After getting dark knight 60 and playing it for a while

[Cidolfas86]

Also Carve and Spit is really misunderstood imo, it's a free 884 MP that's off the GCD and honestly functions better in that aspect than just a DPS gain.

Carve and Spit is wasted as an MP regen ability. You'd have a better argument if it restored more than a syphon strike rotation. As it is now its best to use as a dps gain since cycling through 2x delirium combo should keep mp stable if your pushing DA + soul eater combo.

[Kelg]

yeah add MORE skills that require DORK arts. stupid idea if current dork arts manacost remains. would basicly limit us to about 2 actions and then be nearly fully drained. imo dark arts should only cost little mana and be used more often too create micro management to deepen the class complexity instead of beeing a "i wanna lose EVEN MORE MANA button".

You should have to make choices when using Dark Arts... It's not like you should be able to use it with every variation, every time you use the skill. Might as well not even have Dark Arts at all if that's the case.

[RaineAmorie]

Carve and Spit is wasted as an MP regen ability. You'd have a better argument if it restored more than a syphon strike rotation. As it is now its best to use as a dps gain since cycling through 2x delirium combo should keep mp stable if your pushing DA + soul eater combo.

Why should it give back more MP? Right now it's a great tool to save you from emergency mode should you get a little overzealous with DA. Are DPS that bad that you need to augment CaS instead of using it to keep yourself rolling in mp? During big pulls, using DA+AD when optimal wrecks your MP, but with Blood Price and CaS I'm losing very little MP all together and have more for things like DP and DA/PS.

Also, I think it's crazy that the same people saying Blood Weapon ruins your TP are also saying that we need to be able to use it in Grit. Why? So you can burn out as MT too? It's about MANAGING your resources, not plowing through them.

And on the point of our survivability kit being lackluster, our big CD may have less mitigation than PLD, but we also have a self heal every 6 secs or so. Some of our mitigation is passive and some is active, and I feel like if everyone could look at the class without the WAR/PLD blinders on and looked at different ways to use things besides "more DPS" they would see that DRK isn't in such a horrible place.

[Hundred]

And on the point of our survivability kit being lackluster, our big CD may have less mitigation than PLD, but we also have a self heal every 6 secs or so. Some of our mitigation is passive and some is active, and I feel like if everyone could look at the class without the WAR/PLD blinders on and looked at different ways to use things besides "more DPS" they would see that DRK isn't in such a horrible place.

I absolutely agree Drk isn't in a horrible place however...


Soul eater legitimately does not heal enough. And I don't mean that in the cliche "Oh static healing is bad" crap.
Look at the Healing potency per second a Warrior can put out, or even a Paladin as a result of Clemency. Dark Knight actually does not have a healing advantage unfortunately and to even try in compete in that department you're throwing out DA Soul Eaters like nobodies business.

At best Drk deals decent damage while self healing but as far as actual healing goes, Drk may very well have the worst self-healing of the three tanks. While comparing the 3 tanks isn't what you want if we're arguing the self-heal niche it isn't really there. I keep going back to magical damage mitigation...because it's actually there . For a Drk to bring their self-healing to its full capability they need a Warrior off-tanking for them dropping Storms Path & Eye. Which I suppose isn't a bad thing "team synergy" and all that, but isolated on their own, it's way easier to recover Health as a PLD/WAR so long as the PLD doesn't get interrupted which can happen but in general puts Drk behind them both.

[Faytte]

Cross classes: Some of your core abilities would likely get nerfed if you went to having lancer as an cross class. No offense but plenty of jobs do not like one or more of their cross class (paladins for instance gain almost nothing from white mage other than some convinience, more so now since clemency tends to be more clutch to cast in combat than stone shield).

Blood Weapon: Call for Goad or bard songs? Paladins do this all the time. If a paladin has to use their insane tp cost stun in fights (a3 adds, dungeons for mitigation purposes, etc) they plummet---classes are not all meant to be perfectly self sustaining.

Living Dead: Its buggy--not bad. It has certain advantages over the other two 'do not die' spells. For one, it does not proc until you WOULD die--meaning its effective EHP gain is higher than Holmgang. The living dead state lasts longer than holmgang when procced--so yes the downside has to be there with 2 great upsides.

Soul Eater: Soul eater heals -without- dark arts for almost as much as inner beast, and is a combo attack you can spam. With DA up, it heals for more. That is the strongest self heal through a basic attack in the game (in either version).

Dark Dance: 20 second up time, 1 minute cd. Its hard to buff something like this without increasing its cd, or lowering its up time. Bulwark for instance is 60% to block (vs 30% parry/20% dodge) and has 5 less seconds of uptime about 3 times the cd. Frankly, Dark Dance is fantastic due to how much coverage it gives you--many bosses auto or have physical swings (Bis EX, Rav EX) and even physical busters (rav ex). This is a great cooldown.

Shadow Wall: It's weaker cause you also have dark mind, a one minute cd for 30% mitigation against what seems currently to be ALOT of the raid damage. So yes--your BIG cd is weaker than say, Paladins, who cannot spam any of their defensives like you can. You cannot cherry pick cd's to compare and show that they are weaker--DRK's are defined by -short- cooldowns or -constant- access- to their perks, assuming they can manage their mp.

Dark Passenger: Not all skills are good in all situations. Paladin flash is useless in raids save for its threat--no damage, everything is immune to blind. Ditto the pacification on shield swipe which is largely useless everywhere. These skills dont need to change though--Blind and Pacification do. They need to be nerfed down a little bit and then be allowed to apply to ~All~ monsters. Blind should only affect auto attacks, namely (not powers, tank busters, etc) while pacification needs to be taken off from shield swipe. Similar situations could exist for Drk, but the core ability is fine, it just doesnt scale into raids which is another issue. If it applied a proper blind, it would be fine in more situations and warrant its mana cost.

Carve and Split: 450 damage off gcd. This is weak? Or gain back burst mana when you need it? You think this is weak? I will trade you spirits within for this in a heart beat (spirits hitting up to 300 potency, but generally less given how fast potency tappers off with even a bit of damage).

Blood Price: Its meant to help you with aoe pulls and some self sustain. Your only option for AOE threat are mana spenders after all. Single target, you can easily self manage your own mana---you are not spending as much mana to maintain threat.

Delirium: I laughed at this suggestion. You want a damage debuff that ALSO increases your own damage? Did you ignore the fact that unlike other tanks, you can keep a constant 15% damage buff up while you are tanking? Or that a ton of bosses are using magical damage?

Dark Arts: You are not managing mana properly if the cost of dark arts is an issue. That or you are misunderstanding it--its not meant to be spammed--. You can use it very often--sure, but you also have to regen mana (which is easy enough, frankly).

[Faytte]

I absolutely agree Drk isn't in a horrible place however...


Soul eater legitimately does not heal enough. And I don't mean that in the cliche "Oh static healing is bad" crap.
Look at the Healing potency per second a Warrior can put out, or even a Paladin as a result of Clemency. Dark Knight actually does not have a healing advantage unfortunately and to even try in compete in that department you're throwing out DA Soul Eaters like nobodies business.

Warrior attack based self heal is 300 potency and consumes 5 stacks of wrath. DRK is 260/400. If you are looking at their other powers, these are defensives that replace damage reducers that DRK and Paladins have. You reduce 30% magic damage every minute, while a warrior heals back up that damage instead through bursty self heal cds. That is not the same as constant offensive self healing, where DRK's are clearly ahead of War.


As to Paladin, Clemency is a 3 second cast, and you cant really compare it to the other classes. As an MT you cannot hit a button and save yourself--it takes a lot of foresight and skill, and with harder content you are very prone to being interrupted during the cast (not to mention, you cannot parry or block while spell casting, which is more important given the interrupt mechanic).

DRK's have a great constant self heal, and have access to very short cd defensives. Other tanks work differently (paladin has many defensives, but all on signifncant cds. Wars have limited reduction compared to the other two, but more burst healing).

[stoxastic]

Soul Eater: Soul eater heals -without- dark arts for almost as much as inner beast, and is a combo attack you can spam. With DA up, it heals for more. That is the strongest self heal through a basic attack in the game (in either version).

SoulEater w/o Dark Arts is not as good as IB.

SE w/o DA: 260 * 1.15 (DS) * .8 (Grit) = 239
IB :300 * 1.2 (maim) = 360
SE w/ DA : 400 * 1.15 * .8 = 368

Overall I don't think DRK is bad, but is more difficult to play optimally than the other tanks. Maybe increasing SE's heal % can be good. With DA it heals for almost the same amount as IB does.

[rawker]

From what i know, darkside is 15% more damage, not 50%

Nvm. T'was already edited

To souleater's defense, you can do that every 3rd GCD vs IB's 8, at the very least.

[Phoenicia]

SoulEater w/o Dark Arts is not as good as IB.

SE w/o DA: 260 * 1.15 (DS) * .8 (Grit) = 239
IB :300 * 1.2 (maim) = 360
SE w/ DA : 400 * 1.15 * .8 = 368

Overall I don't think DRK is bad, but is more difficult to play optimally than the other tanks. Maybe increasing SE's heal % can be good. With DA it heals for almost the same amount as IB does.

Yes, in raw potency DA SE barely beats IB. but what Faytte is saying is that while a WAR needs to stack 5 wrath stacks (roughly 8 GCDs, less if CDs used) to pop IB (infuriate for a second), all DRK needs to do is SE every 3rd GCD. Putting SE ahead in raw HPS.

[Faytte]

SoulEater w/o Dark Arts is not as good as IB.

SE w/o DA: 260 * 1.15 (DS) * .8 (Grit) = 239
IB :300 * 1.2 (maim) = 360
SE w/ DA : 400 * 1.15 * .8 = 368

Overall I don't think DRK is bad, but is more difficult to play optimally than the other tanks. Maybe increasing SE's heal % can be good. With DA it heals for almost the same amount as IB does.

My comment was based on its availability, not its potency.

You can IB every 8 GCDS (included). You can Soul eater every 3.

In the time you IB, you can do 2.66 Soul eaters. Without DA that is about 635.75 potency of self healing. Even if you mix in other combos (threat, delirum) you are generally well ahead of the sustained self healing of a warrior (who, also strictly speaking, are not using IB for the heal, but generally for the 20% mitigation, and will commonly pop it while already topped off in anticipation of damage, so much of that self heal is lost).