The Definitive Dark Knight Guide

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Originally Posted by JayCommon

If you blow CD's while Blood Price is up, then you are nerfing your own MP regen but that also puts stress on the healer.
If there are a lot of mobs, I will usually pair Dark Dance with Blood Price since Parrying something still causes you to actually get hit by it.

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Thanks for the tip! This is one of the main things i think needs to be discussed more is CD rotation on Big AOE pulls while Blood Price is up.

Many have mentioned not to DA + DD due to the evasion negating the MP regen of Blood Price. DD without DA seems like a good choice since as you mentioned your still taking damage even with 20% parry.

My Question now is: Which would be the better cooldown to use in this situation. ShadowSkin vs. Dark Dance ?

Shadowskin seems like it would be better at normalising the DMG we take but Dark Dance seems it would replenish more MP due to not all the attacks being parried.

Is there an indication of magic vs physical? There's obvious ones, but for non obvious ones, do we just guess?

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Originally Posted by SpecialKK

Is there an indication of magic vs physical? There's obvious ones, but for non obvious ones, do we just guess?

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If you can parry the attack, it's physical.

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Originally Posted by JayCommon

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C&S is only 50 potency more than a DA/SE and does not heal. If you have plenty of MP, go for the extra damage; but to say if you aren't managing your MP if need to use C&S for mana is incorrect. By using Blood Price and C&S for MP, you are able to keep alternating Delirium and DA/SE combos much longer. This is more DPS and more incoming healing. It seems that you are just happy to see big numbers when C&S crits.

A Dark art Power Slash is 6.5x enmity compared to PLD and WAR 5.5x. I'm not really convinced the cost of a DA is worth the extra 1x enmity.

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If you blow CD's while Blood Price is up, then you are nerfing your own MP regen but that also puts stress on the healer

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Not true. Defensive cooldowns DO NOT reduce the amount of MP regen from Blood Price. If you take damage, your receive the same amount of MP each time. Pop your cooldowns, reduce stress on the healers and enjoy your MP regen.

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Originally Posted by PROBOUND

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Check out my AoE tanking section of the guide for MP efficiency, DPS, and Aggro.

In regards to MP regeneration with Blood Price, JayCommon is incorrect - defensive cooldowns do not reduce the amount of MP absorbed.

With this in mind, when I pull a big pack, I will usually use Blood Price and Shadowskin together. You can't beat flat damage reduction. As Blood Price is close to falling off, I will use a Dark Arted Dark Dance for the evasion as well as a Dark Arted Dark Passenger for the Blind. In my opinion, this is the best cooldown combo for trash and since Blood Price is not up anymore, you aren't losing out on any MP.

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Originally Posted by Docfiord_Fowling

C&S is only 50 potency more than a DA/SE and does not heal. If you have plenty of MP, go for the extra damage; but to say if you aren't managing your MP if need to use C&S for mana is incorrect. By using Blood Price and C&S for MP, you are able to keep alternating Delirium and DA/SE combos much longer. This is more DPS and more incoming healing. It seems that you are just happy to see big numbers when C&S crits.

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You have to count how much potency increases with DA, not the total. Dark Arts adds 350 potency to C&S, and 140 to SE. Trying to count the potency before DA that they do as part of the amount gained doesn't really work.

Edit: As a side note just to echo your other point, Blood Price mana gained is indeed not based on damage taken, it gives a flat amount of MP back per hit regardless of how much the hit is for.

New DRK here:
I'm learning both the class and how to properly tank in behalf of raid content. Recently hit level 50, so I do not have access to Carve & Spit yet.

The use of Dark Arts; It's tempting to really go at it while you regain a bit of MP back with Blood Price (Which recovers only a fixed ammount of MP per hit, if I'm not mistaken? Or so I've seen...), but you get depleted of MP quite hastly if you use many times (And even with Delirium combos between each DASE, it doesn't mean the MP lasts long): Which point on your MP pool do you decide to stop using Dark Arts until you recover enough MP?

Besides that, I would like to know if Carve & Spit is an offgcd ability, working as a free Ether every minute, or as a huge hit.

Also, I would like to know what am I going up for if I'm looking for a raid group; what kind of stuff is the people looking for a tank going to ask of me, besides tanking their stuff, being resilent, and all the givens of the task. Thank you very much.

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Originally Posted by Kuinu

Besides that, I would like to know if Carve & Spit is an offgcd ability, working as a free Ether every minute, or as a huge hit.

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It's an off-GCD ability once per minute restoring the same amount of MP as Syphon. The first impression I got was that C&S was supposed to be an MP tool for main tanking and a DPS tool in Dark Arts while off-tanking/soloing, however reading some of the posts here seemed to suggest a more relevant use on the MP regeneration in order to use Soul Eater more. I'm not good on math, but it makes sense I guess.

I have a question too: how do people manage frequent (less than one minute between each) tank busters with DRK?

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Originally Posted by Malusion

You have to count how much potency increases with DA, not the total. Dark Arts adds 350 potency to C&S, and 140 to SE. Trying to count the potency before DA that they do as part of the amount gained doesn't really work.

Edit: As a side note just to echo your other point, Blood Price mana gained is indeed not based on damage taken, it gives a flat amount of MP back per hit regardless of how much the hit is for.

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But shouldn't the mp you gain from non DA cns be counted as that cns's contribution to damage? Like, 150 potency + 800 something worth of mana vs 450 + (-1800mp)? I mean, I guess it's hard to quantify when you cant immediately replace that 800 mp to a dark arts (being 1800mp cost and all). But then again, blood price mp gain seems high enough for it to not matter (in the long run of a nonstop 10 min battle too? haven't tried)...but what about in grit stance as mt when incoming mp varies and therefore mp has varying, uh, 'values'?

That said, 150 cns's mp gain seems to be just enough for an unleash, with 3 targets will give you 150 + 300 potency at near 0 mp cost while da cns gives you 450 potency for the cost of 1800 mp (Am I wrong?). But then again, it's 1gcd and 1ogcd vs 2 ogcd. Based on time the latter has the 1st beat, based on mp efficiency the former has the latter beat. Same goes for single target cns issue. The DA cns is better for immediate damage and if mp isnt at a premium but it is...right? Where am I even going?

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Originally Posted by Gardes

But shouldn't the mp you gain from non DA cns be counted as that cns's contribution to damage?

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C&S unbuffed rewards half the MP needed for a Dark Arts. C&S has a 60 second cooldown. It'll take 2 C&Ss (1 or 2min) for the MP return to provide a 'free' Dark Arts that you otherwise wouldn't have had access to - and you're sacrificing 700 potency to get it.

Still though - you're a tank, so EHP > DPS if appropriate. If you're in a scenario where you're taking high inc damage and you feel a self-heal is more important than a DPS boost - then yeah obey that priority instead and just vanilla C&S - which will move DA'd SE's availability up 1 syphon combo.

edit: And yeah I agree in AoE/Multi target situations C&S can be better strictly for the MP because it gives a 'free' Dark Passenger with each use.

Passenger is 30s CD, C&S 60s CD. Every other Passenger is free.