Sole Survivor suggestion;

[Odett]

Don't see how this has to do with the topic at hand. Just comparing abilities.

It has everything to do with the topic at hand, because unless you've played DRK once this year, in one dungeon, you are not getting the most you can out of Sole Survivor. I would suggest learning how to use a skill properly before complaining about it.

[Dualblade]

Well if you only have ever used it twice of course its worthless. Every other Dark Knight uses it more then twice and finds it rather useful.

[LordNickage]

"They're calling me... I can't... let them down!"

Yours is the recipe that will pierce the heavens!

[Sailysium]

Mercy Stroke is a Tier 2 cross-class ability compared to a Tier 5 ability.
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I am not saying remove its functions. I am asking for it to be more reliable and activate-able like the other two; as well as its cooldown reduced or its power tuned to its cooldown.
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They are both amazing level 58 abilities. Sole Survivor is worthless by comparison.

I am saying that compared to other abilities; its power is trash since it relies on something to die for one; and it is WEAK in comparison for two.

While I can agree on your desire to see it's recast frequency in shortened, this whole "comparing abilities of the same tier" is not a valid outlook to base your conclusions from as they are all tailored to the design of the jobs respectively. Hell even tank stances aren't at the same level across all 3 but we compare them to each other anyway regardless because who compares by level anyway?. As has been mentioned Sole Survivor is more comparable to Mercy stroke but with a focus on mp recovery that DRKs try to find in order to pump out more skills. Think of it like comparing Monk's purification to invigorate which are as you put it at different tiers (which again doesn't mean anything). At first players thought it was worthless until realizing how the added sustain meshes so well with the design of the Monk job, especially for extending AoE capability.

[Odett]

They are both amazing level 58 abilities. Sole Survivor is worthless by comparison.

People seem to think I am having trouble using the ability; when that isn't the case. I am saying that compared to other abilities; its power is trash since it relies on something to die for one; and it is WEAK in comparison for two.

Except that's not how things work. You're making this comparison because you seem to be under the idea that tanks get an "equivalent" skill at the same "tiers", when this is simply not so. Using your example, I can call Mercy Stroke worthless on Marauder because I find Rage of Halone on GLD as a more useful skill that's gained on the same level, or say that Brutal Swing is trash compared to Flash (oh look, those are gained on the same level too). The best way of judging abilities is by analyzing them in the context of your toolkit and what holes they cover, not based on your own inaccurate tier classifications.

While I can agree on your desire to see it's recast frequency in shortened, this whole "comparing abilities of the same tier" is not a valid outlook to base your conclusions from as they are all tailored to the design of the jobs respectively. Hell even tank stances aren't at the same level across all 3 but we compare them to each other anyway regardless because who compares by level anyway?. As has been mentioned Sole Survivor is more comparable to Mercy stroke but with a focus on mp recovery that DRKs try to find in order to pump out more skills. Think of it like comparing Monk's purification to invigorate which are as you put it at different tiers (which again doesn't mean anything). At first players thought it was worthless until realizing how the added sustain meshes so well with the design of the Monk job, especially for extending AoE capability.

Thanks, you beat me to it lol.

[Seku]

People seem to think I am having trouble using the ability; when that isn't the case. I am saying that compared to other abilities; its power is trash since it relies on something to die for one; and it is WEAK in comparison for two.

Due to the fact you've stated you've only used the ability twice in the last year, which is low if you play DRK at all, and comment on a ability which has a good function of providing mp to aid DRK with mp sustainability which allows for a DPS increase if mobs are still up and you're still doing good on mp or recovering your MP at the end of the battle to allow for a more seamless transition from one pull to the next.

And your first suggestion is worse than the current the ability. As the first relies on a ally to die for a small Defensive cool down, and as with Divine Vile on PLD we've seen how horrible it is to have to depend on the conditions that needs to be fulfilled by another to activate your skill, not to mention you're counting on a DPS lost(your ally dying) to increase your mitigation about the same amount as foresight.

[Syzygian]

Mercy Stroke is a Tier 2 cross-class ability compared to a Tier 5 ability.

Dude, wat even is this wat. Why are you making up nonexistent, meaningless tiers to differentiate abilities?

They are both amazing level 58 abilities. Sole Survivor is worthless by comparison.

I could make a whole thread about what you're doing here but I'll spare the tanking forums of that.

Abilities learned at the same level by different jobs of the same role are not necessarily comparable. Where did you even get that?

For one thing, PLD and WAR are built entirely different from DRK in levels 1-50. They're missing stuff. PLD has only one 3-stage combo at level 50. WAR lacks an OT stance entirely and has no means of utilizing its stack mechanic while not MTing.

This means that from 50-60 WAR and PLD needed to be caught up. They gave them each a shiney new cooldown (bringing their total of non-CC, non-oh-shit-button CDs up to 4 a piece (Rampart/Sentinel/Sheltron/Bulwark, Thrill/Vengeance/Intuition/Beast), gave PLD some new combo finishers, and gave WAR a juicey OT stance and some stuff to use its stacks on. DRK was a new job so they actually designed it VERY well from 1-50. In fact if DRK was a 2.0 tank and 50 was still the level cap it would probably be hands-down the best tank. DRK has all 4 of its job-specific CDs before 50 (Shadowskin/Wall/Dark Mind/Dance) and it has all 3 of its combo chains, and Blood Weapon is an OT cooldown, I consider access to it a stance.

So 50-60 DRK is largely QoL bells and whistles and "fun" stuff. Stuff that seems unnecessary... but 50-60 DRK skills are what give the job its flavor (placed AoE, ranged AoE, gap closer, big oGCD nuke/MP restore... the unique stuff). You can't even make comparisons because they actually designed 1-50 DRK very well whereas from 50-60 PLD and WAR are playing catch-up. These judgements don't work because DRK was designed within a 1-60 framework, not 1-50.

If you wanna make level-by-level comparisons...

Lets take some pot-shots at PLD!

Level 40: WAR gets fucking Unchained!, DRK gets some nice oGCD AoE deeps in Dark Passenger...
...and PLD finally gets its TANK STANCE
Level 42. WAR gets the mighty Holmgang, DRK gets the Gordias-breaking Dark Mind...
...and PLD gets... Tempered Will... woooo.... hooo... um.

or if you prefer to shit on WAR...

Level 2: PLD gets Rampart, DRK gets Shadowskin...
...WAR gets... Foresight... hmmm...... oh wait, PLD and DRK get that too.
Level 6: PLD gets delicious Fight or Flight, DRK gets Scourge aka Fell Cleave in DoT form...
...WAR gets... the cancer of the tanking community: FRACTURE.

See how what I just did doesn't actually work, mean anything, or prove anything at all? That's what you're doing.

People seem to think I am having trouble using the ability; when that isn't the case. I am saying that compared to other abilities; its power is trash since it relies on something to die for one; and it is WEAK in comparison for two.

You said a lot more than that. You announced to us all that you almost never use an ability that has incredible personal utility for the DRK job and that should be used in every single dungeon multiple times and in every single boss fight with adds (so like, 99% of content in the game), and you implied that it was useless by, in a decidedly proud and boisterous fashion, stating that you had used it literally only twice in 365 days.

You basically made flawed comparisons while simultaneously announcing that you believe a key part of a job's resource management is useless.

[Zari]

You comparing these skills because you get them at the same level rather than comparing skills that have similar functions or places in the kit is dumb.

It would be like comparing gravity to indominability for healers just because you get both of them at 52 rather than comparing it to Holy like it should be

[Jpec07]

I think i've only used this ability twice in the past year.

So rather than learn to use what is actually a pretty damn powerful ability in the way it's intended to be used, you are going to ask for it to be changed into something completely different.

Makes sense.

While we're at it, let's change Tempered Will for PLD, and make it so it now multiplies the potency of all your attacks by 3 for 45 seconds with a 60s recast, that also makes you shoot lasers.

EDIT: I will say that I wish it would highlight similar to Mercy Stroke when the enemy is below 10% HP, so you have a good indicator of when the enemy will die within the window, but macroing it to Mercy Stroke's icon has fixed that for me, for the time being.

[Torunya]

This thread: "I think Dark Knight is hard, so we should make it stupid easy."

How about, oh I don't know, practice?