Suggestions for bringing DRK up to par, and QoL changes.

[Crater]

1. Warrior is not "the de facto OT" and hasn't been since 3.x

2. While the best strategy (and the current meta) is to do frequent tank swaps whether they're required or not, Warrior's time spent tanking is noticeably more sturdy than Dark Knight's or Paladin's on almost every single fight, because they're less squishy in their DPS stance than the other tanks

3. Neo Exdeath is the definition of a cherry-picked fight to make PLD look good, as there are no auto-attacks or standard cleaves - everything is either raid-wide damage or a tankbuster, meaning that Sheltron might as well have 100% uptime. This is not the case in Exdeath, Halicarnassus, Catastrophe, Alte Roite, Shinryu, or any phase of Unending Coil, which are all fights where Warrior is the sturdiest tank in DPS stance. And WAR is still on par or better than DRK in that fight

[Aana]

1. Warrior is not "the de facto OT" and hasn't been since 3.x

2. While the best strategy (and the current meta) is to do frequent tank swaps whether they're required or not, Warrior's time spent tanking is noticeably more sturdy than Dark Knight's or Paladin's on almost every single fight, because they're less squishy in their DPS stance than the other tanks

3. Neo Exdeath is the definition of a cherry-picked fight to make PLD look good, as there are no auto-attacks or standard cleaves - everything is either raid-wide damage or a tankbuster, meaning that Sheltron might as well have 100% uptime. This is not the case in Exdeath, Halicarnassus, Catastrophe, Alte Roite, Shinryu, or any phase of Unending Coil, which are all fights where Warrior is the sturdiest tank in DPS stance. And WAR is still on par or better than DRK in that fight

Any instance where the game doesn't 'force' specific tank swaps (A2 for example) with hard death mechanics and players get to choose, the default strategy is War pulls for agro, uses HG on the 1st available thing worth using HG on and hands it over. Takes it back when you can HG something later in the fight. The way players (when given the option) use war now is for agro and abuse of HG then hand the reins over to the other tank.

Pld has the obvious advantage over everyone for DPS stance tanking. They loose nothing at all. Passive shield blocks, shelltron, standard CD suite. Drk is a lesser version as it lacks the passive shield obviously and rides out TBN. The difference between Drk/War offense stance MT squishyiness is not nearly as drastic as Pld/War though. The only way war is superior in this regard is riding the coattails of TBN/Intervention. War is only a better MT in offense stance when the 'oh so bad' IB equivalents for Pld/Drk are used on war. But again, this is the nuanced way people actually play, not this BS sweeping generalization of "WAR OP". War by itself is binary based on defiance/deliverance. Deliverance war is ONLY superior to Pld/Drk offense stance mitigation USING pld/drk abilities.

But if war is only better working WITH another tank, but if there was no war, then the Pld/Drk combo could do the exact same thing and be even MORE defensive by combining TBN+Shelltrong/Intervention.

Just check FF logs. War is, most often, the tank that takes the least damage/boss time. I know because I was forced into MTing for my raid when we repped our Drk and the new tank wasn't very experienced vs me tanking since 2.0. I tried to find what 'mt' war damage was supposed to look like to see how I was doing by checking wars on FFlogs that MT. They are few and far between.

[whiskeybravo]

Just check FF logs. War is, most often, the tank that takes the least damage

Come Aana, it's obviously because they are the best defensive tank

Ironically my dps went up when I started MT'ing v1s. Could be due to other things but I thought it was interesting.

I just want to throw out my *at minimum* suggestions for DRK, and then I need to peace out of the convo for a while. Just based on how I felt when playing DRK and general consensus on the forums:

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Living Dead
CD reduction to 180 sec. If they don't otherwise adjust the instant KO aspect of this CD it should be reduced similar to War. I do feel like the ability to move around is better than being rooted, but the instant KO is every bit as dangerous.

Shadow Wall
Increased duration to 15 sec, same 180 sec CD. Possibly tack on a gauge/mp/hp restore effect to assist in overall survivability/damage potential.

Dark Mind
15% DR for 10 sec with 60 sec CD.

TBN
Duration extension. Possibly add a DA effect to power up the shield. Possibly add a 25-50% self heal upon shield break.

***

I think those coupled with the possible re-work posted for HW Reprisal would be enough to bring DRK up to par with WAR/PLD. I'm not real sure how I feel about possibly losing reprisal on war/pld, as there's a fine line where it would have the opposite of effect of balancing the tanks. Just my opinion, but all 3 tank comps should have access to/be able to provide baseline raid mitigation. If HW reprisal is too strong it would simply shoehorn us in to pld/drk or war/drk comps and leave pld/war comps undesired. (I'm eyeballing about 15% uptime, anything more than that and I think it would overtake DV/SiO shield combo, which while hard to calculate exactly have about 10% uptime each as far as I can calculate - feel free to correct me here)

I do believe they deserve some synergy with one or both of their old skills. PLD has synergy with Rampart via Intervention, and War has synergy with Awareness via Raw Intuition. Maybe there is a way to give DRK a better reprisal, or as already spelled out, give them the old reprisal back (would create synergy with Anticipation) and introduce a similar effect role skill that couldn't be stacked with Reprisal.

Or maybe I should just prepare to lose Reprisal lol. Not that I particularly care, but it's one of the of the only 2 things I can use as a war to help out my party. Used to be the only thing so I guess I've gotten a bit attached to it. But I think about how we are able to rotate Reprisal and shields on Neo and that would be lost if Reprisal were to become drk exclusive again.

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Another thought I had, and I don't think it's all that feasible but was just trying to think outside the box. Change DRK's damage to blunt and give them a blunt resist down to help improve another oddly undesirable job - monk. I don't know if it would actually be able to work or even if it would be beneficial. Again just an off-the-wall idea I had to change things up

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Another area where DRK seems to be lacking is in a self heal. PLD has clemency, WAR has Equilibrium.. DRK has.. Sole survivor? IDK. Depends if DRK's want a 1-button self heal or something more complicated/engaging in the style of DRK. But they need some help in this regard, as well. (maybe the TBN self-heal would be enough? A 50% heal 4 times a minute would be pretty close to a crit Equilibrium)

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That's all I can really figure. I leave the rest to the experts

[Claire_Pendragon]

Another area where DRK seems to be lacking is in a self heal. PLD has clemency, WAR has Equilibrium.. DRK has.. Sole survivor? IDK. Depends if DRK's want a 1-button self heal or something more complicated/engaging in the style of DRK. But they need some help in this regard, as well. (maybe the TBN self-heal would be enough? A 50% heal 4 times a minute would be pretty close to a crit Equilibrium)

Actually, rethinking on this, a way to "make it more engaging" and a slight fix to sole survivor, is to actually strengthen sole survivor (why not anyways? its not good enough as is) like double the effectiveness of its heal, and maybe 50% more mp on its return.

BUT if you press sole survivor again, it actually cancels the effect, to only give you half the HP portion of it's effect. (or something along those lines)

Or allow it to target PT members too, and Walking Dead triggers the effect of sole survivor.

[whiskeybravo]

Actually, rethinking on this, a way to "make it more engaging" and a slight fix to sole survivor, is to actually strengthen sole survivor (why not anyways? its not good enough as is) like double the effectiveness of its heal, and maybe 50% more mp on its return.

BUT if you press sole survivor again, it actually cancels the effect, to only give you half the HP portion of it's effect. (or something along those lines)

Or allow it to target PT members too, and Walking Dead triggers the effect of sole survivor.

It would help, I think, but the problem is drk can't use it in raid to get the full effect, except perhaps on add phase. It's pretty much an (odd) dungeon ability, and it needs to be more useful or replaced.

An interesting take on walking dead, but again it becomes an ability with a niche use. You wouldn't be able to use for the same things Eq or Clemency are used for.

[Claire_Pendragon]

It would help, I think, but the problem is drk can't use it in raid to get the full effect, except perhaps on add phase. It's pretty much an (odd) dungeon ability, and it needs to be more useful or replaced.

An interesting take on walking dead, but again it becomes an ability with a niche use. You wouldn't be able to use for the same things Eq or Clemency are used for.

Thats why i was saying you could "cancel" the effect, so if the fight is just 1 boss, no adds, pop it when its up, and turn it off imediately. (unless you want the heal to reflect how long its been active, then canceling it at the last second gives the biggest heal)
The act of turning it off, puts it on CD, and heals HP only, comparable to the current amount, maybe less if its based on how long its been on the enemy.

[whiskeybravo]

(unless you want the heal to reflect how long its been active, then canceling it at the last second gives the biggest heal)

That's a decent solution, honestly. I just meant, like, you wouldn't be able to use it for the full effect if it was instant activation for half. But this suggestion would solve that for the most part, although, there's still the minor issue of potency vs need. IE, "I need this heal right away but 25% isn't enough". Which is certainly better than it currently is, but still a bit behind compared to the other tanks options.

[Aana]

Actually, rethinking on this, a way to "make it more engaging" and a slight fix to sole survivor, is to actually strengthen sole survivor (why not anyways? its not good enough as is) like double the effectiveness of its heal, and maybe 50% more mp on its return.

BUT if you press sole survivor again, it actually cancels the effect, to only give you half the HP portion of it's effect. (or something along those lines)

Or allow it to target PT members too, and Walking Dead triggers the effect of sole survivor.

Sole survivor+walking dead synergy. That's a new one. I kinda like that.

[Reynhart]

Or allow it to target PT members too, and Walking Dead triggers the effect of sole survivor.

Long time ago, I suggested somes changes to Living Dead.
- Increase its recast to 6 min.
- If your HP reaches 1, you create a Zombie enemy with the same HP as your max HP. If the Zombie is still alive after 10s, it kills you.
- If the Zombie dies while under the effect of Sole Survivor, Living Dead recast is halved.

[Claire_Pendragon]

Long time ago, I suggested somes changes to Living Dead.
- Increase its recast to 6 min.
- If your HP reaches 1, you create a Zombie enemy with the same HP as your max HP. If the Zombie is still alive after 10s, it kills you.
- If the Zombie dies while under the effect of Sole Survivor, Living Dead recast is halved.

The obvious weakness to this would be the DPS loss, unless the zombie is taking over threat for you, and attacking the boss with the same amount of DPS you'd be doing.
(if its tanking and dpsing, then the next weakness is that it can potentially add too much dps)

While this may be a bit overly complicated, its technically an improvement when it comes to future tanks, and needing to make invincibles, and not just be copy pasted from what we have now. (as it would free up another "survive at 1hp" styled one. and of course a zombie fits DRK more than another future tank, unless its a pet class, liek BST)