The Bottom Feeders: Moves You Never Use and Why.

[Kaztiel]

Blood Price + Dark Arts + Abyssal Drain = 15 seconds of Immortality

O God a thousand times yes.

And Sole Survivor has become a staple for me as well. Basically once per pull get 20 percent MP back for picking a mob that's about to die anyway. Wanna feel like a rockstar? Time ur Mercy Stroke properly and get HP back as well! Isss DEELICIOUS.

Stuff I forget about? Dark Passenger. blind effect is meh (I WANT those mobs hitting me so I can get my MP back w/ Blood Price). How about lancer's Piercing Talon? I've only used it twice. Once to show a new tank how to pull in Stone Vigil NM. And once in Copperbell to pull the spriggan away from the bomb that blows up the (2nd?) boss.

[Februs]

snip

Kinda funny to see the things we use some functions for, isn't it? lol. I remember when I first started playing this, seeing the lock-on function and thinking it was gonna be like every other video game out there and that I'd end up using it a lot... And then I didn't, except for these very rare instances lol.

I thought the crit rate was 5%... I seem to recall reading it somewhere. I don't know if it's true though. Either way, it's very difficult to quantify the benefit of moves like Bulwark and Awareness since we have no way of knowing how many crits were nullified, if any.

[Giantbane]

The only problem I have with Awareness on Pld is actually a problem with Bulwark. The CD timers don't line up for Bulwark and Awareness to be used in sync or even with every second usage. Terrible timing. Bulwark's CD timer should be adjusted to match.

I'm really not liking how Bulwark is set up right now. It's an in between ability that's not 100% block rate, but it has a long cooldown. I wish they'd either make it a short cooldown with only a modest improvement in block rate (like DRK's dark dance) or a longer cooldown with 100% block rate (like Raw Intuition, although I guess that is a short cooldown too...). It was ok in 2.0, but by 3.0 standards it feels very lackluster.

[Giantbane]

WTF. When you DA C&S you gain 350 potency (from 100 to 450), when you DA SE you gain 140 potency (from 260 to 400). C&S is oGCD. And honestly, you shouldn't have to choose between DA SE and DA C&S if you're playing properly. You should have enough MP to DA every time C&S is available while rotating DA SE and Delirium and using Dark Passenger on CD. C&S without DA becomes more efficient only during huge AoE pulls; when the extra 884MP you get + the 1768MP you didn't spend makes you able to use Abyssal Drain 2-3 more times.

Even with smaller groups, I'm finding I use C&S on its own now much more in dungeon runs.

After Blood Price runs out, I'll drop a huge chunk of MP on DA + DD + DA + DP to max out evasion. During this, I'll drop Grit and Blood Weapon and use C&S to get that MP back so I'm near full when I turn back on Grit and move on to the next group. I can only afford to DA + CS if the group kills really slow, and I've got more time to regen MP after blind wears off.

But single target, obviously DA + CS all the way.

It's funny because dungeon runs are starting to feel how I thought DRK was going to be played. I'm managing my MP tightly between blood price, aoe spam (maybe DA + AD depending on group size), DA + DD, DA + DP and having to make decisions about whether I need the extra MP from C&S to top off after the group or whether I can afford the extra damage without starting the next group low on MP.

As opposed to single target where the only decision you really need to make is whether or not you're going to get hit with a hard enough magic attack that you want to use DA + DM.

[Giantbane]

Except that that post was mimicking your own exaggeration. Realistically, Path is unused 99% of the time because it's both lowest dps and has a largely unwanted secondary effect, except for those moments when you need the extra mitigation because you're too bad to get gear to not need the mitigation.

The original post was "This move sucks because it's not needed, not sucks because it's bad".

Yea, but it's not that much weaker. You're only losing 40 potency every 7 or so GCD (if you include wrath moves & fracture), I think I napkin mathed that out to like 1-2% of your total DPS.

So 1-2% of your DPS vs. 10% less damage all the time to everyone. I think unless you're talking about bleeding edge content, the extra couple % dps you do isn't going to make that much difference. But 10% allows your healer to breath a little easier.

10% is something like an 11% ehp/eheal increase. For the tank alone, in full STR acc around i200-i210, what does that give you? a base of around 15kish hp? So maybe this is giving you (or the tank) an effective extra base 1600 hp (along with the corresponding eHeal increase). Even if you're doing 1500 dps on a fight, that's a loss of like 30 dps at most (and I think that's a high estimate).

What would you say that was in STR? I've heard vit > str acc adds something like 25% to your DPS on a tank. So 5% each accessory, each accessory at i210 has, what, around 50 STR on it? So lets say 1% is 10 STR. So you're trading 20 STR to give the tank an extra 1600 base HP (more if they're wearing melded or any VIT acc) and 11% effective extra healing. And in reality this applies to the whole group. It sounds like a great trade off to me, unless you are on bleeding edge content and you absolutely NEED that extra few points of DPS to beat an enrage.

[Februs]

I'm really not liking how Bulwark is set up right now. It's an in between ability that's not 100% block rate, but it has a long cooldown. I wish they'd either make it a short cooldown with only a modest improvement in block rate (like DRK's dark dance) or a longer cooldown with 100% block rate (like Raw Intuition, although I guess that is a short cooldown too...). It was ok in 2.0, but by 3.0 standards it feels very lackluster.

100% agreed.

A simple adjustment to Bulwark's timer would go miles and miles for fixing that move as well as the efficiency of Awareness on Pld (call me crazy, but I kinda think it's weird that Pld's get the least utility out of a move that comes from their kit). I would probably leave it's block rate the same for now though. 100% would be inefficient now that Shelltron is in the Pld line-up and lowering it would make it under-powered compared to Drk's and War's, because the Duration of effect is much shorter.

Personally, if I could sit down and talk to the Dev's, the change I'd implement to Bulwark would be to reduce the CD timer to 120s (same as Awareness). I'd also consider decrease the block % (maybe as low as 45%), but only if they also increased the duration of the effect to 20-25 seconds with 25 being optimal, as it would last an identical time as Awareness on Pld (and before anyone gripes about the unfairness of that, I'll remind you all that Awareness is a Pld move. It makes sense that Pld's should get the most use out of it. Wars and Drks can suck it up).

[Februs]

Even with smaller groups, I'm finding I use C&S on its own now much more in dungeon runs.

I don't know if this is right or wrong (and a more experienced Drk can feel free to set me straight on it), but I typically start to use an AD spam on mob pulls of 4 or more to increase my enmity + Dps output. Anything more than 5 (or if the Dmg starts to see sizable dips in my Hp), and I start using DA-AB When Blood Price is up to compensate. At that point, C&S becomes an MP regen move for me, rather than a Dps gain. Once the Mob starts to whittle down to 3 or less, I drop Grit, apply Blood Weapon, and regain as much Mp as possible before next pull...Again, don't know if that's the "right" way to do it, but it's been working out for me pretty well so far.

As opposed to single target where the only decision you really need to make is whether or not you're going to get hit with a hard enough magic attack that you want to use DA + DM.

Dark Mind tends to be the move I use the least on my Drk these days, and I fully admit that I am under using it.

The problem I think I'm having is: 1. I'm used to having no such option on Pld or War. 2. Fights requiring high magic defense are not as common as physical cleaves and Tank busters. 3. Because of reason 2, I placed Dark Mind on my 3rd Hotbar. I basically put it aside in favour of moves I use far more frequently... but the side effect of that is that I tend to forget about it, and even when I'm using it I don't always know when it's off CD... Bad habits I need to get over.

[Syzygian]

I don't know if this is right or wrong (and a more experienced Drk can feel free to set me straight on it)

Here's my big pull ritual in dungeons:

1. Unmend first target.
2. Plunge to the next.
3. Unleash as I run past packs.
4. If my GCD is ticking such that I'll be in melee range by the time my next Unmend goes off, I Scourge instead for shits.
5. If a pack is out of range or stragglers fly past me to eat the healer, I throw an Abyssal Drain at them.
6. I put down Salted Earth wherever the final group is as I approach that spot.
7. Pop Blood Price +Shadowskin or Shadow Wall.
8. AD > DP > AD > DA > AD > unbuffed C&S> AD > DA > AD > AD
9. Blood Price falls, then: HS > DA > SS > (some oGCD here) > DE > DD > HS > DA > SS > (some oGCD here) > DE > DP > Scourge > Awareness
10. Multidot with Scourge if my MP is above like 2.5-3K and mobs are still at around 75% or more.
11. Salted Earth again.
12. 1 or 2 other defensive CDs.
13. Blood Price again.
14. Rinse&Repeat/Wing it.
15. Stuff dies.

I typically pull 10 or so targets in this fashion, and I'd say at least 6-8 mobs are necessary to burn MP as liberally as I do.

[Februs]

Here's my big pull ritual in dungeons: 8. AD > DP > AD > DA > AD > unbuffed C&S> AD > DA > AD > AD
9. Blood Price falls, then: HS > DA > SS > (some oGCD here) > DE > DD > HS > DA > SS > (some oGCD here) > DE > DP > Scourge > Awareness

This is pretty much exactly what I do on mobs of 5 or more, or near enough depending on Mp regen (damn those Whm holy's for wasting my blood price) and which CD's are up at the start of the pull.

Some differences would be that I almost always use DA with DP on any group of 4 or more. Around step 14, "wing it" would be replaced for me with dropping Grit and using Blood Weapon to prepare for the next pull. I typically try to save Shadow Wall for this part, or some sort of a combination of Fracture/[DA-DD/Raw - DD] + Awareness (with DA being applied only if the Dps is slow and have yet to thin out the ranks to my liking) if Wall is still down.

I know I should be more considerate to my healer (and often am if they seem to be struggling), but most healers I've come across don't seem to have a problem with dropping Grit for Mp Regen near the end of the pull.

[StitchWork]

Abyssal Drain is great when you use it with Dark Arts and Blood Price. The more mobs that are beating on you the better. You can just about fill up your HP and MP bar in one shot. :-D