~First And Final Line Of Defense V2.0~

Node 231

Great job on the updated Paladin guide.

SE removed(or changed) the gear enmity+ cap. And didn't tell us what the new one was. But it's certainly not +100 anymore.

MAX ACC set: PLD can't equip Ej necklace. grounded mantle +1 is a substantially stronger acc piece than Letalis and comes with 2% haste.

CDC. I'm getting Fotia > Chiner's+1. Carried fTP on CDC now.

EDIT: Also, no Requiescat set? While it's no longer PLDs staple WS, it's still a useful tool vs physically resistant mobs.

Ah, forgot the Requiescat set, I'll add that. As for the belt I was curious because I tried all kinds of setups and Chiner's+1 kept pulling ahead of Fotia Belt... Will edit the necklace and acc back. Also, didn't know they changed the Enmity cap. Did they raise or lower it?

Thanks for the input!

*edit: I'll change up the spreadsheet a bit. Chiner's +1 pulls ahead when fighting Tojil with minimum buffs and spamming CDC at 1000 TP.

I'll look up the update notes regarding the enmity cap and post them here in a min.

More CDC thoughts. When latent is active, which is about 58.3%~ of the time, Lugra Earring/+1 is best in slot for CDC. Both slots. Even with minimum unity rank, the NQ beats moonshade

However, the other 41.7% of the time they're just inv-1. Although, with max unity rank, either would match Trux as a TP earring with latent down, then stomp it with latent up.

Regarding the belt, surprisingly, Fortia wasn't a ton ahead in my comparison either. I suppose it's close enough that either is an option. which seems... really odd considering the carried http://fTP.

But anyway, I'd tend to go with Fotia in anycase. Cause I already carry it, and my poor inv is so screwed. lol. And there's also that delicious cahnce to not expend TP.

If they're close enough for differing buffs to change the winner, perhaps list one or the other as an alternative?

Well, they didn't say much about it. but.

from the Aug 12, 2014 (JST) Version Update
I don't think anyone has bothered testing for the new cap.

Is Excal still #1DPS under Burtgang...compared to say an Alluvion Sword with 20acc, 4DA and 17 base dmg?(has like 40ish more dmg than Excal)

I kinda doubt it is. But I haven't bothered to run it through te spreadsheet.

And also, the spreadsheet doesn't account for Excal add effect procs. which makes it harder to say.

Also for MDT...if you have Aegis and Shell 4/5, then you don't need MOST of that MDT gear. I would opt for MDB gear.

Mesyohi Slacks
Ostro Greaves
Lunette Ring
Lunette Ring +1
Coatl Gorget +1(or the new absorb neck from unity)
Gavialis Helm(same MDB as Cizin but tremendous M.eva)
Engulfer Mantle +1
Sanare Earring
Spellbreaker Earring

Your MDT set would be better suited for ochain MDT set

Also Fotia has Conserve TP+7 and Accuracy which could be more benefitial.

Atonement set lists Karieyh ring... Most other sets list Vocane ring. Since we can only have one, can alternate sets be shown excluding Vocane as a choice?

with 50% DT and burtang why even bother using ochain?, just toss in Aegis and you can just stand there and laugh through everything the mob toss at you.

Yes, the MDT set needs a little work simply because I personally use the DT set so I just kind of threw this MDT together without much thought. Even so, you want to cap MDT before moving onto MDB. You could have GS check for appropriate buffs and equip MDT/MDB gear appropriately.

Because even at 50% DT the damage mitigation from blocking, which Ochain excels at, is still a huge chunk of -dmg that you're not taking. If that made since...

Majority of these sets are shown as MAX sets. Not ideal or even possible to carry everything shown. Alternatives to Vocane Ring would be Dark Ring with -6% PDT/MDT/BDT depending on situation or Patricius Ring for -5% PDT.

I'm a lazy pld, *** macro in/out ochain and aegis. at 50% dt and aegis decent block rate, nothing even show threat to pld except maybe AA EV VD that incarnate move. btw if you have burtang its 68% pdt, Also Priwen might be the best choice if you tanking facing away a mob that only deal physical damage because of the enhance phalanx stat but you'll loose the Vit from Ochain so I'm not sure which will be better.

The more I consider this the more I agree this is likely the most beneficial way. Each user can back out what they lack. Thank you for your hard work!

Aegis' block rate on current content is anything but decent. Take a lvl 126 mob in woh gates. That's the highest lvl stuff where we can accurately check what lvl they are, NMs being a pain about it. Aegis? 11.91% block rate at 432 skill. So, toss in reprisal. 11.91*1.5 =17.86% block rate. That amounts to about -14.4% avg dmg reduction.

Ochain? 70.23% block rate on the same mobs. Add reprisal and you cap. Puts Ochain at -66% dmg reduction.

Aegis is not in a good place in terns of physical dmg reduction. The poor grumpy *** needs an iLVL update.

Ignoring Chyula's........ Rather short sighted comment about Aegis and Ochain Blockrates, isn't Priwen better than Ochain for Block Rate with Reprisal up?

Maybe replace the Creed Collar with the Coatl Gorget +1 in the idle set if inventory permits? Unless there's a benefit to the collar that I'm missing of course.

I already said I'm a lazy pld, and I never question the block rate of an Ochain. its my play style that I don't make macro for every damn spell and ability, I flip through manual and I can't hit switch shield macro when I'm flipping manual for other shits. I agree the optimal is switching out shield when call for, but my point is when there is no physical damage that can bring my hp to danger there is no point for me to do the extra work. Blocking an attack is nice but right now in game nothing is hitting hard and fast enough for me to even bother putting on Ochain, when the 50% DT gear is more than enough to tank. I don't even have to bring burtang into the equation, I can just toss on Aegis and laugh at both physical and magical damage without worrying I will hit that switch macro before the mob finish casting or not.

As for Aegis's block rate I really don't care that much, its just icing on the cake if it do proc. The only time I use ochain is for DM2.

I don't think anyone here mentioned needing to make any macros for switching shields. I do have macros just in case but the need is so rare I end up switching them in the equip screen or typing out the command.

And switching shields in the middle of battle shouldn't be hard if you can just laugh off damage like you're saying as it shouldn't be urgent to do so.

Priwen is stronger in overall dmg reduction with reprisal up. Owing to a very high block dmg- and nearly Ochain-esque block rate with reprisal.

A couple of things to note though. Priwen does NOT cap block rate. Even when it should be able to easily based on current block rate and the strength of its reprisal bonus. It still doesn't cap. Not really sure why. Very high, but not capped.

This means that Ochain still holds an advantage in reliability. It can prevent dangerous spike dmg from unblocked hits/ws that are potential PLD killers. Also means Ochain is still the only shield that can 100% prevent physical ws additional effects.

The other concern is anything that prevents Reprisal from being full timed. Being slowed, haste buffs or reprisal itself being dispelled, etc. Should anything happen to reprisal, Priwen drops substantially below Ochain defensively.

That being said, if you can maintain good conditions, Priwen is a powerful and easy to acquire shield option.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to convince you to change your play style. You said one thing I felt the need to address, incase you perhaps didn't realize, or some poor noob read that and believed it. That would be this.
I don't see Aegis' block rate as decent. But as you said, you don't care. Carry on.

Seems like ochain will eventually falter as mob ilvl increases, forcing us to start eventually using ilvl shields

Agreed. Although S-E was forced to update REM weapons, PLDs still have to deal with their original plan to phase out older shields that worked with horizontal progression in favour of vertical progression instead.

On the other hand, it does give S-E the opportunity for new shield designs and gimmicks to keep things fresh.

Ochain is pretty OP, just for the shield mastery and virtually capped block rate alone. The fact that it scales down vs high lvl mobs, does that bely a hidden +shield skill? Martel, did you ever nail down ochain's mechanics and if svallin with its 100+ skill and +10 block rate could even compare?

Most plds want a 119 ochain, complety disregarding the fact that 99% of plds are rocking a lvl 90 ochain. Plates and rifts will bottleneck plds further without a suitable replacement shield. However if they make ilvl ochain and aegis and pit us against 130-140 mobs(after they raise ilvl), a hypothetical 128aegis with 65 defense and 130 shield skill might be better than a 99 ochain against future lv140+ mobs perhaps? Idk

I'm still a little bitter that we didnt get 10 shield skill as a gift, instead we got shield mastery. Says it raises tp by 3 so instead of 63 on a shield block we get 66 which is virtually unnoticable considering that's 6.3 vs 6.6 tp under the old tp system paradigm.

The only time even a perfectly augmented Svalinn will approach Ochain is when fighting trash/lower content lvl mobs with reprisal up.

I don't know why ppl keep saying crap like "Hidden skill+" or whatever about Ochain. It's a size 6 shield. Different shield sizes have different base block rates(and different block dmg-.) Size 6 base block rate is apparently very high. Every shield in the game loses block rate as mob level increases. Ochain was just so over capped when it came out that it was hard to find a mob high enough to uncap you. And as the lvl cap continues to rise, so did PLD shield skill. Thus did Ochain block rate also rise.

Now, it's not like I can prove that's where the higher block rate comes from. There's no way to tell. But it's pretty damn silly to attribute Ochain's properties to some invisible stat bonus, when there's a stat on Ochain that clearly differs from any other shield in the game. Size 6 shield. Can read it right in the item dats.

Higher and higher level mobs actually favors Ochain over other current shields. Cause it still has a higher block rate than them. It's the higher and higher skill+ on shields that have far greater block dmg- that begins to challenge Ochain.

Although it's really only Priwen+Reprisal that is that good on high level mobs. Now, back when the highest lvl ***I could test on was 105....

Anyway. If they keep adding more skill to other shields, and Ochain gets no updates, eventually Ochain will become unusable. And Aegis will have floored block rate, but still have a use.

I still have a 90 Ochain myself. There really hasn't been sufficient reason to go through heavy metal hell over it. And there were plenty of other things to make. (Ryunohige, Burtgang, Yagrush, Idris... )

But if SE updates Ochain/Aegis, I will jump all over that. Although I hope they do something about the heavy metal supply first. <,<;

EDIT:
That was pretty disappointing. Neeed more skill. And while I love shield mastery... 3 TP? 3? not 30, but 3/3000? the hell SE? that's piddly. Every piece of shield mastery gear ever has at least given us 10(old 1.0) TP. /sigh.

Aparently they said it was same as a level 150 shield with the skill.

You can use respite cloak for body/head on Requiescat.

Honestly as it stands, PLD's shield options give it plenty of ways around current content, and I think SE is loathe to raise the caps again, solely because of how much backlash they recieved over the last one without upgrading REM's, they lost a huge player base doing vertical progression vs sidegrades.

With this in mind, Ochain, Aegis and Priwen are probably going to continue being the only shields worth bothering with for a long long time.

The problem is most ppl took that to mean that Ochain was ilvl 150. Or was fully equivalent to a 150 shield.
Source
The block rate. JUST, the block rate. Which I'm finding, is actually fairly accurate.

Lets figure out a ilvl 150 shield.

a 119 shield has 112 skill. So 112 skill for 19 levels. which is about 5.8 per leve. I'll just use 6 for simplicity.

So, going up to ilvl 150 would be a 31 lvl jump. So, 31 lvls * 6 skill per lvl. 186 additional skill. 186 skill would be 39.99 block rate gain.

So using Priwen(no reprisal) as a base. vs 126 mobs, 30.21% block rate base + 39.99 = 70.2% is our new ilvl 150 shield block rate.

Ochain's block rate on 126 mobs... 70.23%. Nice fit. <,<

Now, here's where the issue is. That's just the block rate. A real ilvl 150 shield wouldn't have Ochain's really low blockdmg- and def. Let's just use Priwen's stats. Realistically, they'd be higher. but this will do.

70.2% block rate, -88% block dmg. This would be -61.7% avg dmg reduction. Ochain? -46.3%

A real ilvl 150 shield would kick the snot outta Ochain.