The Case for Early Oblation

[Voryn]

I personally feel like DRK has enough mitigation and sustain, but looks bad because the other tanks have much more mitigation/sustain than the need and also tools that are more obvious about how to use.

Before getting TBN, we can use Reprisal, Dark Mind, and Abyssal Drain during every dungeon pull. Shadow Wall and Arm’s Length can be used on every other pull. Rampart and Dark Missionary can be used every other pull, but if the pulls are taking longer then they can be used at the start of one pull and the later on the next one as they come back up. If there’s no WHM then we can make use of Low Blow once or twice per pull. Then after we get TBN it can get pressed 2-3 times per pull.

But in comparison the other tanks already have a short cooldown mitigation/heal (Rampart, Raw Intuition, Heart of Stone) and it’s more obvious that these can be used every pull. And the other heals they have (Equilibrium, Aurora, Clemency) aren’t attacks so people are more likely to actually use them for healing. But honestly I don’t feel like they even need Rampart/Raw/HoS for dungeons, if I use my other buttons properly and the healer is awake then I imagine it would be ok without them because DRK feels fine to me when it doesn’t have a short cooldown mit yet.

I’m also unsure about why more sustain is needed at higher level casual content, as I’m finding that many times Shadow Vigil’s heal doesn’t even happen in dungeons, especially if I press TBN a lot. We’ve also recently gotten Dark Mind and Dark Missionary able to mitigate physical damage as well.

But the only casual content I do is msq, duty roulette, and society dailies so maybe other content has more concerns.

[bundythenoob]

I suppose I should've been more specific.
The biggest reason I want Oblation to be moved/buffed is for leveling content reasons.
I think these changes will allow DRKs to help both themselves and their teammates at lower levels, and having a Vigilant effect would also help in that regard at later levels.
Giving a teammate a bubble shield plays into the current DRK fantasy, and it feels good to give a teammate a support buff in case they need it. the whole reason I play tanks is to support my friends!
Having ZERO team utility until lv 70 felt so bad during ShB, and the Dark Missionary change helped a lot in letting us feel like a proper tank (bless Early Stalwart too).
I simply wish for Oblation to be given the chance to prove itself as a substitute for TBN in casual content (the majority of what players experience anyway)

[Carighan]

I personally feel like DRK has enough mitigation and sustain, but looks bad because the other tanks have much more mitigation/sustain than the need and also tools that are more obvious about how to use.

Yeah. Like healers not using 90% of their kit because so little damage comes in and hence needs so little healing, tanks only really need a small portion of their sustain kit because of the low incoming damage outside of specific mechanics that deal a "burst" of damage. This also extends into how TBN, in-theory the strongest short-CD skill in raids, actually comes out quite weak because you cannot reliably use it pre-emptively or reactively except in those specific situations. All 3 other tanks have secondary mechanics on their short-CD skills that give a benefit even outside of the main damage avoidance (though Pally is quite weak, granted), but if we just had a lot more damage coming in this would just not be a problem.