How to make TBN feel on par with other tank Mit.

There are changes I feel would make "TBN" "The Blackest Night" stand strong along with Heart of Corundum, Bloodwhetting, and Holy Sheltron. It feel that TBN has lost its potency as a Mitigation since Endwalker came out and made every other tank feel better mitigation wise in every way. My solution is simple, there's a couple minor changes that I feel would make DRK feel better both from the DRK's perspective and the healers. Right now there are fundamental issues with TBN.

First change should be how Dark Arts work. I like the system of using MP earlier into the fight and saving the Dark Arts for 1/2 minute burst windows, it makes you feel smart when you do it right, but when you miss-time TBN it doesn't feel like "High Risk High Reward," it feels like "Low Risk, High Frustration." To fix this feeling you should be able to stack 2 charges of Dark Arts. Right now if you already have a TBN proc, but 2 minutes is coming, then suddenly hitting TBN feels like a complete waste of 3000 MP. It would make sense if TBN was a 60 second cooldown but its 15 seconds, which is wasted on the mit as it stands.

Second, change how the TBN proc itself works. I feel that TBN should Always give you a stack of dark arts. You spent the MP, you shouldnt feel punished for mitigating. This change would give you that "free" edge with every use of TBN. This would make Dark Knights less scared to mitigate without feeling punished if they can only take a couple autos. Often times the better you are geared, the harder it is to actually fit TBN into a mitigation plan unless its a buster.

Third, there should be added mitigation to TBN itself. For this I would combine TBN and Dark Mind or Oblation. This would help get rid of button bloat in the job and make it a lot easier to mitigate during a 2 minute burst window. It feel that the devs are placing Tank Busters inside of burst windows, making the already busy DRK insufferable at times while you try to hit all 15 OGCDs if you really needs to Mit during two minute. Sometimes it feels even worse if its a Pot windows like the 6 minute burst of P8S part 1.

Fourth, to keep this balanced the cooldown on TBN should be better aligned with BW and HoC. TBN if these changes are made, should be on a 25 second cooldown.

To unlock this improved TBN, there should just be a trait at around 83-87 called "The Blackest Night Mastery"

Just to Summarize this is what the Tool Tips on TBN would look like with these changes.

Sorry for second post, I ran out of room in initial post.


The Blackest Night:
Creates a barrier around self or target party member that absorbs damage totaling 25% of target's maximum HP.
Duration: 7s
Grants Dark Arts when barrier is completely absorbed or upon effect duration expiration. Players can have at max two stacks of Dark Arts.
Dark Arts Effect: Consume Dark Arts instead of MP to execute The Blackest Night, Edge of Shadow, or Flood of Shadow
Additional Effect: Grants Dark Mind
Dark Mind Effect: Reduces damage taken be 20%
Duration: 4 Seconds



Overall even with these buffs to TBN I don't feel DRK will feel any better or worse than other tanks mitigation wise because besides Living Dead, DRK doesn't have any way to regenerate health outside of the very minor amounts we get from our 1-2-3 combo.

I dunno. I would think a barrier that can already negate damage and any effects that come along with it is easily the strongest out there.

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Originally Posted by Deveryn

I dunno. I would think a barrier that can already negate damage and any effects that come along with it is easily the strongest out there.

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Before Endwalker I would've agreed with you but considering Gunbreakers have Heart of Corundum is effectievely a 30 percent mit, with an Excog, they get a shield from their 1-2 combo, and HoC is completely free to use, Warriors have Bloodwhetting which is 5 GCDs of heals that can crit, 20 percent mit, and a small shield, and PLDs have Holy Sheltron which is 15 percent, plus block, plus their entire magic rotation is free heals, TBN and DRK fall behind solely because TBN can only effectively be used once a minute without losing damage, and its the only mit that requires as stringent of timing, and the other mit in DRK's kit all feel like filler mit that really cant effectively cant be used on half of the damage in the game. On top of all of that TBN is the only shield in the game that you actually need to break to have used it right it feels like crap to use

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Originally Posted by Frostyyy

Second, change how the TBN proc itself works. I feel that TBN should Always give you a stack of dark arts.

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It's suggestions like this that are why complexity is being eroded from the game. If that's what everyone wants, it's fine, I'm just pointing it out.

If TBN doesn't break then it's not worth using in that situation again. If the incoming damage is barely enough to take 25% of your health bar, then it's not even denting you enough to make a healer concerned enough to heal. This was the logic I used in Shadowbringers when I mained DRK and it worked fine. I revisited this whenever my gear upgraded and over time stopped using TBN in situations it had stopped breaking in.

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Third, there should be added mitigation to TBN itself. For this I would combine TBN and Dark Mind or Oblation. This would help get rid of button bloat in the job and make it a lot easier to mitigate during a 2 minute burst window.

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I agree that one of the main problems with TBN is that it is not as versatile as the other tank mitigations became in Endwalker. Every other one contains a mixture of raw mitigation, heals and regens. Individually, these things are not useful in certain situations, but together, they are almost always useful for something. TBN is just a shield, so if it is not useful for something, then it's useless.

TBN is useful even against the dots in the latest raids, but technically it doesn't reduce the potency of those dots so once it's gone, you have nothing to save you unless a party member, such as a healer, cares. Whereas I can just about survive longer than a DRK because of the regen that PLDs have.

You have to weave even more to reduce the potency of the dot, which is not necessarily a problem but DRK has a lot of abilities to press for attacks as well. To be fair, other tanks run into this problem a bit because if you combine two mitigations for a tank buster (which I would recommend in Abyssos), it's easy for the timing to fall right when you also need to weave an attack. Easy to time an attack or a mit a bit differently, but easy to get wrong as well.

Overall, any suggestion that involves something other than adding a heal I would find interesting. I like the tanks to be different. Whether Souleater is buffed, a Painhaima effect is added to TBN, raw mitigation is added to TBN or a second shield is available, something other than heals is welcome. Because all the other tanks have that and it would be boring to copy them.

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Originally Posted by Frostyyy

Sorry for second post, I ran out of room in initial post.

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If you hit edit on your post, you can type a lot more. The limit isn't something feasibly attained in an edited post.

It's a 25%-scaling MaxHP Shield that gives you back a damaging skill when broken. That's quite strong.
And Oblation is a defensive mitigation, and you get 2 stacks of it. Paired up with TBN and this is honestly pretty cool too.

My personal problem with both TBN and Oblation is that Oblation's got a long cooldown because you're expected to have TBN... but TBN has a cost. Sure, it's refunded, but only if it breaks. And while proper use of TBN ensures it will, the fact that it has a potential to not refund the cost + the fact that the cost implies you can't spam it makes me feel like Oblation's cooldown is a little on the high side.

TBN is strong for what it does, and Oblation is nice for what it does. I assume they can be improved upon, but there isn't much you can do to these skills that won't interfere either with eachother or with other parts of their kit. Even just merely making TBN have a Haima effect isn't a good idea, because it scales off of 25% Max Health, and it can be used on other people. It's not a fluctuating value like crit shields from healers are.

imo if DRK wants sustainability like other tanks, either Abyssal Drain should be a bit more accessible (which will interfere with TBN and Oblation a lot), or Stalwart Soul can give a very small heal when it hits anything. Not "per enemy", just proc on use. And that will interfere with TBN and Oblation also, but at a lesser scale. And let Abyssal Drain be the per-hit heal.

My real question is about Dark Mind. Because it's great to use in magic tankbusters... but what if you're in a physical-heavy fight? You're just gonna use Shadow Wall for hard mitigation? Sure, paired up with other stuff of course... but really, that's the only other answer we got? Better than nothing, I guess, but least Camouflage doesn't just give a Parry boost. But that I agree is just me asking dumb questions and derailing the thread a bit.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

It's suggestions like this that are why complexity is being eroded from the game. If that's what everyone wants, it's fine, I'm just pointing it out.

If TBN doesn't break then it's not worth using in that situation again. If the incoming damage is barely enough to take 25% of your health bar, then it's not even denting you enough to make a healer concerned enough to heal. This was the logic I used in Shadowbringers when I mained DRK and it worked fine. I revisited this whenever my gear upgraded and over time stopped using TBN in situations it had stopped breaking in.

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While I understand what you're saying, the main issue is that what breaks a TBN is ever so slightly inconsistent. Sometimes 2 autos break it, sometimes it takes 3, it gets pretty stupid. But, the way TBN currently is, if it doesn't have any free proc of dark arts, I don't want use it at all otherwise Ill be punished for playing the job with its current design at a whim, or if someone else throws a mit me without my knowledge (Divine Benison.) Considering you can only use it effectively once a minute without sacrificing damage I would rather just not use it, and I don't think that's how the button is supposed to feel. I feel that DRK feels unique enough Mit wise because the whole point of DRK is to stop as much damage as possible, but if too much comes in you dont have a way to recover it so it creates a completely different feel that warrior where you dont really care if you take a lot of damage because you can heal a lot of damage. Same as PLD. GNB honestly, has mit heals and regens for everything. As for the current tank busters in Abysoss the main issue is that if your progging and not BiS, even when you are BiS for Dark Knight, if you dont use 3-4 Mits with TBN you just die, you have no way to save yourself, and healers are often paying attention to other things and will just let you die then blame the DRKs lack of mitting the hits. To go back on one last thing, "If the incoming damage is barely enough to take 25% of your health bar, then it's not even denting you enough to make a healer concerned enough to heal" I disagree because its often not the 1 hit massive damage that kills Dark Knights, its the consistent autos/multi hit busters that you cant really mit properly without placing yourself in danger for the next buster.

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

It's a 25%-scaling MaxHP Shield that gives you back a damaging skill when broken. That's quite strong.
And Oblation is a defensive mitigation, and you get 2 stacks of it. Paired up with TBN and this is honestly pretty cool too.

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While yes TBN itself is decently strong at single bit hit busters, it falls apart in almost every other aspect. You cant use it for autos, or it wont pop, and you need to have 3000 mp just to use it. All of the other tanks have so many free mitigations that can save them and their kits all synergize. DRK has next to 0 self sustain, and adding and extra button back to the rotation for healing will just honestly make the already OGCD heavy job Miserable to play as a tank. Its effectively already high BPM dps that also has to mit as well, which get miserable for any buster that's on a 1 or 2 minute window. During Bursts DRKs are effectively too busy to add anything in for over 12 seconds while they get everything off cooldown. As for oblation and Dark Mind, they both at best filler mitigation. Dark Mind is mostly useless except for a couple busters, and oblation honestly feels like filler. The CD on Oblation being long is fine, but its only 10 percent mit which doesnt exactly do much considering its only active for 10 seconds. Look at warriors Bloodwhetting, which is already super stong, but paired with equillibrium and ITS FREE. Its a better mit that is completely free. Gunbreakers Heart of Corundum is just the best mit in the game due to the 30 percent plus 900 pot heal, but it also has Camo, which is a 20 second 10% mit plus 50 percent parry. its on a 90 second cd which means with the parry its better than both charges of oblation immediately. Half of paladins rotation heal them and they can spam Holy Sheltron since gauge for PLDs is never an issue. To continue "TBN being too strong with a guaranteed refund" I firmly disagree. If you go too hard in burst, you don't have MP suddenly you're screwed because its not a free mit. Its a costly mit that at best is frustrating and stressful to use in its current state.

Two issues I see with this.
TBN at 25 seconds would be absolute ass in dungeon content, where DRK is already incredibly weak. Even adding mit to it wouldn't make up for the severe loss in spammibility increasing its cool down by over 50%.
And more importantly, your changes would give DRK a 50 second Pre-pull of getting two Dark Arts stacks. No one wants to put up with that.

If we're going to look at DRK mits to change, I'd focus on Dark Mind as its a borderline useless skill at the level you get it, and wont start to feel like a real skill until you get to high end raid content.
Its also far more redundant with Oblation than it is TBN, both being deceptively good short cd mits, Dark Mind is in no way the baby version of TBN.

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Originally Posted by Frostyyy

You cant use it for autos, or it wont pop

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Yes, well, that's what I meant by "And while proper use of TBN ensures it will [break]". Using it on autos is not proper use of it. And while that in itself is a disadvantage, it's also not what it's meant to be used for. Now, that doesn't mean I'm against having some form of mitigation for it, it's just that the current design of TBN isn't what you'd use to mitigate auto-attacks. You'd need to look at something else. Meanwhile a shield that scales off of your HP? That's a pretty big shield, so in the instances where you DO use it, it is quite strong.

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To continue "TBN being too strong with a guaranteed refund" I firmly disagree. If you go too hard in burst, you don't have MP suddenly you're screwed because its not a free mit. Its a costly mit that at best is frustrating and stressful to use in its current state.

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Well, yes. I agree with you. At no point did I imply that wouldn't be the case. I never even said that "it's too strong with a guaranteed refund". Believe me Frosty, if you think I'm defending TBN, I'm not. Acknowledging its perks doesn't mean I don't see flaws nor that I don't think it's lacking. It very much clearly is, I only pointed out the benefits because THAT'S what will end up causing SE to tell you "We understand, but it still has a stronger value than other tanks do." Especially considering you also have other things past TBN. The issue on DRK is that, as you said, it's got virtually no good sustain, Oblation is piddly and takes too long to recharge, and TBN is only good to cut down on incoming damage, not mitigate nor add to it.

I suggest you re-read exactly what I said. The quote was

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you're expected to have TBN... but TBN has a cost. Sure, it's refunded, but only if it breaks.

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Meaning I never once said that it was a positive that I agreed to. Or at least, not without nuance. What I meant by that was: "Even if it has a refunded damage when it breaks, it first consumed MP and then it requires you to break the shield. That's two conditional aspects no other tank needs to deal with." And then I go on to say "Even if it does refund it, the mere fact it might not do so feels REALLY BAD".

And you pointed out something pretty good that I didn't even consider. You may get a refund if you break TBN. You do not get anything defensive out of using Shadow skills. And considering you're basically replacing it with your best tool available (again, a 25% scaling shield isn't nothing), it quickly makes the system they implemented REALLY AWKWARD. So you always need to keep tabs on your MP. No other tank needs to deal with this.

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The CD on Oblation being long is fine, but its only 10 percent mit which doesnt exactly do much considering its only active for 10 seconds. Look at warriors Bloodwhetting, which is already super stong, but paired with equillibrium and ITS FREE. Its a better mit that is completely free.

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Yeah, pretty much. Like, what I mean by "Oblation has perks" is that you have a 10% mitigation on 2 charges and also have access to TBN. But obviously there are problems with this. Two off the top of my head:
1 - I reiterate: have access to TBN. Not "You also have TBN". Because, cool, you can use TBN, but there are detriments to using it, and that's a problem. Meaning you cannot consider TBN as always being there for you to complement Oblation.
2 - Which is what I wanted to get to in that other post, it's too piddly and on a long cooldown, which does not match the rest of the kit.

That's why I said "for what it does". Oblation's a nice cooldown... in a vaccum. TBN is also a nice cooldown, again, in a vaccum. In the way DRK is designed, those two have their uses, but are clunky. And when you compare DRK with other tanks, DRK falls behind. Even if other tanks don't have access to 2 mitigations, none of them have a skill with a cost/a skill with a huge cooldown/a skill that can gimp DPS/a skill that if you DPS hard enough with no incoming damage to break a shield will make it problematic when you DO need it in the future. No matter how good a 25% scaling shield is, it alone cannot compete with that. Especially not with a cost on it. No other tank has anything THIS nuanced. And Oblation isn't enough to complement it, no matter how much you have 2 charges or it being decoupled from the skill may be.

Arguably the most "feelsbad" skill in the game is Clemency, which is a GCD that eats up MP. DRK might have the saving grace of at least TBN being more useable than Clemency, but that's not by much!

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Originally Posted by Oizen

Two issues I see with this.
TBN at 25 seconds would be absolute ass in dungeon content, where DRK is already incredibly weak. Even adding mit to it wouldn't make up for the severe loss in spammibility increasing its cool down by over 50%.
And more importantly, your changes would give DRK a 50 second Pre-pull of getting two Dark Arts stacks. No one wants to put up with that.

If we're going to look at DRK mits to change, I'd focus on Dark Mind as its a borderline useless skill at the level you get it, and wont start to feel like a real skill until you get to high end raid content.
Its also far more redundant with Oblation than it is TBN, both being deceptively good short cd mits, Dark Mind is in no way the baby version of TBN.

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Ok you made a very valid point I did not think of, a 50 second prepull sounds miserable. How about instead of two stacks of dark arts, you could use the first stack on TBN again for free without it feeling like a waste since you are going to get your proc back in at most 7 seconds. I feel this would work better because with a 25 second CD you realistically wouldnt want to spam it on cd anyways. Now for the dungeon comment, in my honest opinion DRK in dungeons is fine. The major issue most newer/non-drk mains run into is not utilizing the rest of their mit correctly, this feels like such a major issue because the other tanks all have a "win in dungeons button" with no thought required. 90 percent of the time a DRK is struggling in dungeons they aren't even using the majority of their kit including arms length. This is more of an issue with how new tanks often dont get all the nuance explained earlier in the game, all there really needs to be is an off line that arms length is a cd and a better tutorial. On the other hand the main aspect DRK has in dungeons that helps is its massive aoe damage, I found that even in crafted gear that DRK can consistently out dps even top level DPS players in trash pulls. I find that DRKs in dungeon can often help kill most mob packs in a decent time. before they're even close to running out of mit. That in combiniation with Abyssal Drain, their other mit, and Living Dead create a great balance in dungeons. The other thing I can include is if the mit is added to TBN, it will feel a LOT better in dungeons than it does now, you would feel the longer duration of the shield and not free like you need to pair tbn with another mit in dungeons, because as it stands right now TBN breaks in a second in mob pulls anyways.

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

Yes, well, that's what I meant by "And while proper use of TBN ensures it will [break]". Using it on autos is not proper use of it. And while that in itself is a disadvantage, it's also not what it's meant to be used for. Now, that doesn't mean I'm against having some form of mitigation for it, it's just that the current design of TBN isn't what you'd use to mitigate auto-attacks. You'd need to look at something else. Meanwhile a shield that scales off of your HP? That's a pretty big shield, so in the instances where you DO use it, it is quite strong.


That's why I said "for what it does". Oblation's a nice cooldown... in a vaccum. TBN is also a nice cooldown, again, in a vaccum. In the way DRK is designed, those two have their uses, but are clunky. And when you compare DRK with other tanks, DRK falls behind. Even if other tanks don't have access to 2 mitigations, none of them have a skill with a cost/a skill with a huge cooldown/a skill that can gimp DPS/a skill that if you DPS hard enough with no incoming damage to break a shield will make it problematic when you DO need it in the future. No matter how good a 25% scaling shield is, it alone cannot compete with that. Especially not with a cost on it. No other tank has anything THIS nuanced. And Oblation isn't enough to complement it, no matter how much you have 2 charges or it being decoupled from the skill may be.

Arguably the most "feelsbad" skill in the game is Clemency, which is a GCD that eats up MP. DRK might have the saving grace of at least TBN being more useable than Clemency, but that's not by much!

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My apologies if I came off a little strong, I agree with a lot of what you said but the issue is that DRK doesnt have a button that it can really hit for Autos besides oblation, but often 10 percent doesnt like enough esp only for only 10 seconds at a time. I feel this is why they added parry to camo, making camo honestly one of my favorite mitigations in the game. If you can only realistically save TBNs for busters then there is no reason for it to be on a 7 second CD. As for the oblation comments, I agree with you completely, the main issue with oblation is that its on DRK. It would fit into any other tanks kit much much much better. While its fine that oblation is ok, DRK needs something great because as it stands the best mits on DRK is Rampart and Shadow Wall which are essentially shared with the other tanks. In my opinion all they need to do with DRK is consolidate the kit so its not a complete mess. I would rather have 1 strong cd, 1 ok ish cd, than 1 terrible cd, 1 ok cd, and a cd that feels like a waste most of the time. My apologies for cutting most of your post, I did read it all, the forum word cap is just low.

I feel like they ought to remove the opportunity cost from both TBN and Clemency; the former by removing both the dark arts effect and MP cost, and the latter by making it an OGCD and no MP cost, but having a single charge that's gained from using Requiescat.

TBN is the strongest shield in game. The only think I agree is to give back the MP if the shield expires (or part of the MP). otherwise, is stronger than other "similar" skill on the other tanks. You can literally negate tank buster damages while other tanks can't. YOu can survive the share tank buster of P6S alone with a DRK without using invulnerability with this (of course combined with other CDs).

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

I feel like they ought to remove the opportunity cost from both TBN and Clemency; the former by removing both the dark arts effect and MP cost, and the latter by making it an OGCD and no MP cost, but having a single charge that's gained from using Requiescat.

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The main reason i don't want them to just remove the MP cost of TBN to make it free every 15 seconds is because it would add clunk to the DRK opener. Its not a bad change it will just feel terrible to pull with Edge, or even flood if the boss is too far away for Edge. Like I said, its a good change and I definitely would love to see it as a step in the right direction, but overall I do like the MP cost for TBN, just not the feeling like I'm wasting that MP. As for Clemency, I feel that Req should give you a stack for clemency that doesn't expire for two minutes (Assuming the make PLD a 2 minute job like everything else)

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

Yes, well, that's what I meant by "And while proper use of TBN ensures it will [break]". Using it on autos is not proper use of it. And while that in itself is a disadvantage, it's also not what it's meant to be used for. Now, that doesn't mean I'm against having some form of mitigation for it, it's just that the current design of TBN isn't what you'd use to mitigate auto-attacks. You'd need to look at something else. Meanwhile a shield that scales off of your HP? That's a pretty big shield, so in the instances where you DO use it, it is quite strong.

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What? Why wouldnt autos be a proper use of it? Bosses hit pretty hard with autos.

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Originally Posted by Xlantaa

TBN is the strongest shield in game. The only think I agree is to give back the MP if the shield expires (or part of the MP). otherwise, is stronger than other "similar" skill on the other tanks. You can literally negate tank buster damages while other tanks can't. YOu can survive the share tank buster of P6S alone with a DRK without using invulnerability with this (of course combined with other CDs).

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While yes TBN is the strongest shield in the game, it is by no means even close to being a great CD for tanks. Every other tank has something great about their mitigations. DRK just has a lot of clunky mitigations. And yes while you can solo the tanks busters in P6s and P7s, you only realistically do that in the forbidden number parties to help both the healers heal less, and it feels awwweeeful to do esp as the DRK considering most of those busters are during 1 or 2 minute bursts which can derail your entire rotation in an already busy burst. For normal gameplay, reclears/prog, none of the other tanks really even need to be healed after tank busters with dots considering they all have the self sustain to do just fine. I feel that the point of DRK is no self heal and more self mit to stop the damage, so just giving the free TBN proc doesnt fix all of the issues with TBN, just the risk reward. As for TBN being "Stronger than other 'Similar' skill(s) on the other tanks" I firmly disagree. Heart of Corundum and Bloodwhetting overall are better mitigations with more uses than one big hit. And while Holy Sheltron could be considered worse than TBN in single use situations, its the ability to spam it due to gauge rebuilding so fast on Paladin, making it so realistically you can get a lot more great usages of HS over the once a minute TBN (that if you're playing optimally will be used on a raid wide just for the proc and not for the mit itself every other minute)

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Originally Posted by Saraide

What? Why wouldnt autos be a proper use of it? Bosses hit pretty hard with autos.

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Because of the inconsistency for TBN pops. Most of the time the boss only Autos 3-4 times before going into a major mech, to then auto 15 seconds later, which means if you have a great internet connection and timing you can get a TBN to break on autos consistently, but if you dont have great internet the snapshotting on TBN will cause you to miss an auto or two which 99 percent of the time will cause your TBN to be left with like maybe 1 percent left on the shield and you get nothing but depression, frustration, and disappointment lol.

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Originally Posted by Frostyyy

Because of the inconsistency for TBN pops. Most of the time the boss only Autos 3-4 times before going into a major mech, to then auto 15 seconds later, which means if you have a great internet connection and timing you can get a TBN to break on autos consistently, but if you dont have great internet the snapshotting on TBN will cause you to miss an auto or two which 99 percent of the time will cause your TBN to be left with like maybe 1 percent left on the shield and you get nothing but depression, frustration, and disappointment lol.

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Oh I have used TBN a lot. What I take issue with is saying autos arent proper use of TBN because it's just straight up wrong.

While yes, TBN is great in itself and I don't want any changes to that skill, I have one issue with the whole situation:

In ShB the general opinion was that the tanks were better balanced than ever before. DPS-wise and mitigation wise. TBN shield vs self-sustain basically.

Now every tank got a huge buff to their short mitigation CD except DRK. How is that balanced still?

If it breaks, TBN is good to use on trash autos in dungeons. Unless a boss has extremely hard-hitting autos that take 25% of your health, it's probably not worth it even in raids.

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Originally Posted by Tint

In ShB the general opinion was that the tanks were better balanced than ever before. DPS-wise and mitigation wise. TBN shield vs self-sustain basically.

Now every tank got a huge buff to their short mitigation CD except DRK. How is that balanced still?

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In Shadowbringers, in my opinion, TBN was the best. All they did in Endwalker was bring the other tanks up to its level.

Warrior's didn't change much except some extra mit because it healed about the same as it does now if used on Inner Chaos. Warrior's was pretty good in Shadowbringers, but Nascent Flash was not a mitigation, so they still had to receive the damage first unlike Dark Knights.

Paladin had no self-heals except Clemency and Sheltron didn't compare to what TBN and Souleater were doing for Dark Knights.

Gunbreaker's was almost as bad except their combo had shields and heals and they had a regen, so they managed better than a Paladin, but not as well as a Warrior or Dark Knight.

Endwalker merely brought Paladin and Gunbreaker up to Dark Knight's level and it was mainly those two that got buffed.

The problem is as I explained earlier that those buffs made them more versatile. TBN is fantastic but in situations where a shield isn't as effective, they lose out to the raw mits and regens and heals that the other tanks got.

One way to fight it might be to combine Shadow Wall with Oblation or Dark Mind instead of TBN, and then apply TBN later (in Abyssos, after the dot is already applied), because shields still absorb dot ticks after the cast completes.

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Originally Posted by Tint

Now every tank got a huge buff to their short mitigation CD except DRK. How is that balanced still?

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It's not. And that's the issue. DRK has a pretty strong shield that's now hard to balance, because while it's strong, it's still not something you can compare to the likes of Bloodwhetting or HoC. But add anything to the shield and it surpasses those other skills.

DRK had Oblation to make up for it, but it doesn't make up for it. Not entirely.

And then there's the rest of its kit, which works at face-value, generically. But then you look at the other tanks and it just "lacks" something.

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

And then there's the rest of its kit, which works at face-value, generically. But then you look at the other tanks and it just "lacks" something.

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It's called a lack of HP regen. A funtime shield is okay but not when you compare it to Pld's defensive kit and War's Benediction they can spam every 15 seconds in a group pull.

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Originally Posted by Raoabolic

It's called a lack of HP regen. A funtime shield is okay but not when you compare it to Pld's defensive kit and War's Benediction they can spam every 15 seconds in a group pull.

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In that case the clear problem is Abyssal Drain having a pathetic heal potency and a 60s CD, and oddly stapled to Carve and Spit in Endwalker for no real reason.
Skill could honestly have its heal potency doubled and its cooldown halved and it would probably be fine.

I really dont like the fact its attached to Carve now, because that skills fine as a 60s ogcd.
When I want changes to Abyssal, I don't want changes to Carve, but they're attached now because Square Enix said so.

Personally I think they should just make TBN cost 2000mp, changing it from "high risk (possible loss of 460p) minimal reward (less pressure on healers)" to "high risk (possible loss of 460p) high reward (gain 460p for every 3 uses, possible extra gains due to kill time, less pressure on healers)

although this would reward smart usage of the skill and inspire further optimization, so the devs will never allow it

I think it's fine the way it is. It benefits those that learn the fights directly.

Interesting idea I just had. Create a 3rd gauge specifically for TBN.

Gauge is valued off of damage taken. Replenishing the gauge the more damage you take.

Treat tbn gauge like a 3 stack mechanic. Press tbn once receive a 33% of a shield.
Twice 66% shield.
Three times 99% shield.

No idea on shield value. Just had a random thought.

While I remember, the multiple Dark Arts idea is mostly just useful for people who are trying to save it for a burst window, because you can just use it right away normally.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Axious

Interesting idea I just had. Create a 3rd gauge specifically for TBN.

Gauge is valued off of damage taken. Replenishing the gauge the more damage you take.

Treat tbn gauge like a 3 stack mechanic. Press tbn once receive a 33% of a shield.
Twice 66% shield.
Three times 99% shield.

No idea on shield value. Just had a random thought.

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The main reason this wont work and old make it TBN feel worse is button bloat. Its not a bad idea its just DRK already has too many buttons to hit

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Originally Posted by Oizen

In that case the clear problem is Abyssal Drain having a pathetic heal potency and a 60s CD, and oddly stapled to Carve and Spit in Endwalker for no real reason.
Skill could honestly have its heal potency doubled and its cooldown halved and it would probably be fine.

I really dont like the fact its attached to Carve now, because that skills fine as a 60s ogcd.
When I want changes to Abyssal, I don't want changes to Carve, but they're attached now because Square Enix said so.

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If you want something like this they should combine salted earth and abysal drain. That way you use Abysal Drain and it throws out the salted earth, then take all the damage does from salted earth including salt and darkness and turn that into life steal. If thats a little strong turn it into percentage of damage done.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Raoabolic

It's called a lack of HP regen. A funtime shield is okay but not when you compare it to Pld's defensive kit and War's Benediction they can spam every 15 seconds in a group pull.

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There's nothing wrong with DRK being different from other tanks. We already have so much homogeneity between jobs and their roles. Most of my tanks have nearly identical button placement so I can hop around to any tank and look competent enough. Here's my 1-2-3 single target, here's my 1-2 AOE. Here's my gauge goes up skill, or no-gauge-cost skill. Here's my mitigation stuff with slightly different names.

DRK is probably the most different of the 4. They should keep it that way.

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Originally Posted by dspguy

DRK is probably the most different of the 4. They should keep it that way.

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Valid. But it doesn't mean we cannot criticise its skills.

If comparing it to other tanks isn't valid, then sure: Is Dark Mind truly necessary? And could DRK do with a bit more durability, defensive cooldowns or sustain? Both in AoE and\or in Single Target.

If it's going to be different than the other four, it needs to feel good to play. And to a lot of people, it doesn't, either due to its damaging kit or its defensive kit. And that should be considered.

Unfortunately, this is an MMORPG and there is a role. So comparisons to other classes of that role will be innevitable.

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

Is Dark Mind truly necessary?

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Yes and I want to explain why.

PLD's Sheltron used to only block physical attacks. People were unhappy with this, so it was changed to block magic as well. Now it is effectively like Rampart. Homogenized.

WAR's Raw Intuition used to parry and only affect physical attacks and crit from behind. People used Awareness to nullify the crits, removing the penalty and with the PLD change, they made Raw Intuition like Rampart. Homogenized.

Let's imagine that Dark Mind is changed to mitigate physical attacks as well. It becomes Rampart. Homogenized.

We will be getting indicators to tell us which attacks are magic and which are physical soon. In some cases these indicators will be wrong but they should be right for most of them.

I've found Dark Mind very useful against magic attacks. That extra mitigation goes a long way. I find DRK to be the most strong on mitigation of any tank but that is obviously at the expense of self-heals.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

Yes and I want to explain why.

PLD's Sheltron used to only block physical attacks. People were unhappy with this, so it was changed to block magic as well. Now it is effectively like Rampart. Homogenized.

WAR's Raw Intuition used to parry and only affect physical attacks and crit from behind. People used Awareness to nullify the crits, removing the penalty and with the PLD change, they made Raw Intuition like Rampart. Homogenized.

Let's imagine that Dark Mind is changed to mitigate physical attacks as well. It becomes Rampart. Homogenized.

We will be getting indicators to tell us which attacks are magic and which are physical soon. In some cases these indicators will be wrong but they should be right for most of them.

I've found Dark Mind very useful against magic attacks. That extra mitigation goes a long way. I find DRK to be the most strong on mitigation of any tank but that is obviously at the expense of self-heals.

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Sheltron and Raw Intuition are also baby versions of stronger skills they level up into.


Dark Mind doesn't really fit into that category. And while it is a really strong skill, the further we get away from the level you unlock it, the more questionable its existance becomes.
As it stands, its a lv 45 skill that you probably wont even use until lv 90. IMO DRK really needs some baby form of TBN unlocked in the 40s or something.

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Originally Posted by Oizen

As it stands, its a lv 45 skill that you probably wont even use until lv 90. IMO DRK really needs some baby form of TBN unlocked in the 40s or something.

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We don't really need extra mitigation then. We already have a lot more at that level than we used to.

We didn't used to have Reprisal and our combos only reduced specific types of damage on a single target after we got our full combo. We didn't have Arm's Length to slow them down at that level. Shadow Wall's cooldown was reduced in a Shadowbringers patch. We can stun and there is Souleater which does actually heal you.

Most of the content up until the start of Stormblood doesn't really hurt that much, at least not anymore because SE didn't used to item level sync dungeons very much.

Maybe I am bias, because I use raid food in dungeons which doesn't sync properly.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

Yes and I want to explain why.

PLD's Sheltron used to only block physical attacks. People were unhappy with this, so it was changed to block magic as well. Now it is effectively like Rampart. Homogenized.

WAR's Raw Intuition used to parry and only affect physical attacks and crit from behind. People used Awareness to nullify the crits, removing the penalty and with the PLD change, they made Raw Intuition like Rampart. Homogenized.

Let's imagine that Dark Mind is changed to mitigate physical attacks as well. It becomes Rampart. Homogenized.

We will be getting indicators to tell us which attacks are magic and which are physical soon. In some cases these indicators will be wrong but they should be right for most of them.

I've found Dark Mind very useful against magic attacks. That extra mitigation goes a long way. I find DRK to be the most strong on mitigation of any tank but that is obviously at the expense of self-heals.

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Fair enough, though that's the thing. Dark Mind is only useful against magical attacks... that's literally its main point. So naturally, you will find it very useful against magical attacks. The extra mitigation, however, tends to fall in line with what other tanks have.

I was thinking of making it like Camouflage rather than Rampart, but the issue with Camo is that it gives you the possibility of cutting the physical damage by -15% (+ the normal mitigation). DRK's Dark Mind is more guaranteed.

And unfortunately, homogenization isn't necessarily what you want but you cannot help but compare it to other tanks. No other tank has a specific, unique skill that only works on one type of damage. Last time we had that, PLDs complained they weren't picked for duty. DRK doesn't have that, thankfully, but it doesn't mean that the design is good.
So rather than "make it like everyone else", I'm just saying that there are ways we can keep it unique but still do similar to other tanks in the role.

My one issue with what you said is that you see Awareness, PLD blocking magic and Raw Intuition being simplified as homogenization, whereas to me it just felt like some of it was clunk from Heavensward's design. That, and crits no longer really matter when you can mitigate and shield up the arse with healers directly, so...

Like, things don't need to be "homogenized" for there to be "equity". That's what I mean. As in, we can have unique designs just fine, so far as they don't cause issue. And to many people, the lack of sustain from DRK and its awkward mitigation path is a potential issue. Because it's not that it "has to do what WAR does". Shields and mitigation work fine... it's that sustain helps you keep afloat, especially if your healer struggles. Shields can help you slow down the momentum, but a shield won't keep you from dying. Which...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

We don't really need extra mitigation then. We already have a lot more at that level than we used to.

We didn't used to have Reprisal and our combos only reduced specific types of damage on a single target after we got our full combo. We didn't have Arm's Length to slow them down at that level. Shadow Wall's cooldown was reduced in a Shadowbringers patch. We can stun and there is Souleater which does actually heal you.

Most of the content up until the start of Stormblood doesn't really hurt that much, at least not anymore because SE didn't used to item level sync dungeons very much.

Maybe I am bias, because I use raid food in dungeons which doesn't sync properly.

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TBH Bardam's Mettle can get spicy. And we won't have TBN then. We'll have the same mitigation the role has generically. Problem is that at Bardam's Mettle, most tanks already have a solid grasp on their mitigation. I think the only one who doesn't at that time is PLD, but... PLD passively blocks things. Which is why I was focusing on Dark Mind.

And you won't Souleater in AoEs. A healer, especially someone new, can very much struggle, and the lack of sustain skills unlike other tanks is really felt on DRK.

'-' also why do you use food buffs in dungeons, do you guys tend to have surplus after raids?

Food in dungeons is probably for the 3% EXP gain.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Midareyukki

TBH Bardam's Mettle can get spicy. And we won't have TBN then. We'll have the same mitigation the role has generically. Problem is that at Bardam's Mettle, most tanks already have a solid grasp on their mitigation. I think the only one who doesn't at that time is PLD, but... PLD passively blocks things. Which is why I was focusing on Dark Mind.

And you won't Souleater in AoEs. A healer, especially someone new, can very much struggle, and the lack of sustain skills unlike other tanks is really felt on DRK.

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Which is why I said until Stormblood content. But since you brought it up, it's mainly the first pulls that are a struggle and I think those are rough on any tank. Fortunately, DRK recently had an improvement to Living Dead where it is also a sustain. They also have Abyssal Drain, which if used on enough enemies can heal you to full. Bardams actually has enemies that use magic attacks too (particularly the ones that spam Aero).

Quote:

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'-' also why do you use food buffs in dungeons, do you guys tend to have surplus after raids?

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Food is that cheap that I can buy 99 of them, use it regularly for roulettes and easily buy more when I run out. I don't even have a lot of gil. I just make 100,000 from doing battle content and selling dungeon loot.

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Originally Posted by RobynDaBank

Food in dungeons is probably for the 3% EXP gain.

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Not necessary because I have all 90s. The extra Vitality is great for tanking and helps with survival, especially in a dungeon like Bardam's.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

Yes and I want to explain why.

PLD's Sheltron used to only block physical attacks. People were unhappy with this, so it was changed to block magic as well. Now it is effectively like Rampart. Homogenized.

WAR's Raw Intuition used to parry and only affect physical attacks and crit from behind. People used Awareness to nullify the crits, removing the penalty and with the PLD change, they made Raw Intuition like Rampart. Homogenized.

Let's imagine that Dark Mind is changed to mitigate physical attacks as well. It becomes Rampart. Homogenized.

We will be getting indicators to tell us which attacks are magic and which are physical soon. In some cases these indicators will be wrong but they should be right for most of them.

I've found Dark Mind very useful against magic attacks. That extra mitigation goes a long way. I find DRK to be the most strong on mitigation of any tank but that is obviously at the expense of self-heals.

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I agree I don't think DRK needs extra mitigation.

It needs low level skills that rank up into the lv 80/90 ones like the other tanks have.