Perhaps a Simple DRK Solution

[Chronons]

I posted a brief version of this in an earlier post about the identity of Dark Knights, to avoid it being buried in another thread I thought I would make it its own thread. I would very much like to get peoples insight on it.

I only recently returned to ffxiv and have fallen in love with the DRK class. These forums have been super helpful in getting up to speed with the class mechanics. I have noticed, and agree with, many major concerns with the DRK class. Mainly that its best mitigation tool is locked behind RNG, DRK lacks utility in the OT position, and their play style doesn’t really reflect the class’ lore. I think these could all be fixed by changing DRK’s cross class abilities from PLD/MRD to PLD/LNC.

We would lose access to Foresight, Mercy Stroke, and Bloodbath. The only real loss here is Foresight as DRKs have weak physical mitigation. MS and BlB are in my opinion decent at best.
Will post in pieces due to character limits, sorry for the inconvenience!

[Chronons]

Opening up Lancer gives DRKs access to Blood for Blood, Keen Flurry, and Invigorate.
-Blood for Blood: In the OT position you sacrifice your defenses for increased damage (stacked with Darkside +25% damage). In the MT position you have the option to use BfB for increased damage at the cost of losing the benefits of your tanking stance. (5% incoming damage for 5% outgoing damage). This would give DRKs a “built in” pseudo stance dancing ability alleviating the problems with Grit being on the GCD and having such a high MP cost. A change here would make the DRK a dynamic tank to play where you can put yourself at risk for increased damage potential, which I think better reflects its lore.

[Chronons]

-Keen Flurry: +40% to Parry means greater probability to proc Reprisals. When stacked on top of Dark Dance you have a very substantial chance of a Reprisal proc. The way the recast time for both line up you could stack a KF every other DD or hold it for moments where you need extra mitigation. This doesn’t remove the chance elements of the Reprisal mechanic, but gives the player better control of their best mitigation tool.
-Invigorate: TP regen we can use even while we are in Grit and Blood Weapon is unavailable. Not super needed, but just as relevant as the two other MRD abilities in my opinion.
-Other options would be Feint or you could always bring in Awareness, which some DRKS already do.

[Chronons]

The problems I see with this is that it further limits our physical mitigation and it means that bad DRKs may be a healer’s nightmare (using BfB unwisely). However, I don’t feel like Foresight is the only thing allowing us to be viable against physical threats. I don't believe that without it DRKs would become unusable (considering increased Reprisal use). In regards to healing - DRKs are a 3.0 class and as such not designed for brand new players. I think it’s okay that they have a higher skill cap to be proficient and a good player would be no more difficult to heal than currently. These changes would give DRKs a greater presence in the OT slot, better burst damage ability, more control over their mitigation, and a more complex and defining play style. Further the change is lore friendly and necessitates minimal need to change or redesign any of their other skills. What are your thoughts? If I am have missed something obvious I apologize. Look forward to reading your thoughts!

[MagiusNecros]

Flurry and B4B can help us yes but in the long run I will miss Bloodbath and Foresight.

[Chronons]

Flurry and B4B can help us yes but in the long run I will miss Bloodbath and Foresight.

Yeah Foresight is the biggest loss that I can identify. I think it would be worth the potential gains though. I do wonder how BfB boosted Soul Eater Combos would compare to BlB as far as self healing is concerned.

[Zven]

Chronos,

This is an interesting idea, more creative and constructive than most suggestions I find on this forum. Personally, I think DRK weaknesses are exaggerated, but you do address a couple valid concerns. DRKs lose a lot of their toolkit as OT, and it seems we are a bit softer than PLD currently as MT. To me this is just ebb and flow of the game/patches, there are many fights DRKs are stronger MTs and PLD got buffed not long ago. I think we just need a few minor tweaks/some tuning to catch up. I too would miss foresight and BB tbh. This is a bit too drastic of a change for my tastes, but I like the direction of these ideas -- I like the thought of making parry more powerful for DRKs in some fashion... just not sure what exactly.

[Jukebox12]

8If this happen ur looking at a op tank u guys keep forgetting that low blow has a a chance to recast every parry that means with dark dance and keen furry ur looking at 70% chance to parry even with the rng it seems a bit op and u guys forget that rerepirsal has a longer cooldown so everytime u proc it u can't use it... bfb seems a bit much to me. if it was gld and lnc ur looking at another war ot as a mt

[Chronons]

8If this happen ur looking at a op tank

You could save and stack both DD and KF every 90 secs or stack them every 180 and have a DD up every 120 secs. The greatest advantage would be the ability to "at will" proc a Reprisal. Increased RP and parry mitigation over all would be a secondary benefit- helping to pad the loss of Foresight. I don't think that potentially increased low blows is going to skyrocket DRK's dps potential. Also I'm not sure how BfB would give DRKs the status of WAR MT? Its a 20sec buff that more than negates their tanking stance and has a 80sec recast time. So it would be far less effective than the WAR's stance dancing abilities right? I could be misunderstanding though.

[Jukebox12]

You could save and stack both DD and KF every 90 secs or stack them every 180 and have a DD up every 120 secs. The greatest advantage would be the ability to "at will" proc a Reprisal. Increased RP and parry mitigation over all would be a secondary benefit- helping to pad the loss of Foresight. I don't think that potentially increased low blows is going to skyrocket DRK's dps potential. Also I'm not sure how BfB would give DRKs the status of WAR MT? Its a 20sec buff that more than negates their tanking stance and has a 80sec recast time. So it would be far less effective than the WAR's stance dancing abilities right? I could be misunderstanding though.

Your taking a sentence out of multiple sentences your ur statement is fall. Did you forget that u can also stance dance during when your main tanking when u build enough aggro. 15% is darkside, for 20 secs you add blood for blood at very 60 secs cuz bfb lasts for you 20 secs and increase your dmg by 10%, its a min after bfb is popped. Its a bit close to war mting tanking in tank stance. War stance is minus 25% of dmg plus maim adds 20% dmg. Berserk is 50% dmg increase 4 20 secs for ever 40 secs its lasts 20 secs but its a min cooldown. The total is 35. This doesn't included unchained. With unchained its 70%. With this change pld might be out of a job