Dark Knight Megathread

[Lyth]

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You could stick a maintenance combo on DRK, similar to PLD/WAR/MNK/DRG/NIN/SAM, but they're usually placed on the job in question to reign in its damage and resource-generation (our average self-sustain would be reduced as well, in DRK's case). I think that if you're going to add a new combo to the job, and at a high level, then it should be something that players enjoy using, rather than prefer to avoid using. That's why I think setting up an 'enhanced' combo is a better choice overall. I feel good when I can use a Soul Reaver combo, both in aesthetic and damage dealt. I do not feel good using Storm's Eye. Of course, if you can come up with a 'second combo' concept that doesn't fall into the categories that we've discussed, it would be worth discussing that now.

If you have specific improvements that you want to discuss, great. But people tend to latch on to catchphrases and stop thinking about what they really mean. Everyone becomes obsessed about 'when are we getting our rework' because they have come to associate the term with buffs and changes. But it doesn't always work out that way, as we've seen. I think now's the time to push the big red rework button from our minds and think in a more focused way about how DRK's gameplay can be improved from where we are now. All I'm asking is that people think critically for themselves, rather than repeating the 'rework' phrase because they've heard it's a popular thing to say.

The self-healing discussion is an odd one. I personally feel that tanks in general have way too much self-healing, this expansion. You can fight for more self-sustain on principle, but I don't think that it actually matters that DRK is at a disadvantage in this category. For example, if you gave me a choice between more self-sustain vs. replacing Dark Missionary with something on par with Shake, I'd pick the latter in a heartbeat. I also think it's better for DRK to not be the FoTM (as long as we're in striking distance of that spot), for a couple of reasons. First, it's more fun outskilling someone playing the 'best tank' by virtue of having better uptime. Second, I never enjoyed seeing what the WAR and PLD communities became like when they were FoTM (or perhaps the better term is flavor of the expansion). Third, look at BLM - they're perpetually second to third place, and they're happy there. I think if there's a tight enough balance, and they change up the relative strengths up frequently such that nobody stays on the top for too long, then it's fine. The people campaigning for the FoTM are the ones that mess up most jobs anyways.

Either way, I'm not opposed to more self-sustain, but there are probably other things that I would prioritize over this.

I actually like procs a fair bit (and enjoyed seeing them on DRK in Heavensward), but some people don't fare as well with them. The decision-making around them tends to be fairly simple, even on dps jobs that do have them still (i.e. RDM). I think that if what you're looking for is skill expression, what this game is really missing is skillshots. Oddly, the closest thing that we've ever had to this on DRK was the old Salted Earth. RPR's Ingress/Egress is pretty fantastic in this regard, because you're eyeballing a distance and trajectory based on the direction you're facing, while planning a return point after the mechanic resolves. But I think that opportunities for skill expression are also things that you can brainstorm when coming up with new abilities for next expansion.

As for the statement about verbiage, it is what it is. Your posts are at their best when just make your points clearly. I only remind you when I find myself getting tired trying to decipher your point.

I mentioned earlier they would have to change some numbers around to make it work, otherwise yeah I agree if they just dropped it in at level 30 when you first get Flood of Shadow without any other changes, it'd suck. I don't know what those adjustments would look like exactly (although separately I want Delirium to change to literally anything but an IR clone) but I imagine there's a sweet spot between having to do an MP combo after every Souleater combo and doing it every once in a blue moon. If the devs wanted to get really spicy, they could pop a Darkside cost on Blood abilities and make it less static.

I don't mind Delirium too much now, especially since we're only down to three stacks. I wish that it gave a GCD speedboost in honor of the old Blood Weapon. I wouldn't mind if it brought in some new animations. But I probably would find a way to upgrade Living Shadow first before doing anything with Delirium.

[baklava151]

I don't mind Delirium too much now, especially since we're only down to three stacks. I wish that it gave a GCD speedboost in honor of the old Blood Weapon. I wouldn't mind if it brought in some new animations. But I probably would find a way to upgrade Living Shadow first before doing anything with Delirium.

I'll only tolerate Living Shadow's existence if this is the level 100 capstone ability

[Dracosavarian]

I'll only tolerate Living Shadow's existence if this is the level 100 capstone ability

I laughed way too hard at this. Thanks for brightening the day some.

[baklava151]

I don't mind Delirium too much now, especially since we're only down to three stacks. I wish that it gave a GCD speedboost in honor of the old Blood Weapon.

I remember you making a post a while back about having either Darkside or Delirium, can't remember which, boost your GCD speed which I thought could be a cool idea and serve as a good way to differentiate DRK from the other tanks, using speed rather than hard hits to do damage.

[Runeslayer]

I remember you making a post a while back about having either Darkside or Delirium, can't remember which, boost your GCD speed which I thought could be a cool idea and serve as a good way to differentiate DRK from the other tanks, using speed rather than hard hits to do damage.

In my head, the idea that 'dark knight ramps up their attack speed over time, like they fight harder and faster the longer they fight' seems a really neat concept if executed properly.

Perhaps they could lean into that as a rotation that caps out with some kind of finisher? Building levels of speed before needing to finish it off and reset or 'rest', then ramping up again.

[Eorzean_username]

In my head, the idea that 'dark knight ramps up their attack speed over time, like they fight harder and faster the longer they fight' seems a really neat concept if executed properly.

Perhaps they could lean into that as a rotation that caps out with some kind of finisher? Building levels of speed before needing to finish it off and reset or 'rest', then ramping up again.

This is idea sounds fun, and would actually do something different as a system vs. FFXIV's recent tendency to recycle the same basic concepts again and again with the older Jobs.

However, I can foresee complaints forming already:

a) If your DPS gain comes from lowered GCD time, then just like stacking Skill Speed now, the DPS gains have a "sawblade" pattern where you either gain an extra GCD in a phase, or you don't. This could lead to a sense of ineffectiveness, since it's "easier" to squeeze in binary gains like eg, "Carve and Spit", where it either hits or it doesn't, than "gambling" on whether you actually get something extra out of it. Even for Machinist Hypercharge, what you're really gaining is mostly the extra Gauss/Ricochet spam and Wildfire compilation.

b) Due to the need to dump both MP-based and traditional-cooldown OGCDs, Dark Knight is already a hectic and punishing mess for any connections that can't comfortably double-weave. Overlapping its current burst phase with Machinist/Reaper-style "rapid fire" GCDs would further narrow the band of players that can execute the burst comfortably without "external tools™".

c) Potentially very feast/famine in terms of buff coordination. If you misalign from external buffs, then your own faster speed potentially becomes a lot less valuable, similar to how Skill Speed gains now can either be high or much more middling depending on where your extra GCDs land (the longstanding "Get X and then stop" Skill Speed approach, where "stop" is when you can squeeze an extra GCD inside a buff window). Of course, this issue affects all rotations and attacks to some degree (doing something inside +N% damage is better than doing it outside that bonus), but it might feel more pronounced if your "only" bonus is doing things faster, rather than harder, bigger, or flashier.

I personally think that the idea of a "frenzying" Job sounds fun and would actually give Dark Knight some kind of combat identity, but I also notice that "do things faster" rotations tend to get peeled away or marginalized in games like FFXIV... for example, Greased Lightning being converted to a Trait, or "Slice and Dice" being deleted in WOW.

...Or, well, Blood Weapon's previous increased attack speed actually being removed in Shadowbringers.

And to be clear, all of these issues can either be argued against, or adjusted for. I'm just trying to bring up stuff that pops to my mind as potential problems.

For example, it would probably work fine if you imagine an FFXIV where:

• Encounters don't try to cleanly fit around 60s cycles
• 2-minute party buff stacking has been deleted
• Dark Knight's weaving burden during burst has been scaled back considerably

In such a case, an "ebb and flow" cycle ramping between high and low speed would probably have room to feel both natural and effective.

[baklava151]

For example, it would probably work fine if you imagine an FFXIV where:

• Encounters don't try to cleanly fit around 60s cycles
• 2-minute party buff stacking has been deleted
• Dark Knight's weaving burden during burst has been scaled back considerably

In such a case, an "ebb and flow" cycle ramping between high and low speed would probably have room to feel both natural and effective.

Yeah that's the big elephant in the room, Square could feasibly make these changes for 7.0 but then DRK possibly just becomes a weird outlier that doesn't mesh well with other classes. From what I've seen other people say about PLD now, you have to do some funky things with the rotation to keep it aligned with raid buffs which I don't think is necessarily an issue with the rotation itself, just the environment it's in. It just depends on what direction they want to take job design in 7.0, I'd really be interested in Yoshi's thoughts on that.

[baklava151]

In my head, the idea that 'dark knight ramps up their attack speed over time, like they fight harder and faster the longer they fight' seems a really neat concept if executed properly.

Perhaps they could lean into that as a rotation that caps out with some kind of finisher? Building levels of speed before needing to finish it off and reset or 'rest', then ramping up again.

Could be cool. Like say every time you hit Edge of Shadow you speed up just a bit more until after 4 or 5 you're going crazy fast and end it with some sort of burst.