If they removed the mana cost on TBN DRK would have even less mana management. Then there'd be no reason to look at your mana bar except pooling for TA windows, or pooling mana for an aoe/priority add situation.
If they removed the mana cost on TBN DRK would have even less mana management. Then there'd be no reason to look at your mana bar except pooling for TA windows, or pooling mana for an aoe/priority add situation.
The current build isn't a management tank anymore. Its brain dead. It's just war but instead of using the beast gauge for everything it uses blood gauge and mp. You blow all you're mp/blood then build it back up. No management necessary, no punishment for screwing up, and no reward for doing it well.
Again, I said make it cost mp, but if all goes well and pops refund the mp and you get the dark arts proc. All the risk, all of the reward. And that way it's also in line with the other similar tank abilities which have zero resource cost.
If you feel like your overcapping on mana then you aren't using edge of shadow enough. If you still request more mp spenders then you'd need an addition to BW. The mana gain potential in this build could use a slight boost as it stands.
It's your opinion. For me that button was a bless. Made me chose between damage and utility options on some skills and raise my APM a bit. The only thing I realy hated and can't understand during the Stormblood is all those role skills. They could make rework around the Dark Arts, tbh. This one button could just unload our loadouts of skills with changing one skill to other and giving them different properties. But we got the 5.0 simplifying everything we loved.
It WAS fun for the likes of me, the Dark Arts. More than that I've even ENJOYED the pre 5.0 MCH with it's reload mechanic and I HATE what they done to him.
This is why I moved to a dragoon main. They're not the best dps, but they're solid still. They have a long-as-hell rotation, but it keeps me engaged. They have split-decision-making moments, and they're relatively unchanged as of this xpac. That means if you liked them in StB, you'll probably still like them in ShB, now that they have a legit AoE rotation that works.
I leveled my dark knight for the MSQ, for the role playing aspect, but dragoon is just way more fun to use.
For example "Split and carve"? I had an option: do I want mana or damage? About inconsistent damage - that's, again, YOUR opinion. I never had any problems with damage on DRK or MCH before and I've never had the strong wish to fall asllep in the dungeon, because I had something to do.The jobs were intersting and unique - not anymore, now they are just generic. Too simple and bleak. I will still play them, just because I like the THEME there was once, but as much as I played before.
I always compared those SB three tanks to cars.
PLD: Automatic
WAR: Originally a standard that got changed to into an automatic by 4.2
DRK: Standard
Each one had their own things to do but you can tell that some were designed to have much more rolled into them. For a time I would say the complexity of gauge management for WAR and DRK were almost the same for a time but when Inner Release got changed in 4.2(making BG moves free instead of half) it made WAR much easier to play/optimize
DRK for the rest of 4.x from that point had the fun of managing blackblood. The old blood weapon making gcd's go by faster made it feel insanely fun. Add in that your Dark Artsing more moves during that period and it made the job very very active but rewarding. DAing into perfectly timed Bloodspillers during raid buffs gave me the feeling WAR did with IR Fell Cleave crits, just getting that sweet feeling of damage.
My DRK is currently 74 and I do enjoy weaving FoS in between my aoe combos, and EoS's during my Delirium Bloodspillers, but it doesn't compare to the fun I had with SB DA. It's stupid I know because we all make memes about DA but it had a feeling the current DRK lacks, and it's replacement just doesn't add up.
I'm hoping SHB will only improve on some of these jobs through patches as I feel there is something in current DRK that can be salvaged, but in it's current state it feels like it's just aping WAR. Fray is nice but when Nascent Flash is extremely fun to use it does make DRK look like it's kicking the sand waiting for it's time to shine.