Dark Knight Megathread

[Shurrikhan]

Which is understandable, but in the event of a rework and a choice forced between TBN losing its Dark Arts interaction to be freed of its MP cost and balanced properly against other on-demands versus remaining as-is with its primary defensive skill weighed against two attacks, the fact it keeps coming up seems to mean most would be happier with the former.

I don't know why you keep trying to sell this idea. The MP cost constrains its available timings, keeping it more in line per average minute with the likes of other on-demands despite the added flexibility, but TBN is not, unless used poorly, weighed against Edge/Flood.

In fact, it carries a potency advantage once per raid buff cycle specifically because of that MP cost, as you can essentially push the Edge/Flood's MP cost to earlier -- where it prevents MP overcapping -- while allowing the damage itself to be dropped later, into raid buffs.

Just get level the job and this much quickly becomes apparent. Even in normal mode content, there is virtually zero risk of TBN not popping at any point that wouldn't also be a waste of any other on-demand (save for Nascent, as it just doesn't give a damn when damage is incoming since some 90+% of its value is from healing). In practice, TBN's MP cost is a subtle constraint (though with a decent knowledge requirement in dungeons), with a commensurate subtle advantage available to it -- no more.

You aren't choosing to use TBN over Edge/Flood. At most, you might choose to use TBN when you would barely have taken damage anyways for... reasons? But it's a matter of choosing to use it when no other on-demand would likely bother (if even available), holding it instead for the next actual spike of damage or not doing that -- choosing between a fluff TBN and a solid one, not between TBN and Edge/Flood.