My AST is so weak, why?

[Werhusky]

It's a drk thing. omg when I enter a dungeon and I see a drk tanking I want to leave, even at 55 where I am now. But I tend to struggle thru.

idk what it is about drks, I hear the abilities are really situational, but about 99% of them I encounter via df take incredible damage, cannot hold hate on more than a couple mobs and are just all around bad.

To make your life a little easier, work on timing so your able to get stoneskin up as the last mob drops so there is no pause between pulls and then get your nocturne shields up on him before he does the next pull, that gives you a little time to get cards running or other things if needed and it allows the tank to get sufficient hate before the cure bombs roll in.

The heals themselves are not bad by any means. Just keep your gear on par and you should be good.

Its because people consider it a cool tank but don't know how to use/time cds, dont have any intend to listen when you say at start "btw I lag" (which defo is for me a don't be a prick do smaller pulls) and still pull 3 packs at once.
I admit I leveled white mage with a friend who did dark knight. I am a horrible white mage that to be said and till about level 55 we tried to minimize the amount of him dieing during the runs (I derp and lag a lot ^^) and then we did Vault... considered one of the most heal intense dungeons and I had suddenly no issues to keep him up. He himself said on the runs he did alone he noticed him to be less squishy (weird as u dont get new defensive abilities).
I wouldnt worry about a fail because AST is a great healer just a bit unbalanced on level 50. Keep going figure it out and enjoy yourself