Dark Knight and the Dev Team

[Zeroth]

I also like the fact that anything given to DRK is then nerfed later on down the road.

Souleater, Drain, and now Absorb TP have all been nerfed in some way.

[RaenRyong]

It is hard to think something is wrong with DRK when so many claims the solution is a multi hit crit WS. That just makes it sound like you get less out of razed ruin atma and that is all.

They changed WAR Raging Rush to crit and didn't do the same for DRK Guillotine in one update. Why? I don't know. I like to think SE deliberately keeps WAR overpowered but that's another topic. Critical weaponskills are generally by far the best in terms of raw damage output, so Razed Ruins or not even updating Guillotine to make it critical would be a significant increase in its damage.

[Malamasala]

Well, I also think they keep WAR overpowered by choice. Mainly because everyone thinks that unless it is the best DD, it is just a subjob. There are no other options, just black or white.

I also didn't understand why they kept so many level 70 avatar pacts out of the crit WS update. Ifrit's BP for example is useless on everything in the game except open mouth goldfishes. SE seems to always just update some jobs and leave others to rot.

Of course, Summoner gets a lot of updates so you can't say they are forgotten, they are simply misunderstood since almost all updates add the wrong things. (5 bucks on next update not having any Summoner armors. At most it will be a BLM/WHM/SMN armor with +7 summoning skill and the rest MAB and cure potency)

[Olor]

I think both DRK and PLD really need some love. They are not really "needed" for anything these days. And I agree - if a player has a skill which increases their attack at the expense of damaging themselves - they should have top tier damage after using that skill.

[Kagato]

A crit WS only starts to fix DRKs problems. They are also the only melee job that doesn't have JA or trait to enhance WS frequency and DoT. Jumps,Hasso,STP,DA,TA,DW,MA,Counter,Retaliation,SATA,Pets,Zanshin are all spread across melee jobs to help their output and to help their WS frequency. Before the haste cap a top DRK could hit 86% during LR which gave it a slight edge for 30 seconds every 4:10 but now that thats gone DRK it left swinging the slowest weapons and using the worst WSs. Torclever might be a decent WS but compare it to any other Emp and its down right crappy and a lot of that has to do with the jobs that can use it. Anyone that says DRK is fine inside or out of abyssea is just trying to cockblock any attempt to get it fixed.

Oh, you mean people like this guy:

You guys do know that from a Melee damage standpoint DRK is one of the top DD in and outside of abyssea?

the only difference in damage between us and a war is WAR has better weaponskills (not empy) and they ONLY win inside abyssea with RR taking affect..

we dont need fukin berserk to cap PDIF.. and giving us super last resort would make us so overpowered....

If you want to keep up in abyssea on DRK you need to get one of the empy weaponskills.. just like to be a good WAR you need Ukko's and a good sam has Fudo.......... the WoE version even..

Stop askign for some crit weaponskill to be handed to you and go work and get a good weaponskill yourself..

By saying we're one of the top DD in/out of abyssea, that our Last Resort is just fine, and that we need an Empy Weaponskill to keep up (lolQuietus. At least Torcleaver is trying) is stuck in some whacked out world of delusion. And you know what's sad? There are people who actually believe this.

[Frost]

Idk, I like Dark the way it is. In Abyssea, if you want a Crit Hit WS, just use swords, axes or even g.axes(for Cleaving). You don't ALWAYS have to use a scythe or g.sword. Drk's get access to pretty much everything a War gets, and then some, so comapring Darks to War is kinda moot.

Dark is a hybrid class, it has a lot of uses other than "MONGO SMAAAAASH!". 99% of the Darks out there REALLY want to be playing Warrior, because there's absolutely no difference between how 99% of Darks play Dark and How a War plays War, except for aesthetics.

That's not to say there's NO differences between them. Just that people rarely use the stuff that separates Drk form War. I rarely if ever see Drks cast anything besides maybe Ab-TP. Most of them only see the job abilities and seem to ignore they got an MP pool. Do you know what Ab-Agi does for a group? It drops the mob's agility, aiding in the overall crit-rate of the entire group. Ab-Acc, is like another Blind that stacks in addition to Blind, Ab-Dex drops that accuracy even further (not so noticeably though). And dare I remind you, did you know Dark can actually sleep stuff? Never seen that cross a Darks' mind when an add is sitting there whacking on someone (Or aggro something and choose to die instead of sleep it).

SE keeps trying to corral Darks into casting more, and I wish they would, but I will admit, Dark does have a few "Head Scratchers"... Elemental Magic is kinda too low to be Useful. Why would I cast Aero III when I can hit a mob 3x in the same amount of time, do 5x as much and be 3/5's of the way to a weaponskill? If the elemental spells were incorporated/combined with the Ab-Spells in some way, like say instead of having Ab-Dex and Thunder, instead give Ab-Dex a thunder property that absorbs dexterity and deals thunder damage. It would be a lot less insulting than an elemental spell thats out damaged by something a healer could toss out while goofing off.

And if SE really wants Darks to be more valuable to parties, AND cast more, give us an ability that allows Darks to share their absorb spells with a party member(s). How nice would it be to have a Dark cast Aspir, or Drain and have it shared with a tank? Like a "Trick Attack" for magic. Just put a party member between you and a monster, cast Ab-Acc, you get accuracy and so does your buddy. Or just an Aura ability: you Absorb Strength, and anyone within x yalms gets the Str buff too.

[Gradd]

Casting magic (yes even absorb TP) hurts your over all DPS and isn't worth it in any way, that is why you do not see DRKs casting their spells.

[Therin]

DRK would be easy to fix with the coming updates. It's not nearly as far behind the other jobs as people think it is - it's solely that Atma makes critical-based jobs so overpowered that any two-handed DD without a critical WS is subpar. Outside of Abyssea, where the playing fields have been leveled, DRK is only slightly behind, if at all, other DD jobs.

Also, the differences between DRK and WAR are much more than aesthetic as a previous poster suggested. DRK has much greater survivability. I know that, even with Apocalypse, my WAR is much stronger than my DRK in terms of straight damage output, but I feel paper thin and vulnerable when I play WAR because I don't have any ability to regain health, stun the enemy, or use Dread Spikes as a buffer.

DRK can be easily fixed by making more use of its job abilities such as Souleater (perhaps a trait at 95 that lowers the downside to Souleater, so that it takes only 5% of your health, rather than 10%, yet deals the same damage as before), and perhaps the addition of job abilities that allow, or force, critical hits on weapon skills, or additional effects on regular attacks (low chance, say 10%, permanent Endrain is what I'm thinking of).

[Flunklesnarkin]

lower souleater timer to 1 min and ungimp souleater ;o

[blowfin]

Get torcleaver, sub thf. Problem solved.