I know, I know...lot's of other opinions. But we were conspicuous in our absence.
Considering we outnumber pally's 3 to 1 I thought we should at least have our own thread.
To those perpetually wondering? Do I go pally or DA?
The answer is: what were you thinking when you leveled a human knight to 39 in the first place?
(mostly jk)
Seriously though, the real answers go back and forth. No one ever called a DA the "best Tank"...though across all mobs in the game I think they are a bit more offense oriented (cause of summon).
The panther is a glass cannon. In pve (though expensive) it allows a DA to walk into nearly anywhere in their level and walk back out again.
Remember playing ANY of these human melee classes, that the Devs sort of put Humans "in the middle" or average on starting stats.
Close order human melees are going to use summons, top gear (weapons and armors), extensive buffs, groups (almost always) and tats to try to tweak out some skill areas---like killing power.
Admittedly tanks are under appreciated atm. Many party without us. One hopes that won't always be the case (that someday archers won't be able to one-shot antharas).
Buy the best weapon you can afford and kidnap a buffer...then get going!
Well, a few counter comments to our darker brethren.
Dark Avengers are granted overall more utilitarian, but fall short in the areas a Paladin specializes.
Dealing with more than one mob? 360 degree shield block for paladins will allow them to outlast a DA in the same situation, from raid minion spawns to AOE Tanking.
The ability to heal your comrades in a pinch will save you form party wipe more times than not, or incase of our raid nights, 2-3 paladins will save a DA whos maintanking, where the same cadre of DAs would just watch as their buddy dies.
Angelic Icon is amazing, it is 60 seconds of just hurt, however, not as utilitarian as a panther all the time, but certainly not a skill to be forgotten.
TOL > TOD, period.
If dealing with the Undead vs Dealing with angelics, Paladin has built in Holy Weapon, Dark Magic Resistance and AOE debuff and a Lethal Strike/Fear ability, compared to the DA's lonely Lethalstrike/Fear.
Also in large mob situations or mass pvp the paladin has AOE root to couple with their AOE hate.
DA does have a PvP fear and Slow, where as Paladins Can Nuke Necro Summons.
Paladin at 79 has a self Rez, DA has nothing at 79 thats unique.
With New PVP hate lock, DA will be prety godly though in 1x1 if your not able to take out their panther first, but this is yet to be sean.
Right now when facing a fully leveled PK vs HK, the PK will Have 2 UD's Equalled with the HK 2. The HK will have his Cat, the PK Angelic Icon. The PK will have ToL to self cast, and pretty much be full HP again, the HK at 30% life will get his debuff, the Paladin can Full rez himself, the HK can not.
So, You have to kill the PK 3 times, the DA has to only die once. Lets hope glass kitty can chew through the HP of a PK 3 times over.
And this bares some mentioning, though is a VERY RARE BUILD. Paladin, Orfen and Zaken jewels for +% to heals. Prayer Passive augment for +% to heals, DC heavy for +% to heals, and an OEed Sacrafice skill can self heal. Toss in an ACU weapon acu pots, it can far out heal most melee inflicted damage.
Paladin's heals are worthless even with cast speed buffs acu weaponm and acu armor but sadly one thing to agree on tanks are getting hit hard every chrono :(
Paladin's heals are worthless even with cast speed buffs acu weaponm and acu armor but sadly one thing to agree on tanks are getting hit hard every chrono :(
pally can self rez and self heal them selves for 500+ hp every time scarfice recharges i know i got +9 scarfices noob
Paladin's heals are worthless even with cast speed buffs acu weaponm and acu armor but sadly one thing to agree on tanks are getting hit hard every chron
Ontop of getting sacrafice to self heal you obviously have never seen a paladins heal in action, also let me explain the self heal.
Sacrafice does not use MP, it uses HP, and with the right set up it can restore more HP than it takes, hence a paladins infinite supply of hp, however in more general game play, Sacrafice can restory 1200+ hp, when useing acumen alone its twice as fast any SE heal, and onpar with a bishops heal speed(not counting battle heal).
Our raid group last night had 3 paladins healing, 1 bishop, and 2 EE recharging, 75+ raids.
I can't disagree and I didn't want this to be a thread DA vs. Pally anyway.
Truth be told since I'm still in low 60's I don't know a lot about what happens next for DA.
Up to this point I like the crowd control options (and being able to kill from corpses or heal a bit from corpses helps DA stand awhile too)...the shield stun lands a lot and shackle is actually pretty reliable while the ability to wipe a yellow angelic mob with one spell will put a smile on anyone's face (when it lands).
If somehow the DA could actively keep that kitty going and when the panther is well buffed--it's not exactly a whimp.
Mostly I just wanted to post a little fun and remind everyone that DA's are in the game! (lol).
My associations with pally's has been almost non-existent.
DA by far is definatly a powerful class, however do to the lack of tanks period on servers, some merly look at the specs of the paladin and the DA, and bias their opinions purly off that alone. For starters, don't like the DA because of his undead skills, most of them are completly useless.
Life Scavenge-completly useless, not only do you need a dead corpse to be around in order to use it, but it only heals maybe 200hp max at its highest level, not to mention there's not always an abundence of corpes, especially in seiges or in olympiad.
Corpse plauge- simply put is an aoe poison, but you need a corpse yet again, and this skill is based off your M. atk, which means its never going to land becaues your a tank.
Horror- sounds like a fun skill, being able to make a player or mob run away, but yet again this skill is based off M. atk, good luck getting this to land on anybody your own level or higher. works on mobs ok though.
Touch of death- by far one of the Hell knights best abilities, can cancel buffs, bring your enemy down to 10% of his CP, and make it easier to debuff your victim. only weakness to this skill is your hp has to be at 75% or lower in order to use, plus it costs 1k hp. don't get me wrong, this is my favorite skill period as a HK, i pwn most classes in olympiad because of this.
Panther- the pride of any dark avenger lies in his panther, this allowes a DA to actually solo mobs, yes there's a 10% exp penalty, but the panther makes killing mobs a ton faster, i personally think the 10% loss is a small price to pay. 3rd class DA's, or HellKnights can even use a giant book to enchant the panther skill to +1, boosting its stats very nicely. only down side is you won't see any more increases again till +10. The panther's performance veries in pvp, in a 1v1 type fight, the panther will excell, however in a mass pvp type battle, most people are smart enough to take down the panther first, not to mention simple enemy aoes can bring the kitty down fast.
There are plenty of skills the paladin and DA share as well, shield stun, majesty, deflect arrow etc. The paladin by far is definatly the best "survivor" of the two tanks, having awsome heals, and touch of life. but because of the DA's offensive ability with the panther, and later touch of death, this gives the DA a major pvp advantage. Hell knights are also great for olympiad, a 78 HK with touch of death can beat most classes thrown at him. So if your having trouble deciding between DA and pld, both classes are great in their own ways, but that decision really lies down to weither or not you plan to pvp, or just beat on mobs.
angelic icon is very nice, but an even level HK will still pwn a pld. i'd know, i've dueled paladins not just in olympiad but in open pvp, and have yet to lose. self rez, ya its kinda nice, hope he dosn't forget noble buff.
angelic icon is very nice, but an even level HK will still pwn a pld. i'd know, i've dueled paladins not just in olympiad but in open pvp, and have yet to lose. self rez, ya its kinda nice, hope he dosn't forget noble buff.
Yeah the self rez does keep the paladins buffs. With the new hate lock I dont see the DA looseing much 1x1. In mass pvp though paladin excels. Aoe Roots, beter shield defense rates, healing your allies, crowd controlling, just alot more options for the paladin. Also their passive dark magic resist, with all the new dar magic resist gear, and stackable buffs, will make necros just barely tickle.
In 1x1 Its pretty impossible for a Pali to beat a DA simply because you can never 1x1 a DA it will be 2x1. Both are a valuable class, however the paladin has more specialized roll. There are just some jobs a paladin is better for, where teh DA does well in most any job.
There's several changes to hate and hate aura. Their power will go up about 3.33, reuse will be locked to 6s and 40s and they will lock the target to the tank for some time. OR so they say.
as far as i know the "hate lock" is nothing more than a rumor, but i've heard this myself from alot of people. with out a doubt if there is a hate lock, all tank classes will be having a lot of fun in the next update. DA will pretty much pwn olympiad, and Pld will play a better role at a seige. hate aura is definatly my favorite skill in mass pvp, but if it could actually "Lock" somebody on to you, then good game, very nice skill.
New wolf will counter DA's advantage with the panther. Tranformed wolf seems to have simaler stats and some nice abilities. Cost to use a pet brez on wolf is about the cost of crystals for panther and you have to minutes to rez before it goes away.
If its pvp, and your using your wolf, just dont lose. Cause your really gonna hate those people when they camp at your wolfs corpes for 20minutes, and not let you rez it.
Panter just resummons. :)
Why do so many people think these 2000patk/10000hp/200pdef pets are such do-or-die factors? I'd much rather have a character that is strong by itself, than having to rely on an external power source. Titans / Duelists all eat such pets alive, after which the owners usually run for their life ^^
a DA who actually knows how to play his class dosn't soely rely on the panther for victory. ya a gladi or tyrant can kill it in 2-3 shots, but thats 2-3 shots not on me, plus i still have plenty of inner power to still win the fight. trust me i'd know, i beat gladis and tryants all the time.
as far as using the panther or "wolf" in pvp, i have to be honest, at seiges or most pvps i don't even buff my panther. i go in with my tank fully buffed and usually have a drac bow to help with range. thing is when you have a buffer like a prophet buffing a 9man party, they often don't have enough mp to do panthers as well. the only exception and thank god for warcryers is they give full buffs and even COV to the party including the panther, thats bout the only time it ever gets buffed for me. i rely on skills like shield slam and touch of death to win my fights.
a DA who actually knows how to play his class dosn't soely rely on the panther for victory. ya a gladi or tyrant can kill it in 2-3 shots, but thats 2-3 shots not on me, plus i still have plenty of inner power to still win the fight. trust me i'd know, i beat gladis and tryants all the time.
I haven't read anything after the first post in this thread(and the 2nd) , tbh, I don't care what is written. I STARTED my human fighter so I can go knight, with which I would later on move to da and the take to hk. Just because I like the idea about a fighter using dark powers, like the description, always wanted to have a tank(at the end of 2005, start of 2006 I played only wizard classes before quiting) eventually I learned stuff like "DA is TheEEeE best tank" from clan mates, I'm a DA now and I don't feel sorry for it. Happily half of my friend list is healers, so I can always steal some evalh-archer-that-can-one-shot-Antharas' healer by just saying "Let's go to Branded" or "Wanna party somewhere?" :p
Things like best tank don't really matter, as long as I'm having fun :)
Gonna think about PvP when the time comes, atm I'm happy I have top C at lvl 41 without botting, begging, e-baying, asking for help from high level friends and stuff :)
a DA who actually knows how to play his class dosn't soely rely on the panther for victory. ya a gladi or tyrant can kill it in 2-3 shots, but thats 2-3 shots not on me, plus i still have plenty of inner power to still win the fight. trust me i'd know, i beat gladis and tryants all the time.
I lolled LD, I seriously did. :)
Im gonna have to agree with Lionheartboy on this one LD!