The Definitive Dark Knight Guide

In every savage fight outside A2S, our group has the WAR pull in defiance as opening out of grit and with blood weapon and ootnis really strong.

Because of all the oGCDs, potting prepull is optimal IMO because it won't delay your other moves and you get a potted scourge.


3s prepull: Dark arts
1s prepull: pot
Pull: plunge > scourge > BW + C&S > hard slash > salted earth > siphon strike > DA > Soul eater > dark passenger > repeat DA SE combo...

As MT I would still prepull DA, pull with unmend > pot > scourge > CS > power slash combo with oGCDs.

If you want max damage as MT and don't need grit mitigation you can do unmend > power slash combo > pot + drop grit > scourge > DA Soul eater combos with oGCDs.

if you pot>plunge you're gonna miss a GCD for your pot because of plunge animation delay

if your MT is pulling with tank stance/shadewalker then might as well do something like this

da>unmend right after your MT tomahawks>str pot>scourge>salt+bw>1>c&s+da>2>plunge>3>dp>1>low>2>da>3>pot off>1>bw off

I always have trouble fitting salted earth plus another skill in the same GCD window. I also have trouble fitting 2 skills between gcds with BW up without delaying. I mean it might be lag but i find it really hard to not delay skills doing this.

I'm also super patient on my salted earth because I'm afraid I'll put it behind me or something silly like that. But yeah I can see how plunge messes with your pot timing.

But I started playing DRK so I didn't need to walk up to the boss, lol.

Congratulations for your post, it is very helpful. Well, I'm still a newbie at tanking (DRK is my first tank job) and never OT before, so I have a very "newbie" question (xD): as OT, would it be better to keep Grit off since I could steal aggro from MT or whatever?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DMARX7

Congratulations for your post, it is very helpful. Well, I'm still a newbie at tanking (DRK is my first tank job) and never OT before, so I have a very "newbie" question (xD): as OT, would it be better to keep Grit off since I could steal aggro from MT or whatever?

---

That's where the cross class skill "Provoke" comes into play. As OT, you should be in Darkside (without grit). If a tank swap is needed or if the Mt derps and dies, thats when you'll turn on grit, provoke the target, follow up with unmend/unleash/abyssal drain (unleash is what I use as it casts really fast compared to abyssal drain).

Here is an OT rotation that I've found very effective:

-pre-cast DA
-Salted Earth
-Plunge
Scourge
-Carve
Hard Slash
-Low Blow **
-Dark Passenger **
Syphon Strike
-DA
Souleater
-Blood Weapon ***
Hard Slash
Syphon Strike
Delirium

**you should be able to weave two oGCDs very easily as long as neither of them are Plunge, which has an animation that can't be clipped by other skills.
***this is popped here since a decent hole has been made in your MP at this point, as opposed to popping at full MP and wasting the returns.


From here you alternate between Delirium and DA Souleater. Yes you can DA every single one when rotating like this. Use all other abilities on cooldown, including Dark Passenger (yes you'll have the MP for it). Regardless of the attack speed increase of Blood Weapon, every other Delirium, you'll reapply Scourge, and every other Scourge, you'll weave in DA Carve.

So not factoring in off-GCD abilities not named Carve and Spit, the rotation looks like this:
Scourge-DA Carve-DA Souleater-Delirium-DA Souleater-Delirium-Scourge-DA Souleater-Delirium-DA Souleater-Delirium--->repeat
-off-GCD cooldowns allowing, you'll pre-cast DA before the Hard Slash leading into Souleater, and pre-cast it either before or after the Delirium immediately before Carve comes off CD.

This rotation bursts to 1.4-1.5K and settles at about 900 and some change with full uptime at about 910 STR, 550 crit, 550 SS, and 250 det. You will TP-floor before you MP floor with 100% uptime, even with DAing every SE and Carve, and Delirium and Scourge will have 100% uptime (Scourge can sometimes fall off if you have a minimum of BW uptime between applications, but it should only be for about 1 second maximum).

As an MT, you can follow a very similar rotation, however, you'll likely have to use an extra Delirium combo if the boss isn't hitting you enough. Blood Price returns 115 more MP than Blood Weapon per trigger to try and mitigate this discrepancy but it often isn't enough.

Got it. Thank you for the tips. :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Syzygian

Here is an OT rotation that I've found very effective:

-pre-cast DA
-Salted Earth
-Plunge
Scourge
-Carve
Hard Slash
-Low Blow **
-Dark Passenger **
Syphon Strike
-DA
Souleater
-Blood Weapon ***
Hard Slash
Syphon Strike
Delirium

---

This is way too late for Blood Weapon. Something like this would be more effective:

-pre-cast DA
-Salted Earth
-Plunge
Scourge
-Carve
Hard Slash
-Dark Passenger
-Blood Weapon
Syphon Strike
-DA
-Low Blow
Souleater

This will give you more mana with Syphon Stirke after using Dark Passenger so you won't top yourself out, and then you will also get blood weapon mana back from the Low Blow after DA.

Even then, in most fight I will use Blood Weapon before the first plunge because you still will not cap yourself on mana after pre-casting DA and you get 238 manax3 back from Plunge, Scourge and C&S and I have been finding by doing this, later Blood Weapon use aligns much better with the OGCs coming off of cooldown to be used with Blood Weapon up.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ladon

snip

---

^ this. I use this exact opener when OTing and it's the best I got so far.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ladon

This is way too late for Blood Weapon.

---

Perhaps. But the point is you still get the same degree of uptime and still maintain sufficient mana to TP floor long before you mana-floor, while DAing everything you need/want to DA, casting DP on CD and keeping full uptime on Scourge/Delirium which was my main point. Its actually a pretty minor difference as BW's main DPS value is the MP returns to sustain continued DA SE/Carve usage more than the attack speed increase, which is a pittance compared to the DPS cooldowns of other tanks. I'll test this though and see if there's a noticeable difference.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Aiurily

if you pot>plunge you're gonna miss a GCD for your pot because of plunge animation delay

if your MT is pulling with tank stance/shadewalker then might as well do something like this

da>unmend right after your MT tomahawks>str pot>scourge>salt+bw>1>c&s+da>2>plunge>3>dp>1>low>2>da>3>pot off>1>bw off

---

vid on opener

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sRjzaEX4tM

pros
2 dark arts souleaters buffed by str pot
everything in your kit is buffed by str pot. scourge, salted earth, c&s, plunge, low blows, dark passenger, all the good stuff, buffed by +10%~ more damage.
plunge, because its after the 4th gcd, is buffed by slash debuff

cons
you don't do unmend>plunge to the target; but not really a big deal; go compare how long it takes for you to walk to the boss from unmend range, compared to how fast plunge takes you there (after its long animation delay for startup) both ways, you ride your GCD anyway
using salted earth with another oGCD in the same GCD can be awkward

@Above: Love the opener, similar to my own as OT. Have you done much testing for unmend>potion+plunge>scourge? I can't pull it off with my latency, but I think/wish it can be done.

I'm sorry to revive this somewhat aged thread, but I'm making a thread myself and want to ask you guys a couple of questions.

How does a Dark Knight overcome it's weaknesses through its own abilities?
What makes a Dark Knight different from the other tanks in terms of philosophy and ability implementation?


EDIT: Keep in mind this is an "at a glance" description that I need and it needs to be clear and concise.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Shining_Tiger_Excalibur

I'm sorry to revive this somewhat aged thread, but I'm making a thread myself and want to ask you guys a couple of questions.

How does a Dark Knight overcome it's weaknesses through its own abilities?
What makes a Dark Knight different from the other tanks in terms of philosophy and ability implementation?


EDIT: Keep in mind this is an "at a glance" description that I need and it needs to be clear and concise.

---

http://pastebin.com/fustXj3R

Had to put it in pastebin as even at a glance explaining it so people could understand was well over 2000 characters.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Violette

http://pastebin.com/fustXj3R

Had to put it in pastebin as even at a glance explaining it so people could understand was well over 2000 characters.

---

Thank you VERY much for this.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Shining_Tiger_Excalibur

snip

---

For your first question, I guess DRK's weakness is its lack of physical mitigation against an eventual physical tank buster (which currently doesn't exist in Savage but could be implemented for the next set of raids), which can be compensated with proper use of Reprisal and Dark Dance alongside their other universal CDs (Shadow Wall and Shadowskin), making their physical mitigation not that far below PLD in reality because they basically only lack Sheltron, Reprisal playing Rage of Halone's role and Dark Dance playing a weaker Bulwark role with more uptime. They also have a very good self-sustain against common damage like auto-attacks with Souleater and they shine when it comes to mitigate magical damage as they are the strongest tank for that thanks to Dark Mind. Their raid utility is quite non-existent if there is a MNK in the party but their awesome DPS while MTing is also raid utility in some way.

For your second question, what makes Dark Knight different is definitely its MP management mechanic. While not that hard to master, it's still a unique trait they get which defines their gameplay. It's also very fast-paced with a lot of offensive abilities to weave in between your GCDs, and even more when you pop Blood Weapon (which increases your attackspeed). Its gameplay can feel similar to a PLD in some fashion but it's a whole different approach. It's more offensive, more aggressive and also more complex. Where PLD feels like they're ready to jump between the enemy and an ally to protect him using its body as a shield, DRK feels more like they're ready to jump ON the enemy to outright kill it before it even gets the chance to hurt his ally. They feel like two opposite sides of the same coin.

DRK also has a unique feeling when it comes to taking damage. A DRK likes taking damage as it results in him benefitting from it for its abilities. Whether it's a physical attack that you can eventually parry to get a low blow proc or use Reprisal, or just any attack with blood price on which makes you gain MP for each hit you receive. The more often a DRK gets hit, the more power he can obtain. I think it's pretty representative of how Dark Knights were sacrificing their own HPs in order to deal more damage in older FF games. Here you just benefit from being hit. You like pain. You enjoy it.

Hello there, I plan to start doing A1S with my FC soon and I'd like to know what's the minimum ilvl required to MT and OT it?

Also, I feel my vit is too low for having all those str acessories. Right now, I sit around 14700 HP unbuffed (ilvl 188), Also, all my points went to str instead of vit. If I swap it to Vit I believe i'd reac 15300 HP (16000 in a party).

What should I do? My HP is too low? Should I move points from str to vit?
Thank you in advance.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Linkan

Hello there, I plan to start doing A1S with my FC soon and I'd like to know what's the minimum ilvl required to MT and OT it?

Also, I feel my vit is too low for having all those str acessories. Right now, I sit around 14700 HP unbuffed (ilvl 188), Also, all my points went to str instead of vit. If I swap it to Vit I believe i'd reac 15300 HP (16000 in a party).

What should I do? My HP is too low? Should I move points from str to vit?
Thank you in advance.

---

Alright, for A1S you will be hit 3 times by a move called Hypercompressed Plasma, which will deal 25000 damage(ish) unmitigated. In these, you will always have 20% + 20% + 30% reductions, along with Delirium (int down) and for 2 of them you will have a further 30% from Shadow Wall.

This translates to being hit for between 7-11k each hit (dependant on lack of shadow wall), which can be followed by a crit auto attack which can hit for upwards of 5k (ilvl195 and one hit me for 5.6k last night).

What does his mean for your health pool?

It means your safety is just above 16k health in a party with food, to survive all mechanics as long as your healers aren't goofing around.

Now, currently I equip several slaying accessories and have all 35 points in Strength, which along with my large amount of ilvl200 gear and my 2 fending accessories (prototype ring/bracelet), in party with food puts me at 16.5k hp, which is plenty for this figt.

So what I recommend to check your hp in party with food, then adjust it till your health is at the 16.3-16.8k zone. For learning, having more health is never bad and when you're feeling safe and your healers are knowledgeable on the mechanics is when I suggest moving your health down to 16.5kish. However, anything lower than 16k is asking for death on multiple occasions.


Hope this helps!

It does! Thank you!

I'm not a fan of using Shadow Wall on the first & third Plasmas. I prefer using Shadow Wall right after the first set of adds die & before the Gunnery Pod & Royal Fount go off.(to keep Grit off until second set of adds spawn) You should never take more than about 11k damage, so any VIT gear or shielding from the healers will keep you safe. I usually go 2STR/3VIT/Full STR attributes until content is on farm, I don't ever put on more VIT than that unless healers are noticeably struggling or ask.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Disc

I'm not a fan of using Shadow Wall on the first & third Plasmas. I prefer using Shadow Wall right after the first set of adds die & before the Gunnery Pod & Royal Fount go off.(to keep Grit off until second set of adds spawn) You should never take more than about 11k damage, so any VIT gear or shielding from the healers will keep you safe. I usually go 2STR/3VIT/Full STR attributes until content is on farm, I don't ever put on more VIT than that unless healers are noticeably struggling or ask.

---

In progression and learning though, it's safer to use shadow wall for first/third because if timed right it'll absorb the royal font beforehand as well. Variations afterwards are good, but when learning you should always aim to mitigate the biggest hits as well as possible.


As for Grit timing, I usually wait until I have a good enmity lead (so about 3 dark arts power slashes) before I swap.

You can use dark dance and awareness at the same time you've said and it'll massively help with auto-attack damage, which is your main threat until the next set of adds.

Dark Mind will reduce Royal Fount by just as much if you don't delay it for Dark Wall instead. If you use Dark Wall a few seconds after the first adds die you mitigate 30% of heavy damage(>12k ignoring autos) directed at you during an AoE phase that will save your solo healer a major headache.(Gunnery Podx2 + Royal Fount + Auto-attacks) You still get to use it again on the second Plasma. You're just seeing roughly 3k more damage on one tank-buster to make an AoE phase mid DPS check easier. Either will work fine, I just wanted to point out this method because I consider it better.

I typically use dark dance when preys go out, this will lead to a reprisal proc 99% of the time for the tank buster. Shadow wall + DA/Dark Mind 1st and third plasma, shadow skin + DA/Dark mind the second plasma. This should put all the tank busters in the 9k-7k range fairly easily. If you are worried about crits awareness can help but honestly if your healer is pre-casting the tank buster cure like they should be it's really a non issue as the heal will come literally fractions of a second after the hit. Currently running 3 pentameld str acc and 2 str rings with all points in str and coming out around 17.5 ish hp with all of the party buffs and such.

Stance dancing I go raw until post split preys > grit until a few seconds after tank buster recovery > back to just darkside.

Curious if this topic (specifically the OP) is still relevant in non savage content? Is there a new preferred updated guide or is this still the way to go.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ElasmoFan

Curious if this topic (specifically the OP) is still relevant in non savage content? Is there a new preferred updated guide or is this still the way to go.

---

Hey, OP here. Sorry, things have been busy for a while. raid static changing and such. I'll try and update the guide soon with some tips specific to savage content. Otherwise, the basics of the guide are still relevant.

When it comes to Scourge, which is better, reapplying it before it falls off and clipping it, or waiting until it JUST falls off and then reapplying it? I found that the DoT seems to have awkward timing because of blood weapon changing it. I'll either have to use it again when it's at around 5 seconds left, or let it fall off before reapplying...

I know that the timing will change depending on how much skillspeed one has, so i'd like to know whether clipping it or not is better.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Praesul

When it comes to Scourge, which is better, reapplying it before it falls off and clipping it, or waiting until it JUST falls off and then reapplying it? I found that the DoT seems to have awkward timing because of blood weapon changing it. I'll either have to use it again when it's at around 5 seconds left, or let it fall off before reapplying...

I know that the timing will change depending on how much skillspeed one has, so i'd like to know whether clipping it or not is better.

---

Using Blood Weapon makes the timer perfect for me. It's at 1-0 sec left when I reapply it. If full-time Grit tho, it could happen that I have to clip it at 4-3sec. Clipping is always the best option for every DoTs (as long as it's not too early like at 7-8sec).

Excuse the necro thread.

I feel like this thread needs reviving though. There's an inexcusable shortage of information/surplus of misinformation out there about how to maximize this job's performance both in DPS and cooldown usage. OP should update or pass the torch to someone.

I threw together some helpful tidbits as an example that I've studied, Dark Arts and MP-to-DPS priority lists both for single target and AoE, and some sample single target and AoE bursts (not necessarily openers however).

Single Target oGCD DPS Priority - Dark Arts is treated as an oGCD for the purpose of Souleater

1. Salted Earth - 525
2. Dark Arts Carve and Spit - 450
3. Reprisal - 210
4. Plunge - 200
5. Dark Passenger - 150
6. Pre-Souleater Dark Arts - 140
7. Low Blow - 100

AoE oGCD DPS Priority (4 targets assumed) - Dark Arts is treated as an oGCD for the purpose of Souleater

1. Salted Earth - 525x4= 2100
2. Dark Arts Dark Passenger - 250x4= 1000
3. Dark Passenger - 150x4= 600
4. Dark Arts Carve and Spit - 450
5. Reprisal - 210
6. Plunge - 200
7. Pre-Souleater Dark Arts - 140
8. Low Blow - 100

Single Target Dark Arts Priority - potency gained from Dark Arts alone

1. Carve and Spit - +350
2. Souleater - +140
3. Dark Passenger - +100

AoE Dark Arts Priority (4 targets assumed) - potency gained from Dark Arts alone

1. Dark Passenger - +400
2. Carve and Spit - +350
3. Souleater - +140

MP Priority

1. Dark Passenger 4 target 884/600 - ~1.5 MP per potency
2. Dark Arts Dark Passenger 4 target 2652/1000 - ~2.6 MP per potency
3. Dark Arts Carve and Spit 1768/350 - ~5.0 MP per potency
4. Dark Passenger single target 884/150 - ~5.9 MP per potency
5. Pre-Souleater Dark Arts 884/140 - ~6.3 MP per potency
6. Dark Arts Dark Passenger single target 2652/250 - ~10.6 MP per potency

Basic safe rotation: Scourge - DASE/DE x4 - repeat

Time remaining on Scourge<Time remaining on Delirium + Blood Weapon coming off Recast -
Scourge - HS - SS - DE (BW) - HS - SS (DA) SE - HS - SS (DA) SE - HS - SS - DE - Scourge
-Allows two DA Souleaters without losing Delirium or Scourge.
http://ffxivrotations.com/1mo

BW on cooldown + Delirium not needed -
Scourge - HS - SS - DE (DA) HS - SS - SE (DA) HS (C&S) SS (DA) SE
-Allows two back-to-back DA Souleaters without losing Scourge, weaves a DA C&S in with no interruption. Delirium falls for just under 2 seconds.
http://ffxivrotations.com/1mp

Sample AoE Burst/Mitigation
(ShSk/Wall) AD (BP) AD (SaEa) AD (DA) AD (C&S) AD (DA) AD (LB) AD - HS (DA) SS (DD) DE - HS (DA) SS (DP) DE - HS - SS - DE - Scourge x #targets (BP) - repeat
-Proper use of Dark Arts Abyssal Drain/Dark Passenger/Dark Dance in conjunction with Blood Price + multidotting.
http://ffxivrotations.com/1mq

Reminds me I have a half written DRK guide somewhere in my documents.


Whelp I got a free afternoon. Will post here when I'm mostly done, so people can fact check.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Syzygian

Excuse the necro thread.

I feel like this thread needs reviving though. There's an inexcusable shortage of information/surplus of misinformation out there about how to maximize this job's performance both in DPS and cooldown usage. OP should update or pass the torch to someone......

---

Casting my vote for a "Syz's guide to the Darkside"..... (immediately regretting saying that)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Falgern

Mercy Stroke is generally prefered over Foresight. Foresight provides around 5% mitigation, mercy stroke is free dps.

---

Lmfao, yes, as a TANK let's toss away damage reduc. to become something (half-assed, mind you) we're not even intended to be. So much crap about dpsdpsdpsdps. You guys do understand when you load up in the duty finder it says tank right? Not half assed dps. Sure dps helps with threat, but isn't an "omfgggg must do dem deepz!" requirement. Build yourself to stay the hell alive and let the actual dps do their damn job. So many trashy tanks trying to dps and not focusing on survival. I honestly feel terrible for the healers that run with some (notice I said some, not all) of you. Lord. This isn't FF11. *glares at you wannabe DRK dpsers*

Mercy Stroke is a tank ability, as is every DRK cross-class ability. In addition to DPS, it potentially brings with it a built-in self-heal when timed correctly. While I wouldn't give up Foresight to bring it along, I'm more than happy to discard Bloodbath to do so.

Surviving when playing as a tank class is the absolute bare minimum of what you're expected to do. You don't get a gold star for mitigating attacks with the correct amount of defensive cooldowns. Nobody will give you a standing ovation for understanding snap enmity generation. These are basic pass-fail checks for a tank. What separates a "good" performance from a mere "pass" is your ability to position smartly, and to maximise your dps while still competently performing the fundamental requirements of your role.

Wow, a thread that got necroposty'd twice.

Mercy Stroke is incredibly weak. It's only 200 potency, has a 90s recast, and can only be used when the enemy is below 20% HP.

Foresight is stronger, providing a good bit of reliable physical mitigation, which can be invaluable for tankbusters. I usually pair it with DA-DD when tanking trash or during a white-damage phase, which usually does a pretty good job of mitigating incoming damage.

Bloodbath is also stronger than Mercy Stroke because you can use it for the whole fight, with a very similar cooldown. It also provides more healing over time than Mercy Stroke, because the potency healed over 15s is 25% of what you put out (on a single target, that can mean 256-627 potency healed, depending on procs and oGCD cooldowns, while the number balloons as you get into multi-target situations). When compared to the possible 200 potency self-heal from Mercy Stroke, there is no question which one you should take.

EDIT:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Lyth

Surviving when playing as a tank class is the absolute bare minimum of what you're expected to do. You don't get a gold star for mitigating attacks with the correct amount of defensive cooldowns. Nobody will give you a standing ovation for understanding snap enmity generation. These are basic pass-fail checks for a tank. What separates a "good" performance from a mere "pass" is your ability to position smartly, and to maximise your dps while still competently performing the fundamental requirements of your role.

---

Ah yes, the old, "good tanks focus on DPS" argument. While it is true that every Tank needs to be able to focus on their damage, being able to do that is secondary to winning an encounter (AS1-4 was unique). The best tanks are the ones who can adapt to any situation that's thrown at them, and who are best able to recognize and deal with mechanics as they encounter them. Progression raiding is about learning the fights and their mechanics more than anything else, and learning what cooldowns to use where to empower yourself to focus on other things.

When you're learning a fight? Focus first on mechanics and positioning, then on mitigation, and once you've got that down, THEN you can begin to figure out where you can push more DPS. A tank's main focus is holding hate and surviving--anything else is incidental.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jpec07

(on a single target, that can mean 256-627 potency healed, depending on procs and oGCD cooldowns, while the number balloons as you get into multi-target situations).

---

How does the number "balloon" in multi-target situations?

edit: just to clarify, I'm not arguing the effectiveness of BB vs MS stroke on single target. On a DRK doing 1200 dps they can get roughly the equivalent of a cure/physic/benefic back meaning the healer can get 1 more "free" dps cast in, which outweighs the 200 potency of mercy stroke.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Deathgiver

How does the number "balloon" in multi-target situations?

edit: just to clarify, I'm not arguing the effectiveness of BB vs MS stroke on single target. On a DRK doing 1200 dps they can get roughly the equivalent of a cure/physic/benefic back meaning the healer can get 1 more "free" dps cast in, which outweighs the 200 potency of mercy stroke.

---

Assuming a DRK is facing 3 or more targets, their DPS starts to go up a lot, and Bloodbath goes from a guaranteed healing potency floor of 256 potency per use to 360 potency per use (assuming you have Blood Price available and don't use something that increases your Evasion chance). 4 targets goes to 480 potency, and it only gets higher as you have more enemies you can hit--and all this in addition to your autoattack.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jpec07

Assuming a DRK is facing 3 or more targets, their DPS starts to go up a lot, and Bloodbath goes from a guaranteed healing potency floor of 256 potency per use to 360 potency per use (assuming you have Blood Price available and don't use something that increases your Evasion chance). 4 targets goes to 480 potency, and it only gets higher as you have more enemies you can hit--and all this in addition to your autoattack.

---

All of drk's aoe skills are magical though, and don't heal when used with bloodbath.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Jpec07

When compared to the possible 200 potency self-heal from Mercy Stroke, there is no question which one you should take.

---

Yeah, obviously Mercy Stroke because it actually does damage.

Quote:

---

Progression raiding is about learning the fights and their mechanics more than anything else, and learning what cooldowns to use where to empower yourself to focus on other things.

---

Correct me if I'm wrong, but you haven't done much progression raiding, right? Tanks have the easiest job in raids. Tankbusters happen at the same time every time and they're extremely easy to get used to popping cooldowns (and most cooldowns are off gcd so you can't mess them up) . Enmity pretty much isn't a problem. Tanks should be trying to do lots of dps from the start, because there's not much else for us to do.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Launched

Tanks have the easiest job in raids. Tankbusters happen at the same time every time and they're extremely easy to get used to popping cooldowns (and most cooldowns are off gcd so you can't mess them up) . Enmity pretty much isn't a problem. Tanks should be trying to do lots of dps from the start, because there's not much else for us to do.

---

Tank busters are only easy because you have guides all around or even clear videos to see, unlike world progressions. During progression it's better to just suck it up and be in tank stance while learning how to tank the fights and clearing. Unless if you are entirely sure about taking calculated risks, you are just being an idiot by blocking potentially clears that should happen. This excludes being in a team where your DPS is highly lacking thus needing that extra oomph from tanks/healer, which again shouldn't have happened in the first place.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Launched

Yeah, obviously Mercy Stroke because it actually does damage.

---

That's looking at the skill inside a bubble of only the tanks dps. If you head on over to fflogs and look at the #1 drk for brute justice it's easy to see why. Brute justice offers almost ideal circumstances for using mercy stroke, with lots of different things to kill spaced out fairly regularly so you can use mercy stoke almost throughout the whole fight instead of the last 20%. The top drk used mercy stroke 6 times (the equivalent to spending over 7.5 minutes in last 20% over a 12 minute fight) for a total of about 6.5k damage. Had the drk used bloodbath off cd and been able to get the whm only 3 more stone III over 8 uses, due to mp efficiency and gcd usage, the damage return would have been higher.( stoneIII 3*2.4k =7.2k).

Foresight is a solid defensive ability. It's become significantly more effective since the last expansion, and it supplements DRK quite well in the physical defense department. But you don't have to give up Foresight to get Mercy Stroke, so this isn't really an issue.

Bloodbath is a fantastic ability on WAR, and to a lesser extent, PLD. It has good synergy with potency-boosting offensive cooldowns such as Berserk/FoF. The fact that it's linked to physical damage lets WAR take advantage of it in multi-target situations, where it really shines. In addition, the trait doubles its duration from 15 s to 30 s.

DRK isn't really able to take advantage of that so well. Instead of popping skills like FoF or Berserk to boost potency, we drop Grit. Bloodbath doesn't interact with our magical based attacks, which make up a reasonable portion of our oGCD attacks and all of our multi-target attacks. It also doesn't interact with DoT ticks, which make up a much higher percentage of DRK dps than they do on WAR.

Lastly, remember that Bloodbath is tied to the amount of physical damage that you do in a 15 s period. Let's face it, if you're subscribing to the AFK-shieldwall tank mindset, you're probably not going to get a whole lot of a defensive advantage from this. Tanks who understand the patterns of incoming damage in a given fight well enough to maximize their dps are the ones who will get the maximum healing potency from this skill, and they're probably going to bring along Mercy Stroke because it's an extra oGCD (i.e. free potency).

Also, if it's worth anything, the DRK in this raid tier's set of world-first clears uses Mercy Stroke.

On a side-note: there's nothing that says that you should dps at the expense of survival or holding aggro. If generating enmity or mitigating attacks is challenging for you, then this must be your focus. But it's a bit like breathing. It's fundamental, but once you figure out how to do it automatically, then you get to move on to other matters.

You don't start a video game on Easy difficulty if you're already familiar with the gameplay. You start on Normal difficulty at the least.

It's never "How do I press activate this instantaneous oGCD defensive cooldown during the telegraphed 2 second tankbuster cast while staying in defensive stance for the entire fight and using my threat combo." It's "How do I use my defensive cooldowns to absorb all of the unmarked cleaves so that I can stay out of stance for as much of the fight as possible." On Tank jobs, the more skilled that your use of defensive abilities becomes, the better your offensive capability becomes. The two are intertwined.