Turning DRK into a tank was a huge mistake.

[Instrumentality]

If you judge all jobs by the people that are bad at them, then they are all mistakes.

This burn is so good I think it hurt me. Very good post.

[Einheri]

All the things the OP has pointed out about DRK's can be applied to all the tanks i have found in the DF. They don't use cool downs. They pull 100 mobs regardless of the aoe potential of the grp. They don't weave in aoe to hold threat. They avoid their tank stance. they succeed purely by the power of my cure two spam. Hell I have had a PLD tell me off when I noted he could right click regen off before a pull to help him establish agro.

It is not a DRK problem its a random internet people problem.

[Noxifer]

You know I meant the Final Fantasy series in general and not specifically FFXIV, right? Was saying that DRK has been presented in different forms and roles throughout the Final Fantasy series and someone saying they cannot be a tank class is not an accurate statement.

It wasn't quite clear from your previous post what you meant, so the misunderstanding isn't too out of the blue ^^

But I would like to disagree with you slightly; in earlier FF titles, you had your squishies (mages, thieves -- people doing more damage or having other roles such as support or healing, but also dying easier), you had your medium-armour people (those in chainmail and such, with slightly more defense values, but slightly less output and/or utility), and you had your heavy armour guys (not doing quite as much damage as the others, but capable of wearing more protective heavy armour, sometimes with skills that protect party members, sometimes with modes that temporarily lower defence for an increase in damage output). Knight/Paladin/Dark Knight have generally belonged to the last category of those. And as far as those titles go, I'd say the "heavy armour" category would count as tanks.

(Of course, I haven't played all of the titles, and some of them not for years, so my knowledge may not be as complete as someone else's. And I never played FFXI, since at the time I didn't have the economy to agree with the concept of "I buy the game, but then I have to pay again and again to actually play the game?")

[Nektulos-Tuor]

There is no mistake about it, it’s a great tank class this coming from someone who only plays tanks. You may be seeing a lot of bad players right now since the Drk is their first tank and they do not have cross class tank cool downs (They really do help level all the tank classes to at least level 20 please)

A “Dark” class that tanks has been in MMO’s for a long time, see AoC Dark Templar, WoW Death Knight, ETC.

Also having a tank that is more appealing to the masses may get more people to actualy try to tank and learn how to tank so please bear with them and help train them, more tanks is always better for everyone all around.

And way before all of that Shadowknight.

Why can't they add more lifetaps, lifetap hots, sacrifice abilities?

[Galdous]

Guess I'm just stupid but my two friends are warrior and dark and we justhink queue in a capacity where the drk just does dps. Won't work in savage but it wirks for us.

[Eisen-Zorn]

I think the reason why some people are bad at DRK is because they want to play them like PLD and WAR. This way of thinking seems to be creating problems because people don't want to change the way they play.

I bonus allocated 15 STR, 10 VIT, 5 PIE because of MP regen. Most all of equipment is VIT focused, but I put a STR ring on to help out with damage. My level 50-60 points have been VIT, but will be STR on the last few points.

I ran Dusk Vigil the other night with both a DRG with full BiS DreadWyrm gear from ARR, a BRD, and a SCH cranking out DPS with Cleric Stance. I had no problem holding aggro and the SCH had no problems healing me either. He never once had to leave Cleric Stance. Now, Dusk Vigil isn't hard, but, from what I've played, I seem to have found a good mix of stats and gear that lets me take some damage while dishing it out as well.

[FallenArisen0990]

You know what's not fun (I guess it was a little bit at the same time)? Having the healer pulling more mobs than what you pulled lol. While I'm not accustomed to bigger pulls, I can see how it can be stressful when you have large pulls. We completed the Dungeon with no Deaths but it I hope that doesn't happen too often XD.

[Ditto]

I think the reason why some people are bad at DRK is because they want to play them like PLD and WAR. This way of thinking seems to be creating problems because people don't want to change the way they play.

I bonus allocated 15 STR, 10 VIT, 5 PIE because of MP regen. Most all of equipment is VIT focused, but I put a STR ring on to help out with damage. My level 50-60 points have been VIT, but will be STR on the last few points.

I ran Dusk Vigil the other night with both a DRG with full BiS DreadWyrm gear from ARR, a BRD, and a SCH cranking out DPS with Cleric Stance. I had no problem holding aggro and the SCH had no problems healing me either. He never once had to leave Cleric Stance. Now, Dusk Vigil isn't hard, but, from what I've played, I seem to have found a good mix of stats and gear that lets me take some damage while dishing it out as well.

The problem with stat mixing like that (Save for the STR ring), is well, you have them so split apart that each one does an incredibly insignificant benefit for you.

5 Piety is a waste for a Drk, just learn to manage MP better. 1 Piety gives you around 5.3 total MP. 5 Piety for an extra 25~ MP is in no way a benefit at all. And as far as the MP regen goes, 30 Piety at level 50 gets you +4.8 MP per 3 seconds in combat. Now try to imagine what 5 Piety gets you. You likely wouldn't notice any difference at all in your MP regen, especially when 99% of your regen comes from your own abilities, which as far as I'm aware is not effected by Piety. And then there's Darkside, which practically makes your passive MP regen useless, as it instantly eats it. Sure Darkside may eat like 3 or 4 less MP, but in the grand scheme of things, when your MP is constantly jumping around in the thousands, that is nothing.

Vit is ok if you're full Vit, but 10 Vit is literally only giving you 20.5 HP per point. That's a whole 250 HP you have there, which isn't going to make that big a difference in your pool of 15k+ HP, and is something easily covered by food, plus more, if you need the HP that bad. The reason people often go full STR attributed is because of this; Vit only effects your max HP, and you only need a certain amount of HP before anything above that is wasted. And no, it does not give your healers extra time to DPS, because any blow that would otherwise reduce your HP enough to where your healer needs to give your attention, is still going to take your HP that low. It's an instant spike of damage that takes a chunk from your HP, putting you into zone that signals that you need healing, or you will die. They will still be throwing heals on you after that hit, because at any moment if even an auto attack crits you at the wrong time, you could easily drop. If they're not healing you, then they must enjoy watching their tanks panic blow all of their CD's to attempt to stay alive.

Splitting stats like that creates the same problem Drk has as a tank overall. It's so even it doesn't excel at anything compared to the other two tanks. Your stats are split so much to the point where your stats in all areas are giving such a minor, nearly unnoticeable effect.

But I mean if you're enjoying it and think it's working out for you, then you rock that 5 Piety. But the only way to play Drk on the defensive side is close to the way you would play a Pld, except there is more to it with less return. You literally just hit your CD's when a big attack is incoming, that is all there is to it's defensive side. And even though it's closer to Pld in terms of tanking, it takes some pointers from Warriors as well in terms of it's offensive side, though not quite as good. STR attributes and slaying accessories is a universal thing. The ultimate offense is the best defense. The faster things die, the easier the fight is. It doesn't necessarily mean that someone is trying to play Drk as if it were a War or a Pld, but even if they were, they'd still be capable with the job, up to it's own limitations at least.

[Stanelis]

For These who say "we are tanks, we Need def,...." I would actually love that if there was an uefull stat for that, parry is utter garbage (and i really tried to see sometthing good in that stat) especially for Paladins and vit is just not that usefull after some time (sure not useless and if I would have to choose vit or parry it would always be vit, but... for known content it is just not really needed to the degree in which it is aqcuirable)

If you want to understand the value of vitality I urge you to attempt T1 to T5 without echo in ilvl 70 gear (or T9 in ilvl 90~100 gear without echo).

[Sapphic]

If you want to understand the value of vitality I urge you to attempt T1 to T5 without echo in ilvl 70 gear (or T9 in ilvl 90~100 gear without echo).

Because 30 vit in ilvl 70 is around a 10% increase in HP, which is quite a significant increase, @50 in ilvl 130 as tank, 30 vit is closer to a 5% increase in HP. So at ilvl 70 it's more useful than wearing ilvl 130. Now we are at 15-20k HP, so the percentile increase is even less for those vit points. Even with the extra points to spend from 51-60.

In other words, as HP gets higher the returns from vit gets lower and STR gets higher in comparison.