~First And Final Line Of Defense V2.0~

You can enter it into the DPS spreadsheet to find out. I believe all bugs have now been hammered out and WSD behaves exactly as expected.

Valorous and odyssean pieces have different att/acc/str base stats.

I believe I have the optimized Savage Blade set entered into the Dps spreadsheet already, but feel free to mess around with the augments to see how different stats compare.

Is Phalenx + oseem aug on odyssean set only a DM thing?

yep

well crap. that was a waste of 1000 ferns lmfao.
Thanks

Looking for some as close to best in slot Aeolian Edge sets you guys can muster!

I have been experimenting with cleaving apex mobs to moderate success but I feel like I can really push my damage a lot farther.

This is my current set. And there's some room to improve still. Although most of that leaves you at the mercy of Oseem.
ItemSet 333947
D path Carmine body. 42 MAB and hefty MACC+. I think it would take DM augs for Odyssean to beat it. BG wiki has teh Odyssean MAB limit listed as 30.
Odyssean hands/legs have WSD/MAB/MACC augs
Swap in Novio earring at 3k TP.

Biggest improvement right now would be Orpheus's Sash, but that's a steep 40~50 mil on my server.

Carmine hands woulds also be +42 MAB, D path. But no macc at all. Could be an issue when cleaving higher level mobs.

EDIT: Pemphedro Tathlum would be much better that my dinky Dosis.

Either of the WSD rings would probably be a boost. Epaminondas's or Kariyeh/+1. But I haven't tested that, and I keep getting surprised by MAB gear being better than WSD for this. So, take that with a grain of salt.


Alternative pieces,
Leyline gloves with max augs are really good. 30 MAB and 33 macc.
Eschite legs D path make good budget MAB legs. +25 and +23 macc. No randomness.
Founder's breastplate is a good option. 20~35 MAB and 20~35 macc depending on augs. Especially effective if cleaving undead. The killer effect would likely put it well ahead of Carmine with holycircle up. I should test that.

If I have Macc/Matt from a Corsair and a Geo in my party, would Magic Dmg+ items become more and more valuable over Matt/Macc?

I feel like I can still get a very large sum of Macc/Matt in gear, but it seems to me Magic Dmg+ becomes my limiting items. That and WSD+ seems important.

No?

You'd think right? I'd really love a good calculator for this, cause going out and testing every gear change is a pain in the ***. I've tried to make one. Can't get the numbers to match up to testing. -.-;

But anyway, PLD almost never gets enough WSD to compete with the available MAB. And pieces with WSD and MAB are pretty much just augmented Odyssean.

Like, say sulevia feet+2. 7% WSD. Should be notable gains when you have Acumen and Malaise, right? You already have so much MAB. But the 35 MAB on Founder's feet stomped all over it.

I had similar experiences gearing up cataclysm on DRG. And DRG actually has decent WSD gear. A few +10% pieces. And in nearly every slot I got better dmg using MAB gear. iirc the legs were the exception, but I'd say that was because the only MAB legs I had on DRG sucked. (limbo trousers I think. +17 MAB.)

Don't get me wrong. Point for point, WSD is better. But when you're getting like 5 MAB per point of WSD, the mab tends to win.

As for magic dmg... From what? There's virtually no gear that PLD can wear that has mdmg in any significant amount. I don't think it's all that significant in the magic ws formula in any case, but there's definitely not enough of it on anything to justify over MAB gear.

Malevolence > Levante Dagger for Aeolian Edge? If so, I'll just trade Levante for copper voucher.

Also, Orpheus's Sash would be great for Aeolian, no?

Yeah, iirc Malevolence is better even with crappy augs. Thing has like 44 MAB, 35 macc, and 10 Int fully aug'd. Oh, and 118 magic dmg. It's a beast.

But just to make sure, and out of general curiosity, I pulled my Levante dagger off my mule and retested. I had Malev over 1k dmg ahead of Levante. That was with wind weather and day up, but I'm not sure if that would be to Levante's advantage or Malevs.

I did mention Orpheus' in my earlier post. It should be a significant upgrade. Just one that I've not been willing to pay for so far. /cheapass.

Good news. One less dagger to carry around. Thanks!

As someone just returning to the game, is there anything useful I can get from any of the campaigns going on or upcoming? There are a lot of things in the Mod Pell list, for instance, and I have no idea what any of them get me or if they're useful. Currently just in some Spark gear + Ochain. I noticed there's no Bayld i119 Sword for PLD?

You need a full set of yorium gear.

3 pieces for Phalanx+SIRD
1 piece I believe is enmitty best in slot

And I think the remaining piece is also a good SIRD/Cure Pot piece? I dont remember.

Which can be obtained from one of the types of wings... is it mellidopt? I think its mellidopt.

Hitting capped SIRD is pretty clutch on paladin and yorium gear is a cheap and easy way to get there early on.

Make sure you get all the trusts you can, you need a *** tonne of them to unlock the Lv+1 Trust quest, and its much harder than it appears at first. Grab all of them that are available this campaign.

Kaja sword and then eventually Naegling is your best budget sword to aim for on Paladin, it performs quite well.

My recommended priority list:

1. Ochain

3. Enmity gear, as much as you can

3. Phalanx gear

4. Hybrid Melee set

5. Kaja Sword

6. JSE Capes (Melee, Casting+Enmity, Savage Blade capes)

<At this point you can pretty reliably solo farm Job Points efficiently, so work towards master>

7. Souv+1 gear, Moonbeam gear

8. Naegling

9. Aegis

Why do you place Aegis last? I'd argue it has a lot more value and use than a hybrid melee set.

Ochain is #1? Then why haven't I used it in like 3 years?

1. As much easy pdt,mdt,dt as you can wrangle cheaply.
- Once you have 30+ full DT you can probably start low-end tanking. You want to hit caps though. 50 dt(or a blend of pdt,mdt,bdt)

2. Enmity Gear - You want 100+, but really you want as much as humanly possible.

3. Aegis - it's cheap and you sprinkle your corn with the highest tier nukes in the game.. they become laughable.

4. Phalanx Gear - Souv hands and legs, Reive JSE Back, Yorium head, body, feet. If you plan to build a SIRD Set, you may want to augment yorium pieces with Spell Interruption Rate Down as well as phalanx3.

5. Tune up that DT Gear - start get Souv+1 pieces with the HP path on them. Moonbeam/moonlight pieces. Really you want a solid pdt/mdt cap with at least 2800 HPs. Once you get here, with phalanx gear, a solid enmity set, and aegis.. you can pretty much tank anything in the game.

6. JSE Ambuscade Capes - you probably want to make a fast cast one with hp+, maybe a DD high acc one with dt properties, and a few others.

7. Burtgang - not necessary, but a great weapon with +enmity and pdt over cap.

8. Ochain - pretty optional really, I would make it though.. it has niche situations that are good. Like when you really need to block hits to not die.

9. SIRD Set - if you have trouble with spell interruption, you can make a set with 104 Spell Interruption Rate Down that will make it virtually impossible to stop you from casting.

Naegling, hybrid, kaja sword = all stuff that PLD doesn't need. It's useful in the sense that you could use it.. but you probably never will.. and if you do, you're probably doing it wrong.

I listed these in steps, but you can work on all of this in any order really.. I was just ranking them by importance.

PLD:
<order>
Lvl PLD to 99
Lvl BLU and WAR to 50
Aegis
Souv+1 set
Moon rings
JSE Cape
FC gear
</order>
<upgrade>
lvl RUN to 99
only play RUN
</upgrade>

Ochain,Burt,Excal,etc, everything else is just because you like the job or sword and board.

@soralin: stop telling people to get Ochain first. Just stop. Souveran+1 gear is dirt cheap and should be higher on the priority list based on that alone.

Aegis > any other sword so you can at least tank anything worth a ***. Unless you're talking strictly solo, then do whatever you want.

Also, SIRD gear is more important now with PLD/BLU tanking, so IMO it's a hell of a lot more important than Ochain.

edit: what Taint said.

Ochain being last is fine with me.

I would rank Burt and SIRD as about the same also. Depending on how you play, one could be more valuable than the other but really both are not necessary.. they are both beneficial though.

Also, reading old stuff, I wanted to apologize to Commencal. I had thought I did this previously but it must've never posted. We might not agree all the time, but got a lot of respect for you.

I already have Ochain anyway so I suppose that makes it an easy decision haha.

In between powering my /BLU to 49 (or 99? Looks like levelling is pretty easy at the moment with the campaigns going on), can I farm the Glory coins/die/residue to unlock CDC, or should I suck it up and grind out my Apademak horns to get my Almace to 90?

CDC isn't even necessary for PLD. Savage Blade is pretty much the better of the two for PLD.

You could also just buy the WoE items from bazaars too (or ask friends/LS if they have any). They're available with login points this month, which tends to mean there'll be a ready supply. As I assume you don't have the Trusts on offer, you'd be better off spending your own points on those (and grabbing up any others available, such as the ones in the anniversary event crate).

Ochain is free, wtf? It costs 0 gil and takes a couple few hours to farm.

(Edited because everyone takes everything hyper literal here, Forgot what forum I was posting on for a hot second)

Definitely get ochain first, you can do it in like one sitting and it doesnt cost any gil.

SIRD gear is pretty important too.

Ochain substantially makes farming Job Points easier. Anyone who claims otherwise hasnt been in an Apex Cleave pt.

Ochain, Hybrud set, Phalanx Sird set, Aeolian Edge set, should be your priority so you can super fast master pld.

People that dont know the power of cleaving apex JP on pld clearly arent experienced enough yet to speak on the priority list. The bonuses you get from mastering pld far outweigh most gear. You lose a ***tonne of capability by not being mastered.

Then start doing your other ***after you've got your stars, especially with us having an exp campaign.

Unless you are just buying your JP in which case why bother asking about a priority order, you gotta have enough gil to buy everything you need.

If not stop wasting gil.

Your priority should be gearing the job to be able to tank ***that matters, not just cleave to master.

I'd rather have a Nixxer/Aegis 100 JP Paladin tanking than some Naegling/Ochain master Paladin that tanks everything in a hybrid melee set. Master isn't make or break like you're claiming.

Where the *** did I say anything about tanking in Ochain?

Id take a Brilliance/Aegis Master paladin over a Nixxer/Aegis non Master paladin.

Interpreting anything beyond that is not what I said.

If you wanna play any job nowadays in FFXI, especially during exp campaigns, go master it.

Let me lay out why real nice and simple.

When I shout for a tank, I will always get a Master REMA tier tank as one of the responders.

You will never get into my party with anything less than REMA + Master.

Not because I /need/ that.

But because I get like 12 responses in 30 seconds from Run, Pld, and Pup tanks, and several of them are REMA Master tanks.

So neither your 'Nixxer/Aegis 100 JP Paladin' or your 'Naegling/Ochain master Paladin' are getting into my party.

Cause there's a Epeo or Lionheart Master Run that also sent me a tell.

Which means if you wanna get started, you're soloing ***to build yourself up to be good enough to get into parties.

If you wanna get into good parties, you need to check off ALL of the boxes.

Not some of the boxes, all of them, especially as Paladin which is currently considered the weakest of the three main tank jobs in current meta.

So in that kind of meta, arguing about which boxes come first to get into parties is flawed. All of them are important. Check them all of. Order doesn't matter, you'll get booted from parties if your missing some.

You may get into parties as a non master paladin though, maybe.

So, when I get asked a priority order for paladin, I presume two things:

1. You mean for soloing ***and self progression, not for partying, cause as mentioned for partying everything is needed.

2. You don't have enough gil to just buy all your ***right now, which means you want maximum bang for your buck gil wise.



Under those reasons I highly suggest Ochain first, as its free which means maximum gil value.

I also suggest getting your Phalanx augments from Yorium gear and JSE Cape, as that substantially boosts your solo potential. Phalanx is life.

SIRD is also mandatory for soloing anything.

Naegling is fine enough to solo many Escha NMs, and Malevolence + Ochain above allow you to solo farm JP ultra fast.

JSE Capes, Naegling, and Hybrid sets are heavily 'free' and cost very very little investment.

Then make an Aegis, as its pretty affordable, then Souv+1 gear as thats also affordable.

I heavily hold Moralltach should be purchased before Burtgang. Burtgang actually doesn't boost EHP and survivability as much as having Moralltach on hand for gearswapping to prevent HP Yo-Yoing.

Moralltach effectively lets you cap Cure potency and SIRD without your HP moving.

Which is incredibly important and I strongly hold contributes more to survivability than a burtgang does.

The penultimate paladin, of course, will have both Burtgang and Moralltach.

But I'd grab Moralltach first.

Ochain takes a couple hours .......

At this current point in the game I wouldn't even get ochain. I'd just pull for blu/bst cleave instead of cleaving myself tbh. Outside of solocleave ochain is (nearly) useless.


This is pretty accurate. Phalanx gear isn't in there. Important pieces.

Even for Apex Cleaving?

pretty much, hell you could also act as a distortion opener for apex parties, both likely get you the same if not more than a aoe cleave with starter gear+ochain. As for mastering pld at all, pld gains probably the least of the 3 tank jobs as far as gifts/jp categories go though, theres some good ones in there but its not run tier with several meva, parry gifts, aswell as several strong categories, nor pup with its ele limit increases+overall puppet attributes.

PLD gets... protect effect/more TP on shield blocks? With its noteable categories being paliside+sentinel, maybe intervene, rest are pretty minimal increases

I really don't feel like I can have a serious discussion with the merits of paladin's priorities with individuals that don't appreciate the value of Shield Mastery.

Also, if you are doing Apex Parties rather than soloing, just make Shining One and close skillchains.

Or better yet just replace 'party' with 'Ayame'

As Ive discussed before, you need a VERY strong party to compensate for exp loss due to down time.

Especially on Apex Bats, where white mages need to be ultra on the ball removing attack down (spoiler alert, they never do and your DPS plummets)

You may get the occasional amazing apex party, but I have pretty much always found I net more JP/hour overall duo boxing with my Geo and trusts.

Simply because most players can't keep up with my pace, many people get tired and leave within 1-2 hours, whereas I will sit and grind for an entire saturday and pump out like 600~800 JP in one sitting.

Trusts don't afk randomly on me, half *** their job 20 mins in, DC, and are incredibly on the ball for removing debuffs.

For the first 30 minutes, sure you'll be soaring at high speeds.

But keep that pace up for 2, 3, 6 hours.

I guarentee you party members burn out and leave way before then.

So yeah.

Ochain, SIRD, Phalanx, and Aeolian Edge sets. Cleave Apex mobs. Get insane fast JP/hour solo or duo with a Geo. Master Paladin in like 3 days. Go get Brilliance. Farm up DT tanking hybrid gear. Buy aegis. Do ambuscade runs to make your JSE capes and Naegling and +2 your Hybrid set.