Dark Knight (Marauder -> DPS)

[Kitru]

Any class can take aggro if not played right. But then again a tank can take aggro if played right.

The only class that can get aggro off of a competent tank that isn't painfully undergeared is a WHM spamming Medica II. Every other class will, at best, manage to get to 25-50% total enmity *if not less*. You're essentially recommending a DPS class that is supposed to sit at 90-95% of tank aggro to deal maximum damage, which, when you consider any kind of pug situation, presents a *lot* of risk since you can't really guarantee that you're not going to massively overgear the tank or that the tank is even especially competent.

Your entire argument for the viability of this idea hinges upon everyone doing everything absolutely perfectly. You're allowing for almost no leeway, which is kind of necessary, especially when you're telling a DPS to ride the tank's ass on enmity while simultaneously not overtaking them. This class would be a pariah in group content because of that because you're, essentially, *encouraging* them to piss off tanks.

On top of that, half of those abilities you'd never want to use. Enmity isn't a resource like MP or TP where you constantly recover a percentage of total value or Wrath where you generate stacks on a regular basis. After the first 20 seconds of the fight, if you used Sinister Plan, you'd be reducing your bonus damage from your stance to nothing for the entire fight, since, at that point, you're talking about having 0 enmity when everyone else has several tens of thousands: you're never going to get above 25% (this is why, when rezzing a tank, that tank *has* to use Provoke; they stand no chance of getting back to the top enmity ever again). The best you could hope for is using Braintwister to get a bit of an enmity boost from another DPS or healer but, for that, you're still restricting Sinister Plan to being used all of 2-5 times for the entire fight (half as much if you're with another of this same class). Facepalm (I'm not even sure how you came up with this name because it makes absolutely no sense to me; facepalming is something you do to yourself as a demonstration of exasperation, not something you do to someone else) would also be horrible because you're actively making the tank's job harder by reducing their enmity as well (not to mention that you'd be screwing with other Dark Knights).

Your design is bad because it doesn't work *on so many levels*. The abilities you've suggested provide no benefit in practical terms and oftentimes actively impede the use or effectiveness of others. If it *were* implemented as such, you can be sure that the job would suddenly become the black sheep of the metagame where no one wants to run with it at all. If you think WARs have it bad, your Dark Knights would have it *so* much worse.

[Sinaloa]

presents a *lot* of risk since you can't really guarantee that you're not going to massively overgear the tank or that the tank is even especially competent.

I can guarantee that I can hold the aggro if I´m playing that tank and I can guarantee I wouldn´t take the aggro if I´m playing the dd. Both classes got the skillset for it. In most of the regulary played content I could even guarantee to keep those pugs up as a healer.

..- because of that because you're, essentially, *encouraging* them to piss off tanks.

Sounds like you would but most players try to play well. But even if they do they will have a tough time taking aggro of a good tank since the highdamage skills reduce their aggro while they won´t get high aggro if they don´t use those.

On top of that, half of those abilities you'd never want to use. Enmity isn't a resource like MP or TP where you constantly recover a percentage of total value or Wrath where you generate stacks on a regular basis. After the first 20 seconds of the fight, if you used Sinister Plan, you'd be reducing your bonus damage from your stance to nothing for the entire fight.

well if you do spam one skill you wouldn´t - there are four more skills to go

, since, at that point, you're talking about having 0 enmity when everyone else has several tens of thousands: you're never going to get above 25% (this is why, when rezzing a tank, that tank *has* to use Provoke; they stand no chance of getting back to the top enmity ever again). The best you could hope for is using Braintwister to get a bit of an enmity boost from another DPS or healer but, for that, you're still restricting Sinister Plan to being used all of 2-5 times for the entire fight (half as much if you're with another of this same class).

Executes are meant to be used quite rarely. Most classes can use them as the mobs are at 25% or benath. He can use it anytime crippling his dps on that mob. For trash it woulb basicly be the same on bosses he would have to use it regulary bringing up his enmity with braintwister being even more usefull by setting that medica-happy-whm´s aggro to zero.

, . Facepalm (I'm not even sure how you came up with this name because it makes absolutely no sense to me; facepalming is something you do to yourself as a demonstration of exasperation, not something you do to someone else) would also be horrible because you're actively making the tank's job harder by reducing their enmity as well (not to mention that you'd be screwing with other Dark Knights).

Feel free to create a name of your own. Beside of that asume if you will the scenario of a tank being at 100% - 10000 enmity a dd (maybe another dk) at 80% - 8000 enmity a healer at 5000 - 50% enmity. now reduce those values by ten percent and calculate the results. I bet 08,15$ the result will be that they will end up at 100% 80% and 50%. The lowering may force the tank to use one cd more to bolster his aggro but if he chose being a tank to dps he could have chosen wiser.

Your design is bad because it doesn't work *on so many levels*. The abilities you've suggested provide no benefit in practical terms and oftentimes actively impede the use or effectiveness of others. If it *were* implemented as such, you can be sure that the job would suddenly become the black sheep of the metagame where no one wants to run with it at all. If you think WARs have it bad, your Dark Knights would have it *so* much worse.

There are plenty of arguments why this build will never be implemented but somhow you managed not hitting one of those, thats why I asumed it is a troll-post in the first place. But it was quite entertaining to read thus worth an answer.

[Leiron]

75% is a bit of overkill. The high enmity mods on the attacks increase the ratio of damage to enmity from 1:1 to 1:2.63. A 75% decrease in enmity generation would cause the class to generate 2/3rds of the enmity per point of damage as other DPS classes. To reach parity, you'd want to reduce enmity by 60%.

Fair enough, I don't know the exact enmity modifiers, so as long as it matches other DPS classes I do not mind.

Of course, the devs have already stated that they could just have the class change from MAR to DRK remove all of the high enmity tags and completely avoid the need for an enmity reduction stance completely. The 40% increase to damage I'm not entirely sure about, especially if you're adding more efficient attacks as part of the job. While it's true that a MAR in DPS gear won't match a real DPS, I'm not entirely sure what the exact comparative discrepancy is; based upon my gut, 40% seems kind of high though. It would probably also serve the class well to tie the damage increase to some other mechanic, like scoring a critical hit applying a stacking DoT that makes up the difference or dealing damage to a target suffering from your Fracture is outright increased, rather than just making it an outright passive increase of that size.

The main reason for the large increase is because other classes have mechanics to modify their DPS by a larger armount.
BLM alone uses an 80% modifier through AF3 for fire spells.
Marauder's just don't have the same DPS capability and need something similar.

Changing the axe to a greatsword requires a decent bit of work, since it requires the art team to create two models for every axe they make. It's not an *insurmountable* issue (especially since implementing it would be the same amount of work for them as just creating an entirely new class that uses greatswords), but it's still a concern, especially since it doesn't actually impact gameplay.

No, you do not need two models for every axe that is made.
Not at all actually.

http://cdn.riftgame.com/rift/storm/s...oncept1_lg.jpg

In RIFT, when a Harbinger applies a weapon buff, it uses a single model for ALL the different weapons in the game.
Sword and totem? Disappears and its replaced with the Scythe.
2H staff? Disappears and its replaced with the same Scythe.

You activate the stance, you get the greatsword in hand regardless of the model
1 model for everything, easy, simple, and not much work.

That's an insanely strong AoE. Fracture costs the same TP and is single target but only provides 300 potency over the (same) full duration. This one is AoE and deals *470*. That outclasses every other DoT in the game by a massive margin *and all of the DoTs we're comparing it to are single target*.

Yes, by comparison Archer's get two DoTs that hit for around 200+ each, and they both have the ability to trigger Bloodletter which is off the GCD.
Marauder is infamous for not having non-GCD abilities besides mercy stroke.
This would help compensate given they are ruled by the GCD more heavily

As Kitru said, you'd need to create animations and models for every axe in the game. I don't think thats a good road to take. And I agree that if you wanted a DPS job to branch off a tank class all you'd need to do is set the job crystal to remove the Increased Enmity tags on abilities that have them.
Up the TP cost, remove the DoT. This should be semi-spammable when AoE is called for like Doom Spike.
From a really old suggestion I made for DRK:

As I corrected Kitru earlier, no, you do not need to.
Activating the stance will replace whatever axe you have with the dark knight sword model.
The only work becomes changing the animation, which in the worst case scenario you can use the already existing animations in the game which is what is done in RIFT.
None of the scythe/Axe/GS animations are different, they all exist in the game already.

I am not sure I agree with the self sacrifice mechanic because many attacks can reduce your health by half already.
You'd have a strict requirement, and due to the HP sacrifice you'd be squishier than other DPS.

[Duelle]

As I corrected Kitru earlier, no, you do not need to.
Activating the stance will replace whatever axe you have with the dark knight sword model.
The only work becomes changing the animation, which in the worst case scenario you can use the already existing animations in the game which is what is done in RIFT.

Except that Rift and WoW have blanket animations for their two-handed weapons, whereas each animation and combat stance in FFXIV was tailored around that weapon. With the way MRD and WAR hold their weapon, you can't just replace that axe with a great sword. One hand is near the end of the grip of the weapon and the other is near the head of the axe with both feet spread apart, the way an axe should be held to maintain your balance.

To add a GSword you'd need to replace not only the combat stance but also all swing animations and foot positioning. How much you'd need to change depends on what stance you're going to use. You could cut and paste GLA's stance and tweak it, but that wouldn't look convincing. If you went with something like Siegfried's stance from SCIV, they might as well make a new class because then you'd need a lot of new animations.

I am not sure I agree with the self sacrifice mechanic because many attacks can reduce your health by half already.
You'd have a strict requirement, and due to the HP sacrifice you'd be squishier than other DPS.

The self-sacrifice thing is one of those staples of DRK that you can't really get rid of. FFII's DRK was a knight with some black magic, but the job didn't come into its own until Cecil came in and started cutting himself to deal damage. I'll admit that my suggestion was made WAY before the 1.0 servers shut down, before I knew they were trimming down GLA's sword skill repertoire as well as increasing the importance of stuff like Blood for Blood. You can't even make it heavily based on drains because WAR's tanking model is currently defined by self-heals. DRK is in an odd spot if you were to go with tradition. Now if they decide to reimagine the job the way they've done with Summoner and Scholar we might be on to something.

[Leiron]

@Duelle: What if you replaced it with a Scythe? The grip would not need to be altered greatly if at all.

[Gamemako]

@Duelle: What if you replaced it with a Scythe? The grip would not need to be altered greatly if at all.

Imagine the animation of Skull Sunder with a scythe. Would be more than a little strange, not to mention that the scythe would need to be pretty short.

[MartaDemireux]

Imagine the animation of Skull Sunder with a scythe. Would be more than a little strange, not to mention that the scythe would need to be pretty short.

There are ways around that. Look at GLA using Straight Shot. It's not like it shoots arrows out of its sword haha.