I've actually little reasoning RPwise for my decision, it was more along the lines that the option simply existed. As stated before, there were gladiators who used the shield and those that didn't. While shield seems like the obvious choice for the tank, I wanted give the less popular route a try and see if it could work out adequately. I love taking the least popular routes in a game and playing around with it. I figured if the class description went to such lengths to state such a thing, there'd be some form of support for it. The shield skills I've got didn't link with a combo nor did they aid MP generation for my flash skill. So I figured why not? Alas now I can't seem to find that depiction anymore on the official site, so looks like that route is gone forever.
Regardless of my previous views, sounds like the shield does gain more importance in the later game so I'll start bringing bucklers into battle and try re-experimenting with the shield skills, perhaps I just didn't give my lower level shields enough credit for the job it did.
Maybe I'll try a marauder some time and get used to the axe design, but my beta experience gives me the impression that gladiator is in the minority of the two tanking classes based on the player's I've encountered.
Should I ever decide to leave the shield at home for field work, I could ICly probably just say its an off hand dagger rather than calling myself a gladiator(considering I normally in the field main Pugilist). But heck I could be fully converted to shields by then.
But really, thanks for your thoughts everyone.
Regardless of my previous views, sounds like the shield does gain more importance in the later game so I'll start bringing bucklers into battle and try re-experimenting with the shield skills, perhaps I just didn't give my lower level shields enough credit for the job it did.
Maybe I'll try a marauder some time and get used to the axe design, but my beta experience gives me the impression that gladiator is in the minority of the two tanking classes based on the player's I've encountered.
Should I ever decide to leave the shield at home for field work, I could ICly probably just say its an off hand dagger rather than calling myself a gladiator(considering I normally in the field main Pugilist). But heck I could be fully converted to shields by then.
But really, thanks for your thoughts everyone.
