Should Dark Arts Come Back in 6.0? If so, What Should the Skill Do?

[Xenosan]

... another great thing about original Dark Arts was that it was even not a "purely offensive" ability, as it also buffed defense skills, and helped with resource(just MP at the time)... it would be great to have the original Dark Arts remastered to fit with current Dark knight, though it better be remastered to still have damage, defense, and resource benefits... a damage-benefits only Dark Arts would just be a disappointment.

They tried this.. didn't work.. years of complaints on this forum can be read through.. The result is one of:

The defensive bonuses are unnecessary, promptly ignored for more DPS channeling.
The defensive bonuses ARE necessary, thus DRK takes a DPS hit in order to execute them.

Do the other tanks have to dip into their offensive resources/cool downs in order to strengthen their defensive CDs to adequate performance?

No. All that is done is gimping DRKs defense kit. Our current DA proc for consuming TBN is already close enough to the edge. No other tank has to concern themselves with their on demand mitigator potentially costing them DPS. They're just free. What is DRKs reward for this risk, that GNB/PLD/WAR do not share in? Nothing.

If it's always worth using Dark Arts on Dark Dance, for instance, it just makes Dark Dance feel unnecessarily unresponsive ("bloated") since it'd require precasts to reach what feels like the "normal" effect.
If it's almost never worth DAing, that feels vestigial (once again "bloated"), too.

Thank you. I think the rose-tinted glasses are coming in hard in this discussion. Edge/Flood Darkside is such an improvement over where we've been. Looking back, if the absence of complexity is an issue, it's the removal of HW's Dark Passenger, which took priority over DA due to its higher pot, every 60sec, and HW/SB DAC&S, which also took priority over other DA effects just the same. Since those oGCDS were bound to cooldowns, and you want to fit as many of them as possible into an encounter, you wanted to prep MP for them as soon as they were available. That MP management is gone and it was also strictly for DPS optimization.

DA effects to increase a CD from 10% to 30% magic DR, or bonus enmity gen, or opening up a HP life-steal.. all things that the other tanks adjacent skills do for free.. no thanks we've moved on

[Anahlise_Auhn_Giinslai]

They tried this.. didn't work.. years of complaints on this forum can be read through.. The result is one of:

The defensive bonuses are unnecessary, promptly ignored for more DPS channeling.
The defensive bonuses ARE necessary, thus DRK takes a DPS hit in order to execute them.

Do the other tanks have to dip into their offensive resources/cool downs in order to strengthen their defensive CDs to adequate performance?

No. All that is done is gimping DRKs defense kit. Our current DA proc for consuming TBN is already close enough to the edge. No other tank has to concern themselves with their on demand mitigator potentially costing them DPS. They're just free. What is DRKs reward for this risk, that GNB/PLD/WAR do not share in? Nothing. ...

... DA effects to increase a CD from 10% to 30% magic DR, or bonus enmity gen, or opening up a HP life-steal.. all things that the other tanks adjacent skills do for free.. no thanks we've moved on

that reads to me to just be balance issues, not a fundamental design issue. allow me to elaborate. my thoughts are along the lines of.. if a Dark Arts bonus is seen as "unnecessary", then it was too weak of a effect or not useful enough, and needs improvement, while if a Dark Arts bonus is overly "necessary", then the base effect is too weak and needs improvement.
also, current TBN is a stupid action, in my opinion... great shield, dumb design. it should have no connection to Dark Knight's offensive potential, and be
a pure defensive skill, while its "if broken" effect is the main issue. relying on a defensive-barrier breaking, for offensive gain, is a stupid design.
the "if broken" bonus should be a defensive or HP-related bonus.

my thoughts on Dark Arts is that its effects should be neither the former nor the latter, and just be a bonus that makes a action either more interesting or have a additional effect. Dark Knight's defensive strength or offensive potential should not rely on Dark Arts or need Dark Arts, or else Dark Arts will just split all actions in half between the do and do not need Dark Arts groups.
we do not need 4.x Dark Knight all over again, where the Dark Knight has to spam Dark Arts all the time for its Offensive potential/Defensive strength
to be only as good as the other Tanks... Dark Knight's defensive abilities and offensive attacks should already be on par with the other tanks.

to reiterate, Dark Arts should be a bonus that just makes the effects of actions more interesting, or gives actions additional effects that either widen or change how to use them.

[Shurrikhan]

that reads to me to just be balance issues, not a fundamental design issue.

It is, but at the same time it's a balance issue that is very hard to avoid (has an increasingly thin balance point, often too thin to deal with varying situations) if the bonus given is merely "more of the same" (more SE potency, more PS potency, more DD effect, more DM effect).

While SE and PS at least had embedded secondary effects, and C&S, AD, and DP each had unique DA effects, the HW experience should have already made that clear. I think this is largely what Xeno is getting at. It's a balance issue, yes, but a balance issue that's so often made an issue because of a more fundamental matter.

my thoughts on Dark Arts is that its effects should be neither the former nor the latter, and just be a bonus that makes a action either more interesting or have a additional effect. Dark Knight's defensive strength or offensive potential should not rely on Dark Arts or need Dark Arts, or else Dark Arts will just split all actions in half between the do and do not need Dark Arts groups.

On this I think we here almost all agree so far.

[Anahlise_Auhn_Giinslai]

It is, but at the same time it's a balance issue that is very hard to avoid (has an increasingly thin balance point, often too thin to deal with varying situations) if the bonus given is merely "more of the same" (more SE potency, more PS potency, more DD effect, more DM effect).

While SE and PS at least had embedded secondary effects, and C&S, AD, and DP each had unique DA effects, the HW experience should have already made that clear. I think this is largely what Xeno is getting at. It's a balance issue, yes, but a balance issue that's so often made an issue because of a more fundamental matter.

I actually had more in-depth thoughts on the matter, and this counter-point of yours will help me make a good example.
in the particular case of "more of the same", Dark Arts needs to be aught but that. if Dark Arts bonuses are just "makes the effect stronger", that will be
a serious problem. I do agree on that point, at least, as it does not give a good feeling for Dark Arts to be like that.

for my example, let us examine old Dark Dance and the old Dark Mind.

for Dark Dance, my idea would be that Dark Arts alters the effect, rather than boosting it. let us say that Dark Dance outside of Dark Arts does damage reduction and evasion, while Dark Dance inside of Dark Arts changes Evasion to Parry. for the sake of argument, let us add numbers.
say.. 20% damage reduction and 20-30% Evasion out, 20% damage reduction and +20-30% to Parry chance in. but then, let us assume that the balance gets broken, and it was discovered that Evasion and Parry are not equal, with one out-doing the other.

there could be two ways to try to balance it, buff the weaker additional effect until they are even, or the weaker additional effect could be paired with
a slightly higher damage reduction, say.. 25% instead of 20%.
because Dark Arts only changes the effect, it could be balanced out and then in-or-out of Dark Arts would not be a forced decision, it would be to just pick what you prefer.

now let us look at Dark Mind.
Dark Arts bonus on Dark Mind was kind of a stupid design, with Dark Mind being 15% out and doubled to 30% in. the current Dark Mind was "balanced"
by removing Dark Arts and setting it to a base of 20%. but how could it be balanced with still having a Dark Arts effect? in this case, instead of Dark Mind doubling in strength inside Dark Arts, Dark Arts aught to completely change its effect. for example, what if it had one effect affect only the Dark Knight, and one effect affects the whole party?
with the % reductions of the two different effects balanced with care, instead of Dark Mind being only good inside Dark Arts, it would instead be a choice, like choosing to use it on a Tank-Buster, or instead using it on a AoE or a RaidWide.

some cases will be more of a pain to deal with, of course, when it comes to keeping Dark Arts being just a choice, rather than a obligation or a necessity, but I feel like Dark Arts could avoid negative impacts on the Dark Knight's defensive strengths and offensive potential with success, so long as its implementation is done with care and thought out proper; so that Dark Arts only adds to the Dark Knight the beneficial utilization and the "fun" of old Dark Arts that we miss, in a way that is both not not-relevant, so that it does not end up being ignored, but is also only interesting and "fun" to use, instead of being restrictive and/or harmful to the Dark Knight's defensive strength and offensive potential.

and also the more important point, Dark Arts not feeling like to use it is things like Stressful, irritating, annoying, spam like in SB, or other bad feelings that the players could, and should not, have to feel when they/we interact with and use Dark Arts.
if old Dark Arts were to return, the last thing we need is a Dark Arts that makes us feel like we "have to deal with" it, when we use it.