Dark Knight Megathread

[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.

[DRKoftheAzure]

DRK has always been some level of ogcd spam, I don't think completely shifting away from that in a rework is a good idea.
The job needs more gcds, but I don't think it should be made into a gcd combo job, we already have PLD and WAR for that.

That was because of Dark Arts spam in Stormblood and I hated it... and Warrior doesn't even do the GCD combo job outside of 1-2-3A or 1-2-3B. Paladin could do a lot better with Sword Oath, and Confiteor combo I wish was not tied to Requiescat's activation, and Paladin would work better as high APM tank because shield and Gladiator training.

I also dont think its gameplay within buffs is all that bad, nor have I ever really struggled to keep everything in a buff window as hard as I have when I play GNB.
To me the issue with DRK is more of it feels really weak outside of raid buffs, and frail too considering you're never going to have TBN after any burst window if you've dumped everything into it.

Gunbreaker was designed with double weaving at the right time in mind, and does high APM thing better than Dark Knight. 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.

[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.

[Lyth]

DRK takes a similar approach to its action budget as NIN, which is why they tend to feel similar in terms of burst/downtime. There are a lot of 60s recast GCDs. The fact that Salted Earth had to be offset to 90 seconds highlights that the dev team are aware of how packed the burst window is. What's missing is GCD variety during downtime, which is partially the consequence of an underutilized blood gauge.

I really dislike how the baseline combo generates resources, and I've been pointing this out since Stormblood. I think every combo step should generate blood, which is how resource generation works on more modern jobs. All of DRK's blood actions cost 50 blood. Blood is acquired in 20 blood increments on each Souleater. Who designed this? Change it to 10 blood per combo step, regardless of which GCD you're on, and regardless of whether it's single target or AoE.

Rather than going back to a flat haste effect, I'd rather see individual GCDs that were sped up. For example, you could have blood-based attacks like Bloodspiller and Quietus on a 1.5s GCD instead.

In short, I'd probably do something along the lines of this:
Hard Slash/Syphon Strike/Soul Eater/Unleash/Stalwart Soul: Gain 10 blood.

Bloodspiller: Costs 50 blood. 1.5s recast. Gain 1500 MP. Restores HP.
Torcleaver: Combos off of Bloodspiller. 1.5s recast. Gain 1500 MP. Restores HP.
Quietus: Costs 50 blood. 1.5s recast. Gain 3000 MP. Restores HP.

I know this impacts MP generation prior to Lv. 62, but perhaps the solution is to just make the blood system available earlier.

[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...

[DRKoftheAzure]

DRK takes a similar approach to its action budget as NIN, which is why they tend to feel similar in terms of burst/downtime. There are a lot of 60s recast GCDs. The fact that Salted Earth had to be offset to 90 seconds highlights that the dev team are aware of how packed the burst window is. What's missing is GCD variety during downtime, which is partially the consequence of an underutilized blood gauge.

I really dislike how the baseline combo generates resources, and I've been pointing this out since Stormblood. I think every combo step should generate blood, which is how resource generation works on more modern jobs. All of DRK's blood actions cost 50 blood. Blood is acquired in 20 blood increments on each Souleater. Who designed this? Change it to 10 blood per combo step, regardless of which GCD you're on, and regardless of whether it's single target or AoE.

More like an amalgamation of pre-existing jobs put together and call it a rework from Shadowbringers, but yeah the GCD variety is VERY lacking... and 10 Job Specific Gauge per combo step(auto-attacks in case of Paladin) SHOULD be standard for ALL JOBS. Also Red Mage would probably feel SO MUCH better to play if it generated White and Black Mana consistantly in increments of 10.

Rather than going back to a flat haste effect, I'd rather see individual GCDs that were sped up. For example, you could have blood-based attacks like Bloodspiller and Quietus on a 1.5s GCD instead.

Yeah I don't see that happening unless it's a passive trait for ALL jobs... Though I am also okay with Darkside being a passive trait that you don't need to turn on and maintain, same with Living Shadow being a trait that just boosts potency by up to 300... Keep the pets on Arcanist jobs, Beast Master, and Puppet Master please and thank you.

I know this impacts MP generation prior to Lv. 62, but perhaps the solution is to just make the blood system available earlier.

That's what I proposed for Edge of Darkness/Shadow but apparently no one likes my idea... Just ask Shurrikhan, and they REALLY don't like my ideas...

[Lyth]

I'm not suggesting a traited global speed increase on DRK. What I'm actually doing is turning Delirium into a modified version of Enshroud on DRK. If you add a second action (in this case, Torcleaver) that directly combos off of Bloodspiller and reduce both GCDs to 1.5s, then you're essentially turning Delirium into a 6 GCD burst. Every two blood GCDs you gain a free Edge/Flood that you weave into the mix.

As much as I liked Blood Weapon's speed boost, I've actually grown to love having a few dedicated 1.5s GCDs so much more. It just feels good.

I don't mind Living Shadow conceptually, but the design concept feels a bit clunky because of the summoning lag. It probably would have been better off going the Bunshin route, which is somewhat in line with what you've suggested.

I do like the idea of interplay between MP and blood. I've been advocating for blood moves to generate MP and vice versa since Stormblood. MP is a slightly awkward system, however, and I feel that jobs are better off if they just use a unique dual resource system. It becomes a bit more complex to design around MP because you also have to account for passive ticks that continue during downtime periods, which ends up with generation either being too fast (Stormblood) or too slow (post-Shadowbringers). I think blood is a more predictable system, though, so building from blood to MP probably makes more sense than making it a recursive loop.

[Shurrikhan]

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...

6 GCDs of "free big damage" every 25s, for a total of 14.4 free GCDs of damage per minute, equating to over 10% of your total DPS in that single "defensive" ability?

"Big damage" does not make up for degraded playflow. "Big damage" is an accident that gets patched out as soon as possible unless it's really just taken from elsewhere in the kit, which then means "your offensive kit is jank af, overly concentrating itself around a single button (a "defensive" of all things, in this case), for no net increase in capacity".

Your entire attempt here is contradictory as hell.

No, removing DRK's oGCDs just to then make TBN a larger damage loss than before when not popped (and yes, it is a damage loss; every advantage you fail to get is still a loss, regardless of what it says on the tin, because your balanced will be balanced around reasonable play, not utter failure) does not "make up" for anything.

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.

Literally no. One does not have to factor in HW Reprisal or Low Blow for DRK to have had, from its inception, a higher APM than PLD or especially Warrior.

Because the average APM

Rotational APM measurements do not factor in defensives, self-heals, or non-rDPS utility actions.

That's what I proposed for Edge of Darkness/Shadow but apparently no one likes my idea... Just ask Shurrikhan, and they REALLY don't like my ideas...

I don't like most of DRK's oGCD attacks being removed in favor of convoluted Blood spending that ultimately offers nothing extra save to force further bundling of actions via a knockoff RDM combo and increased damage loss from failed TBNs.

That has nothing whatsoever to do with whether I'd like to see the Blood gauge added before level 62. Which, also, your post made zero mention of anyways, and still makes no mention of after your edit:

I've already made a conscious decision to not level up Dark Knight in the next expac if doesn't get a rework that makes it feel less bad to play with raid buffs... because the oGCD spam makes it VERY hard to fit all of those oGCDs into 20 second burst window while also clipping the GCD...

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(see the Melee DPS Role Action Bloodbath for more details).

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.
Edit: Basically I just want to turn and maintain Darkside in and out of of combat with the haste effect of Heavensward/Stormblood Blood Weapon.
Edit 2: Have Darkside upgrade into Delirium to where it generates a Dark Arts stack every 15 seconds indicated by the Darkside timer(or gauge as the devs called it) and have Delirium become Living Shadow A.K.A. True Darkside.

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 each, because the MP guzzling aspect of Dark Knight is enough to make it stand out from the other tanks, I just wish the MP spenders were GCDs, and I wish they gave Blood gauge, and restored HP equal to damage dealt per hit (see the Melee DPS Role Action Bloodbath for more details) and were DPS neutral in single target to Blood gauge spender at the start and ramps up, and you could make these share 1 button space like Gnashing Fang combo or Confiteor combo.

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(see the Melee DPS Role Action Bloodbath for more details), and you could also make these share 1 button.

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(see the Melee DPS role action Bloodbath for more details), and people would would try to find a use for these.

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. 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.

You could bring back 4.3 Sole Survivor, buff it to where it increase damage dealt to enemies by 5%(or damage enemies receive to better understand it) and reduce the amount of damage that those enemies would deal to players 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. Not good for when bosses become non-targetable to keep it balanced

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

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. Yes I am aware that the other tanks would complain about their invuln not being as long as Living Dead but that's the point.

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.

Also Red Mage would probably feel SO MUCH better to play if it generated White and Black Mana consistantly in increments of 10.

If you really mean "White and Black Mana" together, there'd be only 2 GCDs of casting between each melee combo, as the melee combo itself has 3 generators after the 3 spenders. If you remove their generation, it's still only 5 GCDs of building for every 6 GCDs of spending, which would gut the burst available to those spenders.

If you mean each generates "White or Black Mana" then you encounter a further issue: What do you do with Jolt, Scatter/Impact, Scorch, and Resolution? If you have Jolt likewise work in consistent increments of 10, then people would just ignore their elemental casts in favor of faster combo preps unless you massively change their balance of potencies. And in either case, you've still increased Mana generation by 67 to 400% depending on the skill, again meaning that your spenders can barely have any burst.

Though I am also okay with Darkside being a passive trait that you don't need to turn on and maintain, same with Living Shadow being a trait that just boosts potency by up to 300

Where/when/how did balance hurt you so badly? Having LS effectively just boost potency is fine, but if you just make it permanent then... there's no gameplay there, only a balancing nightmare that would leave DRK missing two-thirds of its damage until level 80.

I'm not suggesting a traited global speed increase on DRK. What I'm actually doing is turning Delirium into a modified version of Enshroud on DRK. If you add a second action (in this case, Torcleaver) that directly combos off of Bloodspiller and reduce both GCDs to 1.5s, then you're essentially turning Delirium into a 6 GCD burst. Every two blood GCDs you gain a free Edge/Flood that you weave into the mix.

As much as I liked Blood Weapon's speed boost, I've actually grown to love having a few dedicated 1.5s GCDs so much more. It just feels good.

I'm not a fan of how they don't scale with SkS and would prefer a simple 60% GCD length instead of the fixed timer, but yeah, I'd be cool with that. I'd rather have a more noticeable pacing difference of fewer -40% GCD recast times than many more -10% or -15% GCD recast times.

I don't mind Living Shadow conceptually, but the design concept feels a bit clunky because of the summoning lag. It probably would have been better off going the Bunshin route

I'd still like to see the separate unit, but wouldn't mind it just summoning in more quickly and attacking each time you attack (effectively, just a flat ST or AoE GCD potency increase or %damage increase on your GCDs over the duration) instead of being solely a DoT.

[mallleable]

I made this observation in another thread, but it seems like tanks can be placed into two categories in terms of rotational mechanics: knights, and berserkers. PLD, and GNB are knights which focus on using multiple combos, and WAR, and DRK are berserkers which focus on spamming heavy hitting attacks. So I feel like a way to get the warrior stink off DRK while maintaining berserker-like gameplay would be to give it a second combo to build towards like it's a knight -- it is a dark knight after all. Perhaps DRK's gcd rotation could resemble a knight's, and its ogcd rotation could resemble a berserkers.

Another thing that I feel needs to happen to make DRK feel a little more special -- and really lean into the themes of self-sacrifice is to figure out how to allow it to safely spend its own HP on attacks instead of MP in pve duties.

[Shurrikhan]

Another thing that I feel needs to happen to make DRK feel a little more special -- and really lean into the themes of self-sacrifice is to figure out how to allow it to safely spend its own HP on attacks instead of MP in pve duties.

This can be done, but it'd have to follow certain constraints... most of which would provide the same affordance but less flexibly than just using MP (with all MP spenders offering at least some indirect means of sustain via a revised Dark Arts, etc.).

Thematically, I want it. Functionally, I'm not sure I want to deal with the gimmicking required.

Yes, of any job, HP spending actually makes the most sense as a potentially compelling mechanic on a tank, as that's the only role in which we both have pretty good control over our HP and for whom HP-spending wouldn't just be an awkward/convoluted indirect MP spending option (maintain Regen on self and occasionally Cure or Cure II self to throw out more HP-spending nukes). But it's still a can of worms. Doable, but not simply.