Dark Knights are an absolute joke and I'm tired of pretending they're not

[Oizen]

While I agree that DRK needs some kind of HP gain or lifesteal effect, maybe built into Blood Weapon, and of course Living Dead is terrible... the remaining kit is still perfectly servicable, its just not as good as the others.
DRK's can by all means clear dungeons with wall to wall pulls. If I can do it on GNB only using half my cooldowns without ever touching Bolide, DRK can do it without Dark Mind or Living Dead.

My suggestions though:

With Abyssal and Carve now sharing a cooldown, that cooldown should be halved. That alone would double the frequency of Abyssal's recovery.
Blood Weapon should come with a minor lifesteal effect, maybe 100 potency healing per attack when active. Not as strong as Bloodwhetting sure, but it lasts a couple seconds longer, and WAR doesn't have TBN.
Dark Mind gains a physical damage reduction of 10%, while magic damage is still reduced by 20%.

The problem here is wouldn't this be a DPS increase? Though honestly putting these two skills together in the first place was a mistake.

It would almost be better if they were just decoupled and only AD had the 30 sec CD, or maybe make it a 3000 MP attack with no CD like Flood or Edge.

[Absimiliard]

A joke? Nah. Not a joke. More like a train wreck.
The first thing they need is sustain to get them through the expansion. After that, they can get a rework that makes them less like a Walmart WAR and a little more unique.

[whiteblade89]

A joke? Nah. Not a joke. More like a train wreck.
The first thing they need is sustain to get them through the expansion. After that, they can get a rework that makes them less like a Walmart WAR and a little more unique.

I certainly hope that this is the case, but if history is any indicator, this won't happen. SE just doesn't know what they want DRK to be, and I expect this trend of it being the watered down warrior to continue. I hope I am wrong, but based off how they butchered DRK every expansion since HW, I have zero hope that this job will ever get back to it's former glory. It's a damn shame.

[RyuDragnier]

The only sensible reason to nerf Bloodwhetting is to future-proof against potential AoE encounters further into the expansion.

Dominating AoE tankiness in dungeons is almost entirely irrelevant—especially so when it's been this way for nearly the entirety of the last expansion.

You say that, but remember that they NERFED ABYSSAL DRAIN. A move that was only useful in AoE pulls, that was as strong as Bloodwhetting for AoE healing back in SB. This is the precedent everybody points to when we're stating that Bloodwhetting is going to get nerfed. If it wasn't important, they wouldn't have nerfed Abyssal Drain to the sorry state it is now.

[Colt47]

DRK they just need to commit to one of two paths, but one common thing both paths are going to have is making TBN a cooldown that costs no MP. There was a point where that kind of MP management direction made sense, but not with the current resource management we have. Another is probably sticking charges on Blood Weapon instead of dealing with skill speed timings.

1) Go more into Quietus / Blood spiller and away from carve and split / abyssal drain. Blood Spiller / Quietus would restore HP/MP when used if they go this way and they'd make a new skill that replaces carve and split, which evolves into a one charge shadowbringer and then a 2 charge shadowbringer. Abyssal drain is completely removed from the skill set since it wouldn't be needed anymore.

2) Go more into Carve and Split / Abyssal drain. If they go that route than they remove quietus and blood spiller, with the whole job going a bit more like a melee bard with a lot of cooldown based skills to rotate. In that version you'd still have carve and split + shadowbringer as two separate skills since carve and split and abyssal drain share a cooldown. In that one Delirium would allow the DRK to drain HP and MP for three hits to get more damage out of Flood of shadow.

[AziraSyuren]

You say that, but remember that they NERFED ABYSSAL DRAIN. A move that was only useful in AoE pulls, that was as strong as Bloodwhetting for AoE healing back in SB. This is the precedent everybody points to when we're stating that Bloodwhetting is going to get nerfed. If it wasn't important, they wouldn't have nerfed Abyssal Drain to the sorry state it is now.

It's missing the whole picture though.

The only reason Abyssal Drain was nerfed is because the old design didn't mesh well with what they were going with. It was pretty garbo (still highest potency option tho) if you didn't Dark Arts it, and given Dark Arts was removed, it would've just been flatly inferior to your AOE combo otherwise unless you slapped a heal on it no matter what. And if they did that, it would've been even more broken than it was in StB, because it would've had no cost.

Their literal only options were to make it a healing OGCD like it is now, or an OGCD which costs mana in the vein of Edge/Flood of Shadow, and the latter would still be vastly more broken than Bloodwhetting is now in dungeon pulls.

Outside of outliers and job reworks, they've never nerfed tank self-sustain.

[Shurrikhan]

DRK they just need to commit to one of two paths, but one common thing both paths are going to have is making TBN a cooldown that costs no MP. There was a point where that kind of MP management direction made sense, but not with the current resource management we have.

I don't get why people say that TBN involves mana management. Used appropriately, it refunds itself, which means the only "resource management" is just leaving a small resource margin -- an aspect still seen on other jobs.

Do we count having enough Kenki for Kaiten, despite always getting enough in any given combo to afford to Kaiten the Iaijutsu that the combo produces, as significant "gauge management"? If so, it's not out of era for TBN to likewise oblige saving a margin of resource. If not, why are we referring to something so simple as "MP management"?

Moreover, the question of whether TBN should have an attached cost is not as simple as simply whether "MP management" --however one might define it-- should be a thing, because removing that cost will either tremendously reduce what the ability can do or require problematic rebalancing (e.g., TBN, if still granting a free Edge/Flood, causing the kit to be balanced around X number of breaks per average minute).

1) Go more into Quietus / Blood spiller and away from carve and split / abyssal drain. Blood Spiller / Quietus would restore HP/MP when used if they go this way and they'd make a new skill that replaces carve and split, which evolves into a one charge shadowbringer and then a 2 charge shadowbringer. Abyssal drain is completely removed from the skill set since it wouldn't be needed anymore.

I'm curious as to why you think Quietus and Bloodspiller granting HP would necessitate the removal of Carve and Split and significant changes to Shadowbringer. With that alternate --and far more reliable and significant-- means of sustain, Abyssal Drain could then safely be removed, and should be, but the rest seems totally separate.

2) Go more into Carve and Split / Abyssal drain. If they go that route than they remove quietus and blood spiller, with the whole job going a bit more like a melee bard with a lot of cooldown based skills to rotate. In that version you'd still have carve and split + shadowbringer as two separate skills since carve and split and abyssal drain share a cooldown. In that one Delirium would allow the DRK to drain HP and MP for three hits to get more damage out of Flood of shadow.

Carve and Split / Abyssal Drain buffs would not turn DRK into a "melee Bard". Buffing those shared cooldown abilities would not require that they be "rotated", let alone in any manner resembling Bard's three-step waltz of gameplay-affecting (song) buffs.

Having Delirium also grant HP per strike, moreover, would not generate more Flood of Shadow damage; in situations in which Flood (160p) would be useful over Edge (460p), Abyssal Drain (150p and 200cp) would most likely also be using over Carve (510p only) for the prior's healing.
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The problem here is wouldn't this be a DPS increase?

It would, but I think we can assume their potency would be thus reduced or the kit would give up their added ppm from elsewhere.

Though honestly putting these [Carve & Spit and Abyssal Drain] together in the first place was a mistake.

You're never going to get further ppm over C&S and AD being split (as that would just balance down other skills' contributions to the same net result), so their being a shared cooldown merely (A) allows you to sacrifice less of your AoE damage budget towards free ST damage (Carve and Spit), and vice versa, and (B) reduces the number of oGCDs that must be fit into your per-minute burst windows (as you'd otherwise want to fit your per-minute AD in there as well, pitiful damage though it may be).

[Argyle_Darkheart]

You say that, but remember that they NERFED ABYSSAL DRAIN. A move that was only useful in AoE pulls, that was as strong as Bloodwhetting for AoE healing back in SB. This is the precedent everybody points to when we're stating that Bloodwhetting is going to get nerfed. If it wasn't important, they wouldn't have nerfed Abyssal Drain to the sorry state it is now.

And what of the current precedent where WAR's AoE self-sustain was not only buffed but made the standard playstyle? Did SE just not realize what they were doing? Maybe they didn't care?

As far as I'm concerned, DRK's AoE self-sustain got caught in the crossfire of all the other sweeping DRK changes, sadly. That is, I don't think it was specifically targeted for removal, but obviously I can't know for sure.

[Tlamila]

I wouldn't say they're a joke. They're certainly harder to heal in dungeons, especially considering PLD and WAR basically heal themselves as they go now (and GNB has something somethng, I don't play GNB).
Like someone said, DRK stayed more like tanks were in ShB while the rets got all those heals, so the difference is noticeable.

I can say for sure that when I levelled my DRK I did have some difficulties with ehalers keeping up. But I levelled it with dungeons at level and with complete DF, so while I knew my gear was fine and so my mitigations use (I got to the point where I was using even my mother as mitigation), I'll never know about the healer side. Especially I had trouble when healed by sages, and I attributed that also to it being a new class and people just startign to learn how it works.
But now I'm levelling SGE myself, and paired with a DRK for it, and I must say it is being painful. I blamed it on me not being good enough at SGE, since I'm also just starting to learn it, and when told "it's not your fault, DRK is squishy" I keep saying naaa, they might not have heals but they have so many mitigations, they're fiiiiine, it must be me.

But yeah, my denial is starting to wear off. No matter how much I actually enjoy playing DRK. Cause tbh, even though people say it's not fun now, I still find it a very fun class,

[Hierro]

Remember how stormblood DRK was the greatest dungeon tank? All that self sustaining power...

Those were the days.