job with Gladiator at level 30 and Elementalist at level 15.
Gameplay style
The Paladin is a much better tank on single target. Usually, a Warrior is preferred over enemy packs. The reason is that the paladin has very few AoE actions or cone attacks that significantly increase your enmity (aggro, or hate, there are many terms for attracting the attention of the monster on you) unlike the Warrior.
At level 50, you have Flash and Circle of Doom.
The safest way to make enmity on a pack is to use them as often as possible and do your usual three Actions combo while trying to put one Wild Blade and Halone's Rage on just about all the monsters in the pack.
If you lose enmity on an enemy, you don't really have a chance to regain it quickly, the best Actions being Taunt followed by Ranged Shield Throw. If like me you play with good big DPS that sends more than pie, it is not always easy to keep the enmity on 4 enemies at the same time if the DPS is doing massive area damage.
The Paladin is based on his ability to reduce damage through parades and blockages with your bouclier.
There are roughly 2 types of shields: small ones that block more often but less hard, and large shields that block harder but less often. Make your choice ?
Statistics
The important stats in order for the Paladin are:
- La Vitality (Increase your HP)
- La Strength (reduces the damage you take when parrying or blocking an attack and increases your damage which will be used to keep enmity more easily)
- La Dexterity (The DEX, allows you to increase the rate of parries and blockages)
- Critical / Determination / Liveliness / Parade (Critical as the name suggests is used to crit more often than your white strikes, your actions or your heals. Determination increases the power of your attacks, your critics, your heals and your white strikes. decreases the GCD. Finally, Parry increases the parry rate and not the number of damage reduced)
In summary:
- For Statistics: VIT> FOR> DEX
- For Materia: VIT> STR> DEX> Parry> Critical / Determination> Vivacity
There is a big debate between the Parade or the DEX. According to the formulas that can be found here and there on the web and in my experience, the DEX seems to bear fruit faster than the Parade.
The Paladin's Actions
First, there are those inherited from the Gladiator:
- Lv. 1: Swift Blade
- Lv2: Bulwark
- Lv4: Savage Blade
- Lv. 6: Bitter Combat
- Nv.8 : Flash
- Lv. 10: Convalescence
- Lv. 12: Raging Blade
- Lv.15: Shield Throw
- Lv. 18: Shield Bash
- Nv.22 : Provocation
- Nv. 26: Rage de Halone
- Lv. 30: Shield Riposte
- Lv. 34: Diligence
- Lv. 38: Sentinel
- Lv. 42: Will of Steel
- Lv. 46: Fortress
- Lv.50: Circle of Fate
And actions specific to the job:
- Lv. 30: Sword Oath
- Lv. 35: Cover
- Lv.40: Oath of the Shield
- Lv. 45: Inner Spirits
- Lv.50: Invincible
Traits of the Paladin:
- Lv.8: Improved Vitality I
- Lv.14: Improved Bulwark
- Lv.16: Improved Vitality II
- Lv.20: Improved Flash
- Lv. 24: Improved Vitality III
- Lv. 28: Relentless Combat Improved
- Lv. 32: Improved Convalescence
- Lv. 36: Improved Shield Bash
- Lv.40: Halone's Rage Improved
- Lv. 44: Improved Diligence
- Lv. 48: Sentinel Improved
Talents from the other 2 classes (ELM and MRD)
Some are situational, others must be equipped all the time.
Remember that with a job, you are limited to 5 Talents from the other 2 classes.
- Happiness
I want to say: essential even if the care is mediocre both in terms of HPs returned and in terms of the increase in aggro. But it's not uncommon for me to finish bosses from 20% to 0% without a Healer and with only 1 DPS. I find it difficult and more or less to treat myself so I think it remains profitable.
- Watch
INDISPENSABLE
Increases your Defense by 20% for 20 seconds and available every 120 seconds
- Bain de sang
Indispensable in my eyes. Usually I use Fierce Combat and Bloodbath on bosses after my first spin to build haste.
Clear:
I open with: Shield Throw> Swift Blade> Savage Blade> (Macros buffs below) x2> Halone's Rage> Fracture
Especially since Bloodbath and Relentless Combat have the same CD.
- Bouclier
Can be useful solo, not useful in a group.
- Fracture
A good little DoT for the haste, coupled with Bloodbath allows you to add a HP regen.
- Fri
Situational. Knowing that you will not be able to use it in combat.
- Coup de Grâce
In my eyes, almost useless because to be profitable, you have to deliver the final blow to recover VPs.
Basically, it could have been used on large packs of mobs for a free heal but too complicated to place.
- Breastplate
I think this Talent can have its place on your action bar.
Situation: the boss is preparing a very specific movement, you know that you are going to take a lot of money in a few seconds (like a flying dragon or something nice like that), you blow your breastplate and immediately it relieves a little.
How does a fight over trash in Paladin go?
Basically the enemies are far away, I use my Macro Assist (below)> Shield Throw> Macro AoE x2> Combo hate CaC (below)> Macro AoE x2
I try as much as possible to place Savage Blade and Halone's Rage on all enemies in order to maximize my haste on all.
If there are more than 2 monsters in the pack, I use a Macro Defense defensive action (below)
If the Healer does not follow, I heal myself by activating Convalescence before.
As soon as I change targets (usually before the current enemy dies) I restart my cycle from Macro Assist.
Combo Hate au CaC : Swift Blade> Savage Blade> Halone's Rage
How does a single target fight go?
Macro Assist (below)> Shield Throw> CaC hate combo (below)> Fracture.
Positioning of enemies is ULTRA important.
As the game progresses, you will know the skills of mobs by heart. If he does Cone Attacks, AoE damage, if it's stunnable (if we can interrupt it), if we can silence.
As a precaution, we face our group so that the back of the mob is in front of your teammates while keeping a reasonable distance.
If you can't stun / silence for some reason and in the case of a cone or zone attack, you stop whatever you're doing and get out of the danger zone. As soon as it disappears, we do not wait for the animation of the enemy's skill to take place, we return directly to its place.
The goal of the maneuver: not to cause stress for the Healer and to help the Monk and Dragon Knight type DPS as much as possible to maintain their DPS cycle which is based on their position in relation to the monster.
Look around, read your chatlog!
A bad tank isn't just a player equipped with crepe paper, he's a non-attentive guy. If you don't read your chatlog and look around, you are going to miss out on what is expected of you. Example: mob damage losses, involuntary aggro losses from a teammate not managed by the tank, etc ...
And yet it is so easy to avoid by having a global vision.
Even if you have to break your cycle, to stun a mob with Shield Bash on a big skill that might give the Healer a little too much work, do it!
A well-placed stun can save your life.
Knowing that in some fights, the Paladin's job will be to stun a certain skill throughout the fight.
Be careful though, our stun is expensive because no CD but it is on your GCD, so manage as well as possible. Usually, when I'm in a fight where my only job is to stun, I put myself in DPS (Sword Oath) stance and stall a "DPS" cycle only when the mob in question uses another skill than I do. must not interrupt, in order to keep my Shield Bash available to interrupt what I must interrupt.
Combo Hate au CaC : Swift Blade> Savage Blade> Halone's Rage
Coverage is it for who, why and when?
Personally, on trash, I prefer to use Cover on the Healer.
I place it in Focus (not available on PS3 by the way) and my Cover launches the action on
If I see that melee DPS is usually expensive often, I put it on that DPS.
During boss fights, I usually change focus often enough to relieve the Healer.
On specific fights of the Ifrit Brutal, Chimera type, if I am the interrupting tank, I place Cover on the main tank and use it as soon as it is available if the tank has low health.
The Secret Boot of a Good Paladin
Consos!
It's stupid but having potions to heal yourself, surrender MPs, transfer an alteration, it can do more than serve, it can allow you to catch up with a fight that was totally barred.
A Paladin not too badly equipped with consumables is able to finish a boss with only 1 DPS and without a Healer. Think about it?
Macros
- Macro AoE
/ macroicon "Circle of Destiny"
/ ac "Circle of Fate"
/ac Flash
- Macro Defense
/ macroicon Sentinels
/ ac Sentinel
/ and Aguet
/ ac Rempart
- Macro Assist tank
/ mk triangle
/wait 0.5
/p Combat [] => /ta
- Macro Buffs
/ macroicon "Bloodbath"
/ ac "Bitter fight"
/ ac "Bloodbath"
- Macro Coverage
/ macroicon Cover
/ ac Cover
/wait 0.1
/ p Cover on
