PvP 7.1

[Divinemights]

The problem with Salted Earth is escaping the draw-in. The only way to counter the draw-in is to Guard, and Guarding further limits escape opportunities. Some jobs have an easier time of escaping than others, PCT's Smudge can get out of it pretty quickly.

The solution is to add Arm's Length as a PvP action and put it on a lower cooldown than Purify, say 20s.

That provides an opportunity to counter Salted Earth cheese while still allowing DRKs to punish teams that are bunched up too closely together. It also stops the issue where multiple DRKs use Salted Earth and you're bounced between them like a pinball. Team synergy should be rewarded, but the opposing team should be given opportunities to escape.

You only need simple coordination to kill a DK before he triggers Eventide (against normal DK that don't script hack)
Focus fire DK to 45% with Bard Salience and follow with Ninja's Seiton Tenchu or Monk's Meteodrive to lock DK in animation follow with Ninja's Seiton Tenchu
There are multiple ways but only God knows why NA/EU players are not doing that

[Mawlzy]

You only need simple coordination to kill a DK before he triggers Eventide (against normal DK that don't script hack)
Focus fire DK to 45% with Bard Salience and follow with Ninja's Seiton Tenchu or Monk's Meteodrive to lock DK in animation follow with Ninja's Seiton Tenchu
There are multiple ways but only God knows why NA/EU players are not doing that

I'd suggest it's because it's easier and more effective to form a DRK+ premade than an anti-DRK premade. Plus an oft-mentioned FL guide only covers DRK premades, not the anti-DRK balance.

Anti-DRK premades do occur on Aether, with the odd quality that their members communicate in party chat like nobody else is there. As far as I can make out, they are carrying out a targeted vendetta against specific players. Ironically, these antics do very little to help their team, but because they do plenty of damage I guess they are immune from being called out on the ToS violation they are arguably committing. Mostly I wish they'd invest in a CWLS. They're free, guys!

[Divinemights]

I'd suggest it's because it's easier and more effective to form a DRK+ premade than an anti-DRK premade. Plus an oft-mentioned FL guide only covers DRK premades, not the anti-DRK balance.

Anti-DRK premades do occur on Aether, with the odd quality that their members communicate in party chat like nobody else is there. As far as I can make out, they are carrying out a targeted vendetta against specific players. Ironically, these antics do very little to help their team, but because they do plenty of damage I guess they are immune from being called out on the ToS violation they are arguably committing. Mostly I wish they'd invest in a CWLS. They're free, guys!

This is also why I really don't like PvP guide that intrusively preaching a specific tactic
It is creating so called "meta" and kills people's creativity.
When entire FL is balance around counter and EU/NA is trapped with single mindset of DK vs DK and see which group overpower other.
I have DK and I probably would be most annoying one yet I am disgusted by the concept of this job.

[Sinstrel]

It will be interesting to see if they do decide to change DRK for JP/KOR/CHN players because NA/EU couldn't evolve

[Mawlzy]

It will be interesting to see if they do decide to change DRK for JP/KOR/CHN players because NA/EU couldn't evolve

They could sidestep the problem through crude matchmaking. I'd suggest the lack of evolution on NA specifically arises because a fair chunk of every team has a trough of DRK fodder. Hence the DRKs feed. The XPers have no interest in evolving, they're simply leveling jobs. Separate the rabbits from the foxes, and the foxes will develop more interesting strategies.

[OliviaLugria]

I'd suggest it's because it's easier and more effective to form a DRK+ premade than an anti-DRK premade. Plus an oft-mentioned FL guide only covers DRK premades, not the anti-DRK balance.

Anti-DRK premades do occur on Aether, with the odd quality that their members communicate in party chat like nobody else is there. As far as I can make out, they are carrying out a targeted vendetta against specific players. Ironically, these antics do very little to help their team, but because they do plenty of damage I guess they are immune from being called out on the ToS violation they are arguably committing. Mostly I wish they'd invest in a CWLS. They're free, guys!

Hahaha, sorry that I advertise! XD

It just so happens that a drk premade is a pretty good counter to a dark premade. I've also said before that this style of burst and positioning is something that pugs should be striving towards as well. There are stronger strategies that could be employed, but they require more coordination, and at the time of writing the guide I didn't actually know about them. Not much point to updating with 7.1 around the corner. I don't really consider anti-Drk premades a long term solution to them either. The way it scales is just strange. The more optimal the enemy team is playing, the worst these groups preform. Locking down 1 or 2 targets in a premade with a monk stack isn't very helpful if there's other darks going ahead with the engage as usual. It's strong when there's only 4 decent players on the enemy team. Locking them out of an engage is effectively crippling their team. I'm obviously a bit to optimistic seeing as it's rare to have any "meta" jobs outside who you bring, who are also on top of what needs to be done, but I still see these parties as short-term and ill advised solutions. (And side note, what they do would be just as if not easier if they just ran a dark stack since they'd be more effective in more situations while still able to effectively counter a dark stack.)

As for the targeting... it's just hard to prove, and it's not like any action is taken quickly if at all.

[Mawlzy]

Hahaha, sorry that I advertise! XD

It just so happens that a drk premade is a pretty good counter to a dark premade. I've also said before that this style of burst and positioning is something that pugs should be striving towards as well. There are stronger strategies that could be employed, but they require more coordination, and at the time of writing the guide I didn't actually know about them. Not much point to updating with 7.1 around the corner. I don't really consider anti-Drk premades a long term solution to them either. The way it scales is just strange. The more optimal the enemy team is playing, the worst these groups preform. Locking down 1 or 2 targets in a premade with a monk stack isn't very helpful if there's other darks going ahead with the engage as usual. It's strong when there's only 4 decent players on the enemy team. Locking them out of an engage is effectively crippling their team. I'm obviously a bit to optimistic seeing as it's rare to have any "meta" jobs outside who you bring, who are also on top of what needs to be done, but I still see these parties as short-term and ill advised solutions. (And side note, what they do would be just as if not easier if they just ran a dark stack since they'd be more effective in more situations while still able to effectively counter a dark stack.)

As for the targeting... it's just hard to prove, and it's not like any action is taken quickly if at all.

I'm kinda resigned to the idea that NA strategy will remain in an embryonic state until we have 72 players on the field who all want to be there.

[Valence]

You only need simple coordination to kill a DK before he triggers Eventide (against normal DK that don't script hack)
Focus fire DK to 45% with Bard Salience and follow with Ninja's Seiton Tenchu or Monk's Meteodrive to lock DK in animation follow with Ninja's Seiton Tenchu
There are multiple ways but only God knows why NA/EU players are not doing that

Why would you waste precious slots in your 4 man party with anti DRK roles? As said above, making your own DRK premade is way more efficient and safe and I don't know why would someone waste their time trying to counter premades, especially when there is multiple running at once, you're not gonna counter them all.

The problem with anti DRK comps or even solo jobs like MNK is that they rely on non premades to take on the mantle and do it.
First, the effort required to disable a DRK premade is higher in the tenfold, because it requires way more pinpoint accuracy than the premade you're trying to counter: since if you disable the DRK too early, they can just laugh in your face and go at it again once they made mince meat out of you, or if you do it too late the DRK already jumped in and did their thing, which makes anything you're about to do just too late. Sometimes you meteodrive/punt the DRK away and you're like "yay I did it I prevented their combo!" except that once the DRK recovers 5s later, it's not like the fight is already gone elsehwere anyway and they'll just shrug it off and go back at it (and laugh in your face while doing it).
Second, you don't need a DRK to flatten a team, I've done it with a single DNC + PLD, if your team is following, so they can do it with whatever 3 remaining jobs they do have, but granted the DRK is the corner stone to it so going for it is what makes sense.
Third, playing counter is not fun for most people including me: I'd rather play MNK or other counters to directly delete the BH5 players individually when caught pants down instead of suiciding head first into a premade stack or two when my chances do actually get a result out of it are all but guaranteed.

[OliviaLugria]

I wouldn't really say it takes pinpoint skill... whichever people you want to lock down you mark, then have a macro to instantly target then with abilites. Moment they're in range you press the button and instant success.

[Valence]

I wouldn't really say it takes pinpoint skill... whichever people you want to lock down you mark, then have a macro to instantly target then with abilites. Moment they're in range you press the button and instant success.

Not really, you disable them for 5s, then they're good to go again. Better to just counter with a dark premade as you said.