As noone else has jumped in I'll say what I said the last time someone asked this - you can find that thread if you flick back a bit. Beginning of february.

"Magplars are pretty firmly on top right now to the point that they're ahead of the other classes by some margin. They got a bunch of buffs in back in u30 which really moved them up the ladder then another big buff to backlash in u31.Those changes have given them incredible survivability with stuff htd and living dark and then the full package on offense. I mean, you've got a gap closer which stuns and sets off balance, easy pressure with jabs which ofc also heal you, and a huge amount of quite bursty follow up damage from stuff like crescent sweep, purifying light and the burning light passive. Plus a nice execute in the jesus beam. On top of that, they're the easiest class to play bar none. You really can't go wrong with them.

I don't think I'm seeing anything in the pts notes that's going to challenge their dominance. If anything they're getting a slight buff - javelin's damage will now bypass block.

DKs on the other hand are in a much better place after U32 but people tend to overstate how much they've improved. Most of the changes zos made - stuff like combustion, charged, battle roar - were to sort out their godawful sustain, but they still have the most expensive skills in the game. And the rest was in the nice to have category - stacks on whip last a bit longer, foo gives you 3 fireballs rather than two, eruption is a cost over time... They didn't get anything like the big changes to healing power / damage numbers that temps got. My sense is that they're much better than they were and definitely a good choice but not really in the same league...

The changes on PTS are interesting; it looks like the damage boost from engulfing flames is getting a nerf, while the heal from burning embers is getting turned into a hot rather than a burst heal. I think that will reduce their overall damage while giving them slightly better - or at least more consistent - healing, but it looks more on the margins. Not sure it will make big changes but we'll see.

There are two other things it's worth noting. First, one of the things you'll find about DKs is that the class kit misses quite a bit. Whereas you could literally roll a templar and take it for a spin, the DK lacks quite a bit out of the box. To even compete with a temp on healing you'll need restoration staff, to get any mobility you'll need psyjic, for defense you'll need vampire 3 and ideally mistform... And ofc you'll still lack stuff they have like a decent gap closer, an execute...

Second, an awful lot of the Dk's offense comes from dots. I suspect one of the things that's making them seem more potent at the moment is that fact that there's so much plaguebreak around that people can't / won't purge. At some pt tho zos is going to nerf that, and if people start purging again it's quite a hard counter to DKs.

In short, I think templars are quite a long way ahead of other classes and much stronger out of the box. DKs, you're going to need to grind out some stuff to make them good, and they're still not going to be quite as good as a templar. On the other other hand, yeah, templars are pretty easy to play and jabs can get seriously old after a while. I'd give Dk's a definite win on visuals and the fun factor. But YMMW. Personally, I'd roll up a templar - much easier to get going - and see how you go. You could always go to DK if / when you get bored of it or work one up when you don't fancy pvping. Whereas if you roll up a DK and don't like it, you'll have had to invest a lot more up front."

Anyway hope that helps. Personally, while I love my dk, I levelled up *another* templar for mym. Dks are good an all but templars are definitely S tier right now. I'd originally assumed they were going to get nerfed next patch but if anything they're getting a bit of a buff. It's a bit of a no brainer. Just enjoy it while it lasts! they're going to get nerfed at some point.

I got sucked into pvp through my stamina dragon knight years ago and currently play my magplar. All I'll say is in MY exp the dk survival is better (in large part because purging as a templar right now can be FUUUUUN. Esp with synergy.sarcasm folks ) But the magplar is still my favorite. Also keep in mind pvp servers are... difficult.....at times, and MANY of templars toolkit are channels. I have at least two of every class and have more bugs, glitches, etc with him than any of the others.

Edit: added sarcasm
2nd Edit: had to explain sarcasm. Certain sets make purge from any source a gamble. You should always be aware of your surroundings and health of those around you but these sets will... remind you. I can only assume the few questions I got were from people who haven't PVP'D yet.

For a noobie, this is what you can expect:
Magplar - Probably the easiest to get into as a noobie, you might not be able be a killer right away but the rotation is fairly simple to get into. Pop your purifying light, solar barrage, elemental drain(if you use staff) and then spam puncturing sweep to boost up your purifiying light damage. You can even time that with crescent sweep.
The damage rotation of magplar is probably the easiest, they have an amazing toolkit, easiest barrier to entry.

Stamplar - Pretty much the broke version of magplar, can do some of what magplar does but to a less degree because of lack of magic pool/sustain. Maneuverability can be better however due to having medium armor. Its probably the hardest to play for a new player to the class of the whole Mag Dk vs magplar vs stam DK vs stamplar argument.

Mag Dragonknight - Probably the 2nd easiest and 2nd best class in this list for a first time to the class. It's a more skilled play style to get your bearings but it's fairly easy to get into, but not a class you can master in a day. The damage is great if you have molten whip, sustain and healing is great with flame lash/power lash. Sustain is also good because if you panic ulti you can get back resources to help get your bearings back.

Stam dragonknight - the 3rd hardest to play but difficulty comes with HIGH damage. The damage output you can get on stam dk is immense, with powerful dots, even stronger than the mag variants, but harder to play than Mag DK. However if you run both morphs of whip on stam dk with wretched vitality, you can pump out insane damage. You can get 6.5k weapon damage easily fully specc'd into damage, so it's hard playstyle for a noob but you get high damage if you can eventually master it

Olen_Mikko wrote: »

With templar, even a total noob can be unkillable.

Just slot jab and you're good to go

I wouldn't say it's *quite* that simple. But um, sorta... Took my guy in last night. 65 kills, 21 KBs and.... 0 deaths. And I'm a very average, very casual player running absolutely bog standard sets. I don't get anything like those stats on my other toons - for all the posts about "unkillable DKs" I die on my DK plenty.

That said, the oneandonlyskex make a good point. They're probably going to get nerfed sooner or later. Just not next patch it seems. I don't personally think it takes that long to level a toon up - it took me maybe a week of fairly casual playing to get my temp 50, the skill lines levelled up, and the the skill points to fill them out. But.... I was lucky and had the horse already levelled - made him ages back but stored surveys on him. That's probably the biggest constraint unelss you're prepared to spend a ton in the crown store. Cyro is a very big place if your horse is slow.

DK has nice dots.
Templar just purges it.

I have both. DK was what I started with 6 years ago. Back then they were not in a good place in PVP where as Templar has always been strong to a certain degree.

If playing a DK the one huge advantage to keep in mind is Corrosive Armor. The ability to bypass resistance while taking almost zero damage makes it one of the best ultimate's in the game for PVP. You can use this with either Mag or Stam and have really good results either way.

Ferocious leap also is one of the better ultimate's in PVP. Because you are able to knock back players. stun, deal damage and gain a huge damage shield all at the same time. This ultimate is very low cost and the hidden benefit with DK ultimate's is that with the battle roar passive you can replenish a large amount of resources each time you use one.

The DK ultimate's , cost of the ultimate's and ability to gain a huge amount of health magicka and stamina whenever you use one is actually the win for this class. This is the biggest advantage to playing a DK.

One a side note, you can solo the most difficult DLC dungeons in the game with this class as well. I've done it many times and that is not something I could do on my Templar.

Magplar because it do has an execute ability which heals you as well.

Otherwise it is pretty close