IR Legs or ValorFollow

are you saying you have the full valor set? the IR set is defintely good in terms of emnity but it doesnt look shiny and stylish though... erm... in my opinion

my worry is the difference in defense given really.

True, it is only 7 less lol

IR is great for Enmity and MDB, as well as a rather moderate increase to all your elemental resistance. It's also quite a bit easier to obtain than valor armor.

Valor armor is a sort of dead set now, with the body being the only piece I'd recommend equipping full-time. As far as their use for enhancing job abilities, I still only consider the body and boots worth carrying around.

Shield Bash+10 has never done anything I can noticeably see to any enemy I use it on. The common thought back in the day was that it increased your chance to stun, which, if true, is obsolete now that shield bash seems to have a 100% stun rate by itself. If anyone knows exactly what it does I'd be grateful for the enlightenment.

Another 15 seconds to rampart is great, except that the defense it offers is nothing in the realm of amazing, and the magic shield is usually gone shortly after I use it. It simply isn't a big enough boost to validate taking away inventory space.

I'm not a big fan over interruption reduction gear, as I feel the bonuses are always too small to ever stack it effectively without sacrificing more important attributes. It's far more realistic to just learn to time your spells correctly, and with our shield now offering 100% interruption reduction upon a successful block, it seems even more superfluous. That said, the STR+5 is still nice for a WS macro. I just wouldn't tank in it.


On the flip side, Valor Surcoat's alteration to cover is akin to having chivalry on a 3 minute timer. 1/4 damage converted to MP can easily refill your mana supply in a hurry. Words can't really express how much love I have for that piece.

The boots are fairly obvious; Another 10% damage reduction on sentinel is just damn nice.


Until IR Body is added, Valor Surcoat is the only full-time body piece worth tanking in. Otherwise IR is statistically superior.

I would look at it in part as an inventory issue. Sure, IR have more enmity...but on the whole, the two pieces are pretty similar.

Were it a question of which to go for, then I'd say IR wins out. Since you already have Valor though, I'd just not worry about IR unless you're building a MDB set.

Ares's Cuirass, Hydra Haubert, Avalon, even a Hauby/+1 all have their use "full-time" tanking.

Edit: Valor Gauntlets add +10 Damage to Shield Bash

Edited, Feb 11th 2009 12:10pm by NCCoda

I meant of the Valor Pieces. Everything else would only be used for JA's.

I would likely replace Valor Surcoat with Ares's Cuirass as my 'full-time' armor if I had one, with Valor only coming out for the cover.

Gotcha, I misunderstood your post ^^

I just got Valor body last night, I've been using a combination of Gallant+1, Hauby+1, Coral Scale, and Assault Breastplate. I don't see myself phasing out any of those except the Gallant+1, although whenever LBC drops a Phobos Cuirass and I pull 9m gil out of my butt I would probably shift my current tanking around to build more around the Ares's body.

I think thats very funny how you say pld af2 is not very tankly lol, i sometimes feel the same way based on the fact that there is much better tank gear out there nowadays ... like the IR and askar sets. But on the other hand The valor gear is also very friendly and complimentary to paladins, I myself go with the valor set im a galka btw. Im trying to focus on max HP and rely on things to regain MP such as Valor Surcoat, Auto-refresh (from the job trait itself), sanction if i have it sometimes, Chivalry, and im trying to get myself and ethereal earring. Also thinking about just carrying ethers on me.

The IR set has x2 things in my opinion that are appealing, the amazing levels of +enmity and i suppose the bonus from having the set.. whatever that is. But i think the valor set is better.

15 resist on 4 pieces is useless. You need at least 250+ to even make a resist set semi useful. 300 is the number you want to hit though.

It is possible to make it work with 4/4 I.R., but to do so you would need the more expensive and hard to obtain gear (Hrotti, num.+1, Cerb mantle, assault breastplate, etc..). If you have the ability to get all of those, Im sure you have the ability to get crimson legs (although some people are incredibly unlucky on that drop), which are considerably better than I.R legs for resists.

Barspells and 15 resist in gear is not going to resist anything worthwhile to make it a point to gear that way. I.R. is great for an MDB build, but not for a full out resist set (unless you have everything you could possible have.)

As far as full time bodies, I prefer Avalon as it has not only great defensive stats, but +13 acc which helps with atonement spam. The +3 enmity is also very nice over Ares imo. But thats just a difference in tanking styles I suppose.

get both, always good to have both for situational purposes.

I would use Iron Ram over af2 legs for the extra enmity and MDB.

Either way you should be buying the IR Legs for a MDB set.

Personally I choose the IR Legs. With Homam in for Reprisal, Flash, Ichi and Ni.