Dark Knight and Incoming Live Letter 4.2 on 12/15/17

Lol they are going to give WAR YET ANOTHER BUFF. It's just comical at this point.

Dev team should just admit they don't care about and/or don't know what they are doing with DRK so we can move on with our lives.

Yes, I read a post elsewhere that said it sounded like they're addressing complaints about Warrior being difficult to use, so it does indeed sound like a buff. At least Black Mage was actually acknowledged; Dark Knight got nothing.

It isn't possible that Drk don't get a buff, even minimal..., look we got 0 party utility, get less defensive CD (Dark mind is only half a defensive utility due to his magical nature), our Dps is lower than the other tank in average (it's not much but still here). We have 0 DoT, 0 Counter, 0 party buff, Paladin got 2 DoT, Full option for protecting the party like cover or divine veil, and a counter with enmity increased oGCD, War got plenty of usefull buff for him self and can protect the entire party too, defensive CD with counter, and debuff.

I dont want to over react and wait to the Next live letter but im really really really tired about WAR special treathment.
if this ends being a Buff for WAR and DRK dont get nothing i Will send a rant letter to devs and for much i love DRk abandon the job.

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Originally Posted by TabrisOmbrelame

It isn't possible that Drk don't get a buff, even minimal..., look we got 0 party utility, get less defensive CD (Dark mind is only half a defensive utility due to his magical nature), our Dps is lower than the other tank in average (it's not much but still here). We have 0 DoT, 0 Counter, 0 party buff, Paladin got 2 DoT, Full option for protecting the party like cover or divine veil, and a counter with enmity increased oGCD, War got plenty of usefull buff for him self and can protect the entire party too, defensive CD with counter, and debuff.

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Yeah, that makes sense, but all of it was true prior to 4.1 except for WAR having the party shield, and they still got the party shield for absolutely no reason despite already basically being the strongest tank, so we're clearly already through the looking glass.

At this point I really think that the only way dark will get buffs is if people just stop playing the job. The next balance patch is 4.4, that is another round or savage an ultimate that will have no reason for bringing Dark Knight.

The customer service in this game is terrible. My cable company isn't even as bad a square enix. Cable is out, I don't get charged for that time. Internet out I don't get charged for that time. I don't like what I'm getting, I can call someone and they respond. Months of complaints from multiple sources and they don't even mention the class? Multiple ddos making the game difficult if not impossible to play, and you are still charging me for that time? My cable company didn't drive into the telephone pole, they still take responsibility for fixing it and restoring service and still refund for the time access was down.

This is a game, it is about entertainment. People are leaving the job they enjoy and the game because of the lack balance and lack of response of the development team.

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

At this point I really think that the only way dark will get buffs is if people just stop playing the job. The next balance patch is 4.4, that is another round or savage an ultimate that will have no reason for bring Dark Knight.

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Sad part is if Drk is not touched soon till 4.4 you already know how they will handle it in 4.4 by overbuffing it like how Astro was handled in 3.4..

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Originally Posted by Jxnibbles

Sad part is if Drk is not touched soon till 4.4 you already know how they will handle it in 4.4 by overbuffing it like how Astro was handled in 3.4..

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Not necessarily, they might just ignore it until 5.0 like paladin. Though at least paladin got attention throughout 3.x.

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

Not necessarily, they might just ignore it until 5.0 like paladin. Though at least paladin got attention throughout 3.x.

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You may be right about the 5.0.. How will they even balance more classes when 5.0 arrives when they are having issues finding Jobs identities right now..

It just can't be that they don't get that there is something wrong with tank balance. Multiple threads on english forum and from what I've heard, it's the same in the japan forum and ultimate bahamut clears has about 3 drk's in 50 parties. It's just impossible they don't register that people are pissed about this. That would be like you don't notice that someone is punching you in the face right now.
I'm 90% that they are about fixing this and just don't tell about it (yet).

And just in case they are not...My PLD is 70, my WAR is on the way and I have more than enough tokens for a 340 or Shinryu weapon. It's your turn SE. :P

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Originally Posted by Crater

despite already basically being the strongest tank

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No, that's PLD.

This is getting beyond a joke, I was reading it “BLM dps...ok and adjustments to....warriors usability?!?! WHAT?!” It genuinely feels like SE is trolling DRK at this point.

I was seriously refreshing the page to see if it was a typo and they’d change it to say DRK...

Not sure how they could improve the usability of WAR. Personally I find it pretty easy to get into. Takes a little practice, just like any job.

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Originally Posted by Launched

No, that's PLD.

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PLD does not have the highest tank DPS; WAR does.
PLD does not do the highest burst damage; WAR does.
PLD does not have the strongest personal mitigation; WAR does - and that's Deliverance vs Sword Oath. Shield Oath Paladin folds like wet tissue paper compared to a Defiance Warrior.
PLD does not have the best enmity generation; WAR does.
PLD has the worst mobility of all the tanks; WAR has the best.
PLD doesn't have costless, off-GCD stance swaps; WAR does.

There is exactly one arena in which PLD is stronger than WAR - party mitigation - and even there, WAR's party mitigation tool (Shake it Off) is at least as strong as the strongest party mitigation tool PLD has (Divine Veil), and the usefulness of PLD's party mitigation kit falls off a cliff once you get past DV and Sentinel/Rampart-buffed Intervention.


PLD has weaknesses; WAR does not.

Just to be clear before the rage overtakes the tank forums:

They are specifically looking at Blm DAMAGE.
They are specifically looking at War USABILITY.

Wtf that even means? Could be a lot of things really. Usability updates have historically been things like upping drg potency and nerfing heavy thrust. Increasing BotD duration. Increasing duration of upkeep skills or lowering their impact so mistakes are less punishing, but usually not affecting people that already play it properly. Those types of changes just shifted of damage to make it less punishing. Not a buff. Max damage didn't change. An analogy might be increasing damage of base combos but nerfing eye buff for example.

Its vague. Its unknown. But they explicitly did not say damage while they did for blm. Based on what we actually know at this moment and historical uses of that term, theres no reason to think war will get some mega boost. Just some type of shuffle within their current parameters.

Its been 5 min and there are already multiple posts whining about war getting BUFFED AGAIN!!!! So before everyone looses their shit just remember Usability=/=damage. Blm is looking at a straight buff. War is looking at a shuffle within its existing parameters. Read the actual words they say. Will become clearer with a full translation instead of bullet points we have now.

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Originally Posted by Launched

No, that's PLD.

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don't bother dude
that guy is the number 1 warrior hater in this forum, he will say every nonsense there is to overrate warrior and underrate other tank(paladin) to make warrior look like they need to be a nerfed even though they clearly don't
and i have to say i am enjoying his anguish right now(or any warrior hater in particular)

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Originally Posted by Aana

Its been 5 min and there are already multiple posts whining about war getting BUFFED AGAIN!!!! So before everyone looses their shit just remember Usability=/=damage.

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SE uses pretty simple coded language to talk about stuff like this.

In 2.00, Unchained was on a 180s cooldown. They lowered that cooldown to 120s, stating that the change was intended to increase the usability of the skill.
The same reasoning was cited in early 4.x when they removed the BG cost of IR/Unchained and the BG cost of stance-swapping.

These are not "shuffles". This is simply the language that SE uses to talk about class buffs that come in the form of things like cost/cooldown reductions rather than boosts to raw potency.


I guess I'm not surprised I had to make this clarification though; it's not like I didn't see it coming:

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Originally Posted by Crater

I'm sure we're also going to get a ton of people trotting out the old classic "It says Warrior usability is being adjusted! That could mean they're getting nerfed!!" from people who have either never seen a Live Letter before or haven't acquired enough basic pattern recognition ability to realize that that's what SE says when they're planning a big buff.

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Doesn't mean it's going to a big buff. Something as simple as detaching the CD from IR/Unchained would be "usability" related and wouldn't really effect average damage output.

The sad part is, if they were in fact working on adjustments to DRK, you think they'd mention that instead and leave the war updates for next letter. If for nothing more than for PR purposes.

It's code for CD reduction, or changes to abilities like shake it off.

Honestly the ONLY way this can make any sense, is that the new encounters needed a slight adjustment to some key abilities, which I assume is Shake it off, to fit inside the timers of the bosses mechanics better. (What ever they may be.)

But in the long run, it still equates to a WAR buff, and DRK getting shafted again, because "DRK could clear it, even if less optimally"

The only thing I can think of is that inner release cooldown will be lowered. Or unchained and inner release will be separated.

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

The only thing I can think of is that inner release cooldown will be lowered. Or unchained and inner release will be separated.

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But reducing IR cooldown is either a huge damage buff (if it goes to 60 seconds) or basically useless if it goes to like 90 seconds because we'll still wait till Berzerk comes off cooldown anyway, changing unchained seems more likely IMO.

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

The only thing I can think of is that inner release cooldown will be lowered. Or unchained and inner release will be separated.

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Dropping it to 60 would be utterly ludicrous. Theres no possible reason for that. Dropping it to anything else would just desynch with zerk timer and would be more frustrating than helpful.

I have really been struggling to figure out what they could possibly do with abilities for usability and the only thing I can fathom is something with unchained. Decoupling IR/Unchain or somehow otherwise buffing unchained so it competes with IR (give a reason to ever choose it over IR if not decoupled). But as its a defiance ability wont have a large impact on much since we avoid it like the plague.

Otherwise it has to be something completely out of left field like removing the auto crits from RI or something equally unexpected and un-requested.

Not really sure where SE is going with this one. What I really hope DOESNT happen is SE listened to Xeno and completely revamp FC and combos for his exaggerated claims of damage distribution problems.

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I was seriously refreshing the page to see if it was a typo and they’d change it to say DRK...

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Me too...me too. I was sure the translator probably conflated tank adjustments into Warrior or somesuch. But...alas, this is the reality we live in.
I don't think there's a question anymore that Dark Knight's Stormblood treatment is abhorrent.
I even looked at enmity calculations per ability for Dark Knight versus the other tanks, they're routinely about 70% of the other tanks. I'm really starting to notice in Rabanastre when no amount of Abyssal spam can grab things over a Warrior berserk overpowering. It's every single function at this point that Dark Knight is bottom by a margin that is widening into a chasm.

Warrior usability...what a joke. At least they're usable in the first place.

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

Me too...me too. I was sure the translator probably conflated tank adjustments into Warrior or somesuch. But...alas, this is the reality we live in.
I don't think there's a question anymore that Dark Knight's Stormblood treatment is abhorrent.
I even looked at enmity calculations per ability for Dark Knight versus the other tanks, they're routinely about 70% of the other tanks. I'm really starting to notice in Rabanastre when no amount of Abyssal spam can grab things over a Warrior berserk overpowering. It's every single function at this point that Dark Knight is bottom by a margin that is widening into a chasm.

Warrior usability...what a joke. At least they're usable in the first place.

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AD has a lower threat modifier.
The comparable AoE for threat is Unleash. (Though if its threat modifier makes up for its massive potency loss, idk, as I havent bothered looking into it, and of course zerk is still going to give WAR the edge no matter what)

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Originally Posted by Claire_Pendragon

The comparable AoE for threat is Unleash.

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I believe it's something like 20x 50 potency for Unleash, and 5x 120 potency for Abyssal. But yet again, it's an avenue Dark Knights must sacrifice their efficiency to even be at a baseline level with the other tanks.
One problem I just noticed over reading reactions on the Japanese tank forum, it is not that they feel differently about Dark Knight...on the contrary, almost every concern we have is echoed there in multiple Dark Knight threads. However the Warrior thread is a massive 401 pages and they seem to be rejoicing about 4.2 possibly addressing their "distinct gap beneath Paladin" without mentioning Dark Knight at all.

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

the Warrior thread is a massive 401 pages and they seem to be rejoicing about 4.2 possibly addressing their "distinct gap beneath Paladin"

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Thats the thing.
If PLD is 150% better than WAR and DRK, then having both WAR and DRK only 75% of a PLD, was semi acceptable, because groups would almost equally pick WAR or DRK as the other tank.

Bringing WAR up to PLD can seem fine in theory, but not if DRK isnt also brought up.
If WAR is arguably 100% and PLD is 100% now, leaving DRK at 75% just means we know who's the better tank combo.

Sadly they are looking at popularity of a job, rather than actual balance of what the job offers.
(Im still in favor of a better MT/OT style, with a 4 tank system, or the prior 4.0 system of PLD is best, and the other 2 are ur left over, yet equal, picks)

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

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Unleash 20.6× 1030 potency AoE
Abyssal Drain 5× 600 potency ranged AoE
Overpower 10× 1200 potency cone
Flash n/a ~1200 potency AoE

AD will never compete. They all used to be around 600 then SE buffed the low level enmity skills at like 4.05ish for dungeon play and flash/op/unleash got doubled. But they didn't give AD the same treatment for whatever reason separating unleash as the enmity skill, AD as the damage/sustain skill. /shrug.

Even flash with same potency doenst compete if storms eye is up. But if a war is unchained/zerking NO tank will ever take anything. War has always had far superior burst enmity since day 1. Unchained may not see play in raids but if you want threat (like old hunts for credit), nothing comes close to war between unchained, eye, and zerk.

I realize Flash doesn't do damage in an argument versus Abyssal Drain, but they still get to spit out Circle of Scorns for free. And that's just AoE enmity, single target enmity is a similar picture. Dark Knights are routinely ~5x to every other tank's skill's ~7x. Why? Giving them the benefit of the doubt it seems like they're adjusting for Darkside. But that isn't fair at all when enmity for the other tanks is blown up at the beginning of an encounter by Fight or Flight and Berserk.

I don't particularly feel enmity's the battleground to fight for Dark Knight equality, but I'm just trying to show more examples of Dark Knight being dead last in almost every possible tankly function, for...very little justification, if any whatsoever. Enmity just happens to be something the dev team has historically been sensitive about, and even in THIS instance Dark Knight just doesn't seem to matter.

Edit: Yet it's Warrior usability that is in question. Sorry, I'm upset.

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

The only thing I can think of is that inner release cooldown will be lowered. Or unchained and inner release will be separated.

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I mean, they're clearly throwing balance to the wind here and just handing out presents to their favourite child, so there's really a laundry list of what they could do:

- Inner Release/Unchained cooldown could be lowered to 60s.
- Onslaught could have its gauge cost removed.
- Same with Upheaval.
- Inner Release/Unchained could be changed back into separate keybinds with separate cooldowns.
- They could also separate Fell Cleave/Inner Beast and Steel Cyclone/Decimate and let you use any of them in either stance.
- Equilibrium could be changed to give a heal regardless of stance, or always give TP and HP regardless of stance.
- Maybe Butcher's Block gets bumped up to 20 BG so you can do enmity combos and still earn maximum gauge.
- That would probably come with a potency bump to Storm's Path, up to 300, to keep it as "the DPS combo".
- Defiance could give you a 20% heal when you activate it.
- The root effect could be taken off of Holmgang.
- Raw Intuition changed from 100% Parry chance to 20% damage reduction from the front.
- Shake It Off bumped up to a base level of 12-16% HP without consuming cooldowns.

None of them are good ideas, of course, and none of them are necessary. But nothing on that list is even a little bit less ridiculous of a buff than the ones they got to their BG costs in 4.05, or the buff to Shake It Off in 4.1.

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

I realize Flash doesn't do damage in an argument versus Abyssal Drain, but they still get to spit out Circle of Scorns for free. And that's just AoE enmity, single target enmity is a similar picture. Dark Knights are routinely ~5x to every other tank's skill's ~7x. Why? Giving them the benefit of the doubt it seems like they're adjusting for Darkside. But that isn't fair at all when enmity for the other tanks is blown up at the beginning of an encounter by Fight or Flight and Berserk.

I don't particularly feel enmity's the battleground to fight for Dark Knight equality, but I'm just trying to show more examples of Dark Knight being dead last in almost every possible tankly function, for...very little justification, if any whatsoever. Enmity just happens to be something the dev team has historically been sensitive about, and even in THIS instance Dark Knight just doesn't seem to matter.

Edit: Yet it's Warrior usability that is in question. Sorry, I'm upset.

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SE decided to throw all their eggs in the dark arts basket. The theory actually sounds nice. Drk base capabilities are tuned lower than war/pld, but are handed this 1 size fits all tool dark arts. You control the flow to shore up any weakness on the fly in real time decisions. Need some HP? DAAD or DASE. Need some magic mitigation? DADM. Physical? DADP. Want some damage? DABS/DACS. Oh your enmity needs a boost: Power Slash (Dark Arts) 5.5x + Potency 1650 + 1650 Potency. (BB 1960, Halone 1890).

TLDR: Drks base enmity is lower because they 'can' spike it to a whopping 3300 on a single GCD. ~1.7x more than halone or BB. That's really insane. Also with no wind up combo like eye. Drk has serious enmity potential but its an opportunity cost. But with circle shirk and DPS meta its never worth doing. But that's essentially the same problem drk has in every category. DA makes up for drks individual weaknesses, but as a limited resource it cant fix everything at once so people just use it to equalize the damage and everything other facet suffers. In this case, enmity. In the next complaining post sustain. In the next mitigation. Etc. The tool cant handle everything it was envisioned to maintain simultaneously.

The real time flowing concept to put your resources where you need them when you need them into various mitigation, damage, sustain, enmity, etc is pretty sweet. The numbers+the DPS meta just don't play in its favor but its 'cool' imo.

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

I believe it's something like 20x 50 potency for Unleash, and 5x 120 potency for Abyssal. But yet again, it's an avenue Dark Knights must sacrifice their efficiency to even be at a baseline level with the other tanks.
One problem I just noticed over reading reactions on the Japanese tank forum, it is not that they feel differently about Dark Knight...on the contrary, almost every concern we have is echoed there in multiple Dark Knight threads. However the Warrior thread is a massive 401 pages and they seem to be rejoicing about 4.2 possibly addressing their "distinct gap beneath Paladin" without mentioning Dark Knight at all.

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Further evidence that the Japanese players are favored over everyone else, even though we're bigger by far. I hate being the step-child.

You're right, Power Slash is unique in that regard, but remember that Warriors and Paladins will be shoring up their own enmity (or creeping up on a poor Dark Knight) through repeated Circle of Scorns, Shield Swipes, Onslaughts, etc. Dark Knight relies on Power Slash, something they really don't want to use because its only effect is enmity. And it doesn't give back any resource like Butcher's Block either.

But I think you have a point, I feel like the way you're seeing the interaction between Dark Arts and the rest of Dark Knight's kit is how the development team might be considering it and intending it, too. This does not make for a coherent overall class, though.

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Originally Posted by Aana

TLDR: Drks base enmity is lower because they 'can' spike it to a whopping 3300 on a single GCD. ~1.7x more than halone or BB.

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It's not really 'whopping' once you consider that WAR and PLD have enmity multipliers outside of their actual enmity combo, and DRK doesn't. That 1650 enmity-potency they get from Dark Arts is pretty meager when you stack it up against a Warrior dealing 2600 enmity-potency in its opener with the two Onslaughts that are part of its max-DPS rotation, on top of an instant 600 enmity-potency on the pull using Equilibrium. That's twice the enmity that the DRK is getting from Dark Arts, and it's part of Warrior's optimum DPS opener. And DRK has to commit to losing 120 potency on a Power Slash combo before they even have the option to spend the additional 140 potency on DA Power Slash.

Paladin is at a pretty significant advantage in that field too; 450 enmity-potency from every Shield Swipe (usable potentially every 15 seconds), and 300 enmity-potency from every Circle of Scorn (25 seconds) starts to add up really quickly. It's basically the equivalent of the DRK getting that DA worth of enmity every minute or so - except, again, using those skills as often as possible is part of PLD's max-DPS rotation.


I don't think the idea of having to pay an opportunity cost for enmity is a bad one, or even really incompatible with the game's DPS-first/speedrun playstyle - but if only one class is really going to be forced to pay that opportunity cost, the cost needs to be lower, and/or the reward for doing so needs to be massively better in terms of enmity than what the other tanks can accomplish, not just "Yeah, it's kind of good sometimes if you tilt your head and squint."

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Originally Posted by Aana

SE decided to throw all their eggs in the dark arts basket. The theory actually sounds nice. Drk base capabilities are tuned lower than war/pld, but are handed this 1 size fits all tool dark arts. You control the flow to shore up any weakness on the fly in real time decisions. Need some HP? DAAD or DASE. Need some magic mitigation? DADM. Physical? DADP. Want some damage? DABS/DACS. Oh your enmity needs a boost: Power Slash (Dark Arts) 5.5x + Potency 1650 + 1650 Potency. (BB 1960, Halone 1890).

TLDR: Drks base enmity is lower because they 'can' spike it to a whopping 3300 on a single GCD. ~1.7x more than halone or BB. That's really insane. Also with no wind up combo like eye. Drk has serious enmity potential but its an opportunity cost. But with circle shirk and DPS meta its never worth doing. But that's essentially the same problem drk has in every category. DA makes up for drks individual weaknesses, but as a limited resource it cant fix everything at once so people just use it to equalize the damage and everything other facet suffers. In this case, enmity. In the next complaining post sustain. In the next mitigation. Etc. The tool cant handle everything it was envisioned to maintain simultaneously.

The real time flowing concept to put your resources where you need them when you need them into various mitigation, damage, sustain, enmity, etc is pretty sweet. The numbers+the DPS meta just don't play in its favor but its 'cool' imo.

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Actually the main issue "usually" is that it cuts into DPS.
Argueing threat vs mitigation usually isnt something most ppl worry too much about.

So technically the fix would be to make DA only affect DPS, and Blood Gauge ONLY affect threat/mitigation.
If your threat/mitigation gauge doesnt take away from ur DPS gauge, then the design of DRK stops being so bad.
Of course, now you need 2 different versions of Dark Arts, which is where the real problem lies next. (a lot less tidy than what they tried to do, despite being more effective)

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

You're right, Power Slash is unique in that regard, but remember that Warriors and Paladins will be shoring up their own enmity (or creeping up on a poor Dark Knight) through repeated Circle of Scorns, Shield Swipes, Onslaughts, etc. Dark Knight relies on Power Slash, something they really don't want to use because its only effect is enmity. And it doesn't give back any resource like Butcher's Block either.

But I think you have a point, I feel like the way you're seeing the interaction between Dark Arts and the rest of Dark Knight's kit is how the development team might be considering it and intending it, too. This does not make for a coherent overall class, though.

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Coherency is the problem.
"Hey guys, lets give DRK a skill that restores MP on being hit. But if they're being hit too hard let's take half of their MP to blind their enemies. Oh but then they won't be getting hit as much, so there's less MP regenerated... Well, they can just Soul Survivor a single enemy then! But that only lasts for ~15 seconds, if the target dies, every 120s. Oh I know then, let's add an MP Regen to Quietus! But that costs 50 blood. Oh, let's have Salted Earth passively generate 1 blood, and also Blood Price! But wait, if you use BP to generate blood, and MP, but you're blinding the enemies to avoid being hit that negatively impacts both resource generations... Well, our work here is done. Let's give WAR a party shield guys, that's where our work is needed most."

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

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Originally Posted by Crater

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Don't misunderstand. I'm not defending drks current lowered state, just describing what I 'think' the developers envisioned when they designed stormblood Drk.

War/Pld have regular tools to shore up enmity over time. Of course. But if drk 'wanted' to and just spam DA power slash they would easily outstrip both tanks enmity. Just like if they spam it for 30% magic resist they can out magic mitigate. Etc. But leaning that hard in a direction hurts you somewhere else. The design philosophy (as I see it) is Drk is the flexible class. But just like every other game the base efficiency of the real time flexible class/card/item is that it is weaker than a static unchanging equivalent and, just like those other games, buffing that type of flexibility can quickly get out of hand and explains (my guesstimate) as to why SE is so reluctant to buff drk.

But as it stands, that flexibility isn't a valuable trait so you just have a slightly weaker class.

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Originally Posted by Valdegarde

But I think you have a point, I feel like the way you're seeing the interaction between Dark Arts and the rest of Dark Knight's kit is how the development team might be considering it and intending it, too. This does not make for a coherent overall class, though.

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Basically that. I'm not saying drk is fine. I'm saying the 'cool' concept the devs came up with is falling flat in practice. Drks higher potential enmity falling apart in practice is just a clear example of that for me. But its the same story for every facet of drk. DA and TBN being highly flexible 1 size fits all tools is also the reason drk cant keep up. They have to pick 1 thing to lean into making it a game of scarcity instead of gameplay focused on directing your flow in real time as it was (probably) intended.

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Originally Posted by Crater

It's not really 'whopping' once you consider that WAR and PLD have enmity multipliers outside of their actual enmity combo, and DRK doesn't. That 1650 enmity-potency they get from Dark Arts is pretty meager when you stack it up against a Warrior dealing 2600 enmity-potency in its opener with the two Onslaughts that are part of its max-DPS rotation, on top of an instant 600 enmity-potency on the pull using Equilibrium. That's twice the enmity that the DRK is getting from Dark Arts, and it's part of Warrior's optimum DPS opener. And DRK has to commit to losing 120 potency on a Power Slash combo before they even have the option to spend the additional 140 potency on DA Power Slash.

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You're comparing a powered up 1 GCD attack to a 30 or 60 sec sequence of attacks.. Of course the grand total is going to favor the longer duration.

Neither Rage of Halone or Butcher's Block are optimal for DPS, so it follows that Power Slash wouldn't be either. IMO comparing DRK's enmity combo to the other tanks oGCDs that generate enmity is a bit disingenuous. Apples to oranges. The rate at which you could use DAPS is much, much higher than either of the other tanks can use those oGCDs. And it's twice as effective, right? So they'd only need to do it half as much (in a situation where'd we'd have to actually spam hate combo, which, I guess unfortunately for DRK doesn't exist).

I previously worked up some math before on butchers vs halone, I mean everyone talks about how bad it is for PLD to use Halone so I just wanted to get an idea. But aside from the difference in raw combo damage, and I think this is applicable to DRK as well, the MP cost is something that Warrior simply doesn't have to worry about. At the end of the day, just let the war MT. They are obviously designed for it, which is quite possibly the best thing for both PLD and DRK currently.

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Originally Posted by Aana

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Yes, this is the risk reward issue at the heart of dark knight. You decide in real time what to spend your resources on, and its limited. I agree 100% and you are spot on the issue, the reward is too low. We cannot be break even in all areas because if we need to invest in one direction to break even with all other tanks, then we will be short in all areas once we invest towards anything else. This is 100% the issue. This is my issue with TBN, our mitigation, and our DPS everything dark knight. I'm just really happy for this moment.

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

Neither Rage of Halone or Butcher's Block are optimal for DPS, so it follows that Power Slash wouldn't be either. IMO comparing DRK's enmity combo to the other tanks oGCDs that generate enmity is a bit disingenuous. Apples to oranges.

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Okay but if I only have a stack of apples, and you have a stack of apples and a stack of oranges, and presumably we want things to be "fair", then at the very least, my stack of apples needs to be as big as your stack of apples combined with your stack of oranges. Right?

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Originally Posted by Crater

Okay but if I only have a stack of apples, and you have a stack of apples and a stack of oranges, and presumably we want things to be "fair", then at the very least, my stack of apples needs to be as big as your stack of apples combined with your stack of oranges. Right?

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I would rather they just give dark some oranges. Salted Earth seems like a good place, who doesn't like salty oranges.