A new tank stance to fit Dark Knight better

I've posted this idea on another topic, but I think its interesting enough to not be lost upon several others ideas :

I'd like to see Grit changed to be more unique and fit DRK lore.
After all "Shield Oath" is pretty logic. Paladins focus on their shield to reduce damage. "Defiance" ? Sheer HP, pretty much the thing of WAR too.
Why should "Grit" reduce damage taken ?

For me Grit should be closer to "Dread Spikes". Yes, I know "this is not FFXI", I'm frequently one to remind others of this fact, but look at our skills. Leech HP this, leech MP that, etc...
So a Dread Spikes effect that would retaliate 20% of damage taken and heal you for that amount. Basically, as long as you're not one shotted, you only suffer 80% of the damage. Roughly the same as other tanks, but with a unique feel to it.

With that, DRK's potency should be lowered. Yes, you read that right, decreasing DRK's potency. Why ? Because retaliating 20% will allow him to "burst" on every tankbuster. Seeing recent numbers, keep in mind that any tank can do hits that surpass 20% of their HP every minute or so. Of course, mitigating damage will reduce damage taken (duh) thus reducing retaliation.

This would bring a unique meta to DRK : "Ok, I'm full HP, I have Stoneskin and Adloquium, I can take this hit without a cooldown"
Or "I'm passed the HP threshold, should I pack more vitality to need less mitigation and retaliate more, or should I pack strength to do more damage by myself ?"

Except the 20% retaliation on damage, I'm not throwing any new numbers because it would require a lot of calculation to be balanced.

I know there's a little chance to see a core mechanic of DRK being changed, but, maybe if enough people love it, it can get some attention ;)

Nope, not a fan. While the HP refund might sound as good as a standard 20% mitigation, those blows that do end up hitting extremely hard will make you suffer for it. DRK already has a lot of difficulty with tankbusters as it is, this would only drive the knife deeper. Furthermore, multiple attacks that hit before the next server tick will end up absolutely gutting you, as the lack of mitigation could end up killing you before the server decides to actually refund your HP.

Addressing the other side of this idea, by automating a good portion of DRK damage, you end up getting rid of a lot of the complexity that makes the job interesting in the first place. Now, if you were to incorporate something like this into a vengeance-like cooldown, I could roll with that, but as a full on replacement to our tanking stance, this is just bad.

While there's certainly room to make DRK's tanking stance differentiated from PLD's, this is definitely not a method that I would encourage.

You lost me as soon as you said "retaliate 20% of damage taken" most people will read that and go "Oh I need to get hit by everything so I can maximise DPS! that makes me MLGPro"

So really what you are saying is you want DKs to be known as the tank that stands in every AoE that doesn't one shot them and to rage at SCH/AST for using all their healing abilities because shields will reduce their DPS by absorbing damage before it hits them and that's just in 4-mans.

I know that's not what you mean but I would be willing to bet that would end up being the case.

And in terms of "lore" isn't grit meant to be all "I will not die to you" kinda thing so mind over matter type deal? "grit - courage and resolve; strength of character."

Add an Incress to parry while in grit nuf said.

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Originally Posted by Dererk

Add an Incress to parry while in grit nuf said.

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This is a good addition, considering Dark Knights have no shield having more parries to compensate would be great. Especially considering their damage debuff depends on getting a parry first.

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Originally Posted by PotatoWafflez

You lost me as soon as you said "retaliate 20% of damage taken" most people will read that and go "Oh I need to get hit by everything so I can maximise DPS! that makes me MLGPro"

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Any tank who say "I have to maximize DPS above all" is already a bad tank.

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Originally Posted by PotatoWafflez

So really what you are saying is you want DKs to be known as the tank that stands in every AoE that doesn't one shot them and to rage at SCH/AST for using all their healing abilities because shields will reduce their DPS by absorbing damage before it hits them and that's just in 4-mans.

I know that's not what you mean but I would be willing to bet that would end up being the case.

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Ok, I don't understand. Why do everyone keep saying "No, it's a bad idea because people will be bad at it" ?

Do you want to remove Sword Oath because some bad PLD can say "I have to maximize DPS, I don't care it I take too much damage and can't keep aggro on the Uber-DPS" ?
Or Cleric Stance, because some bad healers might want to keep it 24/7 ?

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Originally Posted by PotatoWafflez

And in terms of "lore" isn't grit meant to be all "I will not die to you" kinda thing so mind over matter type deal? "grit - courage and resolve; strength of character."

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Lorewise, the first thing you learn on your first quest is that "pain gives you power, you have to manage your pain so that you doesn't end up killing yourself in your thirst for power" It'd become the basic tutorial of managing Dread Spikes :p
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Originally Posted by Kiteless

Nope, not a fan. While the HP refund might sound as good as a standard 20% mitigation, those blows that do end up hitting extremely hard will make you suffer for it.

DRK already has a lot of difficulty with tankbusters as it is, this would only drive the knife deeper.

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Unless the hit eats all your HP, you're good to go. And if its one-shot, it's either "You didn't use a cooldown to reduce incoming where you should have" or "You clearly lack the gear to stand there, how did you even enter the duty ?!"

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Originally Posted by Kiteless

Furthermore, multiple attacks that hit before the next server tick will end up absolutely gutting you, as the lack of mitigation could end up killing you before the server decides to actually refund your HP.

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I'm not really sure it works that way. The lag we see is between a client command and a server response "I moved out of that AoE !" "No you didn't"
There, all will be server side, so there's no reason for a delay.

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Originally Posted by Kiteless

Addressing the other side of this idea, by automating a good portion of DRK damage, you end up getting rid of a lot of the complexity that makes the job interesting in the first place.

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I don't think so. You"ll still have Darkside and Dark Arts, still need to manage your MP, and your enmity, especially is you do less damage on you own (Not sure if retaliation adds enmity for Vengeance). But, I'd change Dark Arts so that it doesn't increase potency for Souleater or Carve and Spit, but only enhanced the additionnal effect.
But it would add another layer of complexity : Managing the damage you receive. You'd have to know when it's better to reduce 20% of damage, 30%, or even take all of it with Living Dead. By the way, that skill could be awesome with Dread Spikes. You could take all incoming damage, activate Walking Dead, retalitate 20% and leech HP to give head start on your "healing back all HP".

For the record, I'd cap the retaliation to 20% of DRK's max HP too. No uber counter attack from an 18k Akh Morn :p

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

For me Grit should be closer to "Dread Spikes". Yes, I know "this is not FFXI", I'm frequently one to remind others of this fact, but look at our skills. Leech HP this, leech MP that, etc...
So a Dread Spikes effect that would retaliate 20% of damage taken and heal you for that amount. Basically, as long as you're not one shotted, you only suffer 80% of the damage. Roughly the same as other tanks, but with a unique feel to it.

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Unfortunately the bolded part is where it falls apart. If you have an attack that's going to do 25k damage in the final Alex Raid and both PLD and DRK are hovering around 22k with the equally geared WAR at 26,400 due to Defiance. The only one that is going to die is the DRK. It'll hit the PLD for 20k damage allowing him to survive. It'll hit the WAR for 25k of his 26.5k HP allowing him to survive. It'll hit the DRK for 25k of his 22k HP so the retaliation auto-heal affect would never be applied, he would not survive.

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Originally Posted by Dererk

Add an Incress to parry while in grit nuf said.

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It really is that simple. :)

I'd like to see it grant 20%. That is only a 4% reduction in damage on average, and you cannot parry everything anyways.

I think a change to Reprisal should also be done inconjuntion with that. Increase the Duration to 40s// OR lower the cool down to 20s and increase the duration to 30s. The idea is to be able to keep the debuff up consistantly.
Alternatively, remove the Parry requirement and change it to grant -Xs CD every parry. If X is 2s, then 5 Parrys would reduce the CD to the debuff's Duration.

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Originally Posted by Dement

Unfortunately the bolded part is where it falls apart. If you have an attack that's going to do 25k damage in the final Alex Raid and both PLD and DRK are hovering around 22k with the equally geared WAR at 26,400 due to Defiance. The only one that is going to die is the DRK. It'll hit the PLD for 20k damage allowing him to survive. It'll hit the WAR for 25k of his 26.5k HP allowing him to survive. It'll hit the DRK for 25k of his 22k HP so the retaliation auto-heal affect would never be applied, he would not survive.

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Sorry, but if a hit can do more than you max HP before mitigation, you'll pop a mitigation cooldown anyway, and you'll also probably have Stoneskin, Adloquium and Sacred Soil.
Just look at the actual coil, no tank will stay there just eating the buster without anything.

It's like saying that Shield Oath is bad if you have a Pampa boss with "25k needles" on a PLD with 22k HP and a WAR with 26400.

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Originally Posted by Daerthalus

It really is that simple. :)

I'd like to see it grant 20%. That is only a 4% reduction in damage on average, and you cannot parry everything anyways.

I think a change to Reprisal should also be done inconjuntion with that. Increase the Duration to 40s// OR lower the cool down to 20s and increase the duration to 30s. The idea is to be able to keep the debuff up consistantly.
Alternatively, remove the Parry requirement and change it to grant -Xs CD every parry. If X is 2s, then 5 Parrys would reduce the CD to the debuff's Duration.

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that's good too.

But still MORE PARRY.