4.1 Dark Knight Feedback and fixes

[Aana]

I'm all for a drk damage buff of ~5% or so just to bring it to the same level as pld/war. I'm personally more interested in the end result than the nuance of getting there. If SE said tomorrow: Darkside getting a 7% buff (rougly 6% net damage boost) that would be fine. Its not flashy. It doesn't change gameplay, but it would make drk do similar damage to war/pld. I don't think damage needs to be buffed to be more 'Drk-ish' by shuffling around blood/gauge/delirium etc. I feel those are just more convoluted and have more opportunity to be screwed up via performance. But that's my personal opinion.

Drk needs damage. Id rather they just buff darkside/potencies and be done with it. Its easy to measure to get the exact boost intended with no unintended consequences. (it would also be a little boost to enmity generation with overall damage and boosting enmity combo by proxy while something narrow like delirium buff wouldn't as much) I realize many don't agree with my rather bland approach. But we do agree on needing damage buffs.

And to an earlier point: Yes wars are being greedy stupid people. I don't get the obsession with dropping IR to a 1 min CD. Might as well just delete the skill and bake gauge reduction into zerk at that point. Wars already do top damage. They sure as hell don't need a giant damage buff for no dicernable reason besides "I WANNA CLEAAAAVVVVEE".

[SyzzleSpark]

I'm personally more interested in the end result than the nuance of getting there.

You may not be interested in the nuance of getting there, but a lot of us are, because on top of being a below-par tank across the board, for a lot of people it doesn't feel good. Delirium doesn't feel good. SE removed a lot of DRK's "nuances" in the expansion, and tried to make up for it with small combo potency boosts and a %damage increase on Darkside, which pretty much is exactly in the neighborhood of what you're suggesting, and look where we are now. That's why you're seeing people come up with these ideas. Its okay if you're not interested in the nitty-gritty details, but many of us are, because they do matter.

Every single nuance can be mathed out to exact potency gains, just as Delirium can.

For example = Delirium's net gain is the 8s on Blood Weapon, because the MP it gives you only serves as an exchange to cancel out the Blood Gauge cost. Therefore, you can simplify the entire equation of the ability and just remove the BG cost and immediate mana return. When you do that, you see Delirium for all that it actually is: a free +8s on Blood Weapon. That doesn't deserve a 2 minute cooldown. In mana+the attack speed bonus that is about an extra 300 potency per 2 minutes. Its a very weak ability disguised as a strong one.

[Rhais]

You may not be interested in the nuance of getting there, but a lot of us are, because on top of being a below-par tank across the board, for a lot of people it doesn't feel good.

Yeah, I probably would have kept it as my main if it was in the same position as it is now, but still fun to play. However just increasing potency or Darkside buff for more damage will not make me pick DRK back up, the SB redesign was a complete failure, and tank balance is only a part of the problem.

[Aana]

You may not be interested in the nuance of getting there, but a lot of us are, because on top of being a below-par tank across the board, for a lot of people it doesn't feel good. Delirium doesn't feel good. SE removed a lot of DRK's "nuances" in the expansion, and tried to make up for it with small combo potency boosts and a %damage increase on Darkside, which pretty much is exactly in the neighborhood of what you're suggesting, and look where we are now. That's why you're seeing people come up with these ideas. Its okay if you're not interested in the nitty-gritty details, but many of us are, because they do matter.

Every single nuance can be mathed out to exact potency gains, just as Delirium can.

For example = Delirium's net gain is the 8s on Blood Weapon, because the MP it gives you only serves as an exchange to cancel out the Blood Gauge cost. Therefore, you can simplify the entire equation of the ability and just remove the BG cost and immediate mana return. When you do that, you see Delirium for all that it actually is: a free +8s on Blood Weapon. That doesn't deserve a 2 minute cooldown. In mana+the attack speed bonus that is about an extra 300 potency per 2 minutes. Its a very weak ability disguised as a strong one.

I would just point out that sometimes the simple solution is the most effective. For example, all these delirium changes would primarily focus on increasing damage while out of grit in the occasional blood weapon window. This is not only subject to human error (popping without getting full duration, boss jumps etc), but it doesn't do jack for drk in grit. Nor does it increase enmity outside of that narrow window. After that you would need another rework for enmity. And another rework for mitigation. Then you end up reworking the whole job, risk more unintended consequences, piss off the people that like drk the way it is. Its a lot of legwork for less gain. A flat damage boost (by contrast) would increase enmity across the board, including the enmity combo. It would help in grit and out. It would help everything. It starts to address 2 of the 3 issues people have with drk (enmity, damage, not mitigation obiviously).

Playstyle is a preference. For every person you bring on board with aesthetic changes you loose some (unknown) number of people as well. Fixing (sometimes simply) the core problems just helps everyone who plays the job regardless. Saying 'I don't particularly care what form the solution takes' I simply mean my goal is to solve the problem. Not redesign drk. I'm not here to make judgments on what's 'fun' for 10m players in this game. But I can take a simple, practical approach to fix demonstrable, measureable balance discrepancies. There are people playing drk right now that would HATE the proposed gameplay changes here. Im not gonna try to referee whos 'fun' is more worthwhile. But we can bring drk to an even playing field in function and practicality.

[Chrono_Rising]

I would just point out that sometimes the simple solution is the most effective. For example, all these delirium changes would primarily focus on increasing damage while out of grit in the occasional blood weapon window. This is not only subject to human error (popping without getting full duration, boss jumps etc), but it doesn't do jack for drk in grit. Nor does it increase enmity outside of that narrow window. After that you would need another rework for enmity. And another rework for mitigation. Then you end up reworking the whole job, risk more unintended consequences, piss off the people that like drk the way it is. Its a lot of legwork for less gain. A flat damage boost (by contrast) would increase enmity across the board, including the enmity combo. It would help in grit and out. It would help everything. It starts to address 2 of the 3 issues people have with drk (enmity, damage, not mitigation obiviously).

Playstyle is a preference. For every person you bring on board with aesthetic changes you loose some (unknown) number of people as well. Fixing (sometimes simply) the core problems just helps everyone who plays the job regardless. Saying 'I don't particularly care what form the solution takes' I simply mean my goal is to solve the problem. Not redesign drk. I'm not here to make judgments on what's 'fun' for 10m players in this game. But I can take a simple, practical approach to fix demonstrable, measureable balance discrepancies. There are people playing drk right now that would HATE the proposed gameplay changes here. Im not gonna try to referee whos 'fun' is more worthwhile. But we can bring drk to an even playing field in function and practicality.

I understand where you are coming from, but I also feel like darkside is already used as a blunt force weapon against us. "You have a constant x% always active and cannot lose it unless you die". If we continue to increase DS I feel it becomes more and more of an excuse to tell us that we don't need anything. For example, TBN is a powerful shield on dark knight, but for a months it was pointed to as the answer to any mitigation or dps problem dark knight had when brought up in any context, despite the fact that people put time and effort into explaining why is wasn't "Free DPS", "Free Utility", and all the other misconceptions about how it functioned.

[Aana]

I understand where you are coming from, but I also feel like darkside is already used as a blunt force weapon against us. "You have a constant x% always active and cannot lose it unless you die". If we continue to increase DS I feel it becomes more and more of an excuse to tell us that we don't need anything. For example, TBN is a powerful shield on dark knight, but for a months it was pointed to as the answer to any mitigation or dps problem dark knight had when brought up in any context, despite the fact that people put time and effort into explaining why is wasn't "Free DPS", "Free Utility", and all the other misconceptions about how it functioned.

Oh I understand that. At some point buffing poisons, darkside, flat 'on' damage buffs gets a little crazy. "Darkside increases damage by 50%".....

I just prefer more targeted buffs that directly address the issue instead of the kind of roundabout ones. It could be darkside, it could be the Drg treatment (Every skill+10 potency lulz). Is TBN to weak? Instead of a complex 10 step plan with tiered effects and growing costs per use, just make the shield stronger, or the duration longer. Reduce the CD. Reduce the cost. Increase the reward. There are much less obtuse ways to fix things that wont confuse players. Play with the numbers before we redesign a job.

Maybe darkside isn't the answer to this one (it was just an example), but there are relatively simple ways to fix the problems drk has that avoid a rework.

Fundamental job reworks are exceptionally rare. The last one we got was 2.1 war, and that was only because there was a grand canyon chasm of difference between pld/war at that time. Things are 'close' now. We aren't going to get fundamental job reworks when the jobs are this close. Redesigns are only realistically used when jobs are beyond help or an expansion. We aren't getting an entire drk rework. We can, and will, get minor tweaks.

[Chrono_Rising]

..Long quote...
Fundamental job reworks are exceptionally rare. The last one we got was 2.1 war, and that was only because there was a grand canyon chasm of difference between pld/war at that time. Things are 'close' now. We aren't going to get fundamental job reworks when the jobs are this close. Redesigns are only realistically used when jobs are beyond help or an expansion. We aren't getting an entire drk rework. We can, and will, get minor tweaks.

Getting back on track with our discussion, I agree any massive job changes are things which I don't think can be implemented quickly. I think there are some interesting suggestions that could be changed going into 5.0, and I think developing those expansion type of ideas now is a good thing.

Part of this difficulty is that it is hard to tell what exactly can be tweaked and what needs a full patch cycle (4.0 to 4.1) to accomplish. I draw the line here at adding a new effect being something which will take at least a patch cycle to change (like shake it off). Changes to delirium, sole survivor, and adding a blood price effect to shadow wall fall into this category. I think these are necessary changes but may take time. Just knowing the developers are working on something would be enough to hold most people over imo.

In the unquoted part of your post you mentioned darkside being direct changes. I think the most helpful direct changes (other than DS changes which I feel fairly strongly should not be done) on something which can be tweak is the cooldown on blood weapon and blood price. Bringing these down to 30 seconds would have the highest impact changes to our job as it directly effects how often we can use dark arts and bloodspiller. Though not as powerful as a 7% overall boost, it goes part of the way to closing the gap. Increasing dark passenger damage (I think 300 - 400 potency would be a fair comparison to circle of scorn) or lowering mana consumption, lowering the cooldown on shadow wall, and for TBN lowering the mana cost or increasing the blood returns and lengthening the duration do not seem like changes which should not take long to put into the game but would help close the dps gap between dark knight and the other tanks as well as improve its mitigation.

[SyzzleSpark]

I would just point out that sometimes the simple solution is the most effective.

Oh, believe me, I tend to agree. You sound like me 4 months ago. I made more than my fair share of simple suggestions inside posts that required no character limit edits before WAR got a free AoE mini-TBN. And before half of WAR's gauge costs were removed, they were even simpler.

The farther we fall behind the more involved the suggestions get, and the more effort put into making them.

At this point any feedback/suggestions help, so long as they are well-thought out. You can find instances in my post history of telling other people to "keep it simple" earlier in the patch cycle. Not anymore though, and for good reason.

[TouchandFeel]

Oh, believe me, I tend to agree. You sound like me 4 months ago. I made more than my fair share of simple suggestions inside posts that required no character limit edits before WAR got a free AoE mini-TBN. And before half of WAR's gauge costs were removed, they were even simpler.

The farther we fall behind the more involved the suggestions get, and the more effort put into making them.

At this point any feedback/suggestions help, so long as they are well-thought out. You can find instances in my post history of telling other people to "keep it simple" earlier in the patch cycle. Not anymore though, and for good reason.

I would also say that the farther that DRK falls behind and the longer it gets ignored, the harder it is to gloss over the different questionable parts of the the 4.0 job redesign that have been churning about in the back of many players' minds.

As for the simplicity vs. complexity argument; complex things are really, when broken down, just made of simple things designed to fit together to create a greater whole.
Gears, cogs and springs are fairly simple when looked at individually, but when put together in just the right way they make a clock.
So I would say that neither simplicity for the sake of simplicity or being complex just to be complex is really the answer, it's the harmonization of the two that should be strived for.
Simple bits and pieces that when brought together form a well designed greater whole. Design smaller, "simple" changes that synergize and work in tandem with each other. Suddenly that "small" and "simple" change means a whole lot more when looking at the greater picture.

[Aana]

Oh, believe me, I tend to agree. You sound like me 4 months ago. I made more than my fair share of simple suggestions inside posts that required no character limit edits before WAR got a free AoE mini-TBN. And before half of WAR's gauge costs were removed, they were even simpler.

The farther we fall behind the more involved the suggestions get, and the more effort put into making them.

At this point any feedback/suggestions help, so long as they are well-thought out. You can find instances in my post history of telling other people to "keep it simple" earlier in the patch cycle. Not anymore though, and for good reason.

Heaven forbid we be reasonable. I just wanted stance swap to cost a flat 20 gauge (or bring it to zero if you had <20). The free didn't make that big a difference over 20, but the free IR/Unchain was just unnecessary. Shake it off needed anything to warrant a spot on a hotbar. Did 3 min of math on day one to realize onslaught was actually a sidegrade or gain in damage in most cases, let alone the use for massive enmity and gap closer making it a highly functional and flexible skill. Just not a 'use on CD dps ability' which is (apparently) the only kind people think are any good. But Oprah gave out the war upgrades. And people still want more. Everyone always wants more. Separate IR/Unchained! Bring both to 1 min! Make onslaught free! Bring back bloodbath! Jesus wars. Calm your tits. Why cant we ever just be like: "Yeah. That's good. Thanks homie!"
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Derailing aside, random thought I just had. One of the principle issues is that Drk has no enmity actions that serve the function of swipe/onslaught as nice snap enmity and a way to maintain enmity without using the dreaded 'combo' every tank avoids like the plague. Passenger is currently a shit skill.

What if passenger got buffed to 140 pot (costs 2400 MP so no loss in damage in ST, becomes more viable multi target) and tack on a large enmity modifier a la onslaught/swipe? Make DA version 280 pot and therefore even more enmity. Costs a lot of MP, but you get the standard DA potency return on it. There is now a reason to have it on your bar. Its a way to stretch that enmity further the same way swipe/onslaught can be with no loss in damage. Doesn't require some major redesign, but one more step in the right direction.