Wishing for Dark Knight

[SharpD]

Tradition died when Yoshida gave Bard a bow and it came from Archer. I can see Dark Knight being a tank or hybrid of tank/dps. Seems pointless to me to make it pure dps, as we can see from the recent Arcanist Yoshida is aiming to make new classes/jobs hybrid.

Yeah, still wishing for RNG (Was my main in FFXI)

[Reynhart]

Tradition died when Yoshida gave Bard a bow and it came from Archer. I can see Dark Knight being a tank or hybrid of tank/dps. Seems pointless to me to make it pure dps, as we can see from the recent Arcanist Yoshida is aiming to make new classes/jobs hybrid.

Actually, archer is not that illogical for Bard. In early Final Fantasy, appart from buffing (Which our bard does pretty wel), Bards were know for being able to dish out damage from the back row. It's pretty much the closest thing you have to ranged damage. And by the way, doing ranged damage with a bow if far less silly than doing it with an instrument.

As for the hybrid part, you can say that for classes, indeed. But jobs are not hybrid. Scholar is a healer and Summoner is a DPS.

[LineageRazor]

Actually, archer is not that illogical for Bard. In early Final Fantasy, appart from buffing (Which our bard does pretty wel), Bards were know for being able to dish out damage from the back row. It's pretty much the closest thing you have to ranged damage. And by the way, doing ranged damage with a bow if far less silly than doing it with an instrument.

In addition to this, Final Fantasy IV's Edward (the guy most FF fans think about when "Final Fantasy" and "Bard" are mentioned in the same breath) could use bows - and since his harps did pretty poor damage, you'd usually hook him up with one unless you specifically needed the status debuffs using a harp provided. So, Edward the Bard spent a lot of his time shooting arrows. It's not that much of stretch for Archer and Bard to be related in FFXIV.

As for Dark Knight, from the same game Cecil was a sword-and-shield wielder as a Dark Knight, so it would not surprise me at all to see DRK evolve from GLD. That said, it's true that a tanking role doesn't suit DRK, so it'd be tough to justify all of the tanking-specific abilities GLD brings to the table...

[Gilraen]

I think what Yoshida meant with Paladins and Dark Knights not getting along is that the Dark Knight's abilities will probably have high enmity generation making the tank's job all the more difficult. For a TP tank like Warrior that can probably be overcome with a bit more TP usage. Paladins, though, don't have the buff of Defiance to bolster their enmity generation, what with them being an MP tank. Personally I still think Dark Knight will stem off marauder as a DD Job, great axe was one of their best weapons.

[Reynhart]

Actually, Edward had even more choice in bow than in harp or dagger (7 vs 5 or 4)

[Reynhart]

I think what Yoshida meant with Paladins and Dark Knights not getting along is that the Dark Knight's abilities will probably have high enmity generation making the tank's job all the more difficult. For a TP tank like Warrior that can probably be overcome with a bit more TP usage. Paladins, though, don't have the buff of Defiance to bolster their enmity generation, what with them being an MP tank. Personally I still think Dark Knight will stem off marauder as a DD Job, great axe was one of their best weapons.

You can't have DRK overpowering all the others DPS in the game, for the sake of balance. So, if tanks can keep aggro today, they'll still do tomorrow.

As for "Great Axe was one of their best weapon", it's plain wrong:
Final Fantasy III : Dark Knight job uses Daggers, Swords and Katanas
Final Fantasy IV : Cecil uses Swords and Shields. He uses Axes only as a PLD
Final Fantasy X-2: Dark Knight only uses swords although there's no real equipment slot for weapon
Final Fantasy XI : Dark Knight uses Great Sword or Scythe

So, in fact, Axes or Great Axes were never a staple weapon of Dark Knight.

[Gilraen]

Final Fantasy XI : Dark Knight uses Great Sword or Scythe

So, in fact, Axes or Great Axes were never a staple weapon of Dark Knight.

Actually, Dark Knight has a B- rating in Great Axes in XI and was frequently used for it's weapon skills. This is where I get my precedent from, as well, given I never really played many of those games you listed save X-2... and I like to forget I played X-2... I keep saying Dark Knight should stem off marauder because it seems odd to have it stem off gladiator. And I keep citing existing classes because right now we only have one class that has two Jobs, arcanist, and that needs to change before we start getting waves of new classes.

[Erana]

Actually, Dark Knight has a B- rating in Great Axes in XI and was frequently used for it's weapon skills. This is where I get my precedent from, as well, given I never really played many of those games you listed save X-2... and I like to forget I played X-2... I keep saying Dark Knight should stem off marauder because it seems odd to have it stem off gladiator. And I keep citing existing classes because right now we only have one class that has two Jobs, arcanist, and that needs to change before we start getting waves of new classes.

I should probably mention that Yoshi and the devs have said before that they could change the skillsets for later jobs to be different from their base class. So a DD job stemming of Gladiator wouldn't necessarily use the more Enmity based combos of that particular class, but instead get their own skills and combos.

[Reynhart]

Actually, Dark Knight has a B- rating in Great Axes in XI and was frequently used for it's weapon skills. This is where I get my precedent from, as well, given I never really played many of those games you listed save X-2... and I like to forget I played X-2... I keep saying Dark Knight should stem off marauder because it seems odd to have it stem off gladiator. And I keep citing existing classes because right now we only have one class that has two Jobs, arcanist, and that needs to change before we start getting waves of new classes.

In endgame content "B-" is a pretty bad rating. And Great Axes weapon skills were dull, except for specialists, which DRK wasn't.

I agree that we don't need a new class to evolve into Dark Knight, but I think GLA is better choice, just because Sword is far more common for Dark Knight. And since GLA and MRD are both tanks, this would be a different role for the job either way.

[HakuroDK]

It makes a lot more sense for DRK to come out of Gladiator than for anything else. The only differences I see is that it could possibly be a "Backup Tank" in emergencies, kinda like how Summoner can be a "Backup Healer" and Scholar can be a "Backup DPS" in a pinch.

Also, I think the tech of DRK abilities increasing in power with lower HP is interesting, but would make the endgame a LOT more challenging unless there was some way to temporarily reduce one's HP down to critical, then back up to its original value without fearing negative damage repercussions.

Ultimately, I do like the idea of them using Darkness-based magical attacks in a melee range, maybe instead of "Shield Oath" and "Sword Oath", there's something like "Dark Sword", which converts all physical sword damage into magical damage, and "Blood Sword", which acts as a much weaker variant of "Bloodbath", in which it only affects auto-attacks?