Dark Knight Megathread

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Originally Posted by Zairava

Fair enough. It's more of a personal preference to me, anyway. I like the idea of getting offensive options from mitigation, it just doesn't work well in practice because of chasing higher dps with it, which leads to one thing or another..

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I like it too, but... as you said. I'd still wouldn't mind giving it a shot; I'm just not optimistic... in anything like the present context.

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I think I would prefer a newer animation with the DA proc regardless if we took my route of dps net gain.

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I'm all for animation variance. Would like.

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This is still also taking into account they actually tone down the ogcd bloat in the burst to begin with. Which as we stated before would be at least partially solved by Shadowbringer being put on one charge on a 60s cooldown with a mana cost.

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That's luckily really easy to do. And in addition to slapping an MP cost on Shadowbringer and increasing its potency accordingly, you could also do the same for Carve and Spit / Abyssal Drain. Compared to now, you get the same potency under burst, but slightly lower total and, especially, burst apm.

Or, do that and then also tone all those oGCD potencies down just hair, enough to restore the lost APM via further Edge/Flood casts per 2 minutes [5 casts per 2 minutes with a 40s CnS/AD], increase MP generation per 2 minutes accordingly, and voila -- you'll have the same overall apm, same rDPS, and (nearly) identical aDPS, but less of the apm will fall within those bloated burst periods.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

That's luckily really easy to do. And in addition to slapping an MP cost on Shadowbringer and increasing its potency accordingly, you could also do the same for Carve and Spit / Abyssal Drain. Compared to now, you get the same potency under burst, but slightly lower total and, especially, burst apm.

Or, do that and then also tone all those oGCD potencies down just hair, enough to restore the lost APM via further Edge/Flood casts per 2 minutes [5 casts per 2 minutes with a 40s CnS/AD], increase MP generation per 2 minutes accordingly, and voila -- you'll have the same overall apm, same rDPS, and (nearly) identical aDPS, but less of the apm will fall within those bloated burst periods.

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Honestly, increasing the mp generation has been something on my mind since 5.0 launch. As of right now, to me, if we had increased mp generation even in the current expansion, it would warrant having to use mp on edge/flood more often, at least once or twice in downtime between bursts, which would tremendously help make said downtime be less of a snoozefest, especially with said C&S/AD changes.

I'd like to rewrite what I wrote before as it might have been lost in the many replies and also with further changes since I noticed some issues in my suggestions:

-> Oblation grants 20% magic damage reduction and 10% against all damage types. 45 seconds CD per charge, 2 charges. Dark Mind removed. ( It is incredibly difficult to weave both Oblation and Dark Mind when needed, and they accomplish the same thing )

-> Abyssal Drain marks target and all nearby enemies with "Another victim", damage dealt to targets marked by this heals the DRK over time. 15 sec duration 90 sec CD. Does not share a recast timer with C&S, and no longer grants MP.

-> Dark Arts makes the next Edge or Flood of Shadow also heal you for potency equal to damage dealt. Otherwise unchanged.

-> Delirium grants 3 stacks of Delirium, allowing the execution without cost of a combo starting with Bloodspiller into another 2 new abilities ( with AoE fall off , similar to PLD's confiteur combo ). Each combo action costs 25 blood. Your burst is the same as it is now, using Delirium and doing x3 Bloodspillers but instead its just 1 Bloodspiller into 2 new actions. You do this combo for free every minute, and can decide to do it when desired if you max out blood, or during the 2 min raid buff window.

-> Living Shadow can stay as it is now, or just "Enhance" the player to do 20% more damage for the next 6 actions, along with a much more visible darkside aura ( 2 Bloodspiller combos, one from Delirium, one from your blood gauge ). The DoT aspect of Living Shadow is kind of lame. It should also cost only 25 blood, as you can go into your 2 min window with 100 blood, 75 for a Bloodspiller combo, and 25 for Living Shadow.

-> Enhanced Unmend can be changed to "Enhanced Abyssal Drain" as perhaps completing an AoE combo with Stalwart Soul would reduce the CD of Abyssal Drain by 3 seconds, and completing a Souleater combo by 5 seconds.

->Scourge can come back as a high potency GCD, 60 second CD GCD, like Goring Blade.

Gonna follow ItsUrBoi's example and repost my own shortlist, or what all I remember of it, since that's a ton of pages to search through by now:

Simple Sustain + Unbloat Quickfix (+ Living Shadow minor change)

• Shadowbringer, Carve and Spit, and Abyssal Drain now each cost 3000 MP. Their ST and/or AoE damage is increased by the potency of Edge/Flood to compensate.
• CnS/AD gain a second charge, on a 40s recharge time.
• Bloodweapon cooldown reduced to 40s. Remains single-charge.
• Darkside is removed as a gauge/duration-based buff, as it's just a basically non-mechanic anyways after the first Edge cast. MP generation is greatly increased in its place, with potency increases rounding out the rest of the damage otherwise missing.
  (The extent of this increase, which makes up for the bulk of that lost 10% damage amp, is far more than is necessary to simply compensate for the APM lost to ShB and CnS/AD gaining MP costs, causing us to use more oGCDs over our lulls, making them less dull.)
• CnS/AD heal for their damage dealt.
• The MP bar can now offer subtle demarcation of every 3000 MP possessed (standard spenders' cost). The Blood Gauge bar can now offer subtle demarcation of every 40 Blood possessed (likewise, the standard spenders' cost).
• Rather than having a discrete Dark Arts indicator alone, Dark Arts causes next X MP costs on anything but TBN (up to costs equal to 30% of total [3000] MP per TBN) to be nullified, as shown via a black bar portion of your MP bar (with subtle additional demarcation to show how many free casts you have). You can stack MP cost nullification, technically, to up to the full bar. In other words, Dark Arts now stacks up to 3.33 times, and you can just look at the MP gauge itself to see how much you have.
• Edge and Flood heal for a portion of damage dealt, or for their full damage dealt when made free by Dark Arts (one or the other).
• Dark Mind now reduces damage taken by 10%, and magical damage taken by a further 10%.
• Dark Mind upgrades to Oblation, therein having its cooldown reduced (to 40s) and being made castable on allies.
• Living Shadow now instead rapidly copies your weaponskills for 7 strikes, on the same targets, from nearly the same locations, for a portion of damage and full additional effects. (So, rather than a DoT, it can swap about more quickly and now contributes to your resource generation, but also depends upon banking resource in order to maximize its effect. Living Shadow will appear to slip/teleport through you to reach enemies you use weaponskills or gap-close to.)

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

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Can't find anything I really disagree with outside of removing Darkside entirely, it should still exist in some way, shape, or form. Even if we don't think about it.

If I had to choose a method, I would again like to refer to ItsUrBoi's idea for Living Shadow.

Keeping your Living Shadow idea from the shortlist, I would like to add Darkside to it as a bonus effect via a trait that adds it on later, whether it's from the 90-100 range or earlier. It would utilize the Darkside aura from the HW job action trailer and buff the damage output from Fray when it copies your attack by 10/20%. Although, I (and most others) would prefer if it had the aura on Living Shadow baseline. It remains something we really don't think about and is rather taped on, but it still exists some fashion.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

Can't find anything I really disagree with outside of removing Darkside entirely, it should still exist in some way, shape, or form. Even if we don't think about it.

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I'm working on another set that treats it far more integrally and as a pace-setter. This is just a quick-fix rough.

But, to me at least, if something isn't thought about at all (beyond this weird superstition handed down that every fight should start with an Edge/Flood, or immediately after Unmend)... it shouldn't exist. It's just an arcane, wholly useless calculations hurdle.

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Originally Posted by ItsUrBoi

That would still make a 90 second CD ability your only source of healing which you'd always get as soon as its off CD due to the DPS aspect. Instead Edge or Flood should heal, or even Bloodspiller as you use them more frequently and can choose a bit when to delay or not to delay. As for TBN breaking, perhaps Dark Arts can be a defensive aspect too, such as allowing you to heal urself via those mentioned abilities?

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this idea is too good to be true or to actually see squeenix implement it that's why i didn't even think about it

The idea that Dark Mind upgrades into Oblation at level 82 is really good!
It could look something like this:
->Dark Mind: Grants 10% magic damage reduction and 10% damage reduction against all types. 60 sec CD, 10 seconds duration.
->Enhanced Dark Mind: Upgrades Dark Mind to Oblation, granting an additional 5% magical damage reduction, reducing the CD to 45 seconds per charge, 2 charges.

Abyssal drain should mark target and all surrounding enemies with Another victim debuff. Dealing damage to these units will heal the DRK who applied the mark. Similar to RPR's mark.
OR
Enhanced Abyssal Drain ( instead of Enhanced Unmend, please that trait is bad ): completing a combo with Stalwart Soul reduces the CD of Abyssal Drain / C&S by 5 seconds.
OR
Abyssal Drain removed. Dark Arts granted by breaking TBN, makes the next Edge or Flood of Shadow heal you for potency equal to damage dealt.

Here's a more detailed idea for Living Shadow which kind of builds off of how it works now.
->Enhanced Living Shadow III : Upgrades the Simulacrum to fight within you, empowering your weaponskills, spells and abilities to deal an additional 350 potency, granting 10% SkS and Spell Speed, and 15% damage reduction for 20 seconds.

At level 80 and 90 Living Shadow would work as it does now.
At level 100, the Simulacrum would augment the DRK, granting them an aura similar to the aura DRK has in the Shadowbringers trailer when the camera rotates around the WoL as DRK. The damage reduction is there since for those 20 seconds it may be harder for the player to double weave mitigations. The skill speed and spell speed are there are as a tribute to old blood weapon. The additional potency is a tribute to old Dark Arts.

This does not change the way the job plays, it would still be a fire and forget button that costs you 50 blood and that you press every 2 minutes, but now:
->You have some job identity ( although some would say its similar to RPR )
->You have more control over it. At the moment you have to make it so that the Simulacrum lands its hits inside raid buffs, but it has a 5-6 second spawn animation.
->You have a cool effect, and the actual red armor indicator next to your darkside icon makes sense, you are actually unleashing your darkside when its the strongest.
->Very rarely, you may want to time this ability for the extra mitigation when you are playing solo content as you have no raid buffs to make use of.

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Originally Posted by ItsUrBoi

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Agree on all except:

• We shouldn't remove abyssal drain, considering that is one of few abilities left that actually feel satisfying to press animation wise. I would sooner see Abyssal Drain replace Flood of Shadow when tbn pops (equal attack potency to flood obviously, just with the sustain added onto it) and something else for augmented Edge of Shadow. (Scourge or old delirium maybe? I wouldn't exactly like Carve and Spit be relegated to this spot.)
• It would be easier described as a general haste for said Living Shadow upgrade, and I don't think they would add a 15% mitigation to it on top of that. DRK is already good defensively now, to give it more in any fashion with sustain on top of it would "break the balance" in raids if it's dps isn't tuned much lower than it is now. Which leads me to say 350 to every spell/weaponskill WITH 10% haste is bonkers on a tank. Obviously every ability could be tuned much lower than they are now. I would say 100-200 depending on the potency already on the skills.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

I would say 100-200 depending on the potency already on the skills.[/LIST]

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Just have the effect as a Bunshin style effect, that is, have it show up as a seperate number for a flat potency. That way, we don't need to worry about 'oh itll feel bad when your 800+p empowered Bloodspiller doesn't crit', because it'd be a seperate damage number, with a seperate chance to crit.

I don't got anything to add but I think it'd be neat if Syphon Strike gave double MP when it crit, just for some kind of variability during the rotation.

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Originally Posted by ForsakenRoe

Just have the effect as a Bunshin style effect, that is, have it show up as a seperate number for a flat potency. That way, we don't need to worry about 'oh itll feel bad when your 800+p empowered Bloodspiller doesn't crit', because it'd be a seperate damage number, with a seperate chance to crit.

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This is precisely how I would like it to be done. We would still keep the aura (I literally just want the Darkside aura from the HW trailer back by some method, please).

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Originally Posted by baklava151

I don't got anything to add but I think it'd be neat if Syphon Strike gave double MP when it crit, just for some kind of variability during the rotation.

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that crit variability is the exact reason why SE wouldn't add it and why many would be against it. It would be nice to have when it procs but since it directly contributes to dps which is unfortunately all that matters unfortunately, not getting it would outweigh the feeling of actually getting it. It's a neat idea, but they would sooner just make syphon give 1000mp instead of 600mp passively in the form of a trait.

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Originally Posted by ForsakenRoe

Just have the effect as a Bunshin style effect, that is, have it show up as a seperate number for a flat potency. That way, we don't need to worry about 'oh itll feel bad when your 800+p empowered Bloodspiller doesn't crit', because it'd be a seperate damage number, with a seperate chance to crit.

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I would rather it be a multiplier (deal a % of the original's damage). I actually kind of want to ready my rotation for it, rather than it have the same effect on a Hard Slash as on a Bloodspiller. I don't think either way would be particularly crit-dependent, as it's spread out over multiple hits anyways, rather than being, itself, a Shadowbringer or Sonic Break.

Granted, right now we don't really have any way to influence where we'd be in our rotation per 2 minutes, but especially if we were to eventually get some influence over that, I'd like to see that sync be rewarded.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

that crit variability is the exact reason why SE wouldn't add it and why many would be against it. It would be nice to have when it procs but since it directly contributes to dps which is unfortunately all that matters unfortunately, not getting it would outweigh the feeling of actually getting it. It's a neat idea, but they would sooner just make syphon give 1000mp instead of 600mp passively in the form of a trait.

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I figure some people wouldn't like it but I don't think it'd be entirely out of the realm of possibility for Square to add, especially when we already have classes whose gameplay is based around RNG procs (BRD, DNC, RDM). Given that I think it'd be okay to add it in a more minor form to DRK. Thinking about it though it'd probably be better with a flat percent chance.

Thinking of trying out Dark Knight for the story, how hard is it? I heard it has a lot of buttons to keep track off and has less survivability compared to Warrior (which is my first tank to level 50)

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Originally Posted by Styrmwyda

Thinking of trying out Dark Knight for the story, how hard is it? I heard it has a lot of buttons to keep track off and has less survivability compared to Warrior (which is my first tank to level 50)

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DRK's main survival tool, The Blackest Night, isn't obtained until level 70. I admit, it's somewhat difficult to survive prior to that. Not a problem if you're doing beast tribes mind you, and of course the job story instances are tuned to DRK, so you don't have to worry too much there.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Sidenote: I think an even stronger constraint that could be worth waiting for, though, is what ought to be done for tanking as an entire role -- and not just in the sense of contextual gameplay (pre-positioning bosses, coordinating mitigation CDs back and forth with one's cotank, etc.) or bloated systems like our former Enmity "management". There's tons more that each tank job could enjoyably include... if the role were so permitted.

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I want to return to this point in particular, especially the enmity management portion.

I've thought on and off extensively over this particular point of discussion, and nothing I could possibly come up with would help tanking as an entire role that wouldn't be considered either streamlining or bad, seemingly pointless homogenization that would mostly be used in dungeons, rendering it niche and just overall not helping tanks mechanically.

Henceforth, I return to and look to the enmity management. No, this doesn't mean make it a hindrance and reliant on the entire party's cooperation. I have spoken about this method before, but this would be personal enmity management. I still refer to this as possibly one of the better and easier things to implement as enmity is baked into the game.

So, this is how it would work:

1) The simple modifications first

• Tank Stance is changed to already be baked in. No turning it on, no worrying about having to reapply it after being synced down. You just get it naturally.
• Our former DPS stances make a return. GNB is given it's own variant as it was added when they were "removed".

2) How it actually functions. You may be able to see where I'm going with this from the prior changes

• Enmity Generation is about 25-50% of what it is now.
• Activating dps stance reduces your enmity generation to that of our generation without tank stance on currently.
• We get our Enmity Combo finishers back. However, they are NOT a seperate action.
• The dps combo finisher gets roughly 30-60 higher potency than the enmity combo. This does NOT mean the enmity combo has the same potency as our current 1-2-3 combo does. It means it's lower.
• The enmity combo finisher is what we have without DPS stance on. It gives bonus enmity, obviously.

  PLD -> Rage of Halone
  WAR -> Butcher's Block
  DRK -> Power Slash
  GNB -> ???

• With DPS stance on, we have our current combo finishers. These finishers Replace the Enmity combo finisher upon activating DPS stance. this is to prevent attempts of staying in dps stance for an entire fight, if being relegated to attempting to hold aggro off of pure dps wasn't dissuasive enough.

  PLD -> Royal Authority
  WAR -> Storm's Path
  DRK -> Souleater
  GNB -> Solid Barrel

This, I feel, leaves a comfortable skill floor, as you can just stay in tank stance if you so want to, with a high skill ceiling for people who want to go for that extra. As there could be optimizations as main tanking with provoke during dps stance. You aren't using say, just one Power Slash and holding aggro reliably for that higher dps gain during DPS stance. The enmity management is also solely on the tank themselves, not everyone else needing chip in and use diversion/lucid at the start of a pull or otherwise.

It could also be said that dps stance should have a cooldown to prevent just using one enmity combo then hitting Darkside for example, but I'm on the fence about that in particular.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

enmity management.

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A few points, not necessarily in any cohesive form:

If the difference between having an enmity stance vs. a potency stance is simply which finisher you use...

1. It feels unnecessarily punishing to opening enmity (on our combo openers, oGCDs, and ranged attacks) and AoE enmity generation, since you penalize the whole of enmity generation by 50-75% just to buy it back with only a singular single-target skill per job.
   
   
2. In that case, why not simply offer the alternate finisher freely, a la the difference between Storm's Eye, Storm's Path, and Butcher's Block if each fed from Maim?

3. Moreover, though, what is the intended goal of this system?

While the old Defensive/Offensives stances at least also allowed for an extra degree of fall-back safety against mechanics and tankbusters, this would leave only the old game of "How tightly can I barely outpace, up to the end of the fight, the enmity my team has generated?"

Unless something about Enmity itself has changed or encounters bring in ways with mess with it, now that you have removed the opportunity cost across actions other than the combo finisher, there's also nothing left to game while managing that enmity -- no complicating factors beyond whether someone would overtake enmity on the particular target within 3 GCDs (with PLD and GNB being uniquely disadvantaged). There's no difference, even, in what to use raid buffs on, as increasing the damage of an Enmity Finisher would mean that many fewer Enmity Finishers required overall, thus winning back that damage, regardless, so long as one still manages to let their excess Enmity on the given enemy be trimmed away before its death.

Countersuggestions coming on edit.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

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1) The main reason why the enmity generation would be nerfed so hard is because we currently generate way more than we know what to do with currently. I personally wouldn't want to go lower than half of current. If we kept it with my changes in mind, there is a chance we could have a repeat of just constantly being in dps stance and pushing as much as possible that way. Which bring up the question of why even bother have the enmity finisher to begin with? I don't know if there's a cap on how much enmity can be held, but if there is one, it could potentially solve an issue here.

Another point is that the aoe for tanks have been a long process, being that in shadowbringers we finally got a 2-part combo, and Paladin got total eclipse in stormblood. The bonus enmity could also be something that's slapped onto the aoe combo, but the primary reason for the single target finisher in particular having the bonus enmity is to make accessing a reliable burst window in DPS stance faster.

2) I would like to make the finishers separate, but it's more to avoid not using the finisher in itself in turn for more dps. Which, aside of dps stances being removed, is very likely the reason why the enmity combos were removed to begin with. (They could just as easily have kept those in place of the dps combos and just transferred the mp/hp restore to those, though). The other reason is bloat, but that could be resolved in a number of ways which would make having them separate much, much less of a problem.

3) The overarching goal of it is for something for us to pay attention to and monitor, especially in downtime between bursts. To keep the current low skill floor and make the skill ceiling higher.

We would actually have some use for provoke while main-tanking. It's there as a crutch in case you really need it, but not something you would want to resort to. We would still have shirk for tank swaps, so ideally you would want to stay in second in the aggro meter, not too different to now, or it has ever, been.

The only real way to completely prevent just barely staying above the party in dps is to make dps stance have a cooldown, which at that point really isn't really fixing what I'm trying to solve.

Another thing I had in mind was for us to keep our current high enmity generation and to make it gradually wear off while in dps stance, which might sound more appealing. When I think about it, though, it sound like it would be a mess to deal with in any content that requires two tanks, and would probably lead to people complaining about not being able to use, say, souleater while main-tanking.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

This, I feel, leaves a comfortable skill floor, as you can just stay in tank stance if you so want to, with a high skill ceiling for people who want to go for that extra. As there could be optimizations as main tanking with provoke during dps stance. You aren't using say, just one Power Slash and holding aggro reliably for that higher dps gain during DPS stance. The enmity management is also solely on the tank themselves, not everyone else needing chip in and use diversion/lucid at the start of a pull or otherwise.

It could also be said that dps stance should have a cooldown to prevent just using one enmity combo then hitting Darkside for example, but I'm on the fence about that in particular.

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This is the primary reason they removed enmity management in the first place. Nervous and inexperienced tanks wouldn't touch their DPS stance, thus dealing significantly less damage for no discernable benefit. Even with your suggested aggro generation thresholds, you'd still tank almost exclusively in your DPS stance because 25-50% higher than everyone else adds up quickly. Not to mention, Provoke + Shirk would allow tank to walk that line even longer. The end result is a return to the old days which very few players found engaging. Enmity simply isn't an interesting mechanic because it's entirely binary. What you're describing isn't really a skill ceiling but more playing correctly and playing incorrectly. Siting in tank stance is objectively wrong because there's no tangible benefit to doing so.

Another issue is the opener, especially nowadays in this burst centric meta the devs have insisted upon. One tank essentially sacrifices massive amounts of DPS because they have to open with their stance. I can all but guarantee PF would be a complete mess with tanks fighting who has to "main tank." Which brings up yet another potential problem. If tanks couldn't simply Provoke and Shirk each other but actually had to turn on stance occasionally, one tank will be essentially taking a giant L for most of the encounter. Take a fight like Hegemone. You can go over half the fight without needing to swap once after the initial Synergy depending on RNG. So now you have a scenario where one tank is having to give up damage because of an arbitrary aggro system that is neither interesting nor rewarding.

At the end of the day, aggro management simply isn't a rewarding system. It actively punishes the player without providing any sort of benefit.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

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It's just the first thing I come back to when I try to think of what can be done with tanking as an actual role, since we already had it in the past and was something I actually liked. My obvious bias is obvious.

That said, I really am trying to wrap my head around what actually can be done given the current iteration, and I can't help but feel like the answer directly related to how the tank jobs are designed themselves.

I've thought of debuffs coming from your aoe/ST, buffs to yourself from them, etc. Which essentially is just storms eye or what flash/Dark Passenger were. This also would imply bosses would be allowed to have these debuffs, which is incredibly unlikely I imagine.

Say...

DRK:
Salted Earth gets its pvp variant. It pulls mobs to you
Dark Passenger comes back as an upgrade to Flood of Shadow when TBN pops. Edge gets an ability that does the same. They both apply blind and it also applies to bosses.

WAR:
Storm's Eye remains the same
Orogeny/Upheavel increase the potency of your next fell cleave/Decimate by X and gives a vulnerability debuff to the mob(s) hit by them.

Those are just examples though, and are more interactive and passives we really don't need to pay attention to, as we would be using them anyway. Which solves almost nothing.

Draw-in and knockback effects on jobs were fairly common on jobs prior to Stormblood. They were removed because bosses need to be stationary to perform actions and large forced movements can cancel even uninterruptable actions.

If you want tanking to be more interesting, you just need to have tanks position bosses. On any fight where you don't do this melee is significantly more fun.

With us being past the midpoint of this expansion, has anyone given any thought to what the next three DRK actions should be into level 100?

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Originally Posted by Lyth

With us being past the midpoint of this expansion, has anyone given any thought to what the next three DRK actions should be into level 100?

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Additions:
-> Scourge: [ Weapon Skill ] Deal damage with a potency of 700. 1 minute CD, reduced by SkS.
-> Sole Survivor: [ Ability ] Marks target and all nearby enemies with "Another Victim" debuff. 120 sec CD.
"Another victim" : Dealing damage to this unit will heal the DRK who applied this mark for a potency of 200 per attack. 15 second duration. Attacks hitting multiple enemies do not multiply the effect.
-> Enhanced Living Shadow III: [ Passive ] Upgrades your simulacrum to merge with you, increasing the potency of all your attacks by 350 for 20 seconds. ( insert Reaper Enshroud kind of effect but for Dark Knight )
-> Enhanced Dark Arts: [ Passive ] Dark Arts adds a healing effect to Flood or Edge of Shadow.

Changes to existing abilities:
-> Dark Mind upgrades into Oblation. Dark Mind grants 10% magical, 10% damage reduction. Oblation increases the magical damage reduction to 20%, works on 2 charges, 45 sec CD / charge.
-> Dark Missionary moved to lvl 70.
-> Bloodspiller combos into another 2 new attacks, Bloodspiller consumes 25 blood, and the 2 new attacks 25 blood each. Delirium allows the execution of this combo for free.

Additions:
GCD attack, uses blood but has a long cooldown - essentially upheaval from before it was cooldown only, but on the gcd so it's not yet more carpal tunnel
Something that consumes darkside
Something to generate 15 or 25 blood so it doesn't feel like it's a gauge that goes to 10.

Other changes:
Removal of living shadow
Removal of stalwart soul, abyssal drain being given a sensible cooldown and mp cost. Aoe now revolves around mp generation to fuel abyssal drain's sustain.

What I expect:
Living shadow potency buff
Yet another oGCD to fit under burst
Enhanced plunge reducing the cooldown on provoke by 5s
A brand new duration based buff that makes all spells free for the duration requiring weird sps melds to make the most of.

Honestly anything to make it feel more coherent and less like it's throwing the kitchen sink every other minute and comatose the rest of the time.

I'd be impressed if they could add new abilities without a bunch of upgrades and buttons that transform into other buttons, and that would probably still bloat the already bloated opener unless they focus on GCDs. I'm gonna tangent to that particular point, I think they could alleviate a bit in a few ways

- Take damage off Plunge
- Make CnS a GCD
- Remove Salt and Darkness, I honestly can't imagine anyone would miss it

I like having a ton of oGCDs for DRK, I think it's a cool part of its playstyle, but there's a point where it's too much unless they find a way to more evenly spread out DRK's APM rather than having it all happen in a 15-second period every two minutes.

No idea as far as new abilities go for 7.0, I imagine they'll play it pretty safe.

now that goring blade is no longer a combo finisher, WAR is literally the only tank with a branching combo, and this gives me a tiny bit of hopium that they are planning to give DRK another combo finisher so the amount of tanks with branching combos and only a basic 1-2-3 combo is even.

I don't think having a second combo finisher gonna fix everything wrong with current DRK's playstyle, but is still better than getting another random oGCD to press every 2 mins that doesn't interact with the rest of the kit whatsoever.

but knowing SE, they are probably just planning to remove Storm's eye from WAR :,)

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Originally Posted by Zairava

1) The main reason why the enmity generation would be nerfed so hard is because we currently generate way more than we know what to do with currently.

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I agree that, if you want to make anything approaching gameplay out of Enmity, the current Enmity modifiers are excessive, but you still need to account for initial enmity grab and for AoE. That's why we originally had further enmity modifiers on Unleash (while spammable GCD Abyssal Drain did not), Flash (Total Eclipse did not), Overpower, etc., alongside Shield Lob, Unmend, and Tomahawk. If you want to put added stress on Tank Enmity, you'd also need to put back in those modifiers.

Or, put more simply, you'd be better off investing little to no Enmity above what is proportionate to potency dealt into finishers, because you'd no longer have the tank stance affect the GCDs prior to those finishers to, albeit at DPS-cost, cover those low-Enmity GCDs.

In that regard, the old tank stances would appear to me to work much better than what you suggest here, but at minimum, you'd need to push the enmity budget nearer to opening GCDs, with a Damage Finisher likely doing no greater enmity than an opener and a Enmity finisher still doing only, say, 2x an opener, as not to only ever secure Enmity in the 3rd GCD (and only on one target, at that). As such, the practical constraints would then make those differences in Enmity between the Enmity Finisher and the Damage Finisher seem rather lackluster.

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2) I would like to make the finishers separate, but it's more to avoid not using the finisher in itself in turn for more dps.

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Right, but you'd be doing that anyways, just via a more convoluted route (hitting 1-2-[DPS-Stance]3[Stance-Off] instead of 1-2-4 for one's alternative combo).

Put a CD on the DPS stance and it becomes 123-12[S]3, then turning the stance off as soon as possible, and activating it again just before the next Finisher. But I still don't really see the gameplay value there.

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3) The overarching goal of it is for something for us to pay attention to and monitor, especially in downtime between bursts. To keep the current low skill floor and make the skill ceiling higher.

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Okay, but...

A. You don't actually need to pay attention to it until nearing the end of the fight, so long as you're not being absurdly excessive in Enmity generated. Any extra Enmity from raid buffs, since that Enmity allows for more Damage Finishers (instead of Enmity Finishers) is just going to turn equally into damage as well, so long as enough TTK remains. The only complexity there is that you simply only ever swap to tank stance just before the finisher, and try never to swap in before unloading resources (Gnashing Fang, oGCDs, Bloodspillers, Conf combo, etc.), because it punishes you on all GCDs while only rewarding you on a single action.

B. Is that margining really... satisfying? If there's one thing most players have been least annoyed to lose (and the greatest number of players happy to lose), it's been any pure maintenance mechanics. Thus far your system is effectively just an extra combo finisher, but it appears to be used in among the least nuance-capable and knowledge-rewarding ways possible. Old Storm's Eye would add a rhythmic anchor, but this one --worse even than stacking up to twice-- would stack infinitely. A DoT combo like old Goring Blade, for instance, at least adds a rhythmic anchor and varies its use over target count (at least til 3+), but this instead faces only anti-synergy, especially as DPS start using AoEs instead. Perhaps consider what else that extra GCD or finisher option might be used for instead, and what gameplay those alternatives could provide?

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Originally Posted by Lyth

With us being past the midpoint of this expansion, has anyone given any thought to what the next three DRK actions should be into level 100?

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• Scourge on either a 30 or 60s CD (30s preferably).
• Sole Survivor: instead of upon the enemy dying though, just make it so it gives us some hp equal to a 200/300 potency heal upon hitting them.
• Living Shadow getting a passive that makes it merge with you upon activation, increasing damage dealt by 10% or so.

As for changes to existing ones:

• Dark Mind turning into Oblation. Fusing the magical and overall damage mit, adjusting as needed.
• Remove Salt and Darkness.
• Reduce Shadowbringer to one use, remaining on a 60s cd.
• Give Bloodspiller combo actions upon using Delirium.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

With us being past the midpoint of this expansion, has anyone given any thought to what the next three DRK actions should be into level 100?

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If we assume there are no significant changes to overall combat system, what I would like is

Additions -
Return of Sole Survivor - I like the idea of keeping old heal/MP restore on kill, but changing the persistent effect from heal at the end of the duration, to some sort of over time effect. Whether that's heal on hit, or simply heal over time as long as the debuff is active.
Some sort of additional spender for blood - probably on CD (30s?), cost 25 Blood?
Low level variant of TBN

Changes -
Salted Earth with 45s CD, Salt and Darkness restores 600 MP and 25 Blood < traited at 90+
Merge Oblation into TBN at 82, increase TBN duration to 10 or 12s, TBN gets Oblation VFX/SFX
CnS becomes a GCD with 60s CD, restores 1500 MP and 25 Blood < resources restore is a trait
Abyssal Drain gets 510 single target potency with 60% AoE falloff, 600-800 cure potency on first target and 200 for any targets beyond it
For the sake of limiting number of active buttons, Bloodspiller and Quietus become one button with AoE falloff and new animation
Obviously potencies are rebalanced as necessary.

Net effect should be no additional oGCDs in 2min windows, but the monotony of the downtime should be broken up by the new blood spender, Salted Earth, and extra resources from S&D and CnS.

Mind, this is coming from the perspective of someone who mostly enjoys the current gameplay, just thinking downtime could use extra oompf

The cure potency for Living Dead should be buffed slightly. Just enough so that a Dark Knight can heal themselves, without receiving healing from other party members, within 3 GCDs on a single target. Normally a Dark Knight heals themselves with just 4 GCDs under Living Dead. However, if their GCD is slow(such as a 2.5 GCD or near that) and Walking Dead procs right after their GCD cooldown starts, the bad timing can make it so they can only get 3 GCDs under Walking Dead. If all 3 of those GCDs don't critical hit and roll low for variance, the Dark Knight can die while near the HP restoration requirement. This is a rare case and can never happen if you just give the Dark Knight any slight amount of healing. However, I assume the last Living Dead change was to eliminate any need for healing assistance from other party members.

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Originally Posted by nguyentri11

The cure potency for Living Dead should be buffed slightly. Just enough so that a Dark Knight can heal themselves, without receiving healing from other party members, within 3 GCDs on a single target. Normally a Dark Knight heals themselves with just 4 GCDs under Living Dead. However, if their GCD is slow(such as a 2.5 GCD or near that) and Walking Dead procs right after their GCD cooldown starts, the bad timing can make it so they can only get 3 GCDs under Walking Dead. If all 3 of those GCDs don't critical hit and roll low for variance, the Dark Knight can die while near the HP restoration requirement. This is a rare case and can never happen if you just give the Dark Knight any slight amount of healing. However, I assume the last Living Dead change was to eliminate any need for healing assistance from other party members.

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Thing is though, if we had any form of consistent viable single-target sustain, this wouldn't be as big an issue

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Originally Posted by Zairava

Sole Survivor: instead of upon the enemy dying though, just make it so it gives us some hp equal to a 200/300 potency heal upon hitting them.

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and since i forgot to mention it, ideally this would be on either a 12s duration or 5 stack system

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Originally Posted by Zairava

Thing is though, if we had any form of consistent viable single-target sustain, this wouldn't be as big an issue

and since i forgot to mention it, ideally this would be on either a 12s duration or 5 stack system

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Sorry to intrude, but couldn't we do this just by having Abyssal Drain (also) apply a duration (say, 12s) of Leech effect (the debuffer heals for a % of their damage dealt)? Once applied, it wouldn't matter if that's ST or AoE damage, and the gap in our damage dealt in ST vs. AoE is far smaller than the gap currently possessed between our 'burst' AoE sustain and our 'burst' (if we can at all call it that) ST sustain.

Having a shorter-but-burstier Bloodbath on demand, especially if on two charges each on a 40s CD, could be a huge and versatile boon to sustain.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Sorry to intrude, but couldn't we do this just by having Abyssal Drain (also) apply a duration (say, 12s) of Leech effect (the debuffer heals for a % of their damage dealt)? Once applied, it wouldn't matter if that's ST or AoE damage, and the gap in our damage dealt in ST vs. AoE is far smaller than the gap currently possessed between our 'burst' AoE sustain and our 'burst' (if we can at all call it that) ST sustain.

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That is an option, yeah, and considering it would keep us with another button slot, probably the preferred one.

Assuming this means it is separated from Carve and Spit, having read something about this in the past...couldn't we also tack salted earth as an added effect to Abyssal Drain to prevent the already overbloated burst? (this is assuming they double down even further and don't reduce the OGCD chaos during our opener and 2-m bursts)

This is to say that upon activating Abyssal Drain, it would form the bubble around the mob it hits directly.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

That is an option, yeah, and considering it would keep us with another button slot, probably the preferred one.

Assuming this means it is separated from Carve and Spit, having read something about this in the past...

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I was going to keep them together, personally, and just have CnS do the same or similar. I like the idea of CnS thematically divying up the opponent's soul or the like, but in the end that's a matter of whether it's worth the extra button to give DRK more choice and less overlap between ST and AoE (from both Salted Earth and an Abyssal-CnS hybrid) and/or to add an additional button (not necessarily an addition button-press) to its burst button-flow.

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couldn't we also tack salted earth as an added effect to Abyssal Drain to prevent the already overbloated burst

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I would not recommend that. They're different targeting procedures, and though there aren't many unique advantages to ground-targeting these days, the more we trim on the basis that it's not especially handy just right now (rather than just un-nerfing macros and/or allowing for more direct manipulation of targeting procedures), the more we end up devaluing varied contexts, too.

Moreover, if by bloat we're referring to the number of actions over a 20s raid buff, I feel that's something we can and should deal with ahead of time and independently of button-consolidation, as per the means we've discussed before (giving the other oGCDs MP costs and then raising MP generation per minute, thereby raising DRK's apm over its lulls between bursts).

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I was going to keep them together, personally, and just have CnS do the same or similar. I like the idea of CnS thematically divying up the opponent's soul or the like, but in the end that's a matter of whether it's worth the extra button to give DRK more choice and less overlap between ST and AoE (from both Salted Earth and an Abyssal-CnS hybrid) and/or to add an additional button (not necessarily an addition button-press) to its burst button-flow.

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I would be for this as well. Remember my earlier concepts with a status called "Bathed in Blood"? Well, this could be that.

Both Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain could give that status to you, and every time you land an attack it you heal for a percentage of, or equal to, the damage dealt.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I would not recommend that. They're different targeting procedures, and though there aren't many unique advantages to ground-targeting these days, the more we trim on the basis that it's not especially handy just right now (rather than just un-nerfing macros and/or allowing for more direct manipulation of targeting procedures), the more we end up devaluing varied contexts, too.

Moreover, if by bloat we're referring to the number of actions over a 20s raid buff, I feel that's something we can and should deal with ahead of time and independently of button-consolidation, as per the means we've discussed before (giving the other oGCDs MP costs and then raising MP generation per minute, thereby raising DRK's apm over its lulls between bursts).

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Yeah I'm not for the abyssal->salted spitball myself. I would much rather we give the other OGCD's mp costs as we discussed in the past.

Though, this still doesn't remove that I would like something done with salted earth. Even just getting the gauge generation back would be sufficient imo.

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Originally Posted by Zairava

I would be for this as well. Remember my earlier concepts with a status called "Bathed in Blood"? Well, this could be that.

Both Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain could give that status to you, and every time you land an attack it you heal for a percentage of, or equal to, the damage dealt.

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Yup, and while potentially a bit more "tacked-on" a solution, it'd also be the least vulnerable, as it wouldn't depend on the affected enemies' TTK exceeding the (de)buff's duration.

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Though, this still doesn't remove that I would like something done with salted earth.

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Same. Though, I'm not a huge fan of gauge generation being that "something," especially if we were to, say, reduce the Blood cost of Bloodspiller/Quietus already down to 40 (so we could actually have as many natural casts as those provided by Delirium).

(I'd rather Delirium feel like the compliment than the bulk of our gauge spenders, and while Salted Earth could add to those non-Delirium casts, I imagine the two would feel rather fused in their minute-to-minute gating of the gauge, all while --relative to just reducing the BS/Quietus costs-- making Bloodspiller feel far less bankable than what an extra combo's worth of storage could provide and Souleater/Stalwart feel less rewarding. And, of course, if we did both, then we're starting to push into redundancy.)

:: Personally, there's a ton I want to do with DRK that would, sadly, require a context in which utility is actually wanted/rewarded (think more Mythic+ esque, but without the numerous problems/bloat/constraints of surrounding systems). I feel like DRK should be the "cunning, tricky bastard" tank, after all.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Same. Though, I'm not a huge fan of gauge generation being that "something," especially if we were to, say, reduce the Blood cost of Bloodspiller/Quietus already down to 40 (so we could actually have as many natural casts as those provided by Delirium).

(I'd rather Delirium feel like the compliment than the bulk of our gauge spenders, and while Salted Earth could add to those non-Delirium casts, I imagine the two would feel rather fused in their minute-to-minute gating of the gauge, all while --relative to just reducing the BS/Quietus costs-- making Bloodspiller feel far less bankable than what an extra combo's worth of storage could provide and Souleater/Stalwart feel less rewarding. And, of course, if we did both, then we're starting to push into redundancy.)

:: Personally, there's a ton I want to do with DRK that would, sadly, require a context in which utility is actually wanted/rewarded (think more Mythic+ esque, but without the numerous problems/bloat/constraints of surrounding systems). I feel like DRK should be the "cunning, tricky bastard" tank, after all.

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If I were to go off my personal wants I would just slap the pvp version of Salted Earth into pve. Though, the draw-in wouldn't work on bosses and that's fine (I would much rather have more bosses be stunnable anyway, which isn't going to happen either) More interruptible casts would be great, but that trails into tanking as an entire role.

Delirium is a bit rough for me, at least creatively. Outside of Heavensward it's been used mostly for burst damage, Shadowbringers onward just feels like taking the easiest but efficient route. At the very least I would have preferred if it gave a combo off of Bloodspiller, but I'm starting to wonder if it just gave 50 gauge and upgraded Bloodspiller to Scourge at [high potency] instead of giving an entire combo if it would be better. Bloodspiller is definitely more satisfying when not spammed every 60s into oblivion is something I've come to realize. So just using it during burst downtime would feel better imo

Anyway, Dark Knight feels to me like it should be the "by any means necessary" tank, especially due in part to the story. Going ape-shit and embracing that rather than controlling it like WAR.

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Originally Posted by nguyentri11

The cure potency for Living Dead should be buffed slightly. Just enough so that a Dark Knight can heal themselves, without receiving healing from other party members, within 3 GCDs on a single target. Normally a Dark Knight heals themselves with just 4 GCDs under Living Dead. However, if their GCD is slow(such as a 2.5 GCD or near that) and Walking Dead procs right after their GCD cooldown starts, the bad timing can make it so they can only get 3 GCDs under Walking Dead. If all 3 of those GCDs don't critical hit and roll low for variance, the Dark Knight can die while near the HP restoration requirement. This is a rare case and can never happen if you just give the Dark Knight any slight amount of healing. However, I assume the last Living Dead change was to eliminate any need for healing assistance from other party members.

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since they fixed living dead i haven't once died to it

I like DRK... as a damage dealer. As a tank less so.

The main reason why is because it deals good damage for a tank with really no self sustain to match it. People usually say the reason why DRK doesn't have self sustain is because of its damage output but I disagree. Just look at GNB that does as much if not more with so much self sustain for yourself and/or a party member.

• I'd really like to see Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain get separated again. I don't understand why they were combined in the first place
• I think LD is at an ok spot for the healing it gives; however I think you should be allowed to heal yourself the ENTIRE way through and not lose your only regen when you were just at death's door. It doesn't feel good helping the healers out with your hp a bit only to suddenly lose that because you hit the cap in the first couple of seconds with healers also healing you
• Living Shadow. I like the look but... it's just a glorified DoT. I'd like to see... idk something unique with Living Shadow (more below)

My idea for Living Shadow would be of a similar nature to Dancer's steps. I think it'd be really neat where instead of living shadow doing it's own thing it literally copies you like a shadow. You get a bar while it's out and you perform your attacks as normal. It copies those attacks with the same (or more likely less) potency. HOWEVER, when that bar fills? Bam. Synergy attack with your living shadow.

Just spitballing what it could look like here but imagine you raising your greatsword and the living shadow performs a "Shadowbringer" attack and gets absorbed into your greatsword. Your greatsword becomes much bigger with the the classic "dark" look DRK has (that sorta black with dark red and hints of purple). You SLAM that thing down onto the enemy and your shadow dislodges flying up and performing a final greatsword stab, before dissipating.

I think that'd be really cool. At least better than what we have right now.

Doing something with Sole Survivor next expansion is interesting, as ItsUrBoi suggested. It could be implemented as a single target lifesteal-over-time effect as per Vallerie's post. It could give you something extra on mob death.

On that subject, given the Expiacion upgrade on PLD, I think that they might merge down Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain into a single new animation that unifies both effects now that they share a cooldown. For example:

Abyssal Strike: Three-fold attack that deals unaspected damage to target and all nearby targets nearby it.
Additional Effect: Grants Sole Survivor and inflicts Scourge
Scourge: Damage over time. If target dies under this effect, restores your HP.
Sole Survivor: Restores HP over time to player.

I can understand why people preferred those actions to be separated, but it was likely done as an emergency measure to try and make the oGCDs more manageable during burst. That's also why Salted was deliberately moved to 90 seconds. I don't think this would be reverted, but the two effects should be more consistent across single target and AoE. It seems strange that you have self-sustain in one situation but not the other.

I'd agree with fulminating and Amira's point that DRK really needs a new GCD. An additional combo action, either branching off of the main combo or off of Bloodspiller could be a way of adding a bit more variety to the GCD gameplay, as Zairava suggested. I think this is an important way of making downtime more interesting outside of burst, which is definitely a problem.

I think all tanks could use a second look at their mobility tools, given some of the fantastic additions to melee this expansion. Taking the damage off Plunge like baklava suggested is one way to do this, but there are other types of movement abilities as well. I'm personally a fan of fixed distance movement abilities, like you see on DNC or RPR.

The idea of merging with your shadow as Zairava suggested is an interesting idea. What I think is more likely is that we may see a finisher (sequence?) based around Living Shadow, as ataren provided some examples. It would be fun to see Omnislash and Lionheart show up as level 100 actions.