"Dark Knight: Tanking On The Edge"

[Kotemon]

Just some stuff that has been lingering in the back of my mind for a while. Aside from reducing magical damage, are there any other traits that get affected by a lowered Int effect from Delirium. Also what stats or abilities can affect Abyssal Drain. Would Convalescence add 20% to the Hp recovery or is it capped by the damage it does. If Abyssal Drain, Dark Passenger, Unleash and Unmend are all magical. Are they still affected by +Str in the same manner as physical damage. Paladin and war don't need Int for any Mp ability (flash) and it seems odd if Darks main agro pull and aoe potencies to be tied to a stat that's not needed for the majority of combat damage and enmity . Skill and Spell speed affects their Dot in a way similar to Determination. Is Salted Earth's dot affected by Skill Speed or Spell Speed? Or is that one of those things whose effect is so unnoticeable that most would say it doesn't matter?

The only thing I still am NOT comfortable with is Grit.

While I'm no stranger to dropping it, I see a LOT of DRKs keep it off for a long time. I'm hesitant to leave it off for more than 2 combos with a pack of 4+ mobs.

Yeah I'm like that also, but that might be since I'm not full +Str (+14 Vit). I only turn it off near the end when its just 1 or the boss is 20% or in kill the add mode and I tend use more enmity combos and boosted C&S than Delirium when Blood Weapon is up

[Syzygian]

Just some stuff that has been lingering in the back of my mind for a while. Aside from reducing magical damage, are there any other traits that get affected by a lowered Int effect from Delirium. Also what stats or abilities can affect Abyssal Drain. Would Convalescence add 20% to the Hp recovery or is it capped by the damage it does. If Abyssal Drain, Dark Passenger, Unleash and Unmend are all magical. Are they still affected by +Str in the same manner as physical damage. Paladin and war don't need Int for any Mp ability (flash) and it seems odd if Darks main agro pull and aoe potencies to be tied to a stat that's not needed for the majority of combat damage and enmity . Skill and Spell speed affects their Dot in a way similar to Determination. Is Salted Earth's dot affected by Skill Speed or Spell Speed? Or is that one of those things whose effect is so unnoticeable that most would say it doesn't matter?

Delirium reduces all of the boss's outgoing magic damage. All of our spells are scaled off strength but deal magical damage. This means their damage is boosted by things like Foe's Requiem and Bishop Hypercharge. This is all stuff that I mentioned in the guide btw

Basically everything we do (for now anyway, 3.2 may change this) scales from Strength. But our ranged/aoe abilities DEAL magic damage, USING our STR, and thus are checked against the targets magic defense. Convalescence is only healing received, not self-heals. I'm not 100% sure about SkS and Salted Earth, I know Scourge benefits, but placed AoE DoTs tick on a different timer than DoTs applied to a target (put down SaE and SC at the same time and you'll see that they tick separately, this isn't the case with single-target DoTs stacked together like Bio/Miasma/Bio II with SMN, which when applied all tick as one big collective tick.

In no way does DRK utilize its own INT, Spell Speed, or Piety. Everything is STR/VIT/CRIT/SkS/DET/Parry.

[Cynric]

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Dropping Grit imo, depends on comfort levels and experience. If you know a fight really well you'll know how long until you need it for a tank buster, if you're running in DF it's dependent on your healer and gear though for speed runs. Granted with 4-5 mobs and having BP up, spamming Abyssal with DA and using Dark Dance + Awareness/Skin/Wall/Foresight you don't really need grit unless something goes wrong.

As for checking your GCD, Go to the skills in action /traits and for DRK under job, look at a move on the GCD and where it says Cooldown it will show what your GCD currently is including modifiers like Greased Lightning(*if you're a monk) or blood weapon. example for me if I look at it unbuffed it'll say 2.4 if I use blood weapon then look at it during the buff it'll say 2.16

[Syzygian]

I've been getting more and more comfortable with DRK. Unlike my PLD, I even put up learning parties just so I can get a feel for it on a greater level. The only thing I still am NOT comfortable with is Grit.

While I'm no stranger to dropping it, I see a LOT of DRKs keep it off for a long time. I'm hesitant to leave it off for more than 2 combos with a pack of 4+ mobs. On a boss, it's easy~peezy until I need healing and/or when ourhealer dies (I solo'd the Wall in Library as DRK starting at about 28%, using Potions to assist with MP due to me getting under a panic state while using Dark Arts + Abyssal Drain as well as Dark Arts + Souleater with Grit up for the self heals).

As PLD, I kinda did my own thing and didn't care (pure VIT, for example) so long as I kept the mob(s) on me with 100% mitigation. As DRK, I'm actually "learning" it and trying different ways to play it.

Here's what I would suggest for people like yourself:

If you don't feel comfortable to keep Grit off long enough to use Blood Weapon twice (55 seconds) you're better off just keeping it on. Turning it off and then back on so soon is a huge MP and DPS loss.

A 55 second window (the time it takes to apply two usages of of BW and have them run for their full duration) is more than enough time to rotate cooldowns to keep yourself bulky during Grit downtime, even for the most conservative of players, if you're not sure of yourself.

As mentioned in the guide, I never recommend turning Grit off for trash in 4-man content. Just keep it on, pull more, and invest your DPS into AoE rather than Grit downtime/BW uptime. If you are the OT in 8-man content that is particularly trash-heavy, like A2N, rotate AoE bursts with BW and BP (depending on how much your MT is tanking/if you are tanking anything at all). Turning it off against 4+ mobs is inefficient as you're taking disproportionately increased damage with respect to the single-target DPS increase, whereas you could probably match yourself out of Grit in total AoE DPS by just keeping Grit on and AoEing larger packs. DRK's entire toolkit really lends itself to big pulls in 4-man content so I strongly recommend seizing the opportunity to push yourself to pull more to tap into the jobs potential (Getting thousands of MP back every couple of seconds, spamming AoE, being healed for it, and then when BP falls, blinding a pack of 10 mobs with a 250 potency AoE and then boosting your evasion with DADD. Its pretty godmode once you get a feel for the flow of it).

Anyway, turning Grit off is primarily for boss fights. For trash/multi-target stuff, I recommend just trying to pull more to get the most out of Grit's mitigation and BP's MP and use that to go crazy on AoE.

[Cynric]

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I agree with most of what you said except the only thing is while yes you can do more AoE DPS with larger packs grit on compared to single target with grit off using blood weapon, when you're fighting 4+ you should be using AoE anyway which with grit off is still going to be higher. You shouldn't be matching Single target DPS to AoE DPS in an AoE DPS situation.

[Syzygian]

I agree with most of what you said except the only thing is while yes you can do more AoE DPS with larger packs grit on compared to single target with grit off using blood weapon, when you're fighting 4+ you should be using AoE anyway which with grit off is still going to be higher. You shouldn't be matching Single target DPS to AoE DPS in an AoE DPS situation.

Their original post implied they were turning Grit off to use Blood Weapon on 4+ mobs, so I directed them to an appropriate scenario to keep Grit on (since they are less comfortable with having it off) and still do more damage/speed up the run for the party. When you drop Grit, most of the time, you're doing it for BW primarily, you're not doing it to make your AoEs stronger unless in some rare scenarios (OT in solo tank A2 for instance). BW doesn't synergize with your AoE. If you're dropping Grit for only a short time on 4 mobs its likely you're doing it for BW and not for AoE unless you wants to be manafloored very quickly.

The point is, if you're disabling Grit against 4ish mobs, to AoE/self heal, you're not able to do it as constantly, liberally, our repeatedly as if you were tanking more and getting hit more, which, as it happens, is easier with Grit on.

Of course anything you do in Grit will do less damage than its out-of-Grit counterpart. But DRK as a tank craves tanking huge packs, the bigger the pull/more mobs tanked that's more AoE DPS, more MP, and more self-healing. It also means Grit is less of an option and more of a requirement due to the sheer quantity of incoming damage. There are pulls I do in the Arboretum and PSHM that I would never in a million years do with Grit off, even at the end of the pull, popping Shadow Wall my HP plummets until I DA that first AD (I'm actually solo-healing myself for the first couple GCDs).

I'll advocate having Grit off all day for bosses. For speed-run dungeon pulls (which DRK is built for) not so much. My playstyle is to keep Grit on during dungeon trash sections and just pull as much as my body/the healer can take, AoE/self-heal/BP like crazy, DADP the whole lot of them and DADD to go full dodgelord and then single target until BP comes off cooldown, then rinse-repeat.

I'm sure you can keep Grit off if you pull less but this also makes your AoEing less effective overall (less targets) and this lessens potential self-healing and potential BP returns because you just can't pull as much with Grit off as with Grit on. Its just not in the numbers. And from what I've come to understand about the DRK job this is a way to maximize dungeon runs and AoE scenarios and is an area where Grit actually shines. The job craves big pulls, that's just the way it feels, and the more you pull the more bang you feel like you're getting for the job's buck if you will. More mobs just fuels the fire and because DRK's AoEs utilize an endlessly renewable resource (read: not TP) it can AoE longer with MP to spare and then do it again 25 seconds later without skipping a beat.

Its just a quality of life utility that DRK brings to 4-man content or trash-heavy 8-man content, and it just so happens to exponentially synergize with staying in Grit.

[Cynric]

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Ah I see what you're saying.My personal preference for using grit with 4+ mobs is a little different but mileage may vary depending on gear vs content, but if I know I'm comfy with pulling a ton of mobs I'll keep grit up for a couple of AD's then I'll turn it off and try to focus on AoE DPS cycling my CD's. Though it really depends on the healer and party composition. I mark something with sole survivor when HP gets low, if we get to the point of 2-3 mobs left I'll pop blood weapon to regen some extra MP for the next pull, unless it's a boss then I probably have enough MP for it. I don't need to pull less mobs to have grit off though, I pull the same amount either way, as much as possible.

I do have a question though, this is something I'm not really sure about but it involves speed runs and I wonder what your thoughts are. I found that when grabbing mobs for quite a while it seems more beneficial to be grit on/ darkside off for my mana management , then when I stop I turn darkside on. Do you feel like it's better to be darkside off while gathering mobs or on? I just can't stand the MP drain while i'm still pulling things and not being able to regen it or do any real damage yet personally.

[Syzygian]

I do have a question though, this is something I'm not really sure about but it involves speed runs and I wonder what your thoughts are. I found that when grabbing mobs for quite a while it seems more beneficial to be grit on/ darkside off for my mana management , then when I stop I turn darkside on. Do you feel like it's better to be darkside off while gathering mobs or on? I just can't stand the MP drain while i'm still pulling things and not being able to regen it or do any real damage yet personally.

Nah, I never turn Darkside off until the last mob dies. I let it regen on the way to the next pack, reactivate it, then pull. I minimize my mana consumption while pulling as much as possible.

There's a lot of techniques I've found invaluable for this:

1. Unleash procs. If you get one, use it.
2. For individual mobs I won't always use Unmend, sometimes I'll Plunge to them, other times I'll put Scourge on them and Low Blow them as I run by. With Grit these are enough to hold hate. The DoT ticks will keep them on me and the stun will keep them from hitting me for a second so the healer stress isn't so bad. Tagging things with Scourge+LB is actually a favorite MP-saving technique of mine, I utilize it often.
3. If the first mob is part of a pack I won't bother with Unmend, I'll just run through them and Unleash.
4. If you only hit one mob out of a large pack or series of packs, the remaining mobs tied to it of course are pulled and pile up around your location. If you run through them, they stop and turn around and start to chase you. If there's several packs in succession, or more than I could hit with a single Unleash, I'll just hit the first one with Scourge or Plunge or something, and then let the remaining 5-6 mobs pile up as I run by, and then I'll toss an Abyssal Drain behind me. This way I can tag and get aggro on a huge pile-up of trash with a single spell. Can sometimes scare the rest of the party but generally it works.
5. Speaking of generally, Abyssal Drain is an amazing tool, because its the only tank AoE that can reach behind you. This is the only reason #4 is even possible. If WAR or PLD misses something they have to run back to get it off whomever, or worse if they missed more than one. With DRK, sometimes you can just yoloswagfacepull half a dozen mobs and run past them, and as they pile up behind you tag them all at once. This of course implies there's nothing dumb going on like a regen ticking on you or the like. But even so, once you get the timing down its easy to get a bunch of mobs piled up as you run past them, and then AD them while they are clumped up turning around to chase you.

Sometimes once I reach my destination I'm "low" on MP (2-3K) but this is frankly enough. I generally don't start REALLY AoEing hard until I see that first wall of AAs hit me, then I unleash the Sea Urchins. At this point, BP is up, SK or SW is up, Salted Earth is down in front of me, and I'm ready to get busy. With big enough pulls it can be REALLY hard to make your MP dip below 5K, even with repeated AD spam, DAing every other one. My MP rockets up so fast my head spins, and then its just DA every other AD and its not too hard for the healer to keep up, and generally I've got enough MP left after BP falls to DADD and DADP (sometimes I need a DE combo in there, and of course I weave in un-DAed C&S once my MP actually starts taking a legitimate dip during AoEing). I get my MP back up to where I'm comfortable, put Scourge on things until BP comes off cooldown, then pop another defensive CD and rinse/repeat.

[Cynric]

snip.

The AD stuff might help. I do it sometimes but maybe not often enough. I think I pull more with unmend/unleash than I try to run through and AD them afterwards. That might help. It's probably because I went from PLD > DRK so I'm used to doing the typical Lob/Flash style things and I translated that style of pulling to my DRK.

I also never really thought scourge enmity would be enough but i'll try that out as well. Thanks for the tips.

[KaitlanKela]

I used to play healer, now I wanna play DRK?