Dark Knight Megathread

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Originally Posted by Kalaam

This sounds way too hopeful. That also feels very dishonest from the devs, so I doubt that's the case.
In my opinion, if that was the case, they should have said it earlier. That due to constraint Dark Knight didn't get the amount of work they originally planned.
But that's honestly... kind of entitled to expect them to address dark knight specifically, it would need to be in an insanely broken state for it to be addressed by name and with some form of apologies. As bad as it is, it isn't *that* bad.

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I’m going to disagree with it not being that bad... I’ve played every iteration of DRK and I haven’t been happy since HW. I’ve finally moved on and it’s not hard to see in posts that others have too. It’s Time for a rework and it needs to be for ew. This “it needs a rework, please look forward to it in two years” mentality has got to go.

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Originally Posted by Danelo

I’m going to disagree with it not being that bad... I’ve played every iteration of DRK and I haven’t been happy since HW. I’ve finally moved on and it’s not hard to see in posts that others have too. It’s Time for a rework and it needs to be for ew. This “it needs a rework, please look forward to it in two years” mentality has got to go.

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Thinking about DRK now compared to HW still depresses me. We had an actual job identity, there was actual flow in the kit and synergy, it felt both challenging and fun to play, and then they massacred it to give us that...THING that SB DRK was. ShB was better, but it appears they still wish to treat DRK horribly instead of looking back at their job identity ideas from HW and running with some of them.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

ShB was better, but it appears they still wish to treat DRK horribly instead of looking back at their job identity ideas from HW and running with some of them.

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It really wasn't. Simplified, but still one of the worst reworks I've seen. When the expansion came out I saw about 40-50% of the kit completly scrapped. StB DRK was a mess regarding the Dark Arts spam yet it still retained some of its complexity.

I've always been vouching for them to return DRK to its roots but they seem adamant to build upon the 5.0 rework. The only thing I want for this job is the satisfying feel it used to have which is sorely missing still, albeit 6.0 doesn't include the Bloodspiller spam which is good.

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Originally Posted by Danelo

I’m going to disagree with it not being that bad... I’ve played every iteration of DRK and I haven’t been happy since HW. I’ve finally moved on and it’s not hard to see in posts that others have too. It’s Time for a rework and it needs to be for ew. This “it needs a rework, please look forward to it in two years” mentality has got to go.

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I mean I get what you're saying but fact of the matter is Living Dead has been unchanged since Heavensward, which is what? 7 years old now?

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Originally Posted by Shin96

It really wasn't. Simplified, but still one of the worst reworks I've seen. When the expansion came out I saw about 40-50% of the kit completly scrapped. StB DRK was a mess regarding the Dark Arts spam yet it still retained some of its complexity.

I've always been vouching for them to return DRK to its roots but they seem adamant to build upon the 5.0 rework. The only thing I want for this job is the satisfying feel it used to have which is sorely missing still, albeit 6.0 doesn't include the Bloodspiller spam which is good.

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If they're not going to return to their roots, then they need to take what they have and make it unique. Add some complexity, like darkside timer management, interaction similar to Sage's Eukrasia, etc.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

If they're not going to return to their roots, then they need to take what they have and make it unique. Add some complexity, like darkside timer management, interaction similar to Sage's Eukrasia, etc.

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I think one of the more glaring problems design-wise is just how much downtime DRK has compared to the other tanks.

PLD has a whole FoF rotation and a Confiteor extension into Valor, and only has as much as 6s of downtime inbetween rotations.

WAR has a flexible rotation when it comes to gauge management using Fell Cleave, but their downtime is non-existent unless they're forced to disengage from enemies or the boss.

GNB is the same as WAR, except more rigid with how Continuation is. Heck, they even have a continuation off of Burst Strike. They don't have much downtime due to being able to Burst Strike inbetween rotations for Continuation and to keep from overcapping on Cartridges.

DRK in particular is literally the meme, "RANDOM BULLSHIT GO" for 30s and then you literally are stuck in your 1-2-3 rotation with a lot of downtime exempting stray Bloodspillers or Quietus. It's close to the same complaints healers make: They don't have enough to do, so all they press is 1 button, except in DRK's case it's 1 combo. If they could add something that could be used between downtimes that would actually be worth, it'd alleviate some of that aside from mechanical issues such as Living Dead.

To be fair, i didn't read everything on this thread, but i have to say something that hopefully reaches the Dev's.

1. There are alot of things that have to change for DRK, Bloodweapon needs to be 5 stacks instead of 10 Sec. duration, Oblation needs to get a Self-Healing Buff (Nascent Flash Style which also works on yourself),
Abyssal Drain is Useless outside of Dungeons it needs to have a way shorter cooldown or just be a GCD that costs 50 Blood Gauge, The Blackest Night needs to have a 10 Sec. Duration and not cost any MP (just increase the cooldown for it),
Dark Mind needs to be 15% all Damage Mitigation instead of only Magic since you can't always tell what type of damage is being dealt right now, Living Dead needs to change literaly everything is better than Living Dead! i rather spam every cooldown i have and somehow survive instead of pressing Living Dead and dying to a Healer who doesn't know how Living Dead works. Literally all Passive Traits that Dark Knight got are completely useless for his kit and don't provide any help in staying alive or saving a teammate's life. (Which is literaly the Job of a Tank)

2. How on Earth are they removing the Self-Heal for Dark Knight from Heavensward to Stormblood but now give the Warrior something that is even stronger than that back in the day??? Literaly how ??

3. The Situation is so bad that noone over here wants to go into a Dungeon as Dark Knight and i'm actually getting actively bullied for playing Dark Knight and not any other Tank! For real i have so many people message me with stuff like "Just get off that suicidal emo job and pick something that can survive without a Healer." So many people are sending me countless memes about Dark Knight having no self-sustain and how the job is even worse than a melee-dps with Bloodbath on.

The Situation is realy realy realy bad over here, i hope they finally do something about this before the job is completely ruined.

Dark Knight needs WAY more self-sustain and more ways to Help his teammate's.

I Love this Job and i don't want to switch to any other job for that matter, people like me need help from the DEV's !

Living dead is probably the most problematic ability in the game and somehow the one ability in drk's kit that has never seen a single change when virtually every other skill has received some adjustments or removed which is kind of mind boggling. I like the fantasy of the skill, using magic to forcefully keep your body going just like the berserk armor and I would say it's probably the last remaining ability that has some sort of job fantasy besides just being a magic knight. I just imagine you eating a tank buster that instantly drops you to 1hp and your character basically just broke every single bone and ruptured every single organ in their body but living dead just twists them back into place for you to keep fighting.

But the gameplay application is just horrendous as it leans way too much into the fantasy of the ability. You are literally helpless which makes you avoid pressing it unless there is communication between you and a healer. And apparently there is lore reason as to why they never changed it but clearly lore hasn't stop the devs from letting smn do whatever the fuck they want. I'm fine with keeping the aspect of you dying if a conditions isn't met but the current iteration is simply too harsh when compared to the other tank invuls.

Suggestion:
1. Separate the invul and penalty into two separate status effects so meeting the healing requirement does not immediately remove the invul effect.
2. Give drk a way to not die when on their own. Ex: The walking dead status just prevents you from dropping below 1hp for 10s. You also get 5 stacks waking dead for 12s and when the effect ends, you take damage equal to 10% of you max hp for each remaining stack of waking dead. Landing a weaponskill or spell will consume one stack of waking dead, healing you for 10% of you max hp.

With this version, a drk can very realistically save themselves as long as there is a target while still retaining the core aspect of the ability.

For the job fantasy I think I'd like a less severe penalty for failing the heal check. Down for the count for 5 seconds or something, make it feel like you put every last bit of strength into the fight.

And yeah, meeting the check shouldn't end the actual invuln obviously, it's going to be forever a mystery what they've been thinking with that for this long.

Bring back Power Slash and get rid of Unleash and its combo for Tar Pit.

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Originally Posted by Soge01

Bring back Power Slash and get rid of Unleash and its combo for Tar Pit.

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Unleash is pretty cool. Stalwart Soul should be replaced instead, this purple vomit just doesn't suit DRK.

Bring back Scourge, Power Slash, and Sole Survivor. It would add quite a bit to the gameplay loop.

Im pretty happy with Dark Knight right now. My biggest thoughts on it is that Oblation feels underwhelming. I think if they could increase Mit% and or duration on it, it would go a long way towards makings this skill feel more impactful.

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Originally Posted by AC9Breaker

Im pretty happy with Dark Knight right now. My biggest thoughts on it is that Oblation feels underwhelming. I think if they could increase Mit% and or duration on it, it would go a long way towards makings this skill feel more impactful.

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Or add a unique effect to it. Y'know, like every other lvl 82 defensive. But I guess most we can expect is either regen or 15% mitigation. 2 charges is cool idea, just wish it did more for the skill.

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Originally Posted by Shin96

Unleash is pretty cool. Stalwart Soul should be replaced instead, this purple vomit just doesn't suit DRK.

Bring back Scourge, Power Slash, and Sole Survivor. It would add quite a bit to the gameplay loop.

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Yes, yes and YES to all of those. I forgot how good it felt to use all of DRK's old moves...

For Unleash. If its gotta stay, however, it's in desperate need for an upgrade. Needs something bigger, flashier and cooler to fit the sort of power DRK can Unleash now. x3

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Originally Posted by Shin96

Unleash is pretty cool. Stalwart Soul should be replaced instead, this purple vomit just doesn't suit DRK.

Bring back Scourge, Power Slash, and Sole Survivor. It would add quite a bit to the gameplay loop.

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I'd probably take Scourge over Souleater (Fast->Syphon->Scourge has a nice flow), Sole Survivor's or Shadowskin's animation as the lead into a Rampart-reskin, Tar Pit over Unleash, and maybe Dark Passenger over Flood personally. That's about it. The rest look fine to me.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I'd probably take Scourge over Souleater (Fast->Syphon->Scourge has a nice flow), Sole Survivor's or Shadowskin's animation as the lead into a Rampart-reskin, Tar Pit over Unleash, and maybe Dark Passenger over Flood personally. That's about it. The rest look fine to me.

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To be perfectly honest, you can replace about most current animations with what was removed and I'm sure the job would just feel better.

A tank wielding a greatsword should give off a heavy feel. DRK is so weightless right now it ain't funny anymore.

I think it's pretty easy to fix living dead, as it is now, it's the worst skill in the game. Walking dead should actually apply invulnerability for starters. Superbolide and hollowed ground apply this with no hoops to jump through. Walking dead needs to be separated from the death part. As it is now, as soon as your healed to full, walking dead gets removed. This is the only invulnerability in the game that can be removed like this.

As soon as your health drops below 1HP when under the effect of living dead, walking dead and doom gets applied. While under walking dead, take no damage. When healed to full, doom is removed. Problem solved

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Originally Posted by Shin96

To be perfectly honest, you can replace about most current animations with what was removed and I'm sure the job would just feel better.

A tank wielding a greatsword should give off a heavy feel. DRK is so weightless right now it ain't funny anymore.

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Tbf, the most "weightless" ability, Plunge, is an original.

Heck, we've only added 5 attacks since the original set, and Shadowbringer, Bloodspiller, and Quietus are each arguably more weighty than, say, Hard Slash or Syphon Strike (likewise originals). Edge and Flood, moreover, have reason to be such quick animations; we'd otherwise never see them resolve in our openers. (Of course, even Power Slash and Dark Passenger's physical components resolved pretty quickly (though DP less so), so two-part animations would probably also have been fine.)

If the Devs do really pay attention to the Forum here comes my humble opinion.

DRK needs a complete rework. Delirium is a copy of the inner release and it needs to be changed into something unique and fresh. Bloodweapon needs to either give skill speed or to have stacks as the perfect balance has. Living dead should be changed into something else. Flood of shadow and shadowbringers are almost identical in skill design and animation, shadowbringer being the level 90 skill needs to be changed into something unique and worth of expansion content. Salted earth is bad and salt and darkness is even worse. I could have made the animation of salt and darkness in my 10-year-old pc, that's how bad it is. Why not mixing the dot effect on abyssal drain? Imo would be an excellent idea. Remove salted earth from the game.
We also lack a proper combo extension rotation, it's just a 1-2-3 combo and then pops everything else when not in cooldown. It lacks complexity and its just an empty job. It is camouflaged due to the amount of damage it does.
I have played DRK in every type of content, from dungeons to savage.
Is the job fun to play? No, and that is the worse part.
Aesthetically it looks amazing and badass but the gameplay feels bad, boring, empty, and without identity.
For Endwalker the devs were very lazy with DRK, played too much safe and the result is catastrophic.
It needs a rework now, not in 7.0

Abyssal drain applying a lifesteal dot to every ennemy hit, wouldn't that be fun. Could make it the level 84 trait/upgrade even.

Maybe they should have more self-healing in their kit that way they can make better use of living dead. Like Blood Weapon and Delerium, allow those two to restore HP in addition MP.

Edit: Obviously its not a big or semi-big rework for dark knight, but they could use something to tie them over till they get that sort of treatment.

is it wrong to say that i am waiting for the world race to happen? Reason being is that drk will be in this one and its going to clear. And there will be those players saying drk is fine as is because it cleared the raid before the others did.

Anyone remember that live letter when yoshi mentioned that?

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Originally Posted by Axxion

is it wrong to say that i am waiting for the world race to happen? Reason being is that drk will be in this one and its going to clear. And there will be those players saying drk is fine as is because it cleared the raid before the others did.

Anyone remember that live letter when yoshi mentioned that?

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This is true, but remember, when AST had a low number of parses in Savage back in ShB, they immediately started fixing AST. If DRK gets a similarly low number of parses...hopefully it'll happen?

It seems to me that DRK is doing fine in the damage department though, by dumb luck or the fact they just keep slapping on completely unrelated ogcd attacks. The place DRK falls behind is a place that is not often tracked, being self sustain and damage mitigation.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

It seems to me that DRK is doing fine in the damage department though, by dumb luck or the fact they just keep slapping on completely unrelated ogcd attacks.

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Because Dark Knight burst is huge, bigger than Warriors, Semi Burst at 60s, mega burst at 2 Mins.

At the start of fights it out parses certain DPS for a very short time. Only Gunbreaker keeps up right behind thanks to Double Downs ridiculous potency.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

It seems to me that DRK is doing fine in the damage department though, by dumb luck or the fact they just keep slapping on completely unrelated ogcd attacks. The place DRK falls behind is a place that is not often tracked, being self sustain and damage mitigation.

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Not by parsers...but it IS tracked by players. I've seen a number of DRK mains switch after leveling it due to it not feeling that good to tank with, I've seen healers outright complain and dislike having to heal them, and I've seen DPS sweat because they've expected wipes from one being in the party. Combine that, and you get a job that people dread to see. It's very possible that the parses will be low despite the high damage (which btw, is likely to get nerfed the day savage hits).

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

Not by parsers...but it IS tracked by players. I've seen a number of DRK mains switch after leveling it due to it not feeling that good to tank with, I've seen healers outright complain and dislike having to heal them, and I've seen DPS sweat because they've expected wipes from one being in the party. Combine that, and you get a job that people dread to see. It's very possible that the parses will be low despite the high damage (which btw, is likely to get nerfed the day savage hits).

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It really comes down to this... If your class has that blue icon, you will be inherently valued for your defensive capabilities over your DPS. The only complaint people have about DRK DPS is it feels boring to play, no real thought required, just press big damage button and do big damage. But everyone, even non-DRK players are upset the DRK mitigation is severely lacking. It lacks deliberate healing (healing parses are padded because of Soul Eater, which is not deliberate healing and is often direct or indirect overheal) and meaningful unique mitigation. Dark Mind is a cool gimmick but Raw Intuition is better. Having a shield for constant passive damage reduction is better even if PLD can't super easily calculate the RNG behind it because it has 100% uptime. Camouflage is the same percentage of damage reduction, but adds a parry rate and reduces more than just magic damage. Oblation does less mitigation than Intervention and Heart of Corundum. TBN is no longer a god tier party mitigation tool in the face of the other tanks. Being flat reduction of 25% max HP means the more damage taken, the less valuable TBN really is. (I've done the math before, I can show my work if anyone doubts it.)

DRK will be valued by high end groups for its damage, there is no doubt in that. But these groups are outliers and using them to justify not fixing the problems DRK has is just lazy. Think about it. Some people have 1 leg, some have no legs. This means if you average up everyone in the world and do an average leg count, the average person has less than 2 legs. Most people, however, have 2 legs. The average is not indicative of how many legs the average person actually has. The same rule applies here. Just because the DPS was high enough that a few high end raid groups made it work doesn't mean the class is good, it just means they valued something the rest of the player base didn't. Tanks will always be judged on their ability to tank and right now, DRK is pathetic.

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Originally Posted by RyuDragnier

This is true, but remember, when AST had a low number of parses in Savage back in ShB, they immediately started fixing AST. If DRK gets a similarly low number of parses...hopefully it'll happen?

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But for that i thought more of healing potency and not damage. Drk has good damage but just lacks the self sustain it had since hw. Drk does better on single fight but not to well on a five plus mob pull. And since they changed how the fights are arranged now. I do hope they will fix it but once again, they don't really listen that well.

Do keep in mind on the party comps. That will also will be a factor for these fights as well.

I find it really bizarre that our abilities such as BLOODSPILLER, BLOOD. SPILLER. Have literally no life leech of any kind. I will say though I'm now after playing DRK for quite some time after the changes in the boat that it needs TBN to be upped to a 25s CD, remove the "dark arts" proc and mana cost. On shield break give a HoT for w/e potency is balanced for w/e duration, so that it serves its purpose regardless of if it breaks or not. Also add some form of healing on delirium stacks like 300 or 250p per Bloodspiller/Quietus.

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Originally Posted by Axxion

is it wrong to say that i am waiting for the world race to happen? Reason being is that drk will be in this one and its going to clear. And there will be those players saying drk is fine as is because it cleared the raid before the others did.

Anyone remember that live letter when yoshi mentioned that?

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They will use this as a justification to not fix DRK too which is sad. I hope they dont ignore DRK but at the same time I highly doubt a complete rework in 6.1

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Originally Posted by Axxion

But for that i thought more of healing potency and not damage. Drk has good damage but just lacks the self sustain it had since hw. Drk does better on single fight but not to well on a five plus mob pull. And since they changed how the fights are arranged now. I do hope they will fix it but once again, they don't really listen that well.

Do keep in mind on the party comps. That will also will be a factor for these fights as well.

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Keep in mind how the bosses for the raids work as well. The 3rd raid boss of Pandaemonium hits both tanks at the same time with every auto. It's very likely you're going to see people want the other tanks over DRK for that very reason, since the other tanks can keep up sustain and make it easier on the healers, whereas a DRK being there may very well make it much harder than it needs to be on the healers. I wouldn't take a DRK to that fight when I could take a GNB, WAR, or PLD instead.

By Request in another Thread i've been asked to post this here in hope that SE see's this of they only look into the big threads.

We all know now that we DRK have the most problems in dungeons, i even saw multiple healers saying "oh thank god its not a dark knight" at the beginning of a dungeon when they got a different tank.

I have multiple big issues with the job but thats for another thread.

Listen to this:

We are playing a game, where the DEV's decided to get rid off Dark Knight's Self-Heal with the patch from Heavensward to Stormblood with the reason "It is too strong"
But IN THE SAME GAME they give the Warrior a Self-Heal that is STRONGER than what we had with DRK at the end of Heavensward AND it is easier to perform because you only have to hit 1 button AND you can do that every 25 seconds!

We had to Stack multiple cooldowns, use Blood Price, pray that noone stuns the mobs and spam the hell out of Dark Arts and Abyssal Drain! Also the Cooldown for that was at least 60 seconds because you had to stack multiple cooldowns for it.

Even if they nerf WAR's Self-Heal he still will have it and it will still be super strong.
Just give us Abyssal Drain as an GCD back and make it cost 50 Bloog Gauge.

How can SE do this to us?

I believe that this was straight up 100% not tested at all.

So, thoughts?

Just finished leveling DRK to 90, did some EXs on it, and came to the conclusion of the job or rather my opinion on it:

-Opener is sloppy and button mashy where triple weaving is a hand cramp
-Downtime is the same issue as ShB, outside of your burst just 1-2-3, sit on Shadowbringers to ramp up your next burst
-Having 2 charges of Plunge with the trait Enhanced Unmend is as underwhelming as I thought
-A lot of your big dmg moves (especially Shadow) are just tacked on use and forget/spam
-TBN not even being changed or upgraded seriously why does EVERY tank get an upgrade to their short timer mitigations at 82 but DRK gets NOTHING!?
-Oblation is barely noticeable as a tank CD, the combo action off Salted Earth feels clunky

I leveled mostly through dungeons but it was rough probably the worst dungeon experience I've had in quite a awhile I've never felt so...Helpless as a tank, if things go sideways I don't really have anything to help the group or anything outside of TBN. It's fine in EX trials and the new normal mode raids but the other tanks aren't just "fine" they're more engaging. DRK is just the same as ShB with extra visual flair and more hand cramping so idk how this happened but yeah I'll still tinker around with DRK but probably for raid I'll stay WAR idk.

Out of curiosity. Why not combine Delium and Blood Weapon into one button?

It would still be a low effort inner release.

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Originally Posted by shao32

It would still be a low effort inner release.

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Right, but that's still an improvement over the finnicky button bloat of present Blood Weapon.

Personally, I'd rather turn it into an (increasingly powerful) Attack Speed buff that increasingly drains Darkside duration, so long as that (likewise bloated) gauge remains.

Lol. I was mostly just wonderin gif there was a reason not to use them at the same time. If not, they might as well just have Blood Weapon become Delerium. If it needs a buff, why not have it cause 3 free Edge / Flood of Shadows?

Imagine if Delirium gave 15% haste as well as halved the cost of EoS. Bonus if it extended Blood Weapon's duration. It would feel like an actual Delirium....

Now if EoS had a better flowing animation, kind of like the enshrouded strikes of the reaper, that'd be great indeed.

If we actually have MP management and Darkside management with like more MP options that don't grant Darkside time and we use them more regulary and not only in the small burst it would be really nice have a Delirium granting haste and free uses of MP skills, actuall mechanics on the job but right now having free MP usage or just 3 Bloodspiller will be equally empty and swallow specially since it wouln't change the hollow huge downtime the job suffers right now and would just make the burst even more busy for no reason.