Dear Square-Enix: You Forgot About Buffs to Dark Knight's Off-Tank Utility.

[Carstien]

You misread their post completely.

They're saying make Dragon Kick two separate debuffs, one the blunt resist down, and the other the INT down. Similar to how Vengeance puts up the counterattack buff and the vulnerability down buff separately. There've been vulnerability up debuffs in the game that have been able to cancel the latter half of that buff, but not the former.

That way the DRK could overwrite the INT part of DK but not the Blunt resist part. Not really all that important or even really a buff, but uhh. Yeah.



Please for the love of Christ and Satan combined don't turn this thread into that topic.

Ahh, I see. That's actually a really good idea, my mistake.

[Valkyrie-Amber]

well I wasn’t the only one who misread but yeah.

That one subjection alone would allow for better party choice in what classes to take.

but I will add a change that would work well :
remove monks int down debuff and leave blunt resist debuff only and give pld's Royal authority the same int down debuff cause that way both pld and drk will always be a viable choice to go with number 1 tank warrior.

and another buff if only was possible.... if party goes drk pld for some strange reason....

make royal authority ability switch to slashing debuff if a drk is the other tank. if other tank in party is war make it only int debuff.

That way all tank compositions are viable.

oh and also remove slashing debuff from nin and let tanks do them debuffs

[Brian_]

I'd imagine most DRKs out there wanting a slashing debuff just want to be able to be in a raid group with you PLDs and not have both of our personal DPS be screwed by 10%, short of asking a NIN to shaft themselves by 60 potency every other combo by using a suboptimal rotation (this would make NINs happy too, as they could then enjoy additional AE regardless of if a WAR is there or not).

Its a benefit to you guys as well. It means you PLDs can be in a group with DRK -OR- WAR and get your 10% that you rightfully deserve. It wouldn't sideline PLDs and it would do nothing for DRK/WAR comps because the effects would not stack. Please, please stop being such a Bitter Britney. Us DRKs just wanna raid with you PLDs too, without us both being gimped.

I personally would love getting Cover during a fat physical TB, or to enjoy a sweet DV during a big raid-nuke. But I never see those things (outside the DF, anyway) because I main DRK and I need a WAR in order to bring the most to my group.

While I can think of many more creative ways to give DRK OT utility, giving it a slashing debuff would actually fix *many* problems.

This post I think summarizes this topic quite well.

You do realize that to accomplish that same goal, they could also give PLDs more value, right?

Between PLDs and DRKs, one of those two tanks were actually already a favored tank. And, it wasn't PLD.

But no, because of biases, this topic is about DRK rather than the tanking dynamic overall.

You could easily flip this argument and say that the reason PLD + DRK doesn't work is because of the PLD. DRK already has a place within the meta. PLD is the one that doesn't. I'm not suggesting they do what I'm about to say at all but you could just buff PLD out the ass and suddenly WAR might fall out of the meta. DRKs would still be the go-to MT, PLDs actually see play as the go-to OT, and WARs would be left out in the cold. Flip that scenario around and buff DRKs out the ass instead and PLDs would go extinct because DRK + WAR would become an even more dominant tank pairing.

And, yet, we think DRK is the reason DRK + PLD doesn't work.

Like I've said many times, we don't know exactly how the tanking meta will change in Midas so I think it's hard to say anything for certain. But, as I said already, DRK is already part of the two major progression raid set-ups -- they are part of the highest raid DPS set-up and they are part of the highest raid mitigation set-up.

I think this topic misses the point about tank balance overall by a country mile. To steer it to that point from the topic of DRK OT viability is stupid.

[AI_wass]

I don't see what your issue is. Why shouldn't all tanks be not only viable, but desirable, in both MT and OT slots? Why does one always have to have their guaranteed spot, while the other two have fight for theirs?

[Brian_]

I don't see what your issue is. Why shouldn't all tanks be not only viable, but desirable, in both MT and OT slots? Why does one always have to have their guaranteed spot, while the other two have fight for theirs?

My points are thus --

MT and OT should not be the focus of any discussion about tank balance.

If you want to discuss tank balance, then you need to look at overall raid composition balance because it is about overall balance.

We do not know what raid comp balance will look like in Midas yet. We will have to see patch 3.2 play out a bit before conclusions can be drawn about the balance changes. But, let's just look at the current state of raiding --

If you buff DRK's OT utility, does that make PLD + DRK just as desired as DRK + WAR? Why would it? For a lot of fights -- and there is no reason to think this trend will change -- both tanks spend significant time OTing and MTing. Many times, the line is blurred because tanks will MT in their DPS stance. So, if you buff DRK OT utility, you are actually also buffing DRK + WAR comps -- the already preferred raiding comp. This is what happens when you are blind to the bigger picture and ask for such a specific thing when it's hardly the actual problem.

If you just want DRKs to have more OT utility because you're playing favorites, then okay. But, don't claim it's about tank balance.

[Syzygian]

snip

Just saying, but if you gave DRK (or PLD) a slashing debuff, that wouldn't buff DRK(PLD)/WAR combos at all. I feel the urge to remind you of what we DO know about this coming raid tier: 1. Lighter on the DPS checks and 2. Less magical damage, more physical. DRKs are wholly within reason to start looking at their OT utility questioningly at this point if they are looking for a group, as they are likely not to be the ideal MT option anymore given those 2 tidbits we have been given about the upcoming raids.

And of course, anyone with basic knowledge of math can deduce that most balance issues are moot after the progression cycle is over. But the example of progression raiders trickles down to the masses, for better or for worse, even if its wholly unnecessary. Everyone wants to mimic what they do/did to get the best possible results. I'm not saying that's right or even smart, but it happens. That's why I made this thread. Like I said, I'm in a group with a WAR and I'm the default MT of said group, this actually effects me very little. That doesn't mean I don't have my fingers on the pulse of the people.

So raid composition balance...

Is there any situation where a DRK/PLD combination would bring superior raid mitigation and/or raid DPS over DRK/WAR or PLD/WAR, through the remaining composition of the raid (healers/dps) etc. or otherwise? I'm genuinely asking, maybe you can enlighten me. No group wants to gimp themselves if they can help it, especially in this game where true alts aren't actually a thing and you can have every job on any character - and even if its moot after progression, more casual and/or midcore raiders want ideal comps to make up for the fact that... well, generally, they're less skilled (or have less time, which means more time to get rusty between raid days). I don't disregard things just because they don't effect the top 1%.

[Brian_]

It depends on what skill you add the slashing debuff to. It potentially is a buff to DRK / WAR comps. If you just throw the slashing debuff onto Delirium, WARs can choose to maintain Path if general raid damage is just consistently high in new content without sacrificing as much DPS and aggro generation or they can just full-time BB for a gain in overall potency if aggro is not an issue (either because there is a forced difference in boss up-time or the WAR is currently tanking). I'm sure a lot of WARs would salivate at the idea of a full BB berserk window either for DPS or for opening enmity generation. If WARs are able to maintain path in their enmity rotation without losing eye they can drop Defiance earlier in the progression cycle if damage is too high otherwise. As is, WARs dislike putting path up outside of situations where it's necessary because it's a DPS / aggro loss.

Meanwhile, for PLD + DRK comps, it's only a gain in that you let the NIN AE instead of DE. Is that really a big difference from how much it benefits WAR + DRK comps? Probably not.

As for PLD + DRK, like I said before, they are the highest raid eHP set-up. You can have Reprisal, Delirium, a few extra SSs, and Divine Veil. That's 10% damage reduction, 10% stat reduction, a few 1k+ shields, and a what will be a 2k+ group shield in 3.2.

In a DRK + WAR comp, you will have 10% damage reduction, 10% damage reduction, and Delirium. This might look like more mitigation but Divine Veil mitigates more damage from a single attack than Path ever will. Elysium's world first A4S team was actually constantly asking themselves if they had enough raid DPS to carry a PLD and MNK to A4S because they really wanted Divine Veil for the bigger coordinated raid mitigation it provides (and the MNK was then mandatory for the INT debuff) for the 4th leg's Mortal Revolution.

In a WAR + PLD comp, without a MNK, you will only have 10% damage reduction, a few extra SSs, and Divine Veil. With a MNK you have the same raid eHP as a DRK + PLD comp but lose either DRG or NIN. We already saw this comp fall out of favor in 3.0 because of that sacrifice. The changes in 3.1 and 3.2 were targeted at bringing this comp back in line with the other comps.

[Phoenicia]

In a WAR + PLD comp, without a MNK, you will only have 10% damage reduction, a few extra SSs, and Divine Veil. With a MNK you have the same raid eHP as a DRK + PLD comp but lose either DRG or NIN. We already saw this comp fall out of favor in 3.0 because of that sacrifice. The changes in 3.1 and 3.2 were targeted at bringing this comp back in line with the other comps.

Actually with a MCH, you can drop the caster for a third melee and end up with the highest DPS combination in game. That is even before Hypercharge buffs. You only lose on whatever little utility casters bring. MCH LB covers for caster LB. Only real need to break that is if you have physical resistant adds/phases where magical DPS is required.

As a matter of fact I was discussing changing to BRD or NIN instead of my caster with my static.

[MikeZulu]

And frankly it's ridiculous. Skills like Shield Swipe and Reprisal are so flawed in comparison

I do like reprisal as a mitigation and a powerful off gcd. I mean when Warrior does storms path it will be a dps loss rather than rotating between butchers block and storms eye but its possible 100% up time on Storms Path. Reprisal while not able to be up 100% or even up at specific times it is a damage increase to the Dark to use it. So thats where I see the trade off as. I mean if Dark Knight could be changed to have more up time/choice with applying reprisal and near 100% uptime on Delirium then that would be powerful. too powerful mitigation and utility wise. 10% int down and 10% damage down? theres your go to tank now.

[Cynric]

snip.

The problem isn't that reprisal has to be proc'd or that reprisal doesn't have 100% uptime theoretically.

The problem is reprisal can only be proc'd while MTing. If it relied on parry while MT and inside grit, and using Delirium/Soul Eater/Unmend/etc. to get a proc while not in grit that'd be different. It'd still be comparable but the uptime would be similar and it wouldn't exactly be the same as path, but it'd at least be usable OT. It'd be nice if the time you could use to use reprisal after a proc was a little longer.