PLD Relic/mythic/emp Discussion

Oh, and a TP bonus Moonshade earring too

Yeah, that is what I plan to get upon WoTG completion in the future. As for ws legs, I may look into funding Avant Cuisses+1 perhaps~ Thank you again.

I'm considering un-retireing my pld. It would not be my main job, but it would prob be in my top 3 rotation that I use based on event and LS need on that particular night.

I'm therefore looking to outfit my pld with a proper sword and shield and would like input on which to do? Which to do first? Time/effort are considerations since i will want to get my pld up to speed asap.

I understand that its all situational, and the real answer is both/all of them. However for argument sake if i can only make one of each which should it be?

Almace for weapon, Aegis for shield.

As Kelhor said already, Almace should be the best weapon you could invest time in (if you need it quickly and a decent one at that). Doing those trials is really easy and help from others you may only want/need for Sobek, in order to get it to 85.

As for shield, Aegis is your best bet, if you can't (or don't want) to bother people helping you a whole lot.
It just takes a while and I would recommend to try to do Provenance Watcher if and whenever you can, so you can have a shot at a neat sidegrade to Ochain/Aegis.

Ochain is a nice shield and has it's spots where it outshines Aegis, but unless you have a lot of help collecting Souls, you will want to slit your wrists before you finish. Any decently equipped PLD can handle T3 VNM's for souls, but fighting T2 and T3 pops against most likely entire LS's or smaller static groups is stupid. I've got 100 plates nearly for ochain and harp now, and barely 10 souls ... though I've never had any help with them.

I'd also go with Almace and Aegis if you want to work at something but not bother a whole lot of people with it. Aegis PLD can AFK supertank nearly all the Legion mobs, and in most cases tank 2-3 of them at once.

I can hold entire Legion waves with Ochain too; it's not hard. The only way to die with either is to get petrified or terrorized. They both block the same amount of damager per hit. If you have both, Aegis is effectively a 100M macro piece.

Aegis is the easier shield to make, for sure, but I wouldn't call it better. There are just as many (if not more) situations where an Ochain would serve you better.

No offense, but that's all misinformation.

The rest at least can be taken as opinion.

They both have the same defense rating, they're both the same size, therefore they block the same damage per hit. I hold Legion waves on PLD with Ochain, that's not an opinion. The only times I die are from petrification or terror (or a long stun). That's not an opinion. None of it is misinformation.

Edit: I was mistaken, apparently. That's what I get for not having both shields.

They're different sizes. They're both special individual sizes. I remember seeing the dat info when it was first found. Aegis blocks slightly more damage,just alot less often

Er, how does it block more damage? It's a size smaller than Ochain.

Aegis and Ochain dont follow the normal size rules,they have their own individual rules.

I think it was martel that did the testing but there was a huge sample and aegis blocked slightly more damage than ochain,whenever it did block

For the blocked damage/defense rating, you can see testing in the Paladin FAQ, Info, and Trade Studies on this very forum to contra your statement.
For Legion, maybe there are some waves you could hold, but not indefinetly and certainly it's not a blanket statement for each hall and wave, and if you do Mul you wouldn't use Ochain at all.
There's alot of ways to die, depending on what hall/enemies/wave outside of petrification/terror.
I wasn't looking for an arguement, I just think people reading here would get the wrong impression from your statements if they hadn't tried out legion.

Edit: Quiznor beat me to it on the blocks.

Ah, I found the results (but not the data, and Neosutra seems to have been the only one to test Aegis's blocked damage reduction in the first place), but they also indicate that you'll still take ~15% less physical damage overall with Ochain.

On the easier Legion halls I can basically hold most waves indefinitely, although that never happens. I don't go PLD to Mul because I don't have Aegis (and there are obviously situations where Aegis will serve you better, just as there are situations where Ochain would be ideal), but saying one could AFK hold waves with Aegis is just as misleading. and truly, the only issues I have holding mobs in Legion stem from situations where I can't block (petrification, terror, stun. Extended periods of Silence if I didn't bring enough Echo Drops). I'm sure everyone's eaten an unfortunate Ballistic Kick while holding an Ironclad, or Death Prophet from a mantis, but that's not a problem unique to Ochain.

My point (perhaps not very well conveyed) was that neither is better than the other, and which one gets made first (they're both worth having) is likely entirely dependant on one's resources (gil versus friends/time).

The Martel test

Ochain: no cap to block rate, doesn't help with magical damage, reduces about 2/3 of physical damage taken.

Aegis: a cappable block rate like all shields, but still very high, and can be helped with Palisade and Reprisal. Reduces more damage per hit (over 80%!). Stops magical damage cold - being able to hard-cap MDT allows you to not only free up slots for MDB gear, but will render you functionally indestructible against magic heavy enemies.

The reasons I suggested Aegis to Tiran were two-fold; first, it's much easier to build (Dynamis or buy the thing, vs. competing for souls) and second, because Aegis opens more options to bring PLD to events than Ochain does. You can still do a solid job of blocking physical damage with Aegis. Ochain doesn't help against magic.

So knowing that he's going to aim at both eventually, why not get the easier option first, that actually brings more to the table anyway?

Yeah you can shrug off magic damage, but how many things deal severe magic damage frequently enough to worry?

According to this and the surrounding information, even considering Aegis's higher damage reduction, you'll still end up taking >10% less physical damage with Ochain, and physical damage is far and away more common than magical damage. The substantial MP recovery from Ochain opens a lot of doors for the job as well.

I got the impression from the first couple of responses that people were implying Ochain isn't worth bothering with, and just wanted to point out that it is. I've clearly not articulated myself very well here. My bad.

I'm finishing my Ochain just incase SE fixes EMN like they said but there is no current content that Aegis can't tank/hold comfortably and there probably won't be any.

Aegis is a game changer, Ochain is just a badass toy.

This is more or less my position as well. I like my Ochain, but I'd be lying if I said I used for anything of value. Aegis does the job for everything I need it for.

A "real" PLD will have both, because Ochain is a better physical shield, and that might matter at some point. But Aegis is sufficient, so anyone who's only going to get one (which is what Tiran was asking about) is doing themselves a disservice by getting Ochain instead of Aegis.

But Aegis is fugly.

I don't think that anyone here took that position.
It's mainly a matter of how easy the one or the other can be obtained and, continuatively, which one of them is better in the long run.

Ochain is, certainly, a very good shield and it brings your PLD to a point that it can do most things without worrying too much.
(With other shields you just have to work a lot harder)

However, you just won't get around asking for help making an Ochain; or, at least, you'll spend a lot more time making one if you're going to do it solo.

With Aegis, on the other hand, you can do everything solo and get currency from multiple sources (crafting, VW, Legion, Dyna, etc.), in order to get it done alone and as fast as you can get gil.
All this, while still getting a very good shield.

Perfectly said.

If you are only going to do 1, make Aegis. I soloed a lot of my colorless souls with Aegis. Brulo was the easier of the 3 for me. I used both shields farming pop sets to get my Almace to 90. Ochain on Sissy, Aegis on the bomb Upas-Kamuy. Sissy and Morta are 2 prime examples on when Ochain works better.

Almace is a solid sword. CdC spam from Ochain's increased block rate for TP gain is nice. However that's more of a solo, holding adds thing.

I'm about 2/3 done with Excalibur. Hopefully the occ 2.5 times normal damage makes up for tp loss when switching shields.

It's better any time you can't maintain CDC's aftermath; so either Requiescat situations, or just times when you can't maintain it due to running around/switching shields/amnesia/etc.

There are far more mobs that deal "severe magic damage" than severe physical damage. Spells alone are usually more potent than many of mobs' tp moves, and it's not like aegis can't block things. Just because physical damage is more common doesn't make it more dangerous.

The relative differences between either shield are immensely exaggerated. Having either one is a gigantic step above the rest of the paladin-ing community, but the same cannot be said juxtaposed to one another.

Actually it's the other day around. Magic damage (MAB/MDB formula) is easily dealt with now, Shellra V gives 26%~29% -MDT effect with the cap being 50%, MAB/MDB is also unaffected by level difference. Physical damage on the other hand is greatly effected by level difference. A monster 10 or more levels higher gets a pretty obscene bonus to it's physical damage. Then you have "breath attacks" (almost all HP based attacks are considered breath damage) which neither MDT nor PDT work against, only BDT or flat DT take effect.

Where something like Aegis comes in handy is holding a monster that can do Tier IV ga's or Tier V single targets. With the bonus damage multiplier that -ga's get on a single target it's usually enough damage to kill most other players even with 26~30% MDT, and tier V's can be nasty all on their own.

Aegis 90+ allows one to break that 50% cap up to 87.5%