Dark Knight 6.0: Wishlist

[Satarn]

Blackblood as it was implemented in SB was actually a pretty great addition to the job, due to how much it interacted with MP through Delirium, TBN and Quietus(including that early patch change here obv) and how its acquisition wasn't as static as it is now, which made it feel different from other jobs' resources. Giving DRK a second resource that's actually linked with the existing one added more reactivity and evolved the resource management - both very important aspects of the job's(original) identity. It's only in SHB that it's basically become a reskinned Beast Gauge - SB Blood worked quite differently and synergized really well with the entire kit.

The issue was that rather than adding it on top of existing HW mechanics, SE's cut out or changed too much of the original kit, making the end result feel more like a loss than a gain in depth to many vet DRKs. It's a damn shame, because HW DRK with added Blackblood could've been truly fantastic, but I guess devs were afraid it'd be too much for the players to handle.

Honestly the main mistake in SB was that instead of evolving the existing job they tried to outright replace some of its mechanics(procs, og Darkside). SE clearly hasn't learned that lesson though, as in SHB instead of trying to rectify that and returning some of the DRK's HW roots, they must've concluded that if there's complaints then the entire job was bad to begin with and changed it even more drastically than in SB, basically doubling down on their mistake. I guess everybody saying that "people miss the HW version" wasn't clear enough feedback somehow.

[shao32]

Current Blackblood is a total mistake, as other pointed before me the entire system was a successful part of the job back in SB, a fine addition that was well integrated with the job despite what they taked away to put it in, current Blackblood is a disgrace, a checky copy of WAR rage system with every single skill Blackblood interact with it's something that shoulnt have never happen.

Personally the biggest behavior DRK did have to handle this expansion is the entire blackblood system and his related skills aka Delirium, Bloodspiller, Quietus and the boring addition of Living shadow, stuff like the severe reduction of the APM of the job, the total remove of the busy gameplay feeling derivated of the MP economy changes and the simplification of other skills are really big contributors of current DRK gameplay identity problems for sure but Blackblood is the principal contributor to the WAR clone stigma the job have get during SHB and needs to be adressed.

[Ultimatecalibur]

Honestly the main mistake in SB was that instead of evolving the existing job they tried to outright replace some of its mechanics(procs, og Darkside). SE clearly hasn't learned that lesson though, as in SHB instead of trying to rectify that and returning some of the DRK's HW roots, they must've concluded that if there's complaints then the entire job was bad to begin with and changed it even more drastically than in SB, basically doubling down on their mistake.

Many of the HW mechanics were problematic even if they were engaging and you would likely be complaining about them if they had been carried straight over into ShB.

Low Blow and Reprisal requiring Parry Procs forced the DRK into an MT role to maximize damage and if a fight was mostly magic damage (i.e. attacks that could not be parried) Reprisal's intended purpose of damage reduction could not occur. Low Blow being a stun that did damage also aggravated the existing problems fight design had with stuns. TBN's StB blood reward and ShB's Dark Arts were attempts to bring back the "counterattacks" without locking the DRK into the MT position. StB's version failed due to the additional Bloodspillers from TBN varying between dps neutral and a dps loss.

OG Darkside MP drain might have been engaging but DRK suffered heavily when there was a transition or cutscene attack. Coming out of a transition/cutscene with no MP is not fun. They changed Darkside's effect to negating MP regen in ShB in response to their increased use of cutscene attacks, but that still left DRK behind on the MP curve compared to all the other MP users.

HW Dark Arts was a mess with 7 different gcd and ogcd actions interacting with DA in unique ways. DA being a +350 potency increase at the cost of MP recovery, granting an AoE 100% Lifesteal, 15% magic damage reduction, +100 AoE potency increace+15s AoE blind, 140 potency increase, 20% Evasion increase(this bonus was often counter productive), and an 18% enmity increase makes for a very difficult to balance action with a lot of less than useful effects.

I guess everybody saying that "people miss the HW version" wasn't clear enough feedback somehow.

"Missing the HW version" is usually a case of rose-tinted glasses based on the mental image of fighting a striking dummy that threw back perfectly timed parried attacks.

[Lyth]

Every tank had actions that promoted actively tanking. PLD had shield swipe procs. WAR, even still to this day, gains a dps benefit from tanking with Vengeance up on recast. The only thing that's 'problematic' is the mindset that every last attack has to be perfectly optimized on every single run. It's that same mindset that leads people to demand that their jobs always Crit-Direct Hit on every last auto or else they're obliged to wipe and restart, all the while missing the obvious GCD uptime blunders that they could be improving on. Penny-wise, pound-foolish. Honestly, it's not the job that's holding you back. Work with what you've got.

I think it's dumb that we're not allowed have awesome counterattacks like Shield Swipe and Heavensward's Reprisal in the game just because a few players feel inadequate if they can't proc them on recast. Is parry the issue? Fine, make it proc on taking damage. This isn't rocket science. Although in fairness, the vast majority of even 'magic' bosses in Heavensward tended to have physical autos, so pulling out a parry proc of a hat was never all that hard.

By the way, the problem wasn't addressing the MP drain on Darkside. The problem was deciding that replacing it with Dark Arts was Dark Arts a Dark Arts good Dark Arts idea. The job was fairly tightly designed between resource usage and expenditure. The next game designer who came along to do the Stormblood rework very clearly hadn't the foggiest how any of this worked. Which is fair because they have like four people designing jobs.

...

Interestingly, DRK APM hasn't changed significantly at the top end between Stormblood and Shadowbringers. We're talking a less than 5 APM difference, even with the loss of the Blood Weapon speed buff. There was a bigger dropoff after Heavensward.

TBN has always done its own thing, but by fueling Edge/Flood instead of Bloodspiller it ends up being consistently dps neutral, which is a good thing.

The blood system hasn't really changed since its implementation. In Stormblood, your spenders were Bloodspiller, Quietus, and Delirium. Presently, your spenders are Bloodspiller, Quietus, and Living Shadow. Stormblood's take on Delirium is most definitely the worst version of all time. Once every 90-120 seconds spend 50 blood to gain one DA, which just about breaks even. But wait! If you use it with Blood Weapon active, you gain 5 extra seconds! That's exactly what we needed on the tank job which did the lowest amount of damage despite being the most sustain-dependent job in the group. Even less burst.

I mean, I get the belabored point of all your posts. Shadowbringers is the worst ever, so please please please give us nice things next expansion! Sure. But let's not edit in fake history. Heavensward DRK was great, yes. Shadowbringers DRK is a pale shadow of its former glory, yes. But let's be honest, Stormblood DRK was a steaming pile of detritus, excreted from the same tier of game design as Heavensward PLD and 2.0 WAR. Let's not revisit any of those ever again. There's a reason why you, yourself were oh, so vocal about changing DRK in Stormblood. How quickly one forgets. Let some other poor job take up the mantle of worst tank job. Stormblood was more than enough.

[shao32]

Many of the HW mechanics were problematic even if they were engaging and you would likely be complaining about them if they had been carried straight over into ShB.

Low Blow and Reprisal requiring Parry Procs forced the DRK into an MT role to maximize damage and if a fight was mostly magic damage (i.e. attacks that could not be parried) Reprisal's intended purpose of damage reduction could not occur. Low Blow being a stun that did damage also aggravated the existing problems fight design had with stuns. TBN's StB blood reward and ShB's Dark Arts were attempts to bring back the "counterattacks" without locking the DRK into the MT position. StB's version failed due to the additional Bloodspillers from TBN varying between dps neutral and a dps loss.

OG Darkside MP drain might have been engaging but DRK suffered heavily when there was a transition or cutscene attack. Coming out of a transition/cutscene with no MP is not fun. They changed Darkside's effect to negating MP regen in ShB in response to their increased use of cutscene attacks, but that still left DRK behind on the MP curve compared to all the other MP users.

HW Dark Arts was a mess with 7 different gcd and ogcd actions interacting with DA in unique ways. DA being a +350 potency increase at the cost of MP recovery, granting an AoE 100% Lifesteal, 15% magic damage reduction, +100 AoE potency increace+15s AoE blind, 140 potency increase, 20% Evasion increase(this bonus was often counter productive), and an 18% enmity increase makes for a very difficult to balance action with a lot of less than useful effects.



"Missing the HW version" is usually a case of rose-tinted glasses based on the mental image of fighting a striking dummy that threw back perfectly timed parried attacks.

While parry mechanics have a pass they could have added procs to other stuff to make them viable on OT role, Darkside could be deactivated anitime and you start recovering MP naturaly you only need to do it before boss transition and DRK get full resources gain under the downtime easily, i did it all the time on HW and SB so that was not a issue unless you was sleepy and forgeth about it, it was a question of know the combat and act properly for maximun benefic, is compared to a BLM having to know the combat to stay on turret mode the maximun amount of time posible.

from Dark arts effect only dark mind was questionable, dark passenger blind combined with dark dance bonus make DRK being untouchable and it was a great combo when blood price was on recast and the drain effect of abyssal drain was god mode on mass pulling (god those baelsar walls pulls was so good.)

so in resume from the entire HW DRK kit the only questionable desings was the parry that lock him on the MT spot and dark mind not being worthy to spend DA on it, the rest was perfectly fine.

Interestingly, DRK APM hasn't changed significantly at the top end between Stormblood and Shadowbringers. We're talking a less than 5 APM difference, even with the loss of the Blood Weapon speed buff. There was a bigger dropoff after Heavensward.

TBN has always done its own thing, but by fueling Edge/Flood instead of Bloodspiller it ends up being consistently dps neutral, which is a good thing.

The blood system hasn't really changed since its implementation. In Stormblood, your spenders were Bloodspiller, Quietus, and Delirium. Presently, your spenders are Bloodspiller, Quietus, and Living Shadow. Stormblood's take on Delirium is most definitely the worst version of all time. Once every 90-120 seconds spend 50 blood to gain one DA, which just about breaks even. But wait! If you use it with Blood Weapon active, you gain 5 extra seconds! That's exactly what we needed on the tank job which did the lowest amount of damage despite being the most sustain-dependent job in the group. Even less burst.

I mean, I get the belabored point of all your posts. Shadowbringers is the worst ever, so please please please give us nice things next expansion! Sure. But let's not edit in fake history. Heavensward DRK was great, yes. Shadowbringers DRK is a pale shadow of its former glory, yes. But let's be honest, Stormblood DRK was a steaming pile of detritus, excreted from the same tier of game design as Heavensward PLD and 2.0 WAR. Let's not revisit any of those ever again. There's a reason why you, yourself were oh, so vocal about changing DRK in Stormblood. How quickly one forgets. Let some other poor job take up the mantle of worst tank job. Stormblood was more than enough.

Sorry Lyth but you are wrong, i checked the final boses on each raid tier and recopilate CPM from the top 10 DRK of the day, feel free to check it yourself (notice i just picked the highest and the lowest i find betwen the top10) and it's pretty clear HW was fast but the fastest version of DRK is SB and the slowest is SHB by a fair margin, SHB stay as the slowest version of the job to almost 10 A/CPM compared to HW and SB in some cases.

-alexander gordias the manipulator: 43.5-43.7
-alexander midas brute justice: 41.0-44.7
-alexander the creator alexander prime: 37.1- 38-4

-deltascape neo exdeath: 41.7-42.1
-sigmascape god kefka: 44.5-46.4
-alphascape final omega: 46.2-47.7


-Edens gate titan: 38.0-38.3
-edens verse shiva: 34.0-35.1
-edends promise: 37.7- 37.3

And? whats the problem with SB delirium being offering less dps that current delirium? when i complain about current delirium is how operates not the damage it offers since i don't care about that, im talking about gameplay feeling not numbers here and SB delirium was superion in terms of Gameplay integration compared to the current delirium for me, sinergy betwen buffs and mechanics skills can be buffed to offer more impact, if they change how to operate it's another thing and there was a lot of ways to make SB delirium being more important without destroy what it was.

DBlood system is still a 0-100 bar resource and bloodspiller-quietus being fell cleave-decimate, but delirium and TBN make it being nothing like Rage system due the fast generation of resources and usage of skills for no talk about the AOE rotation where quietus was nothing like decimate could offer, now everything is just the same.

To you information i liked SB version of the job, yes i complained a lot bcs the job was the worst on dps, mitigation and support but most stuff was a question of numbers, i wanted improvements bcs i wanted HW DRK back since the job lost stuff and i don't deny that, but current DRK is way worse in my opinion, none of the feedback offered was adressed and i explain you how in a older threat when you listed the request on SB but no need to come back to that, yes i asked to DRK to be better and more fun and the result was worse for me in terms of gameplay, that's all since it's the only reason i stayed being DRK main on SB even in his lowest hour bcs his gameplay was everything for me, not anymore.

I feel like the parry/counter concept/feeling has been moved to having TBN popping and granting you a free Edge/Flood as a counter attack. Which now also works as OT.

Parry mechanics where deleted to make DRK being more viable on OT spot yeah i belive the same, that doesn't change they culd have done it on another way to keep that part of the job still around witch is what i wanted to say.

[Kalaam]

While parry mechanics have a pass they could have added procs to other stuff to make them viable on OT role, Darkside could be deactivated anitime and you start recovering MP naturaly you only need to do it before boss transition and DRK get full resources gain under the downtime easily, i did it all the time on HW and SB so that was not a issue unless you was sleepy and forgeth about it, it was a question of know the combat and act properly for maximun benefic, is compared to a BLM having to know the combat to stay on turret mode the maximun amount of time posible.

from Dark arts effect only dark mind was questionable, dark passenger blind combined with dark dance bonus make DRK being untouchable and it was a great combo when blood price was on recast and the drain effect of abyssal drain was god mode on mass pulling (god those baelsar walls pulls was so good.)

so in resume from the entire HW DRK kit the only questionable desings was the parry that lock him on the MT spot and dark mind not being worthy to spend DA on it, the rest was perfectly fine.

I feel like the parry/counter concept/feeling has been moved to having TBN popping and granting you a free Edge/Flood as a counter attack. Which now also works as OT.

[Recon1o6]

finally, someone else who understands that the "everything must be optimised" is bad for jobs. It makes things less engaging for a lot of people if taken too seriously.

and thats the key thing- engagement. If its not engaging and fun, then the only people who will play the job are the ones who just play for the glamour and if its high enough damage, high end raiders that want their e-peen parse


Why did people play dark back in hw and consistently want its gameplay style back? because it was fun and engaging with a high skill ceiling. Sb drk was engaging but it wasn't very fun for a lot of people even if it did have some positives. shb dark is just a discount warrior, already a broken base of a job with half wanting it more mindless and others wanting it to have a skill ceiling again.

Fun first, then balance/optimisation

[Shin96]

Why did people play dark back in hw and consistently want its gameplay style back? because it was fun and engaging with a high skill ceiling.

Nuh-uh-uh. Can't have that. Lest you incur the wrath of casual players being overwhelmed with what turned out to be a fairly rewarding experience requiring you to actually pay attention. That's not allowed!

[ItMe]

Nuh-uh-uh. Can't have that. Lest you incur the wrath of casual players being overwhelmed with what turned out to be a fairly rewarding experience requiring you to actually pay attention. That's not allowed!

I feel comments like this are counter intuitive and just fuel the problem.

[Shin96]

I feel comments like this are counter intuitive and just fuel the problem.

You might actually be right. Kinda, if it wasn't for the fact that they are between two fronts of players. Making it like HW again? Eh, unlikely but if they did alot of people would complain. Make it too simple and it's still a problem. I for one vote for the former, but I think SE has opened the door for this divide all by themselves. Casual and Hardcore is more of a mentality thing and doesn't automatically assume Savage content, more like if you are willing to actually play your class at maximum efficency while learning the rotation. Point in case is, they're in a rough spot for 6.0 Unless they manage to mix the two well together which is extremely hard to manage but they *are* capable. But hey, if they keep it this way I'm looking forward to no 1-2-3 but only Delirium spam.