Dark Knight Megathread

[Hyodo]

I'm not DRK main but its the only tank i play.
I was silent in forums for 6 years but Im breaking silence for DRK. Dear SE please hear us and fix it.

[Mortex]

Indeed and Warriors are the lifesteal/regen tank like they should be.. /s

I said it before they deleted the posts from the leaks.. Bloodwhetting should of been a DRK skill..

It’s just sad that the job that actually absorbs the enemy’s life essence is the one with the least self heal/leeching. And then you have war who just shakes his shoulder and heals dismemberment and other stuff.

[ArthurATDayne]

That version of Abyssal Drain still exists in the game. It's called Holy Circle now. Because holy magic specializes in lifesteal, naturally.

Sorry, I can't resist but... Holy Sheltron! The PLD Endwalker update of Holy Circle is awesome. I really can't wait to gap close into a big mob group and take my time spamming Holy Circle 4 times for my 1600 Potency heal before Confiteor Nuking, took a scratch? Holy Circle, another scratch, Holy Circle etc

Com'on SquareEnix, just throw the DRK a Sustain bone at least and give Abyssal Drain a decent Minimum Heal Potency when used on 1 target. Even Minimum of 800 Heal Potency on 1 Target with a max of 1200ish Potency on a mob group would be welcomed.

[Deathshiro]

Sorry, I can't resist but... Holy Sheltron! The PLD Endwalker update of Holy Circle is awesome. I really can't wait to gap close into a big mob group and take my time spamming Holy Circle 4 times for my 1600 Potency heal before Confiteor Nuking, took a scratch? Holy Circle, another scratch, Holy Circle etc

Com'on SquareEnix, just throw the DRK a Sustain bone at least and give Abyssal Drain a decent Minimum Heal Potency when used on 1 target. Even Minimum of 800 Heal Potency on 1 Target with a max of 1200ish Potency on a mob group would be welcomed.

That actually gets me thinking... Why don't they just add to delirium that every Quietus/Bloodspiller executed during Delirium gives 400~ pot worth of healing to mirror Holy spirit/circle. That way its not stronger than plds healing, while also fixing some of the sustain issues (also giving a healing pot buff to abyssal drain that doesn't stack with targets would be nice, or hell even a regen effect on use)

[ThorneDynasty]

Or to make a really simple fix, a single target version of Abyssal with a shared cooldown.

[ArthurATDayne]

That actually gets me thinking... Why don't they just add to delirium that every Quietus/Bloodspiller executed during Delirium gives 400~ pot worth of healing to mirror Holy spirit/circle. That way its not stronger than plds healing, while also fixing some of the sustain issues (also giving a healing pot buff to abyssal drain that doesn't stack with targets would be nice, or hell even a regen effect on use)

This is a very good suggestion, Endwalker Delirium is 3 stacks 30s duration anyway and at 400 Potency Heal per Weapon Skill will max out at 1200 Potency, Once Per Minute. Hardly Game Breaking or OP. And it will make Delirium different enough on its own from Inner Release and not look like a Discount Bin Knock Off version of it.

I love this idea. Can totally imagine players not mindlessly blowing all 3 stacks in a hurry because they have 30s Duration to use them while taking damage, take a scratch, use a Delirium Stack, take a scratch, use a Delirium Stack, etc

It would even encourage players not to just use Delirium and mash Bloodspiller/Quietus off CD without any thought, like better utility if you save it for after taking damage from Tankbuster or Mechanic to replenish HP, or when TBN is on CD, you're taking damage and you have very low Mana. Would make Delirium more satisfying to use and DRK more fun for sure.

And the Dev who loves Abyssal Drain as a fluff skill and doesn't want to change that can save face, pride, ego, whatever and keep that crap in the game as it is. Win-Win.

[Shurrikhan]

That version of Abyssal Drain still exists in the game. It's called Holy Circle now. Because holy magic specializes in lifesteal, naturally.

I most hate that not only does slapping the cure potency onto Holy Circle and Holy Shock not fit Paladin in any way, but it also

1. devalues Clemency,
2. siphons budget towards a basically non-timeable heal,
3. is thematically and (mostly) functionally redundant (with Clemency and Holy Shelltron), and
4. by emphasizing small, mostly untimeable heals, deemphasizes sharply timed mitigation and recovery.

There's just... virtually nothing good about this design. It's just yet more uncreative slap-on-further-ease-of-tanking-at-expense-to-tanking-gameplay.

[Shurrikhan]

That actually gets me thinking... Why don't they just add to delirium that every Quietus/Bloodspiller executed during Delirium gives 400~ pot worth of healing to mirror Holy spirit/circle. That way its not stronger than plds healing, while also fixing some of the sustain issues (also giving a healing pot buff to abyssal drain that doesn't stack with targets would be nice, or hell even a regen effect on use)

DRK has only some two-thirds of sustain it ought have, yes, but it also deserves more control over when that self-healing is done. Consider, for instance, if Souleater dropped its self-heal but Bloodspiller healed for its damage dealt (and perhaps Quietus caused your attacks against those select targets to heal you for X% of your damage dealt for a few seconds). Boom, a two-charge Delirium actually makes some damn sense, since it can be worth sacrificing offensive bonus potency (from alignment with raid windows) to self-heal for an extra, whopping 1800 potency over 3 GCDs in a dangerous window. (Of course, I'd also recommend having TBN allow for a freecast, then, of Bloodspiller or Quietus, rather than Edge or Flood.)

Alternatively, while the result may be a bit close to (a longer, stronger) Nascent, I'd rather they just drop all weaponskill-specific healing outright, drop or repurpose Delirium, perhaps slightly reduce Blood Gauge costs (e.g., to 40 per cast), and attach a self-heal percentage to GCD attacks (or just weaponskills) during Blood Weapon. Give BW a second charge, so it actually has timing flexibility, and return its Attack Speed bonus such that (short of extreme SkS) we're very clearly going to get in X number of hits, even with over a second's worth of uptime loss -- and no more than X hits (as not to feel obliged towards maximizing every fifth or so of a second). It has naturally less benefit from being used within raid windows (and therefore loss for being used outside them) than does the Bloodspiller spam, but does create self-heal windows of its own to maximize.

Why not stacks? I think that needing mostly continuous uptime over the duration better suits DRK, so long as there's a charge system involved to allow for that necessary bit of flexibility.

While we're at it, so long as spells themselves can't directly benefit from that Blood Weapon's life-steal (only the added Attack Speed), give Blood Weapon back Blood generation per enemy hit, rather than per weaponskill performed, allowing Quietus to refund itself over large mob counts during Blood Weapon. It makes for a more interesting/varied burst phase, in its difference from the usual preparatory Unleash -> Stalwart Soul, and brings us back to the "go big or die" theme among weaker dungeon mobs from Stormblood's BW-Quietus and DA-AD spam.

[Deathshiro]

Another change I think would be helpful for Dark Knight's sustain could be this:

The Blackest Night shield when fades (either broken or expired) grants a regen (whatever potency seems balanced) for 10-12s.

So no matter what, you aren't punished nearly as hard if shield doesn't break, and it helps the DRK's sustain regardless. That's if they want to just throw in a simple and quick band-aid regen for the job without adding new abilities/completely changing how the job functions. Is it super inventive? No, but imo it would be better than the literal nothing DRK's have for healing.

[ArthurATDayne]

Another change I think would be helpful for Dark Knight's sustain could be this:

The Blackest Night shield when fades (either broken or expired) grants a regen (whatever potency seems balanced) for 10-12s.

So no matter what, you aren't punished nearly as hard if shield doesn't break, and it helps the DRK's sustain regardless. That's if they want to just throw in a simple and quick band-aid regen for the job without adding new abilities/completely changing how the job functions. Is it super inventive? No, but imo it would be better than the literal nothing DRK's have for healing.

Because of the 15s CD of The Blackest Night I think the Devs and many players will still cry super loud if it got a low potency Heal Over Time each time it got used due to the short CD "omfg TBN OP infinite sustain nerf plz". It would look better to sneak that Sustain in somewhere else not so obvious -wink wink-

Personally I'm more in favor of just baking in Oblation's 10% Reduced Damage Taken into TBN where if the bubble pops or ends you get 5 seconds of 10-15% Reduced Damage Taken or something so total uptime would only be 20s of 10-15% Reduced Damage per 60s (same as Oblation's uptime). Not just because of decreasing button bloat but also because I think there will be less ppl crying for nerfs throwing hissyfits.

That or make Oblation a level 30-69 Skill for those lower level dungeons in Daily Roulette.

I really like your idea of having Delirium also grant 3 stacks of Heal Potency 400 for each Bloodspiller/Quietus used and think that it could 100% fit with the current Dark Knight kit and seriously make the experience more fun and satisfying.

It's a Subtle, Sensible, Trait Worthy improvement that isn't too much work.

I get that there are ppl who want the old HW/SB etc DRK back but I doubt that's ever going to happen, I mean take a look at the lazy crap on the Dark Knight's Endwalker Tank Leaks/Releases do ppl really think SquareEnix DRK Devs want to put too much work into this?

Blood Weapon is still 10s (more like 9ish seconds) instead of 5 stacks and they only updated Delirium to 3 stacks because someone working on updating Warrior's Inner Release to 3 stacks remembered the Knock Off DRK Version Delirium and probably left a Post-It Note to update that too.

Simple to the Point is my guess if and/or when DRK gets necessary improvements.

November 19/23 is really coming up soon...