Dark Knight Megathread

Having blood price applicable to an ally would have fixed the issue of "DRK HAS to MT" a bit.
Honestly I kind of like the idea of DRK being a "mean" PLD in idea, PLD protects you, DRK avenges you. His "cover" doesn't reduce your damage taken, but it allows him to hit harder (and then he TBNs your because he still loves you very much)

God you guys are making me want this to happen. DRK should def be the "hit me harder"/avenge type of tank.

Just being able to put blood price or other counter skills on other people would do so much for this job... Very thematic.

Please don't give me hope...

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Originally Posted by Sazuzaki

God you guys are making me want this to happen. DRK should def be the "hit me harder"/avenge type of tank.

Just being able to put blood price or other counter skills on other people would do so much for this job... Very thematic.

Please don't give me hope...

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In other words, give DRK some serious "step on me mommy" energy, I love it.

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Originally Posted by Ryaduera

In other words, give DRK some serious "step on me mommy" energy, I love it.

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DRK has a complicated relationship with...having relationships.
Especially with parental figures.

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Originally Posted by Sazuzaki

God you guys are making me want this to happen. DRK should def be the "hit me harder"/avenge type of tank.

Just being able to put blood price or other counter skills on other people would do so much for this job... Very thematic.

Please don't give me hope...

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That's what it was in Heavensward, and what I want to see it return to.

Dark Knight back then, was a tank that willingly strode with confidence into a storm of blood and fury, relentlessly taking hit after hit after hit and using the enemy's fury as fuel for it's own abilities. Reprisal, Dark Dance, Blood Price, Sole Survivor, and Dark Passenger within it's kit gave it this feel of a Tank that would turn the enemy's hate into it's own vigor and life force.

And I want to see a return to that. THAT, was Dark Knight's theme. The original Tank that was literally too damned angry to die.

I have an idea that's a bit more..... out there, per say, but it came into mind because of the main conversation you've all been sharing.

Keep in mind this is all pure theorycrafting at this point too lol

So to start, what if Darkside instead of giving bonus damage it instead granted haste, similar to the NIN's Huton, and the DRK got a new combo finisher that gave Darkside, meaning it would have to rotate between healing itself and getting Darkside. Ofc then cut most of the oGCD abilities entirely, with a couple exceptions I'd imagine, but instead of being a basic combo tank with fuckloads of oGCDs to make the job feel "busy" it would instead be the low GCD tank that was actively fast paced. Then we'd focus on the GCD rotations with "modes" we could rotate through, maybe toggles or something akin to the BLMs Astral and Umbral modes, if not just duration/charges. These would be oGCDs ofc and they'd be something like the old Dark Arts, where you'd drain MP while empowering your GCD rotation, giving them extra effects and not just bonus potencies (maybe even unique animations... I can dream... lol), and then another one that was just used for MP regen. There could also be multiple kinds of Dark Arts, where one gives bonus damage through DoTs or just extra attacks/damage, and then another one used for sustain where it gives different sustaining tools like cures and HoTs, even shields. So you'd basically go into a Dark Arts rotation then go through an MP regen phase and you'd have to pick which version of Dark Arts to go through since you'd only have the MP for one of them. If they're toggles you could even actively swap between all the modes, being forced into the MP regen phase once you ran out.

Then ofc remove the MP for TBN and make it a beefier shield based anti-buster to match the other three tanks, but all the defensives could be kept in their numerous versions as they'd serve as our main weavable abilities with the reduced GCD from Darkside.

This would differentiate the DRK from the WAR as well as make sure it didn't just become another GNB with all it's oGCDs. You might also think "that would just get boring, mostly just having fast combos," but the NIN is certainly far from boring and it essentially is just fast GCDs and Ninjutsus. So rotating through different Dark Arts would be the variations in our play patterns.

If that's not enough add in a new "Delirium" mode where you have to go through a set number of Dark Arts rotations or uses and you'd get access to a "super mode" that gave one "dopamine" rotation of just three flashy big hitters that also worked as a quicker MP regen phase, or something like that lol

This is all just farting out of my head, full theorycrafting, but I am nonetheless curious if this would be something along the lines of what people want? Or if I'm just lost in fantasy land at this point lol

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Originally Posted by VicariousXIV

So to start, what if Darkside instead of giving bonus damage it instead granted haste, similar to the NIN's Huton, and the DRK got a new combo finisher that gave Darkside, meaning it would have to rotate between healing itself and getting Darkside. Ofc then cut most of the oGCD abilities entirely, with a couple exceptions I'd imagine, but instead of being a basic combo tank with fuckloads of oGCDs to make the job feel "busy" it would instead be the low GCD tank that was actively fast paced.

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I'm all for some Haste, but... if you cut out half the actions per global over one's burst, that's going to feel far slower even if you give DRK whopping MNK-levels of speed (+20% Attack Speed). I'd already rather not just have Storm's-Eye-but-for-Haste or RPR-Gluttony-but-for... wait, hold on a sec.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I'm all for some Haste, but... if you cut out half the actions per global over one's burst, that's going to feel far slower even if you give DRK whopping MNK-levels of speed (+20% Attack Speed). I'd already rather not just have Storm's-Eye-but-for-Haste or RPR-Gluttony-but-for... wait, hold on a sec.

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I just pulled the inspiration from an old League of Legends character, Aatrox back before he was changed for anyone who plays that game too, where he'd toggle between "Blood Thirst" to restore his own health with his attacks and "Blood Price" where he'd use his own health to increase the damage of his attacks. Thought it would be interesting if it were MP on the DRK instead of health, but similar in concept lol And the job is already so "busy" that it could do with a few being removed, it's more "bloated" then it is "fast" tbh :P

I'm not really convinced that passive, always on speed boosts make a job feel fast to play. You feel acceleration, not speed. That's part of what makes Reaper satisfying.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I'm not really convinced that passive, always on speed boosts make a job feel fast to play. You feel acceleration, not speed. That's part of what makes Reaper satisfying.

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Idk, NIN feels faster then RPR to me, but that might be down to personal preference, or just Ninjutsu in between maybe lol

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I'm not really convinced that passive, always on speed boosts make a job feel fast to play. You feel acceleration, not speed.

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This.

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Originally Posted by VicariousXIV

Idk, NIN feels faster then RPR to me, but that might be down to personal preference, or just Ninjutsu in between maybe lol

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NIN's periods of acceleration include both through GCDs (.5s each for mudras and a 1.5s GCD for Ninjutsu itself) and --more importantly, imo-- highly oGCD-crowded burst phases, though. Either way, it doesn't rely merely on a +15% Attack Speed; such is by far the lesser factor.

I'm all for giving DRK a permanent speed buff, but replacing weaving with it is a bad idea imo. MNK had that when they changed from 4.5 to 5.0 and even with GS4 the job actually felt slower due to all the cut ogcds. There is a limit to how low your gcd can go in this game and weaving will always feel faster than that.

Now, the fact that DRK has so much of its weaving stuffed into a small window once every minute is a problem I'd like to see go away, both because it makes the burst too ogcd-bloated and because it leaves nothing to do in downtime. DRK should keep its total apm, even increase it, just have it be constantly high with lower peak in burst, instead of sky-high once a minute and then dead for the rest of DRK's rotation.

As for acceleration vs constant speed - I agree that RPR doesn't actually feel fast at all compared to the likes of NIN and SAM, even DRG with all their weaving. If that was the case, then DRK should also feel great due to its bloated burst window, but actually it feels pretty shit. Acceleration can feel good, but not when the baseline is slow as molasses, that just feels bad whenever you're not speed-bursting. A decent example of a fast job with accelaration is NIN, which already has lower gcd and some weaving in downtime, but gets even faster during Trick (not to say "just copy NIN" ofc, that would be stupid).

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

NIN's periods of acceleration include both through GCDs (.5s each for mudras and a 1.5s GCD for Ninjutsu itself) and --more importantly, imo-- highly oGCD-crowded burst phases, though. Either way, it doesn't rely merely on a +15% Attack Speed; such is by far the lesser factor.

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It doesn't actually have that many oGCDs though, less then half the amount the DRK has even lol

But yeah you're right about the Ninjutsu having even lower GCD timers, I did forget they trigger 1.5s instead of the typical 2.5s, which speeds up the pace you do things in general.

Definitely, having OGCD spread out more evenly would help having a more comfortable and overall enjoyable pacing, I think.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

I'm not really convinced that passive, always on speed boosts make a job feel fast to play. You feel acceleration, not speed. That's part of what makes Reaper satisfying.

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Despite 20% speed boost from Greased Lightning, True Stike and Snap Punch make MNK feel extremely slow.

With the amount of ogcds we currently have to juggle right now, adding haste would be disastrous.
I'm happy to go down the slow, hard hitting route. I just want something viscerally rewarding to work for.

I'd honestly be for a slow heavy route, leading to a more frantic phase for a few gcds. But for it to be alright, the different oGCD need to line up differently

I wish enhanced unmend instead made your next plunge free (no charge taken) and double potency on 30s cooldown.

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Originally Posted by Falar

I wish enhanced unmend instead made your next plunge free (no charge taken) and double potency on 30s cooldown.

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That would mean unlimited 300p oGCD plunges, Unmend spam strat intensifies.

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Originally Posted by Falar

I wish enhanced unmend instead made your next plunge free (no charge taken) and double potency on 30s cooldown.

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No. That would increase Unmend's ppgcd to 450. (Unmend itself at 150p plus a free 300p oGCD per cast), effectively increasing DRK's GCD damage by 44% as they endlessly spam Unmend.

We deal 5310 potency every 17 GCDs via 5 Souleater combos, 2 Bloodspillers, and exactly enough mana gained through Syphon Strike for an Edge, for 312.35 ppgcd. Unmend spam would have to be beneath that.

Just making Plunge free would, at 300 ppgcd, already put Unmend-spam within 4% of the dps of rotating properly, which could already lead to weird interactions like using Unmend spam to delay Souleater and thus max gauge to be spent under raid buffs.

I need to say something, because this happened on Saturday, and I'm so frustrated by it I need to vent somewhere where people will understand. Spoilers for P3S, if you care about that sort of thing.

My team, bless their hearts, decided that it would be for the best to Blind Prog the tier. We want to prepare for doing Dragonsong War Ultimate, and since we've killed ultimates already, the next step is solving mechanics with zero guides, handcrafted timelines instead of one pulled from the internet, our own toolboxes, etc etc. Make our brains larger, and more wrinkled, so to speak. So please don't spoil P4S for me, I'm still unaware of the entire fight. We've had a blast so far, and we were making really great progress DESPITE the various server issues causing people to be up to an hour late each night. After 3 3-hour sessions, we were on P3S, post adds, Fountain of Fire on Friday.

We managed to collect enough footage to brainstorm a GREAT strategy to solve it, one that after I kill the fight, I would love to look to how it compares to the Week 1 and general PF strats, it heavily was of my design, my raidlead made my idea come to life in a toolbox and was quite inspired. I went back into T12 for determine how the birds might best dash, and for more information about the Fountain of Fires themselves. We called it on Friday night, added a Raid day for Saturday to test our strat, when I was asked to switch off DRK.

There was a problem, we were missing critical amounts of information. Specifically, we didn't know 1. Can the same person grab multiple bird AoEs? and 2. How many bird aoes are there? (We thought it was 8, we now know it is 6.) We did know about Fountain of Fires significantly, and aggressively bolstering healing and shielding output. The issue is that in order to make the mechanic easier, IF one person could grab multiple AoEs, we were going to have the tanks take all of the birds. They eat the first AoE and the first dash normally, and then invuln the next three, staying in the middle, pointing the birds out, and keeping Phoinix still, meaning much less movement across the team, and lessening the thoughts required across the team. "Let the tanks handle it, just like how we're doing Intemperance in P1S." I said.

The issue with this? Because we were planting Seraph in the center of the arena, and the AST was using Neutral Sect, there was a LEGITIMATE concern that while the PLD would be fine doing this with Hallowed Ground, I would actually die in my invuln using this strat because my Walking Dead would be cleansed by SERAPH using +400% or whatever boosted Consolations/Embraces in the center of the arena in between the dashes. I would be healed to full HP accidentally, Walking Dead would fall off, and I would be killed by the following dash. My invuln was actively UNDERMINING my OWN strategy.

So they asked me to GNB for the night as we refined the strat and tried to get more footage. The benefits of being an omnitank. I agreed for the sake of prog, because they were RIGHT. Eventually, we found out there were only six dashes, and one person cannot get multiple birds. So we threw the invuln start in the bin and DRK is back on the menu, but it's the principle of the matter that makes me so frustrated. My team, great players in their own right, a lot of them I killed TEA with, asked me to switch off the job they know I knew like the back of my hand because of this ability, and I could not blame them. How do you think that made me feel, after all we've been through on this forum? After all the complaints? After I PROVED to many randoms, my FC, my friend group, that all DRK needs is a competent player and a competent team behind them, and we're just as good as every other tank, if not better? I'm even leveling SGE right now (SCH is done) and helping leveling DRKs understand how to mitigate differently to try and stop this "DRK is bad" narrative. And now, I swapped off for a night like how many people swapped off permanently. "I'm sorry Odin, but can you please switch to GNB for tonight so we can test this."

God. Just...why?

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Originally Posted by shao32

Here is our official answer:

・作っている方もいるので罵詈雑言だけは止めていただきたい
→ちょっと言葉が強すぎるところがある、スタッフが凹んでしまうのでエンターを押す前に考えてほしい
Staff members DO READ the official forums of all language. Please exercise moderation and be civil when providing feedback.
-> There are several posts where people were indeed providing feedback with strong language. This will discourage the staff members so please be polite and always double check and think through before pressing enter.

Considering how active we have been in the forum and the overall reactions about DRK status compared to other jobs/stuff of the game in the last years this basically could be in great part aimed to us, in other words it's probable the current sad state of DRK gameplay experience could be like that bcs we have been so rude they choose to don't adress anything and keep the line bcs of it, independent of how much that could feed back the frustration and rudeness against them.
Idk what to think to be honest, i understand they posture but at the same time i don't find it to be a proper solution either if that is actually the reason DRK gameplay is so horrible right now, it could have been fixed if they have posted in our threads telling us our feedback is being to rude and they would ignore it bcs of it way more sooner, not only we would see them interacting with us and we see they read us and correct our manners way more early they could have prevented the current levels of animosity against them.

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Whoever is reading this at Square Enix, If you know, you need to say something. You need to say something. We need to hear something. I cannot defend this. Even in THIS "interview", still not even a word about DRK. What about Blood Weapon? You said you haven't heard the feedback, but I KNOW YOU HAVE! What about Spells not working with Skill Speed and Living Dead? What about literally everything we and the people who are forced to deal with us are saying all over the internet, not just on the OF? We haven't had a non-expansion patch note of any significance since 4.3 when you successfully fixed SB DRK for a lot of people. It's been total silence ever since. Where are the answers to our questions and pleas? We're hated by the community at large, both on the hardcore side and the casual side, because you refuse to talk to the DRK players. I have players asking me if they are ALLOWED to play DRK. I have players thinking they are BURDENS on their teams because they want to play DRK. This is an incredibly toxic environment. We've given you all the feedback we can, and it all has fallen on deaf ears. So we yell louder, and louder, and then start saying things that we probably shouldn't but I will tell you right now, the things I say on this forum are a lot more tame than the absolute vitriol I spew out whenever I am unfairly undone by Walking Dead in situations like the one I detailed above.

I am beside myself right now, I was prepared to wait until 6.1, we're getting a 6.08, a rare occurrence, and still I can't trust we're going to see a single thing fixed, a single QoL implemented, a single complaint addressed. I feel like I'm being punished for playing the job. I feel like I'm being ignored, because I'm playing the job I am.

It is not fun to be a Dark Knight main.

At this point, it would be best to simply stop playing DRK entirely.

Monk was in a similar situation in the middle of ShB which resulted into literally noone playing it, simply because all the other dps jobs were more fun and better in every regard, which resulted into Squeenix making a "halfway rework of the Job" mid expansion, and finishing the rest of the job with 6.0, resulting into the Monk we have today.

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Originally Posted by OdinelStarrei

Whoever is reading this at Square Enix, If you know, you need to say something. You need to say something. We need to hear something.

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This is what needs to happen, but we only ever get small snippets from Yoshi-P himself and he never goes into great detail about stuff. I would kill to see a blog post from the dev team that went over:

• What they believe a Job's identity is
• What's holding a Job back from fulfilling that identity
• What plans they have to fulfill that identity
• Actual acknowledgement of feedback from the Official Forums

Because right now they aren't giving us shit. I honestly think players are in the dark when it comes to all Jobs. The dev team just doesn't talk about their vision for Jobs, and it feels like the majority of the information we get comes from Yoshi-P during the pre-expac Media Tour. Looking specifically at DRK, they radically reworked it over multiple expacs and I honestly can't remember them actually explaining their thought process on stuff like the removal of Darkside and Dark Arts. I can't remember them explaining why they turned Delirium into an Inner Release clone. I can't remember them acknowledging six years of complaints on Living Dead. I sure as shit remember Yoshi-P saying his team hasn't heard complaints about Blood Weapon while simultaneously saying his team reads the Forums and that feels like a massive lie.

If he wants to say his team reads the Forums and takes feedback seriously then maybe they should actually give us some acknowledgement. Maybe they should communicate. Because right now the general consensus from the Tank and Healer side of the Forums is "stop ignoring us". Is it any wonder the playerbase is so damn annoyed and the feedback is getting increasingly more negative?

https://i.imgur.com/PEQBPxh.png

Give us that clarity you once talked about, Yoshi-P. Tell us what your vision is, actually listen and acknowledge what we're saying, and open a dialogue with us.

Maybe we should post those old pictures over and over as a reminder. Either here or on social medias

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Originally Posted by Kalaam

Maybe we should post those old pictures over and over as a reminder. Either here or on social medias

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No. That message delivery method would only come off as antagonistic, and as we've seen from that interview, the dev team isn't interested in being antagonized.

Maybe. Wouldn't be worse than insults though, plus this is just reminding them of their own promises.

Any time I've seen a gaming company be anything less than grateful for receiving feedback and humble about their achievements, it usually starts trending downhill fairly soon after. A lot of it comes down to pride, the belief that you know what's best of players, and a sense that the competition is inferior. I hope that they can stay grounded and remember their roots. They don't have to keep apologizing for 1.0, but if it helps them remember, perhaps it's not a bad ritual.

I think so too, that's why I sometime say it feels like they are resting on their laurels. growing complacement, in a way.
They did achieve a lot, but in getting too comfortable with success, they should remember what happened to their biggest competitor...

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Originally Posted by Lyth

They don't have to keep apologizing for 1.0, but if it helps them remember, perhaps it's not a bad ritual.

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The problem with "remembering 1.0" is that I don't think that's what anyone actually remembers. Look at any article covering FFXIV, look at many forum posts referring to the past - it's never "oh man, 1.0 was crap, they better not repeat that mentality again". It's always "oh man, the way Yoshi P and the team saved FFXIV with ARR was so epic! what an amazing guy! he cares so much! the dev team is so much better than in other mmos!". People don't remember 1.0 as a cautionary tale, they just remember ARR as SE's greatest epic - and that is what they keep reminding the devs about.

I'm honestly pretty sick of it. ARR was 9 years ago and sure, it was a great rebirth, but that doesn't excuse mistakes done afterwards and certainly does not mean the devs are infallible or any less prone to regular corporate apathy than their competitors. They should be judged for what they do now - good and bad - not for something they did nearly a decade ago.

Yeah that's the laurel thing alright

Success is a rocky road. World of Warcraft used to be the best MMO of all time, it all went downhill from there.

This corporate arrogance always leads to a disconnect between the player and creator. They need to understand that without their customers this game would've never found the success and appeal it did. When people ask for changes to their favourite jobs and they find no response, they'll look elsewhere. If you don't want to surprise us or make us happy then don't expect for people to stay. It takes 20 years to build a reputation, and five minutes to ruin it.

I respect the developers for delievering alot of amazing moments and enjoyable content but that doesn't mean a thorn in my sight goes unseen when they deliberately ignore feedback for petty reasons. I mean alot of Viera players were rude and you caved, right?

In light of the new information from the recent 14 livestream, I'd like to renew my 2 cents after going through a decent bit of the new savage fights. The 3 changes I believe are necessary to at least put DRK on the right path to enjoyability(potencies adjustable):

1. Put Blood Weapon on a stack system similar to Ninja's Bushin, or Dark Knights own Delirium (5 stacks, usable over 15 seconds). The ability in its current state is too restrictive to those with higher ping that about 100, and without very high skill speed melds. Doing this allows for at least 1 edge of shadow's worth of mana generation every time the ability is used, instead of the current (assuming ping over 100/without skill speed melds) 2400 mana.

2. Living Dead needs the Penalty removed period. It should be as such: "While under the effect of "Walking Dead", most attacks will not lower your HP below 1." Duration still 10s to keep in line with other tanks. Not only will this put it on the same level as the other tanks, but it will keep the Guts berserker armor effect that the original design was going for. It has a higher cooldown time than Holmgang already, so that can be kept the same to keep it in line balance wise.

3. Remove the Mana cost on The Blackest Night, increase the cooldown time to 25s, remove the old break effect(Dark Arts) and add a new effect. In my opinion the new effect should be a Heal over Time effect that is as such:

Grants Darkened Embrace when barrier is completely absorbed.
Darkened Embrace Effect: Gradually restores HP
Cure Potency: 200
Duration: 12s

This would put it in line with the other tanks, allowing for skilled usage of the skill to gain an additional benefit, while not having to lose anything crucial like Damage for a misuse. In its current state, its beginner unfriendly and not in line with the other tanks "short duration" mitigation skills. With this, it would be brought in line with Endwalker design, and give Dark Knight players the sustain they've been asking for with skilled play & still fit the Dark Knight identity.

To add: This can be an added trait at 84, as Dark Knights "Enhanced Unmend" Is not very helpful in any situation and hurts their damage rotations more than it helps, as such it should be removed in favor of this new proposed trait. This would also justifying bringing The Blackest Nights duration up to 8s, to keep in line with every other tanks 25s defensive cooldown at that level.

That is all, thank you for reading.

Blood Weapon aside, that's a massive, uncalled-for nerf to TBN, doesn't solve the fundamental problem of Living Dead being a categorically worse version of Holmgang, and contributes to the massive homogenization among tank classes that already keeps the role from being as fun as it could be, should be, and has been in the past.

There are 1900 posts in this thread. There is no earthly way I was able to commit to reading all of that. So, if this has been suggested before, apologies. I've levelled DRK 8 times across various characters and versions (hey, what can I say? NG+ is a relatively recent addition, and there was only one way to replay plot before then!)

My thoughts on improving TBN is to add a trait at 82, same as all the other tanks, called Dread Spikes. I would also move Oblation to earlier in the levelling process, since I do feel DRK could use some extra mitigation prior to TBN. If it comes at the cost of a lower effect which is later upgraded, fine.


Anyway! Dread Spikes! As an FF11 player, this was one of my favourite DRK spells back then. Simply put, I'd get the broken shield of TBN to apply Dread Spikes to the target for some duration, and any enemy that hits the target in that timeframe would damage themselves and the target would absorb a portion of that damage as HP. I know it's conceptually a little similiar to current Warrior territory, but it is flipped to the degree that the enemy continues to kill themselves on your Dread Spikes, and you get better as a result. I'd probably also get the effect to wear off after a little less % than the shield was worth has been absorbed. Improved sustain, keep the DA proc for Flood / Edge so that you are still getting usage out of applying TBN to other party members in OT situations, and you're still spending something for the mitigation, but slip over into being DPS positive due to the Dread Spikes damage on all targets hitting you.

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Originally Posted by Crater

Blood Weapon aside, that's a massive, uncalled-for nerf to TBN, doesn't solve the fundamental problem of Living Dead being a categorically worse version of Holmgang

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We'll agree to disagree with TBN, I don't know how getting rid of the mana cost on an ability you ideally only use once a minute (to avoid dps loss outside of raid buffs) and upping the cd to be in line with the other tanks CD's is a "Nerf" but thats besides the point.

Every tank invuln is a worse version of holmgang at this point. 4 minute cd, invuln for 10s, and can heal themselves so the fact that you continue to take damage during its duration is a nonfactor. GNB literally drops themselves to 1hp, Paladin has nearly double the cooldown time for "I dont take damage for 10s". Dark knights is practically in a different universe of bad right now.

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and contributes to the massive homogenization among tank classes that already keeps the role from being as fun as it could be, should be, and has been in the past.

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Much like Yoshida himself stated, we aren't going back to Heavensward times, we need to move on. Tank defensive homogenization allows for deeper fight design with those abilities in mind. Of which I personally enjoy more than difficult jobs with extremely high skill caps, yet raid fights with the depth of a puddle(See Creator savage at the end of Heavensward).

At the end of the day what I propose is a band-aid to promote general usability improvements, I personally don't see Dark Knight getting a complete rework this expansion if even in the next.

Aside from busters or raids though, there really isn't that much homogenization.

You got Warrior that can already solo savage raids and primals from SB and do 3 DPS speedruns of expert dungs. You got Paladin that can keep the whole party alive in dungeons if the healer DCs even through bosses.

Meanwhile you have DRK and GNB that can just whack things and nearly reach DNC level dps.

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Originally Posted by Mieck

There are 1900 posts in this thread. There is no earthly way I was able to commit to reading all of that.

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That sounds a lot like som--
[MESSAGE REDACTED]

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Originally Posted by Crater

... that's a massive, uncalled-for nerf to TBN ...

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I agree with this sooooo much and honestly I feel that many that are calling for TBN to just be turned into a 25 second recast defensive with no MP cost are just repeating what others, particularly a certain popular streamer, have said without really stopping to think about what the ripple effects of such changes would result in.

Asides from homogenizing the tank jobs even more, something that the forums love to at the same time rail against, such a change would actually greatly hurt DRK defensively in the very place that people feel DRK is currently the weakest, namely in large dungeon pulls. It is the ability to be able to use TBN every 15s that keeps DRK standing in that situation. If you force it to be every 25s, you will quickly find yourself not being able to cover the now longer time between TBNs and will likely end up dying way more than now. Even an extra regen or the like tacked onto the end of TBN will not be enough to compensate. The much shorter recast is a HUGE strength of TBN, greatly increasing its' defensive capabilities in mass dungeon pulls and providing more flexibility of use and timing in single-target fights.

Is anyone asking for this really stopping and thinking about what the problem they are trying to solve is?
The argument is that a defensive shouldn't be tied to a resource that is also used for dps.
Okay, why is that a problem?
The proposed problem is that it could be a potential dps loss if the shield doesn't break.
Okay, so then is the problem the reliance on MP to use or the shield not potentially breaking?

And that is where I see the disconnect is, that people have lost sight of what the actual problem they are trying to solve is and instead are proposing bandwagon solutions that aren't accurately aimed at the actual issue.
If the duration of the TBN shield is running out before the shield breaks, just have the duration increased. If 7s is too short, ask to have it it last 10s. If it is still not breaking after that, the damage input is probably low enough that you probably wouldn't want to even waste an Oblation on it.

If keeping enough MP in reserve for when you need a TBN is too much of a hassle, why are you playing a job more based around resource management?

I'm all for equitability between the tank jobs and constantly champion such here on the forums, but nuking what is probably DRKs' most interesting and unique aspect just to put in place an easy and overly comfortable solution that far oversteps what the actual problem was instead of just simply directly addressing it is, imo, not the way to go.

Let me say what removing the MP cost to TBN, its connection to Flood/Edge, and increasing the cooldown to 25s will do. It will remove the DPS being connected to TBN, it will remove the need to hold onto a resource for TBN when only PLD (who arguably has nothing else to use theirs on) is the only other job who uses a resource for this. It will remove the need to ignore every other problem on DRK because TBN, while still powerful with these changes, will not be usable all the time, thus highlighting the problems DRK has without it and making it easier to actually adjust the job. If one ability is the sole reason your job isn't getting meaningful changes, then I'm sorry, the ability has to be adjusted or removed for the good of the job.

TBN is only good for single hit busters. Previous xpacs you had higher HP and autos hit for way less so it felt like it was really good but with the changes it's only good for a one hit wonder. And it provides no mitigation whatsoever. It's a proactive skill.

It hit it's peak when it was introduced in Stormblood. When you could alternate between TBN and Blood Price + Abyssal Drain. And Blood price not only restored MP but also gave you blood per hit as well. And once geared a whole lot of attacks were very weak hits.

On top of that as a shield since it offers no actual healing it does nothing to synergize with Living Dead which requires your full HP amount in healing. Which the icon for Walking Dead is terrible and the simplest change is instead of Walking Dead they inflict a 10 second Doom debuff on yourself and you just have to be topped off to get rid of it.

Healers KNOW what Doom is and what it looks like and will get rid of it without any communication.

The other Tank TBN competitors all have mitigation, shields, selfheals in their 25s CD.

DRK has a big shield and maybe a free 160 or 460 potency attack?