Quote Originally Posted by Rithy255 View Post
Lets Break down the differences...
I appreciate the time you took breaking things down. On paper it would seem that while WAR is clearly superior in dungeons which is what 90% of people do most of the time when in groups, DRK does appear to have a lot of general damage reduction tools.

The problem is that in practice, these tools fall very short. You say healers have no problem healing DRK over WAR but in practice this is not my objective experience. Healers frequently complain about healing non-WAR, especially the healers that you are likely to encounter in the majority of content you actually run, if you are like me or most people, which is random queue dungeons and roulettes.

The problem it feels is the devs are balancing either around extreme content only or else by one all-spanning metric of "mitigation in a vacuum" rather than ensuring that each tank has the tools to handle each of the primary scenarios they would be used, as in 1) can MT raids/trials 2) can tank savage content 3) can sustain in the bulk content people actually run where healers aren't premade pals but random players with different skill levels.

What they have done with DRK also feels like a bunch of button bloating bandaids. Like, they added 3 separate buttons for various additional versions of Rampart without any actual unique mechanics to them. It feels half hearted.

The cooldown on Abyssal Drain is WAY too long considering it is a one-shot heal/damage.

TBN granting nothing other than a 25% shield (no mit, no heal) feels extremely flimsy. It doesn't refund the MP if broken either. It just lets you use a free damage ability. So it saves you further MP if you want to throw in a little extra DPS.

I suppose if you are one of the minority whos enjoyment of the game comes from pushing top end difficulty content with a premade group then mathematically DRK may work out, but in my experience and that of a lot of more casual healers I talk to it is much less fun to have a DRK in a dungeon trying to do the big pulls everyone wants.

Can it be done, sure. But part of what makes tanking fun and enjoyable is feeling like you are in control, or at least, that you have the tools you need to carry a group that might be less experienced through roulettes or top level 4-man randoms when heals/DPS are not operating at 100% peak performance with PHD crafted 20-step mathematically perfect opener rotations all mapped out like a cyborg.

In the bulk of content I actually play like a "normal" person (read: casual I guess), I have a lot more fun playing WAR than I do being hyper-focused on just staying alive on DRK. I won't hesitate to W2W on WAR. On DRK I am ALWAYS full of anxiety and doubt and every big pull feels like a tedious balancing act on the edge of a wipe.

Healers say they want more to do, but I can attest to most finding this sort of high-stress high intensity struggle much less fun as well.