Ideas to improve ShB DRK's gameplay (Please SE)

Hello fellow tanks/DRK mains. (And hello Square Enix, if you happen to read this)

Since the media tour embargo has lifted and the highly anticipated DRK rework got revealed, a lot of people including me have expressed their dissatisfaction in the tank forums.

I'm not going to list every issues people have with the incoming iteration of the DRK job here, but I will link you to some posts in other threads in order to summarize it :

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post5000392

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post5002292

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post5000824

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post5002685

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...25#post5004725

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So now let's get to the main topic of this thread. Since we got all these informations, I've been thinking about how the devs could "fix" this rework without spending an eternity on it. I want it to be reasonably achievable within one or two patches after release. I've had multiple ideas, one of which is briefly mentionned in one of the posts above. I'm going to put a little more details on that.

I'm not going to go into potencies; this is very easily adjusted. What I want is more engaging gameplay for the job. Performance is important but it's just changing numbers.

First off we have to make the "maintaining Darkside" idea an actual thing gameplay-wise.

Then we have to implement another combo besides Souleater, because right now ShB DRK's GCD rotation is gonna feel like a WAR without Storm's Eye. Just straight up Path spam with Fell Cleaves here and there outside of Inner Release window.

We can hit two birds with one stone on both of these issues. There is my suggestion :

- Bring Power Slash back as a Darkside extender. Make it combo off of Syphon Strike so that we don't lose MP regen.
- Make EoS/FoS pure damaging MP spenders.

That's a step in the right direction, but that's not enough. It'd just make us change our combo finisher once every 30sec. So I thought about something like that :

- Power Slash should only extend Darkside. Not give it.
- Instead of having Edge/Flood of Darkness automatically upgrade to EoS/FoS at level 74, make them upgrade in-battle through job mechanics.

How do we make that happen ?

- EoD/FoD would give Darkside, but they have the same MP cost and lower potency than EoS/FoS. Going in Darkside would then upgrade them to EoS/FoS, which in exchange don't give Darkside anymore.
- Power Slash would then be used to extend Darkside. Stalwart Soul for AoE rotation (maintaining Darkside being a non-issue in AoE doesn't really matter).

Failing to extend Darkside properly would lead to losing EoS/FoS potencies by forcing us into using EoD/FoD to reapply it on top of losing Darkside's passive bonus damage. It rewards good rotation just like NIN with Huton and Armor Crush.

That's already a lot better. Then just give us Blood Weapon's haste and lower CD back, and change Delirium. Maybe instead of enabling free Bloodspiller spam, enable free EoS spam, that way it's a little different. You'd go GCD > EoS > GCD > EoS > GCD > EoS > GCD > EoS instead of just Bloodspiller five times. Again, potencies can be tweaked, I'm not going into complex DPS calculations.


This first part would be enough to make the job more interesting.
But you know what would be ideal for a lot of DRK mains ?
Getting back the HW feel of the job in some way.

Luckily as of the writing of this I came up with something for that :

Put EoS on a 30s CD, give us Dark Arts back as a button and make our MP regen rate similar to HW's in terms of % per minute (If you have to bring back Darkside's MP drain then do it). No more DA Syphon Strike or DA Plunge.
Only Souleater and Carve & Spit. No spam.

This would bring back the old MP priority system. We used to have that, remember. DA C&S was 350 potency for 1 DA, DP was 150 potency for half a DA, and a DA on SE was worth 140 potency. It led to DA C&S > DP > DASE priority (when it came to single target at least). So every 30 seconds you had to account for the MP needed for DP, and every 60 seconds you had to account for a DA on C&S. The rest of the time you'd just be using DASE to prevent overcapping, but it was far from spammy since we also had the Delirium combo.

In ShB, such a system would then be EoS > DA C&S > DASE. Every 30s you'd have to think about having the MP for an EoS, every 60s for DA C&S, and then you'd use DASE to prevent overcapping.

TBN could stay as it is in the current ShB build. DA could be spent on EoS as well to make it free, on top of having all the other effects.
Delirium would put EoS/FoS on a 2sec cooldown for 10seconds while making it free. Huge oGCD spamming burst window instead of GCD like Inner Release.

We'd still have the Blood meter, Bloodspiller and Living Shadow with all that. You'd then have Darkside, MP and Blood to manage, that way DRK would be the oGCD-heavy resource management tank once again for real. BOOM, job identity bois.


If I was able to come up with that in ten minutes of thinking, then the devs can pull something similar if not better in a month, or even within one or two patches after ShB's release.

Come on Square Enix. Yoshi, please dude. It's not that hard is it ?


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Tank mains, DRK mains, your feedback is appreciated.

Edit : English isn't my first language, I have a pretty good level but my grammar might be somewhat inaccurate sometimes, so sorry if that's the case.

I like a lot of these suggestions and completely agree HW DRK was best DRK. I also really miss Scourge's animation.

Those are a bunch of good ideas, works better on keeping DRK identity that the 5.0 design.

5.0 delirium should die in hell, it's the most lazy rework I saw ever, DRK need more combos and deeper interaction between the skills and stop giving the job brainless mechanics like darkside/delirium.

And no less make dark missionary cover all types of damage and give DRK a self heal that they can rely on.

Yeah I haven't mentionned Dark Mind & Dark Missionary still being magic only, because to me it's not the biggest issue about the job. Don't get me wrong, I think that having damage-type specific defensive CDs is obsolete since they made PLD able to block magic, but I made this thread mainly to address the pure gameplay and job identity aspects of the job, rotation-wise. Tweaking Dark Mind & Missionary is easy and it isn't gonna change how the job plays or feels, it's just gonna make it a better tank.
Same for LD. It deserves some change but it's not gonna make or break the job except if they put it on a 1min CD or some crazy shit like that which obviously won't happen.

Yeah yes I agree, saddly SE don't care much about this kind of threats but I will fully support any gameplay change.

I love all of these changes. Good job! The only thing I caution about is DA on this version of EoS/FoS. It just seems like it would lead to double weaving problems as well as you have to look at MP costs, if EoS is free under DA, is DA more expensive or less expensive then EoS, and if it's less expensive then you always use it before EoS and it could create crazy double weaving problems under delirium. Instead of doing DA this way, I would suggest something like this.

DA is still is a passive buff indicated on the Job gauge, however you gain a DA for maintaining Darkside for 30s giving you a free EoS/FoS. (think enochian and BLM foul)

When the Blackest Night breaks, have it reset the recast timer of EoS/FoS.

In my mind everything would cost the exact same amount of MP just like it is right now. It's what the devs seem to have in mind with DRK so I won't go against that. Dark Arts making EoS/FoS free with my suggestions is just there for it to not conflict with the new TBN breaking effect. They could also make TBN free with 25sec recast and make it so that breaking it doesn't matter anymore but it would be deleting a cool DRK gimmick again (which they've done enough of).

Would DA increase the potency of EoS or just make it free? If it only makes it free there isn't much of a point, because it costs the same.

And if it does +140 potency Delirium would look like this:

GCD -> DA, EoS -> GCD -> DA, EoS -> GCD -> DA, EoS -> depending on how much MP you get back it would continue to double weave the next 2 GCD and if not it would just finish without the DA. That much double weaving during a burst window is super unfriendly to people with high ping.

Additional combo: Power slash combo finisher off of siphon strike. Power slash applies a dot. Dot has a percent chance of triggering dark arts, when darkside is active, which allows a free eos/fos in addition (in addition to TBN procing it).

Raise dark missionary to 20% magic shield or preferably make it 15% all damage shield.

Dark mind back to 30% magic mitigation. (again, like most seem to feel, I would prefer no damage specific mitigation CDs)

LD reworked.

A reliable heal more akin to equilibrium.

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Originally Posted by kashi11

Would DA increase the potency of EoS or just make it free? If it only makes it free there isn't much of a point, because it costs the same.

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The point would be just like it will be with the current ShB DRK that was shown at the media tour. Having Dark Arts proc when TBN breaks in order to refund its cost. Dark Arts making EoS free is the only thing it does right now, with my suggestion it also exists as a skill and has different effects. You wouldn't be manually using DA to have a free EoS because there would be no point like you said, but you'd be using it with the other skills and still have the free EoS proc possible from a TBN breaking, while also being able to use that same proc for a Souleater or a Carve & Spit.

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Originally Posted by Danelo

Power slash combo finisher off of siphon strike. Power slash applies a dot. Dot has a percent chance of triggering dark arts, when dark side is active, which allows a free eos/fos in addition (in addition to TBN procing it).

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Well I thought about the idea of Power Slash just giving us a DoT but it wouldn't help giving an identity to DRK. It'd be a Goring Blade clone. And having a chance to proc DAs with its ticks would make the job very RNG and I don't think we'd like it that much. RNG with Low Blow procs was fine because it was 100 potency, but RNG with a 500 potency proc might be too much.

I think SE is wrapped up in DRK having the identity of "magic tank" and it seems that at least a chunk of the DRK mains aren't okay with that anymore. So in light of that I'm less concerned with identity than I am functionality and engaging gameplay. I may be wrong, not the smartest guy but I've gone two years without identity. I will sacrifice identity for engaging gameplay and functionality considering the leaps we have already made towards homogenization - it's almost total. And considering I don't think SE will do anything for us if our gripes are based on "we don't like the identity you created for us". Changes within the structure of DRKs current gameplay are easily doable and nothing I laid out above isn't already a mechanic in the game (current or past) or an animation in the game. Not saying I'm thrilled about the current playstyle but trying to be reasonable here. Afterall, we aren't WARs.

I understand where you are coming from regarding the RNG element possibly being too much. Last thing I would want is for SE to think it was too much and then nerf the potency based of RNG. That being said, the buff to TBN, and SE please don't nerf TBN based on this, looks like it's so strong it may be difficult to get full usage from it in dungeons as we currently do (based on watching the xenosys vex video). It would simply be another unique way to get to that sweet dark arts proc. Set the proc rate low if you wish, not saying it has to be 50% or even 25%. It just has to be enough to add another layer of engagement to the class. It would also be nice to have more procs because SE nerfed the MP return for siphon strike.

First, I'd like to apologize to you OP. When I read that Power slash would refresh Darkside, I got a "Storm's Eye" vibe from it and thought "God no, I don't want DRK to be even more similar to WAR than it already is."
Continued reading and my opinion of your changes made a 180°.

I freaking love how you made resource management and Darkside upkeep to fun and rewarding. This could probably even rival HW DRK, so bravo. I had a sour taste in my mouth since seeing the ShB combat trailer, only to get worse after seeing the actual changes made by SE - so thank you for making this.

At the same time, screw you OP. You made me sad; I really want to play your iteration, no scratch that, I'd love to play your DRK. But getting my hopes up that SE would actually use this rework for DRK before the expansion releases is probably unrealistic at best. For now it'd seem that we'll be stuck with the downgrade that ShB DRK really is.

Nonetheless, a 10/10 rework from your part and I'll pray that SE/Yoshi sees this and decides to use your ideas down the road, if not at ShB release. Will give the new DRK a try once ShB is out, but it's more likely I'll change to GNB as it just feels a lot more fun and busy.

Oh yeah and I wonder who in the world even asked SE for Delirium to be DRK's Inner Release, pretty sure no DRK main asked to be a copy of WAR.

Thank you for your very nice feedback Arsthan. When I came up with the idea of Power Slash extending Darkside I also started to think it'd be too similar to Storm's Eye but then I came up with the rest afterwards. It really didn't take me that long to think about all of that, it'd just feel like a good evolution to HW's DRK. The devs should be able to do it even better. Gaining extra levels should make a job evolve, not take stuff away from it and make it braindead. Especially when it used to be the more engaging and complex tank back in its first iteration.

Man I just want the job to feel good again. Right now it's almost as boring as ARR PLD and it'll come even closer to that in ShB if things don't change. There's almost zero chance that SE is gonna read this and apply it. I'm not delusional. But if it can help showing them how DRK mains want the job to be while giving them at least some basic ideas of how they could achieve that, that'd be absolutely great.

I have one question : with your rework, Power Slash could give the same amount of blood than Souleater or no? I assume Souleater would be a bit weaker potency wise than Power Slash if not DA'ed, like it was compared to HW-Delirium.

Otherwise, it seems quite good. It would go back to a HW-kind of feeling while avoiding some of its imperfections (MT-focus because of Blood Price and Reprisal proc fishing). It would also avoid what seems to be, IMO, the big caveit of ShB DRK, the fact that we generate much less mana, so the optimal play seems to actually stockpile ressource to go full Double-Weave in Trick Attack/Burst Window, meaning we would not use much oGCDs in-between. A bit SB-MCH feeling here, which is not a good sign unfortunately.

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Originally Posted by Nivarea

I have one question : with your rework, Power Slash could give the same amount of blood than Souleater or no? I assume Souleater would be a bit weaker potency wise than Power Slash if not DA'ed, like it was compared to HW-Delirium.

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I don't know about the blood and potency differences on Power Slash vs Souleater. We could get Power Slash only for Darkside extending purposes, in which case it should be the lowest potency finisher with lower or equal blood gain, since we'd need it for Darkside anyways. We'd use this finisher roughly once every 30s in that case. On the other hand, we could get Power Slash as a higher non-DAed potency combo than Souleater with the same blood gain, essentially giving it the same role Delirium had in HW, which was the "filler" combo for when we didn't want to spend any MP. The downside would be that the Darkside extension mechanic wouldn't be as engaging anymore since we'd use the combo for damage anyways (just like EoS in the current ShB build). That's why I compare it to NIN's Armor Crush. There's no point at all in using Armor Crush outside of extending Huton, so this is what makes this mechanic important for the job. If a higher potency option didn't exist (Aeolian Edge), the NIN would just spam Armor Crush whenever they wouldn't need to refresh Shadow Fang, making the Huton extension mechanic non-existent.

Fair point. Another possibility is to tweak how much Power Slash would refresh the timer. But yeah, each possibility, if done well enough, could work.

The crazy thing is no one has played the new DRK. I'm sorry but I find these threads utterly useless with the highest respect. I am a DRK main and I also play WAR in raid content and Savage and agree DRK had some fundemental issues in 4.0 that hurt the job BUT the job was still solid in raid content which is the most important content in any MMO. My thing is with these improvement threads and such is based on people who haven't played the job. the only people that played the job were from people that have YouTube accounts a.d twitch like Mr happy or xeno. Xeno for one had fantastic analysis on the tank jobs going into 5.0 and he is a huge raid content and tank main and whose opinion actually matters because he actually played the job and masters the job. I think people need to relax and wait til July when Shadowbringers comes out and first master the job and its machanics. Before coming out with any any suggestions. Heck you have people that want action to com back simply for the animations and it's mind-blowing to me.

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Originally Posted by Freyyy

There's almost zero chance that SE is gonna read this and apply it. I'm not delusional. But if it can help showing them how DRK mains want the job to be while giving them at least some basic ideas of how they could achieve that, that'd be absolutely great.

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You'd think they'd be very attentive after shunning those that play DRK for the last two years. Not to mention DRK being the poster child for the expansion. It almost seems like SE is happy with making one MT and one OT OP, so from a business model perspective, they can say to themselves "they may not be happy with X but as long as we keep Y and Z in a good spot the player base won't go anywhere". So far they wouldn't be wrong if that were the case.

Since they are sticking to the idea that DRK is the magic tank, and thematically they are a dark paladin, I think a solution to the identity problem would be reworking some of the abilities to have more dark magic to make the gameplay more varied.

I'm thinking doing something different with flood of shadow, abyssal drain, salted earth. If they are giving PLD more holy spells why doesn't DRK get dark magic? Based on their insistence that DRK is magic mitigation and opposite to PLD physical mitigation (block), I don't understand why DRK is taking identity queues from WAR. Instead of Delirium doing what inner release does I would rather have it be closer to requiescat and then rework salted earth, abyssal drain, and flood into more interesting spells.

I also don't see why scourge didn't come back. All other tanks basically have an equivalent...

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Originally Posted by LegolasT

The crazy thing is no one has played the new DRK. I'm sorry but I find these threads utterly useless with the highest respect. I am a DRK main and I also play WAR in raid content and Savage and agree DRK had some fundemental issues in 4.0 that hurt the job BUT the job was still solid in raid content which is the most important content in any MMO. My thing is with these improvement threads and such is based on people who haven't played the job. the only people that played the job were from people that have YouTube accounts a.d twitch like Mr happy or xeno. Xeno for one had fantastic analysis on the tank jobs going into 5.0 and he is a huge raid content and tank main and whose opinion actually matters because he actually played the job and masters the job. I think people need to relax and wait til July when Shadowbringers comes out and first master the job and its machanics. Before coming out with any any suggestions. Heck you have people that want action to com back simply for the animations and it's mind-blowing to me.

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No one is talking about offensive potencies which are obviously subject to change. We can look at the tooltips and get a rough idea of rotations. We can see the job action trailers and wonder about unnecessary animation locks. There is foundational information that allows for critiques. I said this last time you posted a similar comment in a DRK thread.

Are you going to downplay people's issues with DRK in every thread from here till launch or is this just a weekend hobby?

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Originally Posted by Freyyy

The job also still only has one single combo. EoS/FoS and Darkside are fake mechanics. They're actually just replacing DA spam but on a slower rate. Delirium is just edgy Inner Release. I mean, that in itself is enough to feel bad about ShB's DRK.

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This is the real bad part about the "rework". If you look really closely at it, they just changed a few numbers and animations( because that's what the DA to EoS change boils down to in the end), made one ability into a copy of IR and called it a rework. Warrior got more of a rework in 4.2.

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Originally Posted by LegolasT

The crazy thing is no one has played the new DRK. I'm sorry but I find these threads utterly useless with the highest respect. I am a DRK main and I also play WAR in raid content and Savage and agree DRK had some fundemental issues in 4.0 that hurt the job BUT the job was still solid in raid content which is the most important content in any MMO. My thing is with these improvement threads and such is based on people who haven't played the job. the only people that played the job were from people that have YouTube accounts a.d twitch like Mr happy or xeno. Xeno for one had fantastic analysis on the tank jobs going into 5.0 and he is a huge raid content and tank main and whose opinion actually matters because he actually played the job and masters the job. I think people need to relax and wait til July when Shadowbringers comes out and first master the job and its machanics. Before coming out with any any suggestions. Heck you have people that want action to com back simply for the animations and it's mind-blowing to me.

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we dont need to play the job to see they turn DRK a WAR with 1 combo and a bunch of oGCD, all the deep of DRK it's gone, the flow and everything we love from DRK was removed or nerfed and we are not pleased about it,
5.0 DRK can work pretty well but it's not longer the DRK we love and want and for me that i played DRK since release this make the job unfun for me and i will move to GNB at this rate.

I'd like to see living shadow copy your blood gauge abilities. Have that be the means to spam bloodspiller in a distinctly DRK way instead of delirium just being a cut and paste of inner release.

Make delirium like infuriate in turn.

Do something interesting with abyssal drain so it can be part of the mechanic as well.

I say make their Shadow Wall reflect magic at 55 potency to put it in contrast to WAR's Vengeance of 55 potency physical deflect. Otherwise, these changes to EoS sounds good to me. Currently PLD,DRK and WAR all have the same burst rotation within 10 seconds. I think DRK should mix it up with EoS placed in-between gcds similar to OP.

My Gripe is how slowed down the gameplay seems. It was nice because in HW Dark arts made DRK seem as the active tank. SB was too many Dark Arts. While now with Dark arts gone the job looks sluggish and pale. Wont really know until we play it but GNB seems to have a nice quick playstyle that outshines DRK.

Hopefully this rework is good. The last thing SE wants is less people playing tank.