Dark Knight Megathread

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Originally Posted by Undeadfire

I mean, people been doing it for years taking Vuln stacks for more DPS, there's nothing remotely wrong with it as long it's not overboard.

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Right, but that doesn't mean I should get punished with outgoing DPS because I didn't take the vuln stack. I should not get punished for using my actions in a way that allows me to avoid a vuln stack just because "it's fine if I got it anyway." This argument lacks grounding so bad that even conjecture would have more standing than "Lol then don't use your abilities." And what if saving the vuln stack means I can take one later for even more uptime?

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Originally Posted by Ryaduera

TBN having an MP cost is not problematic, no. TBN not breaking punishing you with a DPS loss is. Again, knowing patterns of fights TBN can just not break anyway. I was doing Zodiark and on the first Exoterikos (Spelling?) if he does triangle + Square I will use TBN and Dark Mind to avoid taking damage and not get a vuln stack but keep uptime. I did this with Dark Mind because even though I know I will not need Shadow Wall again in the cooldown duration, if I do this the auto attack that happens after that damage is applied, TBN does not break... I know this because I learned the fights patterns and used my cooldowns to their fullest to keep uptime and maximize DPS... and instead took a DPS loss the first time i tried it. And there are multiple points with the triple Exoterikos where you can use the same trick to avoid moving. That feels so incredibly bad. Imagine someone saying you're too good at your job, so you get paid less money.

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While I get that "overmitigating" sounds like a weird thing to be punished for, the situation can be as easily framed instead as "wasteful usage" -- in which case we'd not long have shrugged off being punished for it since prior to EW its cooldown was disproportionately low relative to its power precisely because it has that alternate constraint (available timings, rather than just a cooldown) to keep it in check.

TBN had so low cool a cooldown precisely because it can't quite by used on CD regardless of circumstance; now, with the buffs to the others, it might be justified in not having that further means of curtailing its usage, but I'd really rather that constraint remain -- if not as sharply/punishingly.

I do think its degree of punishment is excess, but I don't think there is a problem with it having punishment.

And if that constraint --something I find interesting and unique about DRK's on-demand-- were removed, I would not be satisfied short of DRK getting a similarly unique and predictive mechanic (ideally, one that harkens back to HW era anti-synergies between overlapped defensives, as current TBN does).

tl;dr: TBN needs improvement, sure, but it doesn't need to lose its fundamentals, learning requirements, and all else that makes it unique.

I don't think that you can have it both ways, and the trade-off can actually be interesting. I remember that O11S had a damage down stack instead of vuln during the Level Checker sequence where you could use TBN to bypass the effect to keep your uptime. TBN didn't break (if it did you would get the vuln), but gave you a couple of GCDs so it was a dps gain.

I think that damage down is a much better mechanic overall and should apply independently of damage in all circumstances to take these issues out of consideration (or perhaps apply damage down and vuln together for failing a mechanics check). They should also give tanks tools like gap extenders and speedboosts to support more skilled gameplay around dodging mechanics.

Why does Abyssal Drain exist? Why cant Salted Earth and Salt&Darkness have the healing effect? It would keep the life-steal aesthetic. The healing would be single-target viable, and this would reduce button bloat. 200 cure potency per hit is 1400cure potency per 90s, still worse healing/minute than the other tanks.

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Originally Posted by Luin

Why does Abyssal Drain exist? Why cant Salted Earth and Salt&Darkness have the healing effect? It would keep the life-steal aesthetic. The healing would be single-target viable, and this would reduce button bloat. 200 cure potency per hit is 1400cure potency per 90s, still worse healing/minute than the other tanks.

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Tbf, that question can be asked for nearly every shared-cooldown AoE/ST alternative (especially if to a previously falloff AoE / AoE with focus-damage). In AD's case, probably HW/StB nostalgia above all else, as it's not as if C&S doesn't look as if it could cleave, or that Abyssal couldn't just DoT the main target for additional damage over 6 seconds or so and become a fall-off / focus-target AoE in turn.

I was thinking, one of the things holding it back is Square's obsession with designing everything around 1 and 2 minute bursts. It makes it easier to line up raid buffs sure, but it stifles how creative they get with the class if they don't want to deviate from this and just add more and more 1 min CD abilities every expansion. If we got a full DRK rework, I'd want them to spread DRK's damage out with abilities that have shorter CD and focus more on the interplay between resources (MP, Darkside and Blood) to help break up the monotony it currently has between bursts.

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Originally Posted by baklava151

I was thinking, one of the things holding it back is Square's obsession with designing everything around 1 and 2 minute bursts. It makes it easier to line up raid buffs sure, but it stifles how creative they get with the class if they don't want to deviate from this and just add more and more 1 min CD abilities every expansion. If we got a full DRK rework, I'd want them to spread DRK's damage out with abilities that have shorter CD and focus more on the interplay between resources (MP, Darkside and Blood) to help break up the monotony it currently has between bursts.

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Yeah I think SE has kinda designed themselves into a hole at this point. There was a thread discussing this on the /r/ffxivdiscussion subreddit and this comment stood out to me:

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I think it's absolutely awful (note: I don't consider Shadowbringers to be particularly meaningfully different from Endwalker as far as this goes). I don't like that it gives basically every class in the game the same gameplay rhythm, I don't like that it basically removes the ability to make classes that are designed around consistently high damage instead of huge spikes of burst damage, or classes with irregular sets of cooldowns that line up in different ways from minute to minute instead of all existing in multiples of 30 seconds, or classes that revolve around optimizing within their own internal kit rather than playing to the group buffs. It's so ubiquitous that it largely dictates fight design, which puts some hard limits on how interesting SE can make the game's encounters. It represents a severe reduction in the game's capacity to support any sort of player expression. And it makes gauging your own performance needlessly difficult because so much of your damage winds up concentrated into such a small number of attacks within such a small portion of the total fight time that Crit/DH probabilities don't reliably normalize into something that reflects your actual input to the game.

I don't know if I was the one who made the post saying it's the worst thing that's happened to the game in years, but I'm sure I've said it before - and if not, I'm saying it now.

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Every Job is on that cycle now, and I think the only damage cooldown that isn't sitting at a 1 or 2 minute cooldown is Riddle of Wind over on MNK. Sustained DPS is dead, variable timers are dead, and raids are designed such that major mechanics happen right when burst is coming off cooldown, such as Intemperance, Limit Cut, P3S add phase, etc. I dunno, feels like they designed themselves into a corner, particularly in regards to Jobs.

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Originally Posted by Luin

Why does Abyssal Drain exist? Why cant Salted Earth and Salt&Darkness have the healing effect? It would keep the life-steal aesthetic. The healing would be single-target viable, and this would reduce button bloat. 200 cure potency per hit is 1400cure potency per 90s, still worse healing/minute than the other tanks.

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Why does much exist as the DRK current kit - its so vague and forgotten feeling , like finger prints on an abandoned hand rail.

How I feel about DRK is:

It looks like it was designed , to me at least (during proto stages) , to be a Greatsword DPS class with dark magic buffing , and had been changed to the HW tank , and eventually reworked into what could best describe as a machinist with a sword with defensive stats instead of dps that has slow base 123 combos and many quick weaves whilst you charge up your darkside minion like a mCH does with its robo queen ( i didn't play HW version so i cant compare better than this).


All the classes are slowly falling because they have built the game around all classes being viable down to a small difference between the same job arcs which inevitably means they are the same ice cream brand , just different flavours.


They should design a dark knight to be an energy draining black magic sword user , probably ace at multi dotting adds to also HP leech from the dark art skills , that's once the DRK in maxed/very good gear can beast dungeons and content with heavy zergs of adds , but that would be useless in savage boss fights .

This game doesn't have advanced dungeon power creeping modes like say wow does with its serious dungeons in the mythic system, where different job designs can shine with their unique powerful skills, so all classes are going the be left by the wayside at some point whilst they focus on one or two of a job arc and improve/tweak those as they cant get to grips balancing and redesigning them all as their end game goals are not best suited to all the jobs they keep adding.

IMO

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Originally Posted by Izar_Chillen

It looks like it was designed , to me at least (during proto stages) , to be a Greatsword DPS class with dark magic buffing , and had been changed to the HW tank , and eventually reworked into what could best describe as a machinist with a sword with defensive stats instead of dps that has slow base 123 combos and many quick weaves whilst you charge up your darkside minion like a mCH does with its robo queen ( i didn't play HW version so i cant compare better than this).

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That's actually completely backwards to my understanding of events. The HW tank was initially pitched as Samurai, but seeing the direction of its toolkit led the team to turn it into DRK instead.

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They should design a dark knight to be an energy draining black magic sword user

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Seconded.

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probably ace at multi dotting adds

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Unlikely. The devs have previously voiced their disdain towards adding DoT effects, partly because players find them tedious or confusing, partly because enemies can only hold so many debuffs at one time, and implicitly because multiple ticking damage sources are more resource intensive. It's probably not a coincidence that DoTs were removed from SMN and NIN the same expansion we got Death's Design and Eukrasian Dosis, or that PLD's new DoT is exclusive with its old one.

Besides, even BRD can't multi-DoT. With the losses of Bane, Aero III and Miasma II, the only jobs that can right now are BLM and (bit ironically) PLD.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Unlikely. The devs have previously voiced their disdain towards adding DoT effects, partly because players find them tedious or confusing, partly because enemies can only hold so many debuffs at one time, and implicitly because multiple ticking damage sources are more resource intensive. It's probably not a coincidence that DoTs were removed from SMN and NIN the same expansion we got Death's Design and Eukrasian Dosis, or that PLD's new DoT is exclusive with its old one.

Besides, even BRD can't multi-DoT. With the losses of Bane, Aero III and Miasma II, the only jobs that can right now are BLM and (bit ironically) PLD.

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God do I remember the DoT Vomit that happened on a boss' debuff bar in Stormblood in Eureka. Literally made SMN unplayable at times unless you got your DoT in via server tick. However, I think some PLDs want Atonement to mean something again since we literally only just stab once and then go into 60s burst window after a full rotation. Also, as for the idea about a Black Magic Swordsman? I don't want to be frank, but I think that may be a bit of a stretch given how they can be on lore(believe me, DRK and BLM lore are actually pretty good) in their game unless you're a Healer that isn't SGE. I'd rather they work on the current aesthetic, but just fix the f***ing job flow. That's literally all that is grinding against DRK right now is that its Job Flow is HORRIBLE.

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Originally Posted by HyperiusUltima

Also, as for the idea about a Black Magic Swordsman? I don't want to be frank, but I think that may be a bit of a stretch given how they can be on lore

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Two possible responses to this, depending on your meaning.

Either you're fixated on the specific "Black Magic" (proper noun) part as in "the exact flavor of Void-derived Mhachi magic used by Black (and Red) Mages," in which case, I should clarify I didn't mean to second the job learning "Black Magic" (as that is more of a Rune Fencer/Mystic Knight's job). You are correct that DRK and BLM use fundamentally different sources of power. I was seconding the job using "black magic" (lowercase) as in "the classical term for any kind of dark art or witchcraft," things like sacrificial or drain-type magic effects, which already fall within DRK's repertoire in 14 and have appeared as part of its shtick on and off across the series.

Or, you're arguing against it being the "Magic Swordsman", where I should correct you that Yoshi-P fully intended for Dark Knight to be a "magic tank" which we can still see with magic-focused effects like Dark Mind/Missionary, its usage of MP and Spells like Unmend and (formerly) Abyssal Drain, and implicitly magical effects like The Blackest Night or Living Shadow. I believe this is what the poster I quoted was referring to.

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Originally Posted by Beddict

Yeah I think SE has kinda designed themselves into a hole at this point. There was a thread discussing this on the /r/ffxivdiscussion subreddit and this comment stood out to me:



Every Job is on that cycle now, and I think the only damage cooldown that isn't sitting at a 1 or 2 minute cooldown is Riddle of Wind over on MNK. Sustained DPS is dead, variable timers are dead, and raids are designed such that major mechanics happen right when burst is coming off cooldown, such as Intemperance, Limit Cut, P3S add phase, etc. I dunno, feels like they designed themselves into a corner, particularly in regards to Jobs.

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Glad I'm not the only one feeling this way, it'd be a good discussion to bring up for more visibility (off-topic for this thread though). I also feel like that would require a massive overhaul on the devs' part which they might just want to avoid entirely.

(requiring some small adjustments)
If they changed the Darkside buff from a "timer", into an "MP drain" again, and used the Darkside job gauge as the MP gauge, it would already feel better to play. (with little markers to represent MP consumption)
(also, this of course has no effect on the wonkiness of the oGCDs atm)

Changing Darkside from a timer to an MP drain, by itself, would just reduce out of burst apm (likely no Edges outside of burst, while TBN itself becomes much more risky) while requiring a further button to toggle it on and off.

That seems like deliberately slowing DRK down just to introduce a button of very little in-practice decision-making (i.e., mostly bloat).

Going back over the live letter notes and just saw the unofficial translation “its difficult to make big changes since there is an ultimate” in reference to job adjustments. Granted it unofficial but they are never horribly far off the mark if memory serves but what a let down. I wasn’t expecting a full rework but it seems like the DRK community is being let down to just see minor tweaks to living dead and nothing else. This is why they should be doing their due diligence by reading the forums and playing the job so they know the issues come time for the expansion. I can’t help but think in my head “tough cookies, get it done even if someone else neglected their job”. It’s not hating on the devs - I’m pulling from my real life experience. If they think it’s fine then with all the hate thrown DRKs way they need to come out and say why it’s good. Leaving it and going radio silent, as they have a habit of doing, isn’t good enough. If they don’t defend it with the community upset then they need to fix it now.

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Originally Posted by Danelo

I wasn’t expecting a full rework but it seems like the DRK community is being let down to just see minor tweaks to living dead and nothing else.

Leaving it and going radio silent, as they have a habit of doing, isn’t good enough. If they don’t defend it with the community upset then they need to fix it now.

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First off, we don't know what's happening to LD, "minor" or otherwise. Nor do we know that "nothing else" is changing for DRK.
This isn't hopium, they literally didn't go in depth on any of their changes yet and zipped past the "job changes" line in LL69 (per usual), so I have no idea where you're pulling this from.

Second, "radio silent"? This is always how they choose to operate: Part 1 of a Patch LL is general overview (but usually mentions the jobs they're focused on updating), Part 2 starts with a trailer and goes into specifics including job changes.
Yesterday's LL was fairly light, but that's because the one before it, which wasn't even for a Patch, already covered the jobs they're focusing on. We'll hear more in LL70, which will probably come towards the end of this month or start of April.

Official live translation, transcribed verbatim from LL68:

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Question: Dark Knight's Living Dead and Blood Weapon are more difficult to use effectively compared to other tank skills. Are there plans to adjust this?

Answer: So not just Dark Knight, but a whole bunch of jobs will be adjusted in 6.1. We are looking closely at all of your feedback, and will fulfill as many of your requests as we possibly can in 6.1. We are definitely adjusting Living Dead, so you can wait and see how it goes.
We've also definitely seen your feedback about Machinist and White Mage that you're having trouble right at the moment, and we are working on that, so please wait just a little longer. We're also looking at Dragoons who are concerned about the Jump animation lock being too long. We're gonna try to shorten that up, so we're gonna adjust things that affect the feel of your gameplay in addition to just the numbers.
And of course I'd like to say that even if I didn't specifically mention your job today, we're still looking at feedback and making adjustments for those too, so please do not descend on us in a cloud of black smoke because I'm scared.

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Adjusting an invuln is a fairly significant undertaking from a balance perspective. I don't mind waiting for it even beyond 6.1, as long as it's actually on their radar.

I suspect that Blood Weapon is going to be merged into Delirium and that will end up incurring a stealth potency loss, with the MP gain being over 3 GCDs instead of 5. Given how they merged C+S with AD, I don't think that they'll pass up an opportunity to shrink down the number of oGCDs.

I do wish that they would do something about the 'magic only' defensive cooldowns. I think that's its only viable as a 'theme' if it provides the player with something exciting (i.e. if you could reflect back or absorb magical damage in some way, but that's unlikely to happen). Themes should confer benefits and not limitations. That was the critical mistake that they made with Living Dead as well.

You must have missed the part where I said “but it seems”…

Didn’t think I needed to preface with a statement akin to the one that accompanies the media tour footage. Cool your jets.

It would seem, the point of Yoshi’s statement, if translated correctly, was to limit expectations - which is the point I was trying to make.

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Originally Posted by Danelo

You must have missed the part where I said “but it seems”…

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No I saw it, those words are just doing a lot of work with how much pessimism pervades the rest of your post.
Especially since you still haven't cited the "unofficial translation" you keep referring to. Translation of what? When and where?

I agree that we should temper our expectations. I have zero expectation we'll see a massive rework to the job on par with, say, what MNK received mid-Shadowbringers.
But I also know that there are some things that should have priority in any bump to DRK, and if they hit a few key points, we'll live. Living Dead is thankfully one of them, and with Blood Weapon in the same question, hopefully it's on their radar too.

Posted this shortlist in another thread:

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

• Living Dead needs a rework (not just number adjustments) to guarantee 10 sec of being unkillable and reduce strain on healers; we know updates to LD are coming, but the extent of its changes are still unknown
• Blood Weapon needs to be put on a stack system a la Delirium
• Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain need parity (healing on C&S, 3 target damage on AD), or to not share a CD
• Oblation and Dark Mind are underwhelming, borderline useless unless stacked
• Connected to the above, general W2W sustainability needs a boost on par with other tanks' 82/84 upgrades

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I agree with most of those for what's reasonable for them to accomplish in 6.1. Putting a heal on Carve and Spit makes sense if they want to keep it linked to AD but at the same time nobody's ever gonna hold it for the heal so it's kinda pointless. They could also unlink them and put AD on the GCD with an MP cost like other people suggested. It wouldn't bloat the DRK opener and it would help in dungeons.

My rough expectations -

• Living Dead: Completely reworked. (Free space on the bingo card.)
• Blood Weapon: Soft rework, grants 4 stacks that last 15 sec.
• Carve and Spit/Bloodspiller/Quietus: Now have 400p heal effects attached.
• Abyssal Drain: Damage increased to 170p.
• Oblation: Effects increased to 15%.

This is my "I'll be underwhelmed if we see less, though I think this much is pretty reasonable" baseline. Especially since none of this would impact DRK's damage in trials and raids.

Do I want more? Absolutely. But I'd call this a bare minimum.

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Originally Posted by baklava151

Putting a heal on Carve and Spit makes sense if they want to keep it linked to AD but at the same time nobody's ever gonna hold it for the heal so it's kinda pointless.

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Mostly pointless -- it'll probably heal some auto-attack damage -- but again, parity.
I mean it's not like AD was that strong a heal either outside W2W.

The “unofficial translation” is on the balance discord. Not a trick, it’s a one-liner. Didn’t come into here to get into an argument but you seem dead set on having one. “I agree that we should temper our expectations” is where you response should have ended. What exactly are you disagreeing with me on? My pessimistic attitude towards the devs? Fully warranted and you would know that if you have been around since 3.x regarding DRK.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

[*]Blood Weapon: Soft rework, grants 4 stacks that last 15 sec.

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5 stacks. Everything below that would just be a slap in the face because it'd be a flat out nerf, you'd be losing 10 blood and 600 mp every minute compared to now.

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Originally Posted by Absurdity

5 stacks. Everything below that would just be a slap in the face because it'd be a flat out nerf, you'd be losing 10 blood and 600 mp every minute compared to now.

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Optimally (as is entirely the point of the change), though given they shrank Delirium and Inner Release to 3 each when they originally had the same timer, I don't have high hopes they care to faithfully recreate the "optimal" alignment.
Though I suppose those are a different case, given that a potency adjustment to the skills they affect to account for reduced casts-per-minute would have resolved those two, which is harder when Blood Weapon doesn't directly impact any skills...

That said, to preserve it overall, it'd be easier for them to have Delirium replace Blood Weapon, go up to 4 stacks and increase to 900 MP/hit, kill bloat at the same time. But, I shouldn't speculate further lest we get hopes up.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

My rough expectations -

• Living Dead: Completely reworked. (Free space on the bingo card.)
• Blood Weapon: Soft rework, grants 4 stacks that last 15 sec.
• Carve and Spit/Bloodspiller/Quietus: Now have 400p heal effects attached.
• Abyssal Drain: Damage increased to 170p.
• Oblation: Effects increased to 15%.

This is my "I'll be underwhelmed if we see less, though I think this much is pretty reasonable" baseline. Especially since none of this would impact DRK's damage in trials and raids.

Do I want more? Absolutely. But I'd call this a bare minimum.

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you forgot; Increase TBN duration to 8 seconds (up from 7). Assuming they keep the short cd recast. Honestly that one second can make a difference a times and is probably the biggest gripes I have with TBN not being up long enough to proc with enough hits. Heck they could even increase it to 15 secs for all I care. The idea is to remove the penalty of TBN or at the very least reduce it. The game no longer has cds with draw backs attached to them, so why DRK is still designed like its in HW/SB is a quagmire.

Personally I would like to see TBN share the same recast as the other tank cds (25 secs) but given two charges and no MP cost. The MP cost of TBN is pointless because that 3k MP would have been used on a shadow spam in the first place and regardless, you would still use TBN as a cd. Putting an MP cost on it is redundant in EW and the changes I propose would increase its utility and pair well with oblation.

In a light party you can cover each player with either mitigation or shields and in raid situations you can put TBN/Oblation on both tanks for tank busters or on both healers for some mechanics. The flexibility is there and with no penalty, just the ease of use. Just get rid of Dark Arts and either rework it into an actual skill in the next expansion or just get rid of it entirely. It's sad to see it DA used as just flavor text when you compare to what it once was.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Optimally (as is entirely the point of the change), though given they shrank Delirium and Inner Release to 3 each when they originally had the same timer, I don't have high hopes they care to faithfully recreate the "optimal" alignment.
Though I suppose those are a different case, given that a potency adjustment to the skills they affect to account for reduced casts-per-minute would have resolved those two, which is harder when Blood Weapon doesn't directly impact any skills...

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There is another difference between IR/Delirium and Blood Weapon, they reduced the cooldown of Delirium and Inner Release from 90 down to 60 seconds. Keeping those 2 at 5 stacks but with 30 seconds less cooldown would have been a rather sizeable buff, especially for warrior.

Sure, they could've reduced the potency of Bloodspiller and Fell Cleave to account for this but that would've affected the job's "neutral game" outside of burst as well.



Blood Weapon however is already on a 60 seconds cooldown so there is 0 reason to nerf the amount of stacks, it is simply a quality of life change that has no influence on the job's performance.

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Originally Posted by Marxam

you forgot; Increase TBN duration to 8 seconds (up from 7).

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No I didn't forget it, it's just not on the short list. Most of the time TBN barely lasts 3 seconds so an extension is the most mild of quality-of-life adjustments, and would have minimal impact on DRK's survival. It's a want, not a need right now.

Would I like to see TBN adjusted and pulled in line with the other on-demands? Absolutely. But again, this was a bare minimum list to bring DRK up to speed with the other tanks, and a complete rework of DRK's survival (much as I want one) would be an indulgence.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Optimally (as is entirely the point of the change), though given they shrank Delirium and Inner Release to 3 each when they originally had the same timer, I don't have high hopes they care to faithfully recreate the "optimal" alignment.
Though I suppose those are a different case, given that a potency adjustment to the skills they affect to account for reduced casts-per-minute would have resolved those two, which is harder when Blood Weapon doesn't directly impact any skills...

That said, to preserve it overall, it'd be easier for them to have Delirium replace Blood Weapon, go up to 4 stacks and increase to 900 MP/hit, kill bloat at the same time. But, I shouldn't speculate further lest we get hopes up.

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BW is analogous to Infuriate.
4 stacks would be worse than an insult. Just give it 5 for parity with how it optimally should function.

Am I the only one concerned they will somehow make Dark knight even shitter given the track record of their "reworks" being worse or more boring than before?

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Originally Posted by Recon1o6

Am I the only one concerned they will somehow make Dark knight even shitter given the track record of their "reworks" being worse or more boring than before?

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No, but I think the majority opinion is that DRK's dipped about as low as it can in terms of depth, so the risk is minimal compared to potential gains.

It’s impossible to make a job worse if it’s already at 0.

It is possible, however, for sweeping gameplay improvements to be maligned because they supposedly “made the job less skillful,” so let’s hope that doesn’t happen with DRK again, at least.

DRK Gameplay experience is one of the worst things of the Game right now but they can definetly make It worst if they wanted or keep It in this current state forever wich would be just better if they delete the job already.

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Originally Posted by shao32

would be just better if they delete the job already.

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Could we at least stop with this? Just this. Stop, please.

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Originally Posted by Recon1o6

Am I the only one concerned they will somehow make Dark knight even shitter given the track record of their "reworks" being worse or more boring than before?

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I'm going into this expecting them to completely miss the mark while trying to half-ass things. For example:

• Living Dead: Remove the death penalty bullshit and the early cleanse, no other changes. Ends up still being a worse Holmgang since it will have a minute extra cooldown with the "benefit" being that you can precast it.
• Blood Weapon: Duration increased to 11s. I straight up expect them to completely miss the mark here since 11s will provide a big enough buffer to catch five Weaponskills. It would even allow for five Spells, but the timing will be so tight we're back to the whole "a tiny bit of ping screwed me out of my fifth GCD on Blood Weapon." I'll honestly be amazed if they think to give it stacks since they clearly forgot going into EW and ignored the idea for multiple patches so far.

Anything beyond that strikes me as hopium. That's how little I think of the Job Design team and the amount of fucks they give for DRK. Yoshi-P can sit there and say "we're listening to feedback" and "we play our own game" but I'm not gonna trust a dev team that came up with Enhanced fucking Unmend.

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Originally Posted by Beddict

I'm going into this expecting them to completely miss the mark while trying to half-ass things. For example:

• Living Dead: Remove the death penalty bullshit and the early cleanse, no other changes. Ends up still being a worse Holmgang since it will have a minute extra cooldown with the "benefit" being that you can precast it.
• Blood Weapon: Duration increased to 11s. I straight up expect them to completely miss the mark here since 11s will provide a big enough buffer to catch five Weaponskills. It would even allow for five Spells, but the timing will be so tight we're back to the whole "a tiny bit of ping screwed me out of my fifth GCD on Blood Weapon." I'll honestly be amazed if they think to give it stacks since they clearly forgot going into EW and ignored the idea for multiple patches so far.

Anything beyond that strikes me as hopium. That's how little I think of the Job Design team and the amount of fucks they give for DRK. Yoshi-P can sit there and say "we're listening to feedback" and "we play our own game" but I'm not gonna trust a dev team that came up with Enhanced fucking Unmend.

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I'd... actually be fine with both of those, though I'd like then to at least see some small further advantage on LD that makes the precast actually worth something. I wouldn't be okay with that being the end of the changes, since our sustain would still be a noticeable issue (and Oblation still laughable), but I wouldn't mind just getting an effective 10.5s duration, enough for 5 hits, on Blood Weapon over continuing a trend towards any and all durations being given massive leniency.

A 10.5s duration means that DRK cannot get a five Spell Blood Weapon at all. Queue into Levelling Roulette and get The Aery? Enjoy your 2.4k MP Blood Weapon, sorry your resource generator doesn't account for Spells. They're gonna need that leniency as long as their kit is split between Weaponskills and Spells. And I realize this is just for their AoE which is a big ol' "who gives a shit" since it's only relevant to dungeons and has zero impact on the endgame, but dungeons and levelling and what not are still an important part of the game and the Job should function at all levels. Like I said, at the end of the day you're still left with half the problem still there which will require more complaining that SE will continue to ignore but hey, at least it works properly for part of the kit now, right?

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Originally Posted by Beddict

A 10.5s duration means that DRK cannot get a five Spell Blood Weapon at all. Queue into Levelling Roulette and get The Aery? Enjoy your 2.4k MP Blood Weapon, sorry your resource generator doesn't account for Spells. They're gonna need that leniency as long as their kit is split between Weaponskills and Spells. And I realize this is just for their AoE which is a big ol' "who gives a shit" since it's only relevant to dungeons and has zero impact on the endgame, but dungeons and levelling and what not are still an important part of the game and the Job should function at all levels. Like I said, at the end of the day you're still left with half the problem still there which will require more complaining that SE will continue to ignore but hey, at least it works properly for part of the kit now, right?

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A 10.5s effective duration is a 11 duration on any skill which, like Blood Weapon, begins its duration immediately and checks for its existence after a given hit, instead of snapshotting in onto said hit. I'm not adjusting your duration; I'm just pointing out what it really is.

That said, 4.2 GCDs (10.5s duration under an obviously SpS-less GCD) is sufficient to get in 5 Spells under the duration. More importantly, though, it makes less sense to overbuff a ST/weaponskill capacity just to deal with the technical oddities of a AoE/Spell capacity. You instead just address the oddity. Give DRK (and PLD) a trait to duplicate SkS to SpS or just merge the two stats outright.

I'd like to point out a few issues that no one or I have rarely seen people point out. The DRK rotation forces you to double weave for optimal damage. I don't have a problem with double weaving since I find it fun and skillful ( ping issues aside ). However:
-> In order to mitigate you have to press 3 buttons ( TBN + Oblation + Dark Mind / Shadow Wall ), I would certainly wish for 2 buttons. TBN should have Oblation within itself. The reasoning here is that if you have your burst coming up and you have to mitigate, you have to sacrifice damage to do so ( raid buffs ). GNB solves this problem well because it never forces you to double weave for 6 GCDs straight while bursting.
-> Dark Mind shouldn't be only magic damage reduction please. It can be a lot of things. 10% of each damage reduction and a heal over time, or a heal which converts some DarkSide into HP.
-> Blood weapon shouldn't be tied to duration. It should be stacks because stacks allow you more flexible usage ( ex: Opener, pop it a few seconds before combat starts )
-> TBN shouldn't be tied to damage and MP. Dark Arts could give a free use of something else ( like Dark Mind , a heal ). There's many moments when when you have to burst in your rotation and you have ~4500 mp wishing to use an Edge/Flood within raid buffs, but there's a tank buster coming.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Could we at least stop with this? Just this. Stop, please.

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They have ignored the job for so long and acted like there was no negative feedback about his horrible design decision for 4 years, if they are not whiling to listen and act in consecuence just to keep doing what they want against our feedback it would be better to delete the job, it will save them the headache of working on a job they cleary don't have any desire to properly work and for us to stop waiting for them to actually work properly on it.

Yeah is not the kind of argument anyone wanna heard but frustration is frustration.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

That said, to preserve it overall, it'd be easier for them to have Delirium replace Blood Weapon, go up to 4 stacks and increase to 900 MP/hit, kill bloat at the same time. But, I shouldn't speculate further lest we get hopes up.

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That change would make it impossible to use Living Shadow on-time for buffs.