[Nishida]

I've seen sooo many gear options / sets / etc that PLDs have including a lot of hard to get gear, and I'm wondering if I decided to level PLD how in depth would I have to get into this to NOT be a failadin? I don't want to stick to just ONE job forever..I have SAM and BLU, and am working on RDM. I want options. Is PLD out of this thought process?

[Saxonian]

I don't get the question...
If it's about being stuck on the job all the time, then no, not if you don't want to because every end game LS I've been in have had an excess of Pld + Nin + Rdm tanks. You'll have to prove yourself as a decent player to even get a chance.

If it's about spending all your gil on it, then no. A lot of pieces are Ra/Ex, and Pld works just fine with a lot of NQ stuff.

[Nishida]

Spending my entire life to get all the R/Ex gear that PLD needs.

[FurionStormRage]

No, you can have the basics of a starting tank without tons of R/E gear, PLD is gear intensive but it's also able to tank effectively naked, if you know what you're doing. (Exaggeration, but seriously, the job is easy to tank with)

[Saxonian]

Spending my entire life to get all the R/Ex gear that PLD needs.

Well you can tank just fine using regular AH gear, ra/ex shit just helps. And if you really enjoy it at endgame then there is no problem getting Pld gear first prio. ;D

[Hitoseijuro]

Your support will do more for you more than any upgrade in gear can do for you. Get the basics for your PLD, haste, acc, enmity, put them in your macros and builds as you see fit with the rest of the stuff a pld will need, and find or hope you get a good tanking support crew, before you move on to upgrading your PLD gear.

[Corrderio]

If you want to go "light" on gear I'd say you'd only need a couple of sets as opposed to some of the ones more hardcore PLDs have. As for what I'd consider a must it'd have to be.....

1. General Idel set. (Haste > Enmity > HP. You could try accuracy but it depends on your shell's view. I know I got in plenty of fights w/ anothe "pro" PLD about a TP build for my idel set.)

2. HP gear to swap in for a cure macro. (BQ ring, BB Ring, Gigant, Mantle, etc.)

3. MDB/MDT gear (CB, JOL, etc.)

4. Fire Res (This set could be 100% worthless depending on what your shell fights. It's mostly used for Tiamat/Wyrm/etc.)

[Aeonknight]

4. Fire Res (This set could be 100% worthless depending on what your shell fights. It's mostly used for Tiamat/Wyrm/etc.)

It's all kinds of fun to bust out for Suzaku

[BaliCupid]

as they said above, it is gear intensive. some of the best gear for the job is rather hard to obtain unless you roll with a good end-game ls.

[Prothescar]

Expect to be on the lists for gear like Homam for a long time. I was lucky to get my hands and feet fairly quickly, but I'm still on the list for pants.

[Sakka_Valefor]

Most of the good upgrades for PLD gear are actually quite easy to obtain.

Iron Ram, each piece has its use, either as an enmity piece of MDEF/MDB piece.

AF, the feet are the best in game for PLD when without shadows.

The harder stuff to obtain, such as AF2/Ares/Homam are more or less luxury. You can function easily without them, they just improve each of your different setups.

Paladin can function well with just Auction House gear as well.

As I said before, most of the rare/ex items that are hard to get are luxury. They aren't required to be a good tank, they just help.

[TidusV]

I prided myself as a Paladin loved it to bits and as time went on I decided to to take it to level 75 at the same time levelling other sub jobs that would serve the purpose of Tanking in Sky, one thing I always remembered to take into serious consideration, my party or friends came first, even if it meant the loss of xp and I ko'd.
New spectacular gear took second consideration, but having said that I achieved everything I set out to to do in the main I always fully enjoyed all of my Tanking experiences as I am sure you will as you progress, anyway good luck to you I wish you success^^

[Mogar]

NECRO

[Tennkai]

Any job you level will take time to get decent gear for. But until you know exactly what job(s) you will play I suggest trying out each job u have in mind. Remember no one expects you to have great gear when you first start playing.