It's about time Shield oath and Grit become Abilities instead of Spells. (off-GCD)

[Mahrze]

Well said. Even if the devs say oGCD stance is too powerful, at least ease up on the cost of the tank stance or perhaps give an Unchained equivalent to all tanks. Defiance and WAR has so many great features with their stance that the weakness of the stance may as well not be there. The fact that they can remove even the damage penalty with Unchained is a bit much when the other tanks can't.

DRK iirc can also do it. Darkside breaks even the damage penalty. But Darkside and DRKs abilities linked to Darkside are quite a few tiers below WARs.

PLD is on the same boat with FoF if temporarily. But like Chrono and many others point out. WARs toolking has a really high synergy among its skills and abilities. the other two tanks don't even have anything half as "efficient" for a lack of a better word/term.

[Saeno]

DRK iirc can also do it. Darkside breaks even the damage penalty. But Darkside and DRKs abilities linked to Darkside are quite a few tiers below WARs.

As it turns out, having both Grit and Darkside up is a 4% damage loss. Your base power is always 100% before buffs. After Darkside, it's 120% since 100+20%=120. Then, after applying Grit, you lose 20% of your new power, so it would be 120-20%=96.

Another thing to consider is that Dark Knight's enmity multipliers are much lower than the other tanks. You could argue that Darkside helps with this, but PLD has fight or flight and WAR has Storms eye, Unchained. It doesn't work out well for DRK at all when it comes to enmity. https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/wiki/enmity

[Chrono_Rising]

DRK iirc can also do it. Darkside breaks even the damage penalty. But Darkside and DRKs abilities linked to Darkside are quite a few tiers below WARs.

PLD is on the same boat with FoF if temporarily. But like Chrono and many others point out. WARs toolking has a really high synergy among its skills and abilities. the other two tanks don't even have anything half as "efficient" for a lack of a better word/term.

In general I wouldn't compare these quantities in this way. The reason for why not is that FoF can be used without tank stance, and it has more damage that way since it does not have a 15% penalty imposed on it. Likewise dark knight has a 20% damage buff that as Saeno said reduces the 20% penalty to only 4% penalty, I would consider that against doing 120% damage without tank stance (comparing .96 modifier to 1.2).

Unchained doesn't suffer from this because it is specifically designed to only cancel the tank stance penalties, it has no value when not in tank stance. However, you are still out the 5% damage buff of deliverance which is why I say nearly cancel the loss and not "free".

[Mahrze]

As it turns out, having both Grit and Darkside up is a 4% damage loss. Your base power is always 100% before buffs. After Darkside, it's 120% since 100+20%=120. Then, after applying Grit, you lose 20% of your new power, so it would be 120-20%=96.

Another thing to consider is that Dark Knight's enmity multipliers are much lower than the other tanks. You could argue that Darkside helps with this, but PLD has fight or flight and WAR has Storms eye, Unchained. It doesn't work out well for DRK at all when it comes to enmity. https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/wiki/enmity

In general I wouldn't compare these quantities in this way. The reason for why not is that FoF can be used without tank stance, and it has more damage that way since it does not have a 15% penalty imposed on it. Likewise dark knight has a 20% damage buff that as Saeno said reduces the 20% penalty to only 4% penalty, I would consider that against doing 120% damage without tank stance (comparing .96 modifier to 1.2).

Unchained doesn't suffer from this because it is specifically designed to only cancel the tank stance penalties, it has no value when not in tank stance. However, you are still out the 5% damage buff of deliverance which is why I say nearly cancel the loss and not "free".

Ah, TIL. Thanks for the info. I did know about the enmity part. Wasn't acquainted with how instead of canceling out, DRKs buff/debuff was applied in separate steps. I know that Unchained is designed that way. Was trying (and being horribly wrong I guess) to point out that maybe SE interprets those abilities as equivalents. Even more so now with the zerk/IB changes.

But that is my (at this point: erroneous) interpretation.

[Saeno]

snip

It's completely fair to assume that SE tried to balance enmity between the tanks so that it's fair (like it should be). DRK's enmity needs help, but it does function. It also doesn't help that they lose by far the most damage of all tanks when using enmity combo over their DPS combo since not only is it lower potency but also lower MP gain.

[kashi11]

DRK also lacks enmity abilities in its DPS rotation, where paladin has circle of scorn and warrior's highest potency combo is also there aggro combo. DRK has to front load more enmity to ensure they stay in the lead, and are more reliant of things like shadewalker and diversion.

[Casualty]

DRK also lacks enmity abilities in its DPS rotation, where paladin has circle of scorn and warrior's highest potency combo is also there aggro combo

The warrior comment seems like such an odd argument to make considering Butcher's Block is ideally never used, and both Power Slash and Butcher's Block combos have identical potency values (the only difference being that the first hit from WAR does 10 more than DRK's and the second hit dealing 10 less than DRK's.)

[Tint]

whenever you use Power Slash combo instead of Souleater combo you lose 180 potency (70 potency for Dark Arts because no mana gain, 80 potency for Bloodspiller because no blood gain and 30 potency from the combo itself). when you are in tank stance the loss is higher (265 potency), but i guess you should not have any issues to hold enmity then ^^

how much does WAR lose when he is doing enmity combo?

edit: okay, i did some math myself. i have no idea about WAR, but it seems he lose 74 potency whenever he does enmity combo. 30 potency gain for the combo and 104 potency lose on Fell Cleave because the combo builds less Beast Gauge.

[kashi11]

I'm not intimately familiar with WAR so I can't say for sure. But from my understanding, Butchers Block is a DPS gain if used once every 2 minutes, or used when you will cap out on beast gauge by using storms path. Butchers Block combo is a 30 potency gain over Path, but generates 10 less beast gauge.

WAR also has onslaught, which has a large enmity modifier, it's usually a loss but can be a gain when used appropriately.

[Casualty]

I'm not intimately familiar with WAR so I can't say for sure. But from my understanding, Butchers Block is a DPS gain if used once every 2 minutes, or used when you will cap out on beast gauge by using storms path. Butchers Block combo is a 30 potency gain over Path, but generates 10 less beast gauge.

Ideally, there will be 0 Butcher's Blocks used in a fight. If you are going to overcap or need to utilize an infuriate you will use a spender. They do not break your combo, so there is no reason to alter your rotation. Outside of onslaught which will primarily be used for movement, there will be no extra enmity generated in an ideal DPS rotation - just like DRK, and will need to similarly frontload enmity and utilize shirking with the co-tank to manage threat through the encounter.