Are Dark Knights really that bad right now?

[udubdave]

As a DRK main, yes, DRK is the lowest of the tanks right now. Hopefully that changes in the next few patches or expansion.

[shao32]

As a DRK main, yes, DRK is the lowest of the tanks right now. Hopefully that changes in the next few patches or expansion.

acording to the last live letter:

there won't be any major job changes
BLM/SAM are getting some buffs
RDM too
Passage of Arms will take effect immediately instead of waiting for animation to play out
Various other changes too, will be covered more in-depth later.

looks like DRK will we the worst tank the rest of the expansion, i dont hold my breath about those various other changes.

[RyuDragnier]

Tell that to ninjas and bards who press lots of buttons and tend to be the bottum of the DPS totem pole. Dark arts usage is neither here nor there as far as i'm concerned, and honestly makes the play style interested when stack next to warrior or paladin that both build and boringly spend a single resource.

Sadly the other tanks at least have more combos and more ways to do damage. PLD has RoH, Goring (why do they still get a DoT when the other tanks don't?), and Royal combos, along with Holy Spirit. WAR has Path, Eye, and Butcher combos along with a constant usage of Fell Cleaves (can even spam it when Inner Release is up). DRK has Soul Eater and Power Slash combos, and nothing really spammable, since you're either sitting on gauge for Delirium or you're doing 2 Bloodspillers and then have no gauge usage for a while. DRK I'm finding less appealing than it was in HW due to the loss of a lot of their moves (but that's a rant for another day) and less ways to mix it up.

[Lyth]

Combos are not the defining feature of a job. Goring and Eye are close to functionally identical. Every third combo, you press '4' instead of '3'. The only variation happens when a mob is nearly dead, at which point it may be a potency gain to drop Goring. But the average player isn't even going to think about this.

What matters are the number of unique decisions you make over the course of gameplay. Goring and Eye are not decisions. They're muscle memory.

A lot of the times, players will unconsciously make a decision without realising how it influences the outcome. Abilities like Bloodspiller and Fell Cleave (outside of IR) are a lot more interesting because their placement can dictate whether you can complete your combo before a boss jump or mob death. Making Bloodspiller come up more often would change up DRK's rotation much more than simply adding another combo action.

[Azerhan]

The Blackest Night

Creates a barrier around self that absorbs damage totaling 20% of your maximum HP, or around a party member that absorbs damage totaling 10% of your maximum HP.

Increases Blood Gauge by 50 when full 20% (10%) is absorbed.

And it's bad
Since you're supposed to be the MT, you're using it only for you, and in the case you're not the MT, you keep your mp for other thing like dps or prepare for an add, or taking the aggro back.
Also, even if you're using this skill for another player, it's only 10%, barely noticeable, and you'll do it for the BG points.

Sooooo it's much a selfish skill than real skill for your mate.

[Hierro]

And it's bad
Since you're supposed to be the MT, you're using it only for you, and in the case you're not the MT, you keep your mp for other thing like dps or prepare for an add, or taking the aggro back.
Also, even if you're using this skill for another player, it's only 10%, barely noticeable, and you'll do it for the BG points.

Sooooo it's much a selfish skill than real skill for your mate.

You don't necessarily have to be MT. TBN is pretty much DPS neutral, so whether you use TBN or DA makes no real difference. TBN is a nice thing to have, shields are nice in general, since they're one of the forms of mitigation that don't suffer from diminishing returns. People think Divine Benison's alright, yet that's only slightly stronger, and at twice the cooldown.

[Lubu_Mykono]

Probably going to get a re-work like Paladin got in 4.0. Then get over-shadowed by a new tank.

[Hierro]

Probably going to get a re-work like Paladin got in 4.0. Then get over-shadowed by a new tank.

YES, BLUE MAGE HERE I COME! PAPA'S BEEN WAITING ALL HIS LIFE FOR THIS!

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

YES, BLUE MAGE HERE I COME! PAPA'S BEEN WAITING ALL HIS LIFE FOR THIS!

...have yet to understand why everyone and their chocobo thinks Blue Mage will be a tank let alone exist. I think people overvalue the "blue magic file" leak - sorry if I break some hopes but it might just be a new effect and since it has no direct connectiom to a job yet they just call it that way.

[Garry]

You don't necessarily have to be MT. TBN is pretty much DPS neutral, so whether you use TBN or DA makes no real difference. TBN is a nice thing to have, shields are nice in general, since they're one of the forms of mitigation that don't suffer from diminishing returns. People think Divine Benison's alright, yet that's only slightly stronger, and at twice the cooldown.

This is a tecnically true, and is so when used sparingly. However, heavy or over use even if you always get the shield is DPS negative. TBN has to make up for the damage loss of DA and the loss of a GCD later to use blood spiller. Which is some cases the use of blood spiller can be a DPS increase if the GCD used take the spot of Lets say a heavy slash, vs making you drop a Syphon of souleater which would be a dps loss. If you loose all three of these is neutral to your dps. However, use the ability wrong could mean you are only losing a syphon which would be a net DPS loss.

IN the short run its rather DPS neutral in most cases if you use it sets of 3 in a fight where you never have down time and can use all your GCDs (or you never drop a combo).

Honestly, i had talked with a few friend last night. If all the tanks while tanking were forced to use tank stance while actively tanking and DPS stance while not tanking. All of the tank would be in a very good spot. DRKs would be the highest damage and most durable tank in tank stance, with the ability to single MT many fights where you swap for more tank cooldowns.