Dark Knight Megathread

[Shurrikhan]

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I gotta admit... I'm not sure I want... much of any of this.

You can convert Salt and Darkness into GCD spell that combos after Stalwart Soul and move it to level that Salted Earth is and it would make AoE feel slightly better, though could make Stalwart Soul and Salt and Darkness restore MP, Blood gauge, and restore HP equal to damage dealt per hit.

I do not want a three-step AoE combo. Stalwart Soul also already gives resources. And unless you want your AoEs to suck in 2-4 targets, you probably do not want your AoE's resource generation to scale with target count without limitations.

You could bring back Dark Passenger, make it GCD that costs MP, and have it combo into Flood of Darkness/Shadow, which then combos into Shadowbringer, and they all cost 3000 MP, because the MP guzzling aspect of Dark Knight is enough to make it stand out from the other tanks, just the MP spenders were GCDs

I'm honestly not sure what you mean by "combos" into, or whether they cost 3k each or in total (combo nullifies the follow-ups' costs). I don't think I like either one, though. On the one hand you end up with Double Down + Gnashing Fang's inflexibility, requiring that you have 9k MP saved up before each Shadowbringer, with the only benefit(?) being (I guess?) that you'd be forced to spread your Shadowbringers out some. On the other hand, you end up with... well, still bundling those skills completely in order not to waste 2 Edge's worth of MP.

Heck you could make Blood Weapon be a mini Darkside that grants 15-25% haste which then becomes Darkside when you do the quest to unlock it, and then have Darkside become Living Shadow with the dark flames aura that also boosts potency by 100-300, and we can keep the ways to maintain Darkside and have those apply to Blood Weapon and Living Shadow.

Likewise not sure what this means. "Darkside" as a 15-25% buff? And that becomes permanent after unlocking the 'real' Darkside? And then that replaces Living Shadow, too?

I feel like this could be decent, but I truly cannot tell from the way it's described. I'm not opposed to a HW Blood of the Dragon-esque mechanic (but with speed and spenders instead of +50% damage to a category of oGCDs + spenders), but I'd need more info on what exactly it is you want this to do, gameplay-wise.

Edge of Darkness/Shadow you could make it become a GCD weaponskill that cost 20 Blood gauge, that combos into Bloodspiller that costs 15 Blood Gauge, that combos into Carve and Spit that also cost 15 Blood gauge, and they could restore MP and restore HP equal to damage dealt, and you could also make these share 1 button.

Why are we trying to make the job that always had comparatively high oGCD attack usage... lose most of its oGCDs?

I haven't seen many complaints about DRK having too many oGCD casts on the whole, only that they're too concentrated (that, per 120s, you burst them all within 15s and are then left bored for the remaining 105s).

Similarly, what is the point in so greatly reducing Blood costs but then delaying your oGCDs attacks behind them? I don't think it'd necessarily be a bad idea, but... I don't see any obvious merit, either, and of the two I'd tend towards not muddying them in that way probably being the better option.

You could make Quietus cost 15 Blood gauge and have restore MP, and make Abyssal Drain a GCD that cost 3000 MP that restore Blood gauge, make both restore HP equal to damage dealt per hit, and people would would try to find a use for these.

Unless by "restore HP equal to damage dealt per hit" you mean specifically that they just have a cure potency equal to their attack potency and/or use the highest individual instance of damage among all hits done in that cast as their healing value... the use case is going to still be very simple. You'd use it in AoE. Outside of AoE, you would not use it.

Dark Arts button we can bring back as 60 second cooldown which grants 3 Dark Arts charges, which double the potency of all actions, ignore resources for 3 actions and if used on Dark Passenger, Flood of Darkness/Shadow, and/or Shadowbringer it converts Dark Arts into a new resource called Blood Arts which is basically triples damage dealt for Blood gauge spenders, but only in combat

That... seems simply to be a slightly more convoluted version of the current Delirium. What's the objective of this change?

The Blackest Night have the MP cost removed, but would need it's recast timer increased to 25 seconds, and if falls off 1 Dark Arts charge, if it breaks it grants 3 instead.

This would damn near force you to use it on CD, as it'd grant your 60s offensive CD every 25s so long as you pop it. Such would likely be vastly less now that you've made them GCDs, but still, no other on-demand directly grants damage in that way.

You could bring back 4.3 Sole Survivor, buff it to where it increase damage dealt to enemies by 5% and reduce the amount of damage that those enemies would deal by 10%, have it be 2 charges, and it would give Dark Knight a raid buff that's good against bosses and also good in dungeons.

...A 2-minute 30% HP-restoring CD, but now with half a single-target Reprisal? Ehhh...

The problem there is that many raid-buffs that need mitigation... can't be mitigated through debuffs on an enemy, simply because they're either independent or the boss isn't even attackable during that time.

You could give the Dark Mind the Addle treatment, and it would feel less bad against physical tank busters.

Sure. Sounds fine.

You could make Living Dead just be a 20 second invuln that drops your HP to 1(you still take damage) that restores HP equal to damage dealt by 300%, and it would be better than Holmgang, and justify the 300 second cooldown.

I wouldn't hate this.

All of this would make up for the fact that Dark Knight would no longer have oGCD spam, and feel a lot less janky to play and would probably make Dark Knight be SO MUCH better than when it first launched in Heavensward.

Thus far, what you've suggested sounds more jank to me than its present version, tbh. I also suspect I'd slightly prefer the HW version over what you're suggesting here. Frankly, having a higher number of oGCD attacks, and apm in general, than most other tanks --per periods of quick frenetic burst-- seems iconic to XIV's DRK, and I'd rather not throw that out.

[DRKoftheAzure]

I'm only going to respond to the stuff that piqued my interest...

Why are we trying to make the job that always had comparatively high oGCD attack usage... lose most of its oGCDs?

Because Dark Arts spam was stupid in Stormblood and I want to move away from what is essentially Dark Arts spam but under multiple different names

I haven't seen many complaints about DRK having too many oGCD casts on the whole, only that they're too concentrated (that, per 120s, you burst them all within 15s and are then left bored for the remaining 105s).

Thank you for proving to me once again, that you don't actually read...

This would damn near force you to use it on CD, as it'd grant your 60s offensive CD every 25s so long as you pop it. Such would likely be vastly less now that you've made them GCDs, but still, no other on-demand directly grants damage in that way.

That proves how bad you are at managing a single defensive cooldown

Thus far, what you've suggested sounds more jank to me than its present version, tbh. I also suspect I'd slightly prefer the HW version over what you're suggesting here. Frankly, having a higher number of oGCD attacks, and apm in general, than most other tanks --per periods of quick frenetic burst-- seems iconic to XIV's DRK, and I'd rather not throw that out.

Dark Knight sucks at being a tank with a high APM via oGCD, and Gunbreaker already does that better AND intentionally. And again, the high APM was a result of Stormblood Dark Arts spam. And I would like to enjoy looking at the animations before my next GCD becomes available, thank you.

[Shurrikhan]

the high APM was a result of Stormblood Dark Arts spam.

DRK already led in APM... in HW. That's been part of its gimmick from its literal inception.

There is also significant differences between how/where that APM is paced and how that affects playflow. GNB has, on average, an APM between DRG and SAM, yet its flow of that APM is not much like either.

Because Dark Arts spam was stupid in Stormblood

Which has, what, exactly, with wanting to make most of DRK's offensive oGCDs NOW into GCDs?

There is no Dark Arts. This is not Stormblood. You have not suggested a (restrained) reinclusion of Dark Arts. You have not suggested a (restrained) reinclusion of any part of Stormblood DRK. So how would Stormblood Dark Arts be remotely relevant to this?

Thank you for proving to me once again, that you don't actually read

By all means, find me the DRKs who hate using oGCDs, period, rather than simply wanting a more space in their 2m bursts and/or comparatively more to do between them?

That proves how bad you are at managing a single defensive cooldown

You suggested that every TBN, from which you had already removed the MP cost, should freely grant 3 Edges' worth of resources that have yet additional tack-on effects.

How would that not entice using TBN as near as pop-ably possible to on CD? It would be a defensive tool only as a bottleneck and an offensive tool first and foremost.

And The Blackest Night in it's current state should not be tied to damage dealt without a big enough payoff. But I do agree that Dark Knight is a bit too frail for when you DON'T have The Blackest Night.

...Then why are you suggesting that the offensive value difference between popping and not popping it be doubled (3x for popping vs 1x for not, as compared to 1x for popping vs. 0x for not)?

You still ultimately have to balance the job around that resource inflow. Any time you fail to get your suggested 3x Dark Arts per TBN, you've lost 2 Dark Arts. That's still damage being tied to it.

[DRKoftheAzure]

DRK already lead in APM... in HW. That's been part of its gimmick from its literal inception.

Okay, that was MOSTLY because of Parry builds but that was VERY inconsistent, and less Dark Arts that cause the high APM, and maybe Dark Dance and Dark Passenger Evasion bonuses.

There is also significant differences between how/where that APM is paced and how that affects playflow. GNB has, on average, an APM between DRG and SAM, yet its flow of that APM is not much like either.

So what's the APM for Dark Knight, Dragoon and Samurai right now? Because the average APM for Gunbreaker if you factor in Reprisal, 2-3 Heart of Corundum, and 1 Aurora for defensives, to about 45 APM on average, Paladin is slightly lower than (with room for error on APM due to frequency auto-attacks for Paladin) and that's if you doing casual content without using any other defensive cooldown.

Which has, what, exactly, with wanting to make most of DRK's offensive oGCDs NOW into GCDs?

There is no Dark Arts. This is not Stormblood. You have not suggested a (restrained) reinclusion of Dark Arts. You have not suggested a (restrained) reinclusion of any part of Stormblood DRK. So how would Stormblood Dark Arts be remotely relevant to this?

Because I am so fed up with how Dark Knight plays right now that I don't care restraining myself, and you are not helping in the slightest.

You suggested that every TBN, from which you had already removed the MP cost, should freely grant 3 Edges' worth of resources that have yet additional tack-on effects.

How would that not entice using TBN as near as pop-ably possible to on CD? It would be a defensive tool only as a bottleneck and an offensive tool first and foremost.

Again, that's says more about you wasting a single defensive cooldown that has the potential for 6 GCDs worth of free big damage for, otherwise, you only get 2 GCDs worth of free big damage, which is where the Quietus and Abyssal Drain reworks come in, for player like you... Though I do understand the concerns of it being overpowered, but the big damage makes up for the lack of oGCDs, something you CLEARLY did not understand...