Are Paladins really not that bad?

[Crescent Hawk]

Longknife is not a troll, Paladins are bland and boring as hell, he has a right to be "passionate" about the class. Problem is too many classes to balance, In my opinion Paladin should have just been a sub kit of fighter ingame, with a bonus special lay on hands or a spell selection for flavour or something.

Edited April 26, 2015 by Crescent Hawk

[Raven Darkholme]

Fighters are no less “boring“, what are you even talking about?

People fanboy about fighters like crazy, yet they are slightly inferior to pala in deflection and vastly inferior in saves. Paladin passively boosts all group defenses by 5 and accuracy by 6, and has his suppskills on top. All that fighter has going for him is engagement and slightly higher deflection for the first few seconds of a fight.

[MoxyWoo]

Longknife is not a troll, Paladins are bland and boring as hell, he has a right to be "passionate" about the class. Problem is too many classes to balance, In my opinion Paladin should have just been a sub kit of fighter ingame, with a bonus special lay on hands or a spell selection for flavour or something.

 

Aye.  Longknife has tried to do good discussions of it but got sort of attacked by paladin lovers (?) who were equally passionate, but had misinformation on some powers, stacking, aura radius, bugs, cast times (whatever, there's a lot of issues with the paladin) and it devolved into "they can tank well enough" or "LOLZ I beats the game wit' ma paladin" when the underlying issues of bugs, bland play, etc were never addressed.

[MoxyWoo]

Fighters are no less “boring“, what are you even talking about?

People fanboy about fighters like crazy, yet they are slightly inferior to pala in deflection and vastly inferior in saves. Paladin passively boosts all group defenses by 5 and accuracy by 6, and has his suppskills on top. All that fighter has going for him is engagement and slightly higher deflection for the first few seconds of a fight.

 

Fighters have meaningful CC and a taunt/pull skill.  Paladin has broken or ineffective support skills that are so limited in scope next to a priest or chanter that its unnecessary.  Specifically, Liberation doesn't really help versus things you want it too like Charm/Dominate and priests can provide an AoE version on demand since typically the enemy also gives out an AoE version.  Reviving also kills your party member it was cast on without crazy high health/endurance.  Long story short, the mix of broken/ineffective = bad class currently.

 

As for the Outworn buckler, this further devolves the Paladin who has superior defenses and should try to play more offensively on the front line to even less DPS.  They were never that great at it, but this just exasperates the generalist role they have.

 

Fighters also have higher base accuracy that can be buffed on demand via priests.  The Zealous Focus when not bugged has a tiny radius, so effectively, they can maybe give this to themselves and 2 others in a super tight melee formation.  Realistically?  its a self buff that doesn't stack with the priest one in hard fights.

Edited April 26, 2015 by MoxyWoo

[Crescent Hawk]

 

Longknife is not a troll, Paladins are bland and boring as hell, he has a right to be "passionate" about the class. Problem is too many classes to balance, In my opinion Paladin should have just been a sub kit of fighter ingame, with a bonus special lay on hands or a spell selection for flavour or something.

 

Aye.  Longknife has tried to do good discussions of it but got sort of attacked by paladin lovers (?) who were equally passionate, but had misinformation on some powers, stacking, aura radius, bugs, cast times (whatever, there's a lot of issues with the paladin) and it devolved into "they can tank well enough" or "LOLZ I beats the game wit' ma paladin" when the underlying issues of bugs, bland play, etc were never addressed.

 

 

Exactly, and Paladin IS a good class to solo because of those stupid high saves and deflection, and abusing items, but the major selling point, Support, is bad ( I actually think its bad because of the nature of the combat itself but thats another story).

 

As I said I respect Obsidian decision to try to be different and make them Warlords, Marshalls... it could have worked, but with how the combat really performs it falls short. The only way to make Paladin strong is min max since they are so attribute starved, thankfully the game rewards min max, I cant dump Int and dex and forget about auras and max deflection and Might\Con. By this point the Paladin becomes quite resilient.

Edited April 26, 2015 by Crescent Hawk

[Raven Darkholme]

 

Fighters are no less “boring“, what are you even talking about?

People fanboy about fighters like crazy, yet they are slightly inferior to pala in deflection and vastly inferior in saves. Paladin passively boosts all group defenses by 5 and accuracy by 6, and has his suppskills on top. All that fighter has going for him is engagement and slightly higher deflection for the first few seconds of a fight.

 

 

Fighters have meaningful CC and a taunt/pull skill.  Paladin has broken or ineffective support skills that are so limited in scope next to a priest or chanter that its unnecessary.  Specifically, Liberation doesn't really help versus things you want it too like Charm/Dominate and priests can provide an AoE version on demand since typically the enemy also gives out an AoE version.  Reviving also kills your party member it was cast on without crazy high health/endurance.  Long story short, the mix of broken/ineffective = bad class currently.

 

As for the Outworn buckler, this further devolves the Paladin who has superior defenses and should try to play more offensively on the front line to even less DPS.  They were never that great at it, but this just exasperates the generalist role they have.

 

Fighters also have higher base accuracy that can be buffed on demand via priests.  The Zealous Focus when not bugged has a tiny radius, so effectively, they can maybe give this to themselves and 2 others in a super tight melee formation.  Realistically?  its a self buff that doesn't stack with the priest one in hard fights.

The buckler helps paladins dps because its a small shield (no accuracy malus) with deflection superior to medium shields.

The aura stacks with other buffs as repeatedly stated, but resiliently denied...

[MadDemiurg]

 

 

Fighters are no less “boring“, what are you even talking about?

People fanboy about fighters like crazy, yet they are slightly inferior to pala in deflection and vastly inferior in saves. Paladin passively boosts all group defenses by 5 and accuracy by 6, and has his suppskills on top. All that fighter has going for him is engagement and slightly higher deflection for the first few seconds of a fight.

 

Fighters have meaningful CC and a taunt/pull skill.  Paladin has broken or ineffective support skills that are so limited in scope next to a priest or chanter that its unnecessary.  Specifically, Liberation doesn't really help versus things you want it too like Charm/Dominate and priests can provide an AoE version on demand since typically the enemy also gives out an AoE version.  Reviving also kills your party member it was cast on without crazy high health/endurance.  Long story short, the mix of broken/ineffective = bad class currently.

 

As for the Outworn buckler, this further devolves the Paladin who has superior defenses and should try to play more offensively on the front line to even less DPS.  They were never that great at it, but this just exasperates the generalist role they have.

 

Fighters also have higher base accuracy that can be buffed on demand via priests.  The Zealous Focus when not bugged has a tiny radius, so effectively, they can maybe give this to themselves and 2 others in a super tight melee formation.  Realistically?  its a self buff that doesn't stack with the priest one in hard fights.

The buckler helps paladins dps because its a small shield (no accuracy malus) with deflection superior to medium shields.

The aura stacks with other buffs as repeatedly stated, but resiliently denied...

 

And you too :D? So how does it stack? +1 accuracy and +5% crit (if you spendwaste a talent on it) over bless? That's not called stacking, that's called overriding. Or getting completely overridden by eldritch aim or any accuracy potion for the accuracy part?

Edited April 26, 2015 by MadDemiurg

[b0rsuk]

Another way of looking at this is that Paladin lets you do away with a priest ). It's not a very good substitute, but that micro-intensive squishy can become really annoying after a while.

[MadDemiurg]

Another way of looking at this is that Paladin lets you do away with a priest ). It's not a very good substitute, but that micro-intensive squishy can become really annoying after a while.

Yeah, you can do that. Although imo any 6 man party without a priest is suboptimal, he's a huge power multiplier. I'd bring a priest if repulsing seal and devotions of the faithful were his only spells.

[Jimmysdabestcop]

Honestly right now you can't even bring up Faith and Conviction for the Pally since it doesn't work for Party members only the PC.  And as a party member the Priest can have just as high defense. Use the herald shield from adra dragon and have higher accuracy. Skaen Priest with club is +21 accuracy not counting enchanments.

 

There is a ring for more spells so you can put 2 talents on offense and the rest on defense. There is a Paladin Aurua Ring but its still small area. Honestly his Aurora should be base 6m at 10 Int. Sure the Priest has lower HP so can't last as many fights but his defense without spells buffs is basically the same since the party Pally doesn't get any boosts for reputation. Factor in spells and trap spells its no contest.

 

And if you are looking for straight buffs you can go Chanter over Pally. Can't defend as good as a Pally, comes close, but buffs are way better and way larger.

 

Honestly think its the weakest class compared to the other classes. Maybe if Faith and Conviction will work for Party Members it will be better. Currently if you want a Pally you are forced to play with it as your PC and that sucks.

[MadDemiurg]

Yeah, pally is decent as PC only, but overbuffing the class so that NPCs are also decent is not the solution, solution is fix for the NPCs. PC pally could use some tweaks for his support abilities as well, but his overall tankiness is still a factor and shouldn't be neglected when tuning the abilities.

[mazeltov]

 Honestly his Aurora should be base 6m at 10 Int.

 

Every time I read a variation of this it decodes to: "I want to be able to dump Intellect on my Pally without consequences."

[CriticalFailure]

 

Another way of looking at this is that Paladin lets you do away with a priest ). It's not a very good substitute, but that micro-intensive squishy can become really annoying after a while.

Yeah, you can do that. Although imo any 6 man party without a priest is suboptimal, he's a huge power multiplier. I'd bring a priest if repulsing seal and devotions of the faithful were his only spells.

 

Well, a paladin or two may be able to somewhat make up for the lack of a priest regarding buffs, but the healing is harder to substitute, unless you happen to be a moonlike. There's Lay on Hands, but that's not much, and druid requires micromanaging as well.

 

If you're gonna have a druid in the party either way, I guess you have a point.

Edited April 26, 2015 by CriticalFailure

[Jimmysdabestcop]

 

 Honestly his Aurora should be base 6m at 10 Int.

 

Every time I read a variation of this it decodes to: "I want to be able to dump Intellect on my Pally without consequences."

 

 

No its actually the opposite. Even with 18 Int the Aurora is small because its boosting a small area to start with. So in essence the way it is setup you can dump Int now. Perhaps 6m is to big at 10 maybe 6m at 18 Int. So around 4m at 10 then.

 

Right now you dont need a Pally with high Int because even with high Int its still to hard to get any range and duration does little for him. If you are boosting something that is small by increasing Int whats the point?

 

Take the Wizard the reason you want to max Int is because most durations and AoE are decent size and a increase of >30% means a lot. Max Int on something for 2m or lasts under 6secs is basically pointless you aren't getting a lot out of Max Int.

Edited April 26, 2015 by Jimmysdabestcop

[eubatham]

Another way of looking at this is that Paladin lets you do away with a priest ). It's not a very good substitute, but that micro-intensive squishy can become really annoying after a while.

 

I heavily disagree on that point. From a Priest's perspective, the Paladin is only capable of overlapping with a few of their abilities. The difference in quality and quantity when it comes to support is so large between the two classes, that the Paladin really isn't a substitute.

 

I really don't understand this hate against micro'ing. You can pause combat as much as you want and you don't need to (nor can you) spam spells every encounter. Considering that the Paladin has more per encounter abilities than a Priest, you might as well say that a Paladin requires more micro'ing if you're going to fire off abilities constantly.

Edited April 26, 2015 by eubatham

[mazeltov]

No its actually the opposite. Even with 18 Int the Aurora is small because its boosting a small area to start with. So in essence the way it is setup you can dump Int now. Perhaps 6m is to big at 10 maybe 6m at 18 Int. So around 4m at 10 then.

 

Right now you dont need a Pally with high Int because even with high Int its still to hard to get any range and duration does little for him. If you are boosting something that is small by increasing Int whats the point?

 

~4m, which is what 18 Int currently gives to ZFocus and ZEndurance, is a comfy radius (though I suggested bumping the base from 2.5m to 3m in the Talent suggestion thread). Large enough to catch an entire frontline, or an entire backline, but not both at the same, unless the backliners move up and assume more risk. Balanced. Actually dumping Intellect past 10 would bring two of the Auras down to almost melee range. Current radii encourage thoughtful use.

 

This is just for Auras. Decent Int also has an impact on the radii and durations of last hit ability procs and Exhortations. If Paladin really is a support class, and I agree that it is and should be, then game mechanics should encourage Intellect for Paladins just like the attribute is encouraged for other support classes. Greatly expanding base radii and/or durations is a cop out (no pun intended).

[Jimmysdabestcop]

I guess my point is why does the Chanter constant Endurance talent (ancient Memory or whatever) set at 4m but all of the Pallys are 2.5m base? And all of their chant buffs are much larger then the Pally. Ancient memory is like tacked on the normal chants its not even a full abilitiy like the Pally modals but it has better base range.

 

Pally has the smallest buff range out of anyone at base 10. Its ridiculous.

 

And this all has to do with the Attribute System being Percentage based instead of direct numerical increases. Its why if you have squishy range class you can dump Con because it doesn't matter since their gain is so small the dump or max of it doesn't really effect it a lot. Like say a dump or max of a fighter's con would.

 

But I'm not saying change that system. You just have to set the base numbers up enough to actually be effected by being Maxed or Dumped. And the Pallys auroras aren't.

[Longknife]

 

Are you aware absolutely nothing you said was in response to the points I made?

 

....Nor did you even really manage to make any coherent points at all?

 

I don't feel like taking the bait, your strawman.

 

How the HELL can I strawman you when my post was "you did not address any of the points I just made?"

 

 

 

Aye.  Longknife has tried to do good discussions of it but got sort of attacked by paladin lovers (?) who were equally passionate, but had misinformation on some powers, stacking, aura radius, bugs, cast times (whatever, there's a lot of issues with the paladin) and it devolved into "they can tank well enough" or "LOLZ I beats the game wit' ma paladin" when the underlying issues of bugs, bland play, etc were never addressed.

 

 

 

It boggles my mind. Really it does.

 

 

The way I see it, we have eleven classes in this game. If one of those classes is painfully inferior to the other 10, then it means 1/11th of our game is effectively moot and not being utilized properly. I don't like wasted potential, nor do I think anyone does. I've also complained about the plaetorea of useless all-class talents you're offered that are effectively "non-existent" in the sense that no one in their right mind would take them and thus their potential isn't utilized, but nobody freaks out over that. If it were Ciphers who I felt were a sucky class, I'd voice criticisms as to why exactly as I do now.

 

Never ceases to amaze me the kind of stuff people will attach themselves to and fight passionately to defend, especially since it's a matter of....if things went my way, the class they love so dearly would get even better, whereas if things went their way, it'd stay as is.

 

 

 

Also a bit of a tangent and just a fun fact people might be interested in: Ever wonder why people can be such fanatics about a thing that they'll illogically attack you tooth and nail for not showing the same degree of loyalty they do? For example, ever wonder why perhaps you could be a fan of Nintendo and the Wii U, but when you acknowledge that you also think it's kind of a lackluster system, another fan might flip out on you?

 

  I'd long suspected it was this and a study on the matter only confirmed my suspicions: the things you like become an extension of your ego that you use to validate yourself, AKA if you like a company, product, story character, TV show or whatever and then that thing fails in some way, some people take that as a personal attack on their own judgement. It's potentially subconciously viewed as an indicator that you yourself are unintelligent, have poor taste or in some way have failed aswell for believing in that thing. Following that, don't be surprised to, for example, see a kickstarter backer of Pillars of Eternity adamantly defend the game against anyone who voices disappointment, and not so much because they themselves don't understand the disappointment, but because they're inserting their ego into the matter and take an attack on Pillars of Eternity as an attack on themselves. Interesting stuff, imo.

 

 

 

 

Fighters are no less “boring“, what are you even talking about?

People fanboy about fighters like crazy, yet they are slightly inferior to pala in deflection and vastly inferior in saves. Paladin passively boosts all group defenses by 5 and accuracy by 6, and has his suppskills on top. All that fighter has going for him is engagement and slightly higher deflection for the first few seconds of a fight.

 

 

Pretty sure deflection is the category Fighters beat Paladins out on dude. It's the other defenses that Paladin excels in. I'm assuming you're arguing the deflection skill Paladins get at level freaking 9 is what makes Paladins better at deflection, but you fail to account for the fact that it's 20 seconds long, so Vigorous Defender competes with it and again makes Fighters defenses (ALL of them) superior, by your own logic. If you really wanna argue that Paladins have superior deflection because there's a 5 second window where they do, then lulz.

   Likewise, I keep saying people are underestimating Constant Recovery on Fighter. If you've got a Fighter with good armor to the point where a lot of the stuff on him is dealing minimal damage (when it hits, thanks to high deflection), then that minimal damage can be cancelled out by Constant Recovery, effectively meaning one less person is on the fighter, so to speak. It's also a case where some have argued Lay On Hands is superior, but again if we're talking about a fight involving Petrify, Stun or Paralyze, then no, it's not. Constant Recovery is universally applicable, Lay On Hands is not. That problem aptly sums up Paladin's problem in general: their skills are consistently more specialized than the alternative classes and thus only see proper application a minority of the time compared to what the other classes get out of their skills.

 

 

Fighters can also be built offensively and do quite a bit of damage. There's actually not a whole lot stopping you from playing a Fighter like a Ranger or a Rogue lacking Sneak Attack and other free non-crit damage amps in exchange for superior defenses. As I've said before, the only reason people don't realize Fighter's offensive potential is because Fighter is simultaneously the best tank in the game while his damage potential is going to be somewhere in the middle of all the classes. I'd expect a Fighter to outdamage Priest, Chanter, Paladin, and to a lesser extent, Wizard and Druid in certain circumstances and scenarios to the point where Fighter can keep up with their damage output by providing superior damage on average while easily losing out when those three are in their comfort zones; what Fighters provide is solid stats whereas other classes are more skill-reliant. It's tough to pin down where they'd rank since much of Fighter's advantages are that they CAN afford some of the better all-class talents without it being such an inconvenience (when built for damage), but you get the point.  You assign the classes to what they're best at, so that means Fighters rarely get used for damage.

 

And while brief, all of the Fighter's per encounter skills can be a large help to a battle. When I first got the game and I was derp as hell at it, I beat Maerwald and similar "boss" characters by learning that the knockdown a Fighter provides is a large enough window to prevent my team from being hit and then kill that squishy enemy before they even get back up.

 

 

Lastly, I don't think many people have ever spoken about how thrilling and fun Fighters are to play. It's more a matter of respect. This is a class that, if your entire squad wipes and Fighter is the last one standing....? Most classes, when they're the last person left, I expect the fight to be over and done and there's nothing I can do. The only two that consistently seem to pull off miracles are Chanter and Fighter. While Chanter is more invocation dependent, Fighter is one that just may or may not survive off his stats alone with absolute minimal micromanagement from you. My Trial of Iron run and my first playthrough? It survived because Eder was the last one standing against the final boss in his final phase, and he pulled that off alone. So yeah, you better believe I have respect for Fighters when twice in that playthrough, Eder was the difference between the file being deleted and me being able to complete the game.

 

 

 

I guess my point is why does the Chanter constant Endurance talent (ancient Memory or whatever) set at 4m but all of the Pallys are 2.5m base?

 

 

I've said this before, but I truly believe this is the result of the "no bad builds" philosophy. I think somewhere in development, they realized intelligence did very little for Paladins, and unfortunately the solution was to practically make intelligence a requirement if you want to use auras effectively. In this case, I think the devs need to cut their losses on the "no bad builds" mantra, set the auras to a much larger range and thereby make int much less critical, and just leave it at that. Paladins would benefit from this as they ALREADY need practically every stat save for Dexterity. The stat demand is far too high for Paladin and just leads to either complete abandonment of half of their abilities, or you end up lackluster in everything.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Longknife

[Crescent Hawk]

Its true, the stat demand for Paladins is incredible and even if it wasnt they would still be mediocre, If the game had multiplayer they would realize pretty fast the class needs some desperate tweaking.

 

I am torn, I love the paladin orders lore, but they feel so weak. I dont even like Pallegina as a pally companion. Oh well.

[b0rsuk]

Longknife:

Welcome back, Paladin ! I know why you are so drawn to this thread despite not contributing and lack of rational arguments. It's your paladin nature, you need to accept this. You simply stick to the same arguments you used on the first pages. I keep bringing new points of view and argumentation. Not you. "Paladins are awful" is your idée fixe. Very paladin-like. The only reason I haven't put you on ignore list yet is because it's more fun teasing you and exposing your logic gaps. You need something to bash. It can be paladin, but it can also be a class that is not monk. Monk deals like 10% more damage than class X, therefore class X is useless.

 

 

It boggles my mind. Really it does.

 

 

The way I see it, we have eleven classes in this game. If one of those classes is painfully inferior to the other 10, then it means 1/11th of our game is effectively moot and not being utilized properly. I don't like wasted potential, nor do I think anyone does. I've also complained about the plaetorea of useless all-class talents you're offered that are effectively "non-existent" in the sense that no one in their right mind would take them and thus their potential isn't utilized, but nobody freaks out over that. If it were Ciphers who I felt were a sucky class, I'd voice criticisms as to why exactly as I do now.

 

Never ceases to amaze me the kind of stuff people will attach themselves to and fight passionately to defend, especially since it's a matter of....if things went my way, the class they love so dearly would get even better, whereas if things went their way, it'd stay as is.

 

 

 

Also a bit of a tangent and just a fun fact people might be interested in: Ever wonder why people can be such fanatics about a thing that they'll illogically attack you tooth and nail for not showing the same degree of loyalty they do? For example, ever wonder why perhaps you could be a fan of Nintendo and the Wii U, but when you acknowledge that you also think it's kind of a lackluster system, another fan might flip out on you?

  I'd long suspected it was this and a study on the matter only confirmed my suspicions: the things you like become an extension of your ego that you use to validate yourself, AKA if you like a company, product, story character, TV show or whatever and then that thing fails in some way, some people take that as a personal attack on their own judgement. It's potentially subconciously viewed as an indicator that you yourself are unintelligent, have poor taste or in some way have failed aswell for believing in that thing. Following that, don't be surprised to, for example, see a kickstarter backer of Pillars of Eternity adamantly defend the game against anyone who voices disappointment, and not so much because they themselves don't understand the disappointment, but because they're inserting their ego into the matter and take an attack on Pillars of Eternity as an attack on themselves. Interesting stuff, imo.

Completely devoid of arguments. Nothing to comment here. You have a talent for ignoring whatever rational or factual there is about a post and only seeing the rest. I will demonstrate:

 

1. For example with my post a while ago. It was passionate because I enjoy teasing people who are not open-minded, but it also contained truth that paladins have a niche and arguably would be more interesting if they were strong within that niche rather than become like other classes. A melee fighter with support skills. Supports party members, especially melee ones, with strong single-target effects. I was only addressing first part of your post, the rest I didn't care about and didn't delete as much of it as it deserved. No conspiracy here.

 

 

 

Fighters are no less “boring“, what are you even talking about?
People fanboy about fighters like crazy, yet they are slightly inferior to pala in deflection and vastly inferior in saves. Paladin passively boosts all group defenses by 5 and accuracy by 6, and has his suppskills on top. All that fighter has going for him is engagement and slightly higher deflection for the first few seconds of a fight.

 

 

Pretty sure deflection is the category Fighters beat Paladins out on dude. It's the other defenses that Paladin excels in. I'm assuming you're arguing the deflection skill Paladins get at level freaking 9 is what makes Paladins better at deflection, but you fail to account for the fact that it's 20 seconds long, so Vigorous Defender competes with it and again makes Fighters defenses (ALL of them) superior, by your own logic. If you really wanna argue that Paladins have superior deflection because there's a 5 second window where they do, then lulz.

 

2. How can you possibly miss what he's talking about here ?? I'll spell it out to you:

* paladins are essentially comparable to fighters in deflection. A few points here or there doesn't make a big difference.

* paladins have vastly better other defenses, which also matter.

* paladin boosts the group

 

Righteous Soul may be a boring ability, but the defensive bonus is amazing. It would be an amazing skill if it came earlier. +15 to many of the most dangerous effects in the game, including Dominated, Charmed, Terrified, Frightened, and the lesser ones like poison and disease. It also shortens these effects by 5s.

 

It's okay that you like fighters, but why don't you just leave paladins alone ? You don't have anything interesting to say. I'm sure paladins are going to get some buffs in patches. In the meantime, we enjoy paladins.

The data is skewed towards fighters anyway, because Eder sits right there in the first village. You'd have to deliberately skip companions to play with Pallegrina on your first playthrough. It's deliberately the simplest class, and it's working. People like simple stuff that works and doesn't require much thought.

[mazeltov]

Paladins would benefit from this as they ALREADY need practically every stat save for Dexterity.

Its true, the stat demand for Paladins is incredible

 

Paladins don't need tank stats unless they're built to fight in melee with non-reach weapons. Conversely, Intellect boosts all of their support skills, and Might benefits most of them.

[Longknife]

Longknife:

Welcome back, Paladin ! I know why you are so drawn to this thread despite not contributing and lack of rational arguments. It's your paladin nature, you need to accept this. You simply stick to the same arguments you used on the first pages. I keep bringing new points of view and argumentation. Not you. "Paladins are awful" is your idée fixe. Very paladin-like. The only reason I haven't put you on ignore list yet is because it's more fun teasing you and exposing your logic gaps. You need something to bash. It can be paladin, but it can also be a class that is not monk. Monk deals like 10% more damage than class X, therefore class X is useless.

 

Completely devoid of arguments. Nothing to comment here. You have a talent for ignoring whatever rational or factual there is about a post and only seeing the rest. I will demonstrate:

 

1. For example with my post a while ago. It was passionate because I enjoy teasing people who are not open-minded, but it also contained truth that paladins have a niche and arguably would be more interesting if they were strong within that niche rather than become like other classes. A melee fighter with support skills. Supports party members, especially melee ones, with strong single-target effects. I was only addressing first part of your post, the rest I didn't care about and didn't delete as much of it as it deserved. No conspiracy here.

 

 

2. How can you possibly miss what he's talking about here ?? I'll spell it out to you:

* paladins are essentially comparable to fighters in deflection. A few points here or there doesn't make a big difference.

* paladins have vastly better other defenses, which also matter.

* paladin boosts the group

 

Righteous Soul may be a boring ability, but the defensive bonus is amazing. It would be an amazing skill if it came earlier. +15 to many of the most dangerous effects in the game, including Dominated, Charmed, Terrified, Frightened, and the lesser ones like poison and disease. It also shortens these effects by 5s.

 

It's okay that you like fighters, but why don't you just leave paladins alone ? You don't have anything interesting to say. I'm sure paladins are going to get some buffs in patches. In the meantime, we enjoy paladins.

The data is skewed towards fighters anyway, because Eder sits right there in the first village. You'd have to deliberately skip companions to play with Pallegrina on your first playthrough. It's deliberately the simplest class, and it's working. People like simple stuff that works and doesn't require much thought.

 

 

Dude again you didn't counter or address most of the points I made. You countered like one. It's painfully ironic you make this post about how I'm not actually arguing rational thought or the like and then your entire post is one giant example of slander with little else to offer.

 

 

The problem is Deflection is by far the most important defense to have for a front line character, and no, the Paladin does not boost ally defenses for the majority of the game, and no, as discussed even the increased DR aura will have trouble hitting everyone. Will and Reflex defenses for example are largely geared towards avoiding mind-controlling attacks or AOEs. Have you fought the fampyrs in this game? Them and Vithraks, they're like the only enemy type that consistently targets your heavy hitters. I have little need for Will defense on Paladin or Fighter because I can count the number of times I've had either class targeted by a fampyr or Vithrak on one hand. The only enemy type that will consistently try to dominate, confuse or charm your tanks are those spores that just shoot the first guy within range, but since they're immobile you can easily single them out and approach them safely as a group to the point where it doesn't matter who gets hit. Infact you might prefer your Paladin or Fighter be hit instead of your spellcasters.

   Reflex is an issue in the sense that either the Fighter-Paladin will be targeted by an AOE directly or they won't be targeted at all. But you know which defense consistently gets used? Deflection. Every single fight. It's also worth mentioning that since Fighter is commonly built as a pure tank, you'll likely get the all-class talent to make shield defense also boost reflexes. You could do the same on Paladin, but in doing so you're hurting their offensive capacity, and depending on the type of Paladin you're building, this could be bad. A Bleak Walker for example is definitely not going to want the accuracy penalties from shields and is also going to want to try and land kills when possible.

 

 

And Righteous Soul? It's yet another example of Paladins half-assing a skill that another class gets.

 

Righteous Soul

Clarity of Agony

 

I can hear it now: "Paladin's is a passive and Monk's is two per rest!" Yes, but Monk's is also level 5 and covers more status ailments. In theory I could understand why someone might look at Righteous Soul and think it's a good deal. In practice however, it's simply not all it's cracked up to be. Why? Because again, your damage dealers are the ones targeted by charm and dominated attacks the most and very limited enemies actually use frightened or terrified effects. You know what can be somewhat common? Paralyze, stun and petrify. Anyone who's run through the Endless Paths will tell you some of the later stages are plagued with those effects, and it's clearly broadcasted when a fight will involve them. If I'm fighting Cean Gwlas with a Monk and a Paladin, you know what'll happen? The Paladin will not be terrified, which will mean jack all when they use their AOE paralyze and lo and behold he's paralyzed. The Monk will be Paralyze and Terrified, but both of those effects will be short, and the moment the Monk is free, he puts in work killing those things so that less paralyze is being spammed and thus the entire team is in less danger. Just as a bonus, I happen to know Crush damage (Monk's specialty) does wonders vs. these guys. The Monk's benefit is also going to protect him from any potential stun landed by a nearby phantom or the like.

    You might be saying that a Paladin's superior defenses are more likely to save the Paladin from being paralyzed at all. This is plausible, but why not just bring a Monk? A Paladin's damage burns out the moment Flames of Devotion is gone, a Monk can spam Torment's Reach like it's going out of style. This enemy type is an issue because it can spam AOE paralyze attacks that hit your whole team and nuke everyone's deflection as they're swarmed with hits. They need to die and they need to die quick. Both Paladin and Monk offer ways to counteract the ailments, but Monk is going to be dropping these like flies. Once again, another class is doing the job better. To be fair, this is a rare fight scenario where Paladin can do decent, because it's actually a fight where Liberating Exhortation can come into play and help kill these things faster. I only make the "why not just bring a monk" argument because I know how people think: Do I want to bring a Paladin who, IF he gets a saving roll from the paralyze effect, can liberate my Cipher and Wizard (with a bit of time between each cast of Exhortation) to help clean the floor, or do I want to bring two monks instead of one who already have pretty respectable defense against the Paralyze themselves and are fully capable of reliably lowering the potential paralyze duration to nothing while dealing heavy amounts of damage the moment they break free? This is part of what hurts Paladin so bad: they're consistently situational, to the point where you catch yourself saying "well IF I dodge the Paralyze and use Liberating Exhortation and IF I land my Flames of Devotion hits then it'll have been worth it to bring the Paladin along in one of the hundreds of battles we've fought!" It falls flat when the Monk undeniably pulls his weight in every single encounter.

   Again, this is yet another story of "looks good on paper, suffers in practice." Could things like Righteous Soul be good? Yes, the problem being that the game provides you with next to no battle setups where Righteous Soul is noticeable or pivotal. As stated, the charm and domination bonuses are effectively moot because enemies that have these types of attacks go for the wizards, the priests and the ciphers. The frightened and terrified bonuses...? What enemies use these ailments aside from the above-mentioned enemy type? In the end, it's functionally a fortitude bonus, which while good, is nothing to write home about and ffs you could debate just snatching Bear's fortitude instead. (that's sad) What needs to happen is that Paladin either needs respecs OR the game itself needs to offer battle scenarios where some of the Paladin talents are likely to come into play.

   I made the very same point when another thread had people saying that offense characters are Might-Dex-Int and Defense ones are Con-Per-Res and there's no need to play them any different. Currently yes there's a truth to that, but proper encounter variance could change that. Paladin either needs tweaking or encounter types that validate them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And no actually, I immediately traded someone out for Pallegina and she was with me my first playthrough, the very same Trial of Iron one where Eder saved the squad twice. I like her character, but that doesn't mean I wasn't disappointed with her performance. I find it very telling that when I was fighting the final boss of the game and there were those two big guys I needed to keep busy? It was actually Eder and Aloth who kept each one busy, not Eder and Pallegina. Even when I needed someone to grab the one Aloth was on for just a moment so he could get away or reposition, it was my PC Barb that stepped in, and my Barb was the one who initially held one of those giants as Eder kept Thaos busy. I tried holding one off with her initially but she was just getting her ass kicked so I needed her to take on a more supportive role to be useful, which mostly involved using her for heal casts she happened to have thanks to a ring I equipped her with. :/  I might have to load the file up and look if her defenses surpass my barb's or not. Regardless, his insane amounts of endurance are a defense of their own (same can be said for Monks).

 

 

And to anyone arguing Paladins need a niche of their own, I've said this before: I have nothing against that and think it's a fine idea, but the realist in me also knows that at this stage of development (aka, NOT development anymore), Obsidian is far more likely to tweak the numbers on existing skills, not actually revamp the entire class.

 

 

 

Paladins don't need tank stats unless they're built to fight in melee

 

 

If a Paladin isn't tanking then what exactly is it doing? Paladin is such a confused mess of responsibilities that if it even drops one of them, it lags behind. As a comparison, this is akin to you fully ignoring a Ranger's pet and just using the Ranger. If you do that, you've hit a point where it's a question of "why not just use a Rogue?" Without tanking, you quickly hit a question of "Why not just use a ______" for the Paladin.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Longknife

[mazeltov]

If a Paladin isn't tanking then what exactly is it doing?

 

Supporting, attacking, supporting through attacking. The usual things a character who is not tanking does. Building overtanky weakens the key Paladin gimmick of support delivery: abilities that activate on killing blows.

 

Which is not to say that a stereotypical tank build doesn't work well on Paladins. It does, but it also militates against the supporty aspects. Build diversity in action.

[gkathellar]

 

If a Paladin isn't tanking then what exactly is it doing?

 

Supporting, attacking, supporting through attacking. The usual things a character who is not tanking does. Building overtanky weakens the key Paladin gimmick of support delivery: abilities that activate on killing blows.

 

Which is not to say that a stereotypical tank build doesn't work well on Paladins. It does, but it also militates against the supporty aspects. Build diversity in action.

 

Wat.

 

Sure, building to tank weakens the key paladin gimmick of support delivery, but the key paladin gimmick of support delivery is awful. The buffs are unimpressive compared to what a priest can offer. Worse, triggering them is inconvenient at best, when support is the one role you actually need to have on-call. Failing to build your paladin for support is like failing to practice flying by flapping your arms as part of your daily exercise routine.

 

Can you run a paladin as a front-line supporter? Sure, but you pay a ginormous opportunity cost for using a paladin instead of a priest for this role. You also pay an opportunity cost for not developing your paladin fully as a tank (although frankly, if you want a tank in a party environment, fighter is usually better).

 

Paladins are uniquely good for one thing, and no other class even comes close with regards to that one thing - using their ridiculously high defenses to sit and tank everything. No other class can just stand around with a 170/170/170/110 defense spread near-indefinitely. If you're looking to do anything else, though? Another class can do it better.

[mazeltov]

Another class can do it better.

 

It's not a competition, contrary to what the prevalent optimization brain-rot on the forums tends to imply. The classes each cover a role or two; sometimes they cover them in different ways. Some require more micro, tactics, timing, and so on to execute. It is nice that these styles are available.

 

The theoretical limitation on caster power in PoE is the rest/camp mechanic. To the extent players circumvent the soft restrictions that are in place, casters will appear badly overpowered compared to any non-caster class in the damage, CC/debuff, and support roles.