Dark Knight: 5 Reasonable Changes To Balance DPS

[Chrono_Rising]

I would like to Balance Dark Knight DPS in a way that is completely reasonable, reasonable here meaning requiring no new additional effects. Given that Dark Knight offers no raid wide utility to a party, and the single target utility we do offer comes at a loss to our dps, I believe that to balance Dark Knight it should be the highest dps tank of the three choices. Since Dark Knights are approximately 300 dps behind warrior I would ideally like to increase our dps by 350 to 400 dps putting Dark Knight at 50 to 100 dps over Warrior. I believe this can be done with 5 changes.

The Changes

1) Reduce the recast of blood weapon/price to 30 seconds

2) Reduce the recast of Delirium to 60 seconds

3) Reduce the recast of Carve and Spit to 30 seconds

4) Reduce the recast of Salted Earth to 30 seconds

5) Remove the mana cost from Dark Passenger

The Analysis

To raise us by 350 DPS we need to increase Dark Knight Rotation Potency by 350/17.3 =21 potency per sec (current gear transforms potency to damage as a factor of 17.3), to keep it below 400 we want to aim for below 400/17.3 = 23 potency per second.

The goal is to raise Dark Knight potency per second by by a number between 21 and 23 potency per second

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Blood Weapon Change
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Blood weapon nets us about 6000 mana which is 2.5 dark arts and 37 blood or 450 potency.
Potency per second change: 450*(1/30-1/40) = 3.75 potency per second

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Delirium Change
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Delirium works out to 440 potency every 120 seconds. Source Crater (see: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post4456675 )
Delirium per second Change: 440(1/60-1/120) = 3.67 potency per second

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Carve and Spit Change
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Carve and Spit is 450 - 140 = 310 potency. Dark arts potency removed since we must invest a mana cost.
Carve and Spit per second Change: 310(1/30-1/60)= 5.67 potency per second

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Salted Earth Change
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Salted Earth is 525 potency.
Salted Earth per second Change: 525(1/30-1/45)= 5.83 potency per second

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Dark Passenger Change
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Dark Passenger is 100 potency, but its cost doesn't justify using it currently. Making this free of cost and keeping the potency at 100 turns this into a good skill
Dark Passenger per second Changer: 100/30= 3.33 potency per second

Grand Total: 3.75+3.67+5.67+5.83+3.33=22.25 potency per second which is about a 385 dps increase.

Please like below if you support these changes.

[Reynhart]

If I may, I'd suggest that, instead of one of those two changes...

3) Reduce the recast of Carve and Spit to 30 seconds

4) Reduce the recast of Salted Earth to 30 seconds

...the MP cost of Blackest Night should be reduced so that breaking the shield for Blood would be a slight DPS increase, making it a skill that we'd actually want to use more.

[Chrono_Rising]

It would turn TBN into something we need to spam for damage. I would rather it just be a true break even so we can use it as we please.

Had time to do the math now.

In order to turn TBN into the dps gain to put us to the same level, TBN would have to have a cost of 920 while still returning 50 blood. This would be a huge adjustment. However, it also means we would lose the ability to mitigate on demand with TBN, as I said before it would need to be used on cooldown to achieve this level of dps. This is a large adjustment and would tie up one of our mitigations to becoming a dps source. I'm not sure this is the best move for the job.

[SyzzleSpark]

Totally in favor of this at a glance. Simple, gives as a niche, instead of making us a carbon copy of WAR and PLD.

Still a bit dicey on the mitigation side though, and makes oGCD congestion in our rotation even worse. C&S DA effect into the base, having it instead cost 1200-2400 mana as a baseline, that'd be helpful. Cut Plunge's animation lock significantly.

For mitigation I would at the bare minimum have DM work on all damage, and remove its DA effect to compensate.

[Chrono_Rising]

Totally in favor of this at a glance. Simple, gives as a niche, instead of making us a carbon copy of WAR and PLD.

Still a bit dicey on the mitigation side though, and makes oGCD congestion in our rotation even worse. C&S DA effect into the base, having it instead cost 1200-2400 mana as a baseline, that'd be helpful. Cut Plunge's animation lock significantly.

For mitigation I would at the bare minimum have DM work on all damage, and remove its DA effect to compensate.

I agree, I've only attempted to address our damage here. QOL and mitigation I've completely ignored.
Things I want to see change in order of priority:
1) DPS
2) Mitigation
3) QOL

[Kabooa]

The Changes

1) Reduce the recast of blood weapon/price to 30 seconds
2) Reduce the recast of Delirium to 60 seconds
3) Reduce the recast of Carve and Spit to 30 seconds
4) Reduce the recast of Salted Earth to 30 seconds
5) Remove the mana cost from Dark Passenger
.

1-4: It works.

5: If you added 100 potency to plunge, C/S, or Salted Earth, you'd get the same effect here. I honestly feel the No MP Dark Passenger would just be next on the chopping block for things to get rid of. Dark Passenger can use some value, but it really should be in an avenue besides "Single Target Spam ability"

[Chrono_Rising]

1-4: It works.

5: If you added 100 potency to plunge, C/S, or Salted Earth, you'd get the same effect here. I honestly feel the No MP Dark Passenger would just be next on the chopping block for things to get rid of. Dark Passenger can use some value, but it really should be in an avenue besides "Single Target Spam ability"

Except that dark passenger right now isn't anything except something we use when we are about to really overcap on mana. It is barely part of our AOE rotation as is. Adding any additional effects to it is also against the heart of this thread. These are easy changes which do not add a large amount room for unforeseen consequences. It would be cool if Dark passenger could keep its mana and add an effect which buffed us is any number of ways, but that opens alot of doors that I think maybe the devs are afraid of opening.

These aren't the only 5 changes we could have made, it is just the simplest I think without buffing a single skill to the moon.

[Kabooa]

These aren't the only 5 changes we could have made, it is just the simplest I think without buffing a single skill to the moon.

Just saying. You get the same effect by boosting one of the other OGCDs without adding another button in what would be a very spammy button fest at times.

[Chrono_Rising]

Just saying. You get the same effect by boosting one of the other OGCDs without adding another button in what would be a very spammy button fest at times.

This is fair, and I did consider trying to remove the DA condition on C&S, but I didn't want to lose its trick attack synergy, hence the 30 second adjustment. It is definitely food for thought.

If you removed the DA condition from C&S and make Salted Earth 35 seconds I think the two would balance out, but that requires removing and effect, which might be equally difficult to swallow. I'll give it some thought.

[Kabooa]

This is fair, and I did consider trying to remove the DA condition on C&S, but I didn't want to lose its trick attack synergy, hence the 30 second adjustment. It is definitely food for thought.

If you removed the DA condition from C&S and make Salted Earth 35 seconds I think the two would balance out, but that requires removing and effect, which might be equally difficult to swallow. I'll give it some thought.

What if Delirium also extended the duration of Salted Earth?

If it extended it by 9 seconds, that'd be another 225 every 60 seconds, or another 112.5 every 30. A slight bit stronger, another interaction which in turn makes Delirium a bit better, and a scant bit more blood though that probably won't factor in any meaningful way.