Dark Knight feels pretty overwhelming.

Best way to use a Dark Arts boosted Dark Dance is to combo it with a Dark Art boosted Dark Passenger (for the blind effect, since blind works for both physical and magical attacks).....but too bad it costs the majority of your MP to do so rip your dps. A simple fix for that would be to just have Dark Arts give you two uses with each cast so it's easier to get boosted abilities off without it sucking the marrow from your Dark Knight's bones. But that's just wishful thinking.

I had a level 50 war prior to heavensward. Mostly dungeon runs, a few early coil experience. I level dark to 60 and decided to level war a bit. At 50...it felt so sloooow. Everything was on global cooldown. Granted drk has extra 5 skills, but it felt like I was weaving so much stuff compared to war

I had a level 50 war prior to heavensward. Mostly dungeon runs, a few early coil experience. I level dark to 60 and decided to level war a bit. At 50...it felt so sloooow. Everything was on global cooldown. Granted drk has extra 5 skills, but it felt like I was weaving so much stuff compared to war

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Originally Posted by Madepossible

The aggro of a DRK is the highest of all three tank classes.

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WAR would like a word with you.

While everything else you said is true, DRK cannot compete with WAR over aggro.

Power Slash has a multiplier of 5.5, same as Butcher's Block. Power Slash potency is 300 + 15% from Darkside you got 345. Buthcer's Block is 280 + 20% from Maim and you get 336. DRK has DA Power Slash, but I dunno the enmity multiplier on it yet, but let's assume it's a 50% boost pumping potency up to 518. WAR has berserk (50% boost), DRK has..... nothing. WAR has Unchained (33% boost), DRK has.... nothing.

From experience and tests, I've never beaten a good WAR in enmity after the 20s mark.

WAR's optimal rotation is Storm's Eye combo and Butcher's Block combo alternated with Fell Cleave/Inner Beast as needed. DRK will start with Power Slash combo adding Dark Arts twice before running out of juice. If DRK uses Power Slash a third time it will be WITHOUT DA and their MP will get so low they risk dropping Darkside.

Assuming DRK opens with Unmend > DA Power Slash combo > DA Power Slash combo > Siphon Strike combo

Assuming WAR opens with Tomahawk > Unchained > Heavy Swing > Maim > Berserk > Storm's Eye > Butcher's Block combo

On a single target where both tanks are pumping as much aggro as they can, DRK will keep the boss at first due to higher potency on Unmend vs Tomahawk and pumped up Power Slash, then they will hold the target for so long until WAR hits butcher's block in his opener (roughly 20 seconds in). Then DRK will never see the mob face again. It's gonna be WAR holding it from there on. DRK will be forced to use TWO Siphon Strikes before pumping 1 DA Power Slash. Not gonna matter since WAR will just keep building enmity from there on.

While that doesn't matter since tanks shouldn't fight over enmity anyways. The statement that DRK has the highest enmity of the three is not true.

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Originally Posted by Phoenicia

DRK will start with Power Slash combo adding Dark Arts twice before running out of juice. If DRK uses Power Slash a third time it will be WITHOUT DA and their MP will get so low they risk dropping Darkside.

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This statement is not true if you use Carve and Spit in your rotation to get mp back, secondly you make use of Bloodprice, which gives you a lot of mp back aswell so you can keep on dark arts basically. If you have a warrior or ninja that hits the boss with respectively storms eye or dancing edge, it even increases your own attacks. War needs it for its rotation, so DRK benefits from it -> another reason why DRK should be OT and War should be MT but that's another subject. ^_^

Assuming your target doesn't throw magic attacks around. But as you said, that's another subject.

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Originally Posted by Madepossible

This statement is not true if you use Carve and Spit in your rotation to get mp back, secondly you make use of Bloodprice, which gives you a lot of mp back aswell so you can keep on dark arts basically.

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I dropped DE/SE multiplier (x11.11%) from the comparison since both tanks get the effect of the debuff.

Sorry I forgot to mention it in my opener but I also assumed a DA CnS to increase the opener burst. BP will not be enough to pump the MP of a fourth Dark Arts. Even if it did, the DRK is hampered by its MP from generating enough enmity to pull back from the WAR once it gets going.

But since, as I already mentioned, there is no point of "fighting over aggro" except maybe in hunts (which was what actually brought up this testing with my friends), it doesn't matter which tank has higher aggro than which tank. As long as all three tanks are capable of keeping aggro off the DPS and the OT (who should not be building too much enmity), it's fine.

So I finally got Dark Arts and I'm having mixed feelings towards it. An example would be using it with DP for it's AOE blind effect, it sounds great in theory but it leaves me with so very little MP to establish enough hate in large pulls using unleash. Or I could never use it on trash pulls but then I feel like I'm deliberately avoiding a mechanic designed for crowd control.

I won't even go into how DA/DD evasion buff and DP's blind counteract the usefulness of Blood Price and parrying for reprisal (which will be used basically never as an OT). All in all it feels like this class is lacking some serious synergy.

I had the same issues at the beginning but its just practice, now I don't even need to look to my hot bar to use my cool downs or skills and I used to play as a War, actually I find now War more complicated but that's just me

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Originally Posted by CrimsonThunder

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DA+DD and DA+DP's main purpose is mitigation. If you think, for some reason, the chance to reduce a single attack by 20% and to reduce one mob out of many in an AoE pull by 10% trumps 40% evasion (which translates to 40% TOTAL damage reduction) you're looking at this picture wrong!

DA+DD and DA+DP combo wins far ahead of the 10% reprisal. Oh, also do not forget you will still parrying 30% more often so you WILL use reprisal on 1 mob, congrats.

Blood Price and evasion don't go well together. But neither of them lasts more than 20s in the 40s interval. Just alternate them.