Paladin guide 2.0

[dirtyclown]

So I decided to make a Paladin guide that isn't full of bashing, cookiecutters, and stereotypes. We'll see how far this project gets before I give up completely. Let's begin with the races, shall we?
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Races:

Play whatever the hell you want and screw the other guy, we all pay for this game. Race choice never plays a part in the success of an individual Paladin, and never will despite what some may claim. Pick what looks cool to you, because you're going to be staring at that character for hundreds of hours.

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Random BS:
Hook up a macro like so-> /ma "Cure III" <stpc>. Spam this at your puller, the Red mage as he converts, and any melee who steals hate or loses HP from an Area of Effect attack. It keeps you at the top of the hate list, and generates more hate than it would if you were just curing yourself. Dominating hate isn't always a good tactic though, sometimes you need to let another PT member take the mob off of you so you can breathe, or for SATA if a Thief is in the party.

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Your role as a Paladin:
You are the distraction tits, the bullet shield, and the annoying kid in the back of the class all at the same time. You can cast the magics that prevent you and others from falling down, and you can scare Undead creatures. You can also get smacked by a freight train and walk away laughing, while everyone else in your PT dies from getting breathed on. Protecting your PT is your #1 priority, and if that means you die in the process, then oh well. Death is a part of our job and should be viewed as part of the game. Don't sweat death. In fact, learn to laugh at it. By the time you start doing suicide runs in Dynamis you'll laugh maniacally every time. Death will be your one and only constant friend. You can always count on death to slap you in the face every once in awhile.

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Subs:
Oh lawd, is dat sum limited choices? Why yes, it is. Warrior will be your standard choice for exp parties. If you're looking for an experiment, check out this. Armando's onto something here.

/WAR:
You've got Provoke, Double Attack, Defender, Warcry, and Berserk among other things. Berserk can be safely used along with Sentinel as well as Flash, and it's quite likely that you'll be at the defense cap anyway, so taking a little bit more damage isn't an issue if you know how to mitigate it correctly. Don't rely on your support members for this, by the way. If you start taking too much damage, peel off Berserk and cure yourself.

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Hate tools:
Invincible, level 1 - 2 hour ability, negates physical damage to 0 for duration, garners hueg like xbox hate spike. Magic damage occurs as normal, so make sure to keep your HP up. You can cast spells without fear of interruption due to 0 damage being inflicted.

Shield Bash, level 15 - Hate spike with added effect of stun every 5 minutes. Can be used to interrupt goblin bombs and various other attacks, including spells.

Cure I-IV - One of your primary hate tools, used in tandem with Flash. Cure your allies as they come in from a pull or from AoE damage for extra hate.

Flash - Blinds enemies and greatly reduces their accuracy. Causes a huge hate spike, and is best used directly after Provoke and before casting a Cure, reducing your chances of being interrupted.

Sentinel, level 30 - Reduces 90% damage received as well as increasing Enmity of actions taken while it is in effect, in addition to generating a large hate spike.

Cover, level 35 - Works similarly to Cover in past FF games. This one requires that you stand in front of your ally and after activating the JA, you take all damage in place of your ally. You cannot dodge attacks that come at you with this effect active. There's a nifty macro in the section below that helps with this.

Rampart, level 62 - Grants "Magic Shield" to you and all allies in area of effect. Also functions as a hate spike ability.

Reprisal 61 - Raises block rate and grants damage reflection on successful shield blocks. Use this along with Sentinel when fighting a mob that uses Hundred Fists for a great time.

Holy circle - Increases resistance to undead in the area of effect, and in my experience seems to cause the Undead killer trait to proc more often. I could be wrong, but we'll discuss that some other time. Also adds the undead killer trait to allies in the area of effect. <---Thank you, Empedocles.
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Traits:
Undead Killer Level: 5
Intimidates Undead randomly. Too bad we fight dragons and other things that aren't Undead later on.

Physical Defense Up I Level: 10
Increased Physical Defense

Resist Sleep I Level: 20
Increased resistance to sleep spells.

Shield Mastery Level: 25
Grants bonus TP when blocking an attack with a shield. Update:Also prevents spell interruption when a block occurs during casting.

Physical Defense Up II Level: 30
Increased Physical Defense

Auto Refresh Level: 35
Gain refresh effect, 1MP/Tick

Resist Sleep II Level: 40
Increased resistance to sleep spells.

Physical Defense Up III Level: 50
Increased Physical Defense
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Macros:
"how do i maked macro?" These are relatively simple, and they make things easier once you make a few for key abilities. Greatly speeds up your response time, and it doesn't force you to go through the menu every time. Here's a few examples.
/ja Provoke <t>
/wait 15
/echo Provoke ready in 15 seconds
/wait 15
/echo Provoke ready!

/ja Cover <stpc>
/p Get behind me <lastst>.

/ma "Cure II" <st>
/target <bt>
/attack <bt>

/equip feet
/ja "Provoke"
/equp feet "Gallant Leggings"

Running voke macro, useful when you're running so you don't get cemented to the floor during the JA animation. Thank you very much for the macro, Armando. I had completely forgotten about it. D:

The list goes on and on. You can macro anything you want, even silly vanity phrases. Just don't put those in your provoke macro, or I'll beat you with a table leg.

Random stuff revisited: Working <st> and <lastst> into different macros can help out alot when trying to tank multiple mobs at once, and can be applied to just about everything you can use. Shield Bash, WSes, etc. By the time you start doing this sort of thing on a regular basis you'll most likely have a good idea of what to use and when. With some experience in this sort of thing, you'll know exactly how much hate each mob needs to have toward you to keep them all on you at once. It's not required for success, but your Red mage will absolutely love you for it.

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Equipment:

I'm not going to keep that giant list of gear that you might want to get because it takes up way too much room. Basically, you want to focus on defense until after 50ish, when you might start to notice that you aren't as accurate as you once were. This is because monsters post 50 have stupidly high evasion. To combat this, start looking for pieces of gear with extra accuracy. Don't be a retard and purchase a Scorpion Harness, but gradually add gloves, belts, rings, etc. that help with your accuracy. While you're at it you might as well stack up some extra attack and strength to get the most out of your better hit rate. I also suggest getting a Jelly Ring at some point, it's not as difficult to acquire as some might lead you to believe.

[dirtyclown]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

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Parties and you: A guide for the somewhat retarded.
Just kidding about the retarded part. Anyways, as you know, your #1 priority is to keep hate. How you go about that is up to your party. Always ask what the Skillchain will be, and if your party is unsure, then you have 2 choices. Help them figure out one by googling Dranok's Skillchain calc or using one of the many charts, OR running like hell. Because a party that doesn't know what SC they want can be detrimental to your health.
One other thing to note is this:

The really good PLDs know how to keep just the right amount of hate for letting melee turn the mob for SATA, but not lose hate to big WS or MBs.

Hate can be approached two ways. You can either dominate it completely, which basically equates to you spamming JAs whenever they're available and constantly Flashing in order to prevent disaster, or the laid back approach. Knowing when to use different JAs, when to Flash, and when to let the melee turn the mob. Sometimes we need a breather, and sometimes we need to let the Thief SATA onto us. Whatever the strategy might be, you will need to learn how to do this. In time, after you have tanked long enough you will learn what you can do to keep hate at a reasonable level. When that time comes, you'll be a much better Paladin for it. One other thing to remember is that just because you lose hate, does not mean you're bad at your job. Losing hate happens, it's not something you can prevent and that's why total domination is a flawed tanking strategy. It's always good to have a few aces up your sleeve when your BLM decides to burst with Ancient Magic and then proceed to Divine Seal Cure 3 themselves. :D

Thief
For example, let's say you're partying with a RDM, WHM, THF, WAR, and BLM. You're all at level 30, and the THF wants to use SATA to help you gain hate and also to cause damage spikes, killing things faster and netting all of you more exp per hour. What you would do in this situation is let the WAR provoke first. You run around to the back of the mob, and the THF gets behind you. Make sure you're pretty close to the mob so the THF is still in range. Then, don't move and wait for the THF to use Sneak attack and Trick attack. The mob will turn and the damage spike will give YOU all of the hate generated by the attack. Let fly with Provoke, Cure 2, and tank as normal. Different jobs in the position of the WAR will function much the same way, though take care to be quick when a DRK is first voke. They have low defense and will get hurt quite a bit if left alone for too long.

Samurai
Samurai are skillchain masters and if you party with them often, you'll probably be expected to close the Skillchain. Paladins and Samurai are quite compatible for Skillchains..Actually, Samurai are pretty compatible with everyone. Moving on. Update: Samurai have been granted two new Job abilities, and are now beastly. They will give you a much harder time than before, but thankfully Samurai tend to not be retarded with their hate gain and will work with you. If all else fails, use Cover.

Dark Knight
Dark, moody, also answers to the name Batman. These guys are heavy hitters and if you party with them often, expect to be opening alot of Skillchains. I party with a Dark Knight three times a week in my static Party, and she and I have found some nice SC to take advantage of depending on what mobs we're fighting. Things to watch out for with this class is their Job Abilities. If they stack Last Resort and Soul Eater, expect to lose hate in the next few seconds. By the 40s most of them learn to watch their hate and won't pop all their damage enhancing JAs at once. Also by the 40s you've got enough tools to keep them alive and gain hate right back, so it shouldn't be too big a deal.

Dragoon
A knight with a lance in hand, and a cute blue Wyvern that flies around and dies alot. One way you can help with preventing the Wyvern death is by aiming the mobs away from the Wyvern. Lots of mobs use cone attacks, and making sure that they're facing away from your party members and their pets can help ensure that your Dragoon doesn't get a headache. Area of Effect attacks you can't do much about, unless you can interrupt them. Shield Bash helps with this, and picking up a Guardian Ring at some point may help you to interrupt enemies' attacks. Just macro it into your Shield Bash and go. Partying with Dragoons isn't much different from partying with anyone else, although you may find yourself closing skillchains this time around rather than opening them. Also take note about High jump and later on Super jump. High jump sheds a bit of hate from the Dragoon, allowing them a bit of leeway with their damage. Super jump, on the other hand, allows them to reset their hate. With a Thief and a Dragoon in the party, the Thief can SATA onto the Dragoon and the Dragoon erases their hate while you tank as normal. Fun, eh?

Monk
Ah, these guys. Potentially your worst nightmare for keeping hate later on in the game. Until then, they're a solid damage dealer and probably the most effective SATA partners for Thieves. After 40 you'll be opening up Fusion for them (Burst with Holy for extra laughs). There's not really much to say other than stay on your toes.

Blue Mage
I've only partied with 2 Blue mages so far, unfortunately. They can deal quite a bit of spike damage as well as pretty decent damage over time. Keep up on top of hate, and hopefully your Blue mage will be willing to work with you on hate management instead of being retarded and spamming spells nonstop.

Ranger
Can't believe I forgot these guys. Rangers, along with Monks have potential to be very annoying to keep hate from. Especially if they pull with Barrage. D: You might need to swap in a High Breath Mantle along with DD gear to make hate management easier. Otherwise, tank as normal and make full use of Spirits Within if you have it.

Bard
A party with a Bard is quite nice. Except when nobody listens, then the Bard develops an ulcer. When partying with a Bard, you'll most often have to run back to where the mages are sitting to get Ballad for MP. I personally prefer having acc/atk+ songs on, but it's not the tank's place to complain. MP regen is more important than striking your problems until they are no longer problems anymore.

Black mages
Delightfully squishy little powerhouses these are. The more intelligent ones you have nothing to worry about, they most often are quite adept at managing hate and won't intentionally overnuke and will even run behind you for Cover before casting a huge MB. The dumb ones will get themselves killed often. Don't worry about them, it's their own fault.

Warrior
Hate monster. That's it. A good Warrior can do incredible amounts of damage over time and have alot of potential for amazing spike damage as well. Most often they can time their WS to kill a mob outright and not pull hate off of you. Keep up with them and you'll have no trouble.

White/Red mage
Sorry to lump these two together, but they're quite similar in most regards. I run with both in a static party, and they compliment each other very well. Two things to remember: Most of the time, they know when you've got a status on you, because they've got logs set to show that information in their chat window. The other thing is to never demand Haste. If they can squeeze it into their cycle they will, and most likely if they're not casting it on you or someone else they're waiting for the timer to cool down. Patience is your best friend. As for Refresh, every Red mage at least learns how to make a functioning Refresh order for their parties. More often than not, you're at the top of it, so don't be an ass and demand it. Red mages are slaves only to their spell timers.

Summoner
To start, Summoners are not healers. They can do it, but that is not their main function. They can support the party with Blood pacts that cast various buffs, like Blink and Phalanx. They can participate in SCs with their avatars and are capable of MBing with their avatars as well. Overall a very versatile class, if somewhat underrated.

For the rest, you get to make your own conclusions. Every party combination can work with the right mix of skill and planning, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. All that holds you back is the willingness of other players to try something new, if you can find a group that wants to experiment, then go for it. Having fun is the #1 reason to play. Good luck.

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Foods

Eat foods that boost your character's weaknesses. For example, Sushi is great for later on when you have some nice attack gear and want to boost your accuracy to make tanking a little easier on you. Dorado Sushi is an excellent choice to boost Enmity AND improve accuracy. It's a double win. Early on you want to focus on improving defense until you reach your damage cap, and since you lack gear choices at that level range (before 50) food can help you achieve that. Just remember that food, like gear choices, are situational. Usually the economical choice is better for these fights outside of exp parties, and the battle plans are quite often different than the standard tank and spank setup.

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Shields and you: A half-assed guide

Ok, so you've got yourself a skill called Shield Bash. Obviously, this class has an emphasis on the use of a sword and shield. There's a bit more to shield selection than just grabbing whatever's available and going with it though. Shields have 4 different sizes, and 4 different amounts of damage reduction/proc rate. Everything you've ever wanted to know about shields, complete with numbers that probably won't mean much to a casual gamer can be found here.

If that didn't make much sense, here's a summary: Get a size 3 shield. They look similar in design to the Kite shield you get at the end of the Paladin quest, and later on you'll be able to tell which ones are what size. Generally you're going to want a shield that improves stats, and there are several shields that you'll be using for most of your Paladin career. There are also some very awesome size 4 shields later in the game which can be recognized by their square shape. They're also referred to as Tower shields, but aren't much bigger than the size 3 shields.

Reprisal

Reprisal is a spike based enhancement spell that greatly enhances shield blocks and reflects damage back at the attacker. This spell alone is an incredibly powerful tool for both raising TP rapidly, and mitigating damage. Combined with other spells and abilities, Reprisal's potency is enhanced even further to give the Paladin some much needed breathing room in pitched battles.

Before this spell came along, most Paladins never bothered to skill up their Enhancing magic outside of leveling Red Mage to use as a sub when farming. Reprisal places a new importance on Enhancing magic and should encourage Paladins everywhere to skill up Enhancing as much as possible, and to keep it capped.

When applied to a party situation, you should be focusing on maintaining Enmity while mitigating damage to yourself. Maintaining Enmity should be no problem for a Paladin with Reprisal and every other hate management tool available at their disposal. For our example, we'll say that we're a level 63 Paladin with this gear setup. It comes with -12 Evasion instead of the standard -32 that you would get with a Hauby. This does not matter when Reprisal is active, but when it's cooling down you're going to be hurting with so much negative evasion. A Paladin's damage avoidance when Flash is active can be negatively affected by our Evasion rate, so keep that in mind when gearing up. Also keep in mind that Reprisal lasts for 60 seconds and refreshes every 3 minutes, so 2/3 of the time you're going to be relying on Flash and your other abilities, and your gear could become a liability during that time rather than an asset. Shinies aren't effective when you're dead on the floor, after all.

Most Paladins use Reprisal just like any other spell and stick it in their regular rotation just like everything else. This is a bad move, as a well timed Reprisal could turn the tide of a difficult battle in your favor. While it is active, you have some time to gather TP or set yourself up for when Reprisal drops and you don't have a safety net to fall back on.

When the safety net does fall off, have another damage mitigating spell/ability ready to go. Sentinel at the end of a Reprisal works well, as does Flash. Reprisal also works well during Cover, since you can shield block those attacks that could otherwise devastate their intended target.

Another good idea when Reprisal is active, is to use Berserk. It sacrifices 25% of your defense, but Reprisal negates any real drawbacks. Instead, we get a bonus 25% attack for 3 minutes. In this 3 minutes most of your abilities will be close to ready to go, so you can juggle the use of Berserk along with the above examples to maintain a high amount of Enmity while maximizing damage output and mitigating a great deal of damage on your own.

With all that said, there are some situations where Reprisal is not a viable spell to base a tanking strategy around. These few cases involve mobs that absorb magical damage, but for the most part the spell can be applied to all situations. Oh by the way, in case this hasn't been hamered home enough yet, CARRY ECHO DROPS. Even just having half a stack on you at all times is more than enough to potentially save an entire party from destruction.

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For now, this is the end. I'll be updating periodically, so be sure to check back. Special thanks to NeighborTaru for inspiring me to work this into a somewhat legible form.

[Empedocles]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Very good

The only semi-edit I can think of is that Holy Circle adds Undead Killer trait to those that do not have it already, as well as enhancing your own.

[LoneGamer]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

What is considered a good balance between resting for MP and maintaining TP for WS at low levels?

[dirtyclown]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

I'd use beverages for parties at lower levels. If one of your WS is needed for a Skillchain, then try and conserve MP as much as you can and get in a few ticks for MP between fights. Raising cooking a bit helps out alot with MP issues early on, and you don't have to lug around 12 bottles of juice, just a stack of crystals and your ingredients. I wish I could be of more assistance with this, because I joined a static as Paladin and my static leader generally kept me out of Skillchains so I could rest freely for MP. I've found that this is true for alot of Paladins, at least the ones I talk to. Most of the time it's up to the Paladin in question whether they want to be vocal about participating in the SC or not, otherwise they'll just get left out of it entirely.

[LoneGamer]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Yeah, I guess juice works.

[MadCrom]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Great Post

Rate up!

[Celeal]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Good job! Very nice guide ^^b

P.S.
I think it would be nice if you include information about shield in your equipment section. With the increased proc. rate from shield, and different size of shield, etc, I think it is important for PLD to know which shield to use.

/salute

[dirtyclown]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

That's my first planned update for the guide, actually. I thought Shields were fairly obvious as far as what to use, but I didn't take into account that new players probably don't know about shield sizes. That as well as a full list of our job traits and a section dedicated to what exactly Shield Mastery does is next on my list of things to do.

[Tevabond]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Great Guide!! im planing on maining paladin and i think this helps a lot!

couple quick questions at lvl 25 theres a repuiblic targe and 28 theres the jennet shield (I think i may be wrong on name) one is big one is small. the targe adds HP which is better...same def btw



P.S. HI EMP! (That was Kat.....)

[Davitron3000]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

couple quick questions at lvl 25 theres a repuiblic targe and 28
theres the jennet shield (I think i may be wrong on name) one is big one is small. the
targe adds HP which is better...same def btw

Jennet Shield

Republic Targe

I like the Jennet Shield. Can't go wrong with + Vit on your shield at that level.
Jennet Shield is size 3 and Republic Targe is size 1. Either shield would probably
work, but I hate the way those size 1 shields look...

Also, according to somepage the Jennet Shield is level 38. Kite shield is level 28.
I would probably use this over Republic Targe also, for the nostalgia of the Paladin
Quests you did to get it, and cosmetic reasons (plus I just like the size 3 shields
for the block rate/damage reduced stats)

[Arwenne]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Awesome guide! Very well written.

[Tevabond]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

Also, according to somepage the Jennet Shield is level 38. Kite shield is level 28

WOOOPS thats the shiled i ment not the jennet...the lvl 28 size 3....yea thats the one....w/e thanks for the info

[dirtyclown]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

And there's the update I was talking about. Added in job traits and info on shields.

[Tsikuro]

Re: Paladin guide 2.0

You don't even mention the JA 'Sentinel'.