The Definitive Dark Knight Guide

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Originally Posted by HidingYoshis

This is your issue. At 60, DRKs aren't really much different than PLDs. I get complimented all the time by my lack of damage taken.

Sole Survivor is very good for burst survival, and rotating your CDs properly means you're not taking much.

I've tanked with all three, and DRK is around the same level as my PLD in terms of mitigation. It loses to Warrior because the self healing in AoE situations is ridiculous, they're still the kings of AoE tanking.

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interesting, thanks for that tidbit

I don't buy into Warriors being higher DPS, and with all the new parses being posted with DRK's almost hitting 1k outside of grit on reddit I've yet to see a Warrior push those numbers. Granted ACT has been wonky with the new classes since 3.0, but all the problems were things not being parsed so the damage was coming in lower than it should.

I'm not trying to say you can't play the class, but there is a pretty large collection of DRK players who don't have issues, and you don't really hear from them because they are playing and not on the forums. I would be too if I wasn't at work hah.

I've yet to feel like I was squishier than my WAR or PLD. There were plenty of fights where I felt squishier on my WAR compared to DRK doing it, Ramuh specifically, honestly the 60 dungeons are all pretty easy so we really won't know till we have full geared tanks doing Savage Alex and extremes.

What are all you guys at 60 doing to compensate for TP issues when you don't have Goad/Spire or Paeon/Rook to rely on? Throwing out an Unmend every so often?

If I ever run out of TP, yeah, I just throw Unmend and free Unleashes out for a couple GCDs. It's usually enough to go back into quite a few rotations afterwards. As far as I am aware, this is just as true at 50 as it is at 60, so me only being 58 shouldn't affect this rested rotation overmuch.

Subscribed. Glad to see the community working towards how to best use one of my favorite jobs since Ninja.

Just a thought. Earlier in this thread it was mentioned "never use Carve and Spit without Dark Arts" and I simply disagree with that. It's something that takes a lot of pre-planning and thought, but I tend to line up my C&S + Dark Arts combo any time I have a surplus of mana and want to just go full DPS.

There are times where you will need to play conservatively and C&S is a REALLY good catch up tool for that if you're in a mana hole for any reason.

How often do you guys find yourself using the Power Slash combo? I feel like it's way easier to move Soul Eater to 1-2-3 since I use it way more often than Power Slash.

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Originally Posted by Miyuyu

Just a thought. Earlier in this thread it was mentioned "never use Carve and Spit without Dark Arts" and I simply disagree with that. It's something that takes a lot of pre-planning and thought, but I tend to line up my C&S + Dark Arts combo any time I have a surplus of mana and want to just go full DPS.

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That's not optimal at all. You're dropping 350 potency to gain 800 mana. When you're going "full DPS", you're dropping Grit and activating Blood Weapon, which will give you way more from your Syphon Strike than Carve and Spit will.

At Eej: TP usage is actually something that I'm worried about. It does seem like Unmend or Unleash is the only real alternative you have when you go out of TP. Paladins have auto attacks in Sword Oath if they wanted and Warriors have stacks that they consume instead of TP. I think Dark Knights might need something to offset TP costs. But theorycrafting is about working with what you have.

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Originally Posted by HidingYoshis

That's not optimal at all. You're dropping 350 potency to gain 800 mana. When you're going "full DPS", you're dropping Grit and activating Blood Weapon, which will give you way more from your Syphon Strike than Carve and Spit will.

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It's not "optimal DPS" sure - but I'd consider it optimal play. Humans are incapable of being perfect at all times. Saying "never" is a strong descriptor. I'd say "most of the time you want to use C&S w/ DA" but I completely see the value in it as a catch-up \ emergency tool.

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Originally Posted by Ipkonfig

I don't buy into Warriors being higher DPS, and with all the new parses being posted with DRK's almost hitting 1k outside of grit on reddit I've yet to see a Warrior push those numbers.

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Player skill will always be the determining factor, but....

on paper WARs should be doing more. Deliverance is +5%, maim is +20, so (100 * 1.05) * 1.2 = 126% all the time. Season with Berserk as necessary. In Defiance, they only do 90% damage compared to our 92%