Aegis Speculation

Doing the same, but will take a little longer than that. I must say though, if you are okay with TP loss (I don't really mind since no CDC yet), utilizing both shields makes it pretty hard to get killed.

COMEBINE THEM TO BECOME TENGA TOPPA GURREN LAGANN

i don't know how you would properly utilize both shield midfights since the only extreme damaging spells atm are usually stuff like instant cast meteor lol. and if its just a higher tier aga you could just go with -50mdmg cap and still tank just fine.

but if you were to know prior to engaging the nm, that they insta cast meteor etc then utilize aegis that way, but it still feels a bit too "situational" for 150m lol.

Ya Hahava is a good example of a mob where you could really utilize having both shields available, esp on the weakness status some of the T4s have, you almost want to have Ochain available to block all on coming hits or have aegis ready for nukes or idle in for magic TP moves since the Raksha stances are magic tp moves.

Its not necessary to beat him having any of those shields, as we did it the first week it came out, but it creates less chances of things going wrong and the ability to do it safely with fewer ppl if you have to while holding.

That I can't argue with. I was quite happy with it on stuff like Voidwrought's incinerator, seen some strange number ranges on it, even in regular MDT. I'll probably just opt for 1 shield post-Almace.


That's a good example actually, I'm pretty sure Hahava follows up weakness with an aga (usually?), can survive with both shields, quite comfortably.

Yea, atleast you know with Aegis you could take a nuke for 10,000 damage and live to tell about it. That gets you points with the ladies, that has to account for something right??
I know he loves casting within every 20-25 seconds or so as with marches and haste I think, I wasnt always making my stuns on blm and another blm had to cover. Eitherway having Aegis on during raksha stance and ochain during Yaksha stance is probably the best way of maximizing both shields utility. Sure its a lot of money but how many of us already make high purchases for +1-+2 stats with limited situations that probably wont be noticed when you can utilitize it for said situation?

Yeah, no.

Ochain blocks everything dangerous that Hahava can do. An Aegis paladin is going to take a significantly harder beating throughout the course of the fight. The only time Aegis could ever be better than Ochain for Hahava is if your stunners are completely incompetent.

Raksha stances are magic tp moves, just as Hito said in his previous post, Ochain does not block Magic based TP moves only the Physical ones.

Aegis is going to win in that Deparment, and in a perfect world yea everything gets stunned but thats hardly the case in reality.

Also if your abusing stun for everything he does hes going to build resistance fairly quick.

If I had a choice for one or the other, I'd take Aegis. Sure it's block rate is not as high as Ochain but it's still rather high. And from what I observed, most if not all VWNMs cast magic and have a greater arsenal of magical TP moves than most of the previous era NMs.
I hardly see the need to use Ochain at all unless the NM has an unusually high attack that can tear through a PLD with a few hits if not shield blocked or if the NM has little to no magic damage capabilities.
In the end, I guess both shields are situational but I see Aegis prevailing the majority of the time. And there's the swap shield idea if you're willing to sacrifice the CDC and I imagine the amount of times you would have to switch before getting 100TP would be quite common.
Just my take, feel free to poke.

I agree with this. If you're having troubles with physical damage, there's something wrong with your PLD. I can't think of any physical tp moves that are really that dangerous for a PLD. Magical damage is the only type of damage that is ever going to kill you if you have a semi-competent healer. Thus Aegis seems the much better choice.

add a 75% chance to resist death and you've got yourself a dale.

60-70% block rate is not a 99% block rate. Enjoy being stunned frequently against Voidwrought, being completely unable to recover if you die against Hahava, and enjoy mitigating virtually nothing noteworthy against Celaeno.

lol'd at 'in a perfect world'. If your stunners cannot handle their jobs, Hahava will be miserable, while Celaeno and Voidwrought will be borderline impossible without multiple tanks. I'll never understand why stunners are so forgivable in the general community. You don't allow tanks who can only handle tanking part of the time, and you certainly don't allow healers who can only handle healing part of the time. Casting one spell in large windows every 30 seconds is not difficult.

lolwat.

Stun Firaja, go afk until next Firaja.

45-60% block rate is great for me, stacked with reprisal and the new PLD ja Aegis will be doing lots more blockin :D oh and higher shield skill

Your shield skill is increasing relative to the monster's level. You're maintaining your block rate, not increasing it.

No one is saying you need any of those shields, just that one shield excels over another shield in the right circumstances.

Ochain doesnt block 100% nor 99%, if anything its 90-95% on higher NMs. Since pld with Ochains have already parsed those numbers on things like Raja and other NMs. Ochain already has been parsed to have a lower overall damage reduction on block vs Aegis. At a 70% block rate, Aegis is already reducing the same amount if not slightly more than Ochain is at 90%. Which is why ppl suggest that you pull out your Aegis if the mob tends to cast spells as it would reduce your damage overall probably more than Ochain. Things like Hahava/celaeno have both magic TP moves and spells.

Since we're talking about having both shields available, its a no brainer that Ochain is the better shield to have against Voidwrought.

Also im not really sure on your comment about Celaeno. 4 out of 6 tp moves are magical, on top of her being able to cast spells. Are you refering to her normal attacks being more dangerous than her tp moves/spells?

Your numbers are all over the place. As of several years ago, Aegis was found to cap in the 60-65% range. Cap, as in perform at its maximum. Shields without atypical block rates(including Aegis) don't cap their block rate without fighting something with a very modest level advantage, or by cramming yourself full of shield skill. Neither is always realistic, and the latter is never ideal.

This has clearly been posed as an either/or, and there's virtually never a time when Aegis is a win or lose instrument, while the contrary is very much a reality with Ochain.

As its been pointed out, and somehow used as a means to justifying a lesser shield, gimp stunners can't be relied upon, and if you get encumbered by Celaeno, or weakened by Hahava and Voidwrought, you're going to wipe without another tank at the ready(who hopefully isn't dead or afflicted with a similar status). An AFK Ochain can tank any of the three weakened.

Aegis is great, and any career paladin should aspire to have it, but its not Ochain, and it will never mean the difference between a wipe and a save.

It's more like doing ochain trials for a low mp macro item.

I wasn't very impressed by ochain on VW today. The amount of damage aegis blocks vs ochain is very noticeable with phalanx. Aegis still blocks like a brick wall. If you're able to keep reprisal up 66% of the time it probably wins out in pdt and mdt.

With the new job ability increasing shield block rate I doubt they will give Aegis another bump in block rate.

Um, what? Phalanx favors Ochain, not Aegis.

you don't die from the magical tp moves/spells, you die from them in combination with fast regular hits. That's why Ochain is better and always will be - take out the worry of regular hits at all. If some magical tp/spell "can" 1-shot you... that's what you stun.

Insta-cast meteor would want a Aegis yes, but let's just make up stuff to make it seem better.

Save your breath. The concept of big TP moves only being dangerous in conjunction with unfortunate strings of normal attacks, and that stunners are there to, you know, stun, is completely lost.

Also, shields that mitigate higher amounts of damage benefit more from static subtraction, apparently.

You die from death (spell). You're referring to unblocked vs blocked?

If we're going to pretend that Aegis blocks(or is going to?) at a rate just shy of Ochain, you can't claim Phalanx as a benefit.

I would love to see a link to this testing, as everyone with an aegis who have tested state its within 60-70% but never have a decent size or can find the actual proof/parse of this. Some people recently have been reporting a higher block rate from Aegis(higher than 70%) so imo I think Aegis needs to be retested.

I still think anything Aegis can block for at a 60% block rate and up makes it comparable with Ochains damage reduction to a point(note to a point)magic damage would obviously be a better factor.

I do agree with your last part with shield gear. Aegis' problem is not the damage it reduces, but the gear you have to wear to achieve that, which ochain block rate seems to drop a minimal %, I dont think anyone has reported anything lower than 90%. Thats an overall 54% damage reduction just the shield alone.

*note* Im not bias or defending any shield in this discussion, both are great and tbh I like ochain more, but I can see Aegis' usefulness, whether SE is going to apply that usefulness is another story

Aegis shits on Ochain, its pretty hard to die to anything with the right support~

I don't feel like digging for testing that may no longer exist, so you can call my years-old block rate % claim speculation. Its an irrelevancy, though. Tanking VW mobs is about not dying, ever. MP is all over the place, and sustainability is rarely an issue. The difficulty in VW comes from the unrealistic nature of recovery(especially when dealing with stunners who apparently aren't capable of handling their single, simple task). You either remedy this by hoping you never get unlucky, or you add tanks. Ochain makes both of these things unnecessary, as it has absolutely no difficulty in tanking things with any affliction outside of encumberance, which at worst results in the death of the tank, at which point you regain use of your Ochain and, well, yeah.

Wipe-proof tanks > conveniences

Bring up more points that have already been addressed, please.

This whole thread is amusingly akin to the resistance the progressive tanking community got when Atonement first came out. Something about clinging to minor, irrelevant increases in convenient defensiveness in lieu of expanding the capabilities of the job as a whole.

yeah i like to have an alliance of summoners rotating PD and warping to jeuno to pay for COR 2H to reset too.

Good one.

Fanatic's Drink + Aegis