About TBN

[DustyBlue]

How about the addition of a Carve & Spit-like skill that recovers HP instead of MP? A single-target Abyssal Drain, if you will. I hate that recovering HP button is shared cooldown with recover MP button and that you can't do both still, but if you had a single target oGCD version of Abyssal Drain, it could be a threeway share for all I care. Just seems like a waste that their only non-Souleater HP gain skill is so directly tied into the AoE set of skills these days. Maybe Oblation can be the one with an HP gain rather than TBN, since I agree with Reinhardt_Azureheim about the skill expression aspect of having to use MP instead of thoughtlessly bashing it for a freebie like other tanks. Giving up a chunk of something for extra effectiveness is part of dark knight's identity since the classic games, it's part of what makes it satisfying. If anything, maybe warrior and gunbreaker can be given something to do with those useless MP bars of theirs? That would help distance TBN's MP cost from being perceived as a weakness, instead of a strength. Paladin's Sheltron does take job gauge, remember, so maybe the perception should be that the freebie mitigations are a warrior and gunbreaker specific thing rather than an issue of dark knight being the odd one out.

[Daeriion_Aeradiir]

How about the addition of a Carve & Spit-like skill that recovers HP instead of MP? A single-target Abyssal Drain, if you will.

The problem with tying lifesteal to any long CD offensive OGCD is that its borderline useless for actual sustain.

It could be a 10,000 potency heal but it'd be irrelevant if the damage you wanted to sustain against didn't happen at the one minute window when C&S came up. Simply because its a dps loss to hang onto it for any duration of time as it risks drifting/loss usage and no serious DRK would hold it.

If DRK gets any form of self-sustain, the only 'real' targets to receive it that would actually be useful to DRK are the MP spenders, the AoE combo (ideal target if talking about Dungeon sustain), the Blood spenders, and (best choice) Oblation since those are used very frequently and/or you have more liberty to use them.

As for the topic, TBN would be an alright choice, but only if the heal was a regen after the fact or it left an excog like ability behind. An upfront heal / heal on TBN break like suggested would be borderline useless since the entire ethos of TBN is to reduce the damage you're about to take as close to 0 as possible through non-diminishing return shielding. A direct heal would be useless when you want to be as close to max HP as possible before the hit and the healers will be getting you up there anyway, meaning if your shield broke by only 100 damage, you'd get a 99% overheal.