DRK needs re-tuning/buffing.

[LegolasT]

To be honest I hope they don't make any major changes. Just tweeks to potency for an increase and in terms of defensive capability change Shadow Wall to be longer mitigation and higher defensive capabilities. With TBN and an improved Shadow Wall I would be happy and I think those are changes that actually make sense with a lot of these complaints. All in all people will always complain I find them annoying cause they really arn't needed right now since none of the content really ask for a particular tank all 3 can main and off tank ALL of the content in storm blood without issue of the job. I honestly think people that complain so hard are the people who just arn't that good at Tanking but that's just my opinion.


PS- I am DRK main beat all stormblood content so far so my opinion is based on experience and me playing the content daily.

[Eliroth-Kaminari]

i main drk and i can handle sb content expt we dont yet know what V1-4 savage will be.
Problem is if 4.05 patch help out wars from they misery drk will fall off and fall off hard.
only excuse of reason drk is in meta raid comp atm is because TBN but as far as i have use it. it is self defence skill and its not utilty ppl think it is.
If this hype die down ppl move back to highest dps tank comp and thats PLD/WAR spechaly if war gets desired fixes. If so drk only excuse of Utilty TBN wont make cut. i think drk need bring more utility in raid then it does atm.

[Derio]

Shadow wall needs to be buffed or have the cool down time reduced

[DWolfwood]

Shadow wall needs to be buffed or have the cool down time reduced

Man, I didn't expect to see this kind of talk in the forums.

We've already seen the majority of what we'll get in Omega Savage this time around, albeit stronger versions. DRK is going into Omega in a very good place. Dark Mind is going to be extremely strong when coupled with Blackest Night. While there are still some janky abilities that could use work on DRK, the only real problem is their lack of DPS currently.

[Crater]

DRK is going into Omega in a very good place. Dark Mind is going to be extremely strong when coupled with Blackest Night. While there are still some janky abilities that could use work on DRK, the only real problem is their lack of DPS currently.

I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that it's in "a very good place". Rather, I would say that Deltascape v1, v2, and v4 all seem to have taken specific efforts to cater to DRK from a defensive standpoint, and as a result DRK can be said to either be equal to, or have a slight advantage over, Paladin, in terms of personal main-tank mitigation - while providing lower DPS, offering far worse raid-wide/party mitigation, and existing in a tenuous position where any fight that doesn't specifically cater to Dark Mind (for example: Deltascape v3) pretty much puts DRK in the ground compared to PLD.

The above paragraph is almost word-for-word how you could describe PLD's position relative to DRK in Heavensward from 3.2 through 3.4. In almost every case in HW, even when PLD had a clear and obvious advantage in terms of personal mitigation, DRK was the better choice due to higher DPS and more valuable party utility. Except that in Stormblood, DRK's advantage over PLD against magic tankbusters is far lower than PLD's advantage over physical tankbusters was in Heavensward, and Reprisal's HW advantage over Divine Veil was much less pronounced than PLD's DV/Passage of Arms/Cover/Intervention kit's advantage over Blackest Night. And on the contrary, PLD's advantage over DRK in physical-based fights is actually more pronounced in SB than it was in HW, since DRK no longer has Reprisal, Dark Dance, and Foresight.

They need to eliminate DRK's lopsided magical vs physical defenses, just as they removed PLD's in Stormblood - and they absolutely should not be waiting two goddamn years for the next expansion to do it - and they need to actually give DRK a niche where it clearly and obviously outshines the other tanks, just as PLD outshines the others at keeping the party safe, and WAR outshines the others at being able to stack cooldowns or keep them rolling for sustained mitigation. The former can't happen until DRK has something as good as Dark Mind for physical mitigation, and we're even farther away from the latter, because Dark Mind simply isn't strong enough (even when paired with Blackest Night) to offer that kind of clear advantage over the kit that PLD and/or WAR can now bring to a magic mitigation fight.

Edit: And of course, this is before even getting into any issues with DPS.

[DWolfwood]

They need to eliminate DRK's lopsided magical vs physical defenses, just as they removed PLD's in Stormblood...

I definitely agree that in a vacuum, DRK (and WAR considering Raw Intuition) needs to be brought back up to PLD's level defensively. I don't see it happening outright until there's a need however. Obviously PLD had a need to be brought up to a reasonable defensive level. I do favor the approach of balancing DRK in this way, simply because I would like to see a bit more variety in endgame other than only magic tank busters.

That said, having all three tanks, they're all pretty balanced right now in terms of self-mitigation, and I'd actually go as far as to say that DRK has the edge on it. PLD's CDs are extremely long, and it's pretty much left with Sheltron and having to use Passage of Arms as self-mitigation. WAR is solid with tons of CDs on short timers to rotate, but losing Raw Intuition when things become magic damage hurts.

[Falar]

Just because we have Dark Mind doesn't mean we are the "magical tank" now.

PLD's shield works against magic attacks as well now.

[mcspamm]

Just because we have Dark Mind doesn't mean we are the "magical tank" now.

PLD's shield works against magic attacks as well now.

Yeah, exactly. Not to mention Cover now works against magical attacks as well.

While I'm glad they addressed PLD's "weakness" to magical attacks in SB, it seems like a gross oversight to have left Dark Mind untouched.

TBN in its current form just isn't enough to make up for all the defensives lost to the battle system changes.

Perhaps they could modify TBN such that when combined with DM, it grants an additional defensive effect (could potentially replace DADM).

e.g. The Blackest Night
Creates a barrier around self that absorbs damage totaling 20% of your maximum HP, or around a party member that absorbs damage totaling 10% of your maximum HP.
Duration: 5s
Increases Blood Gauge by 50 when full 20% (10%) is absorbed.
If Dark Mind is active when using The Blackest Night (on self?), <insert defensive effect here>.

Some ideas for this effect include:

• +Parry chance akin to Dark Dance (and would stack with Anticipation, if you ever actually took it)
• For the next N seconds, whenever you would take damage, immediately restore X% of that damage as health. Not sure how well this would work as a HoT instead. Wording might have to change, but ideally I would see this as healing a percentage of any damage you would have taken (meaning it would still heal you while TBN's shield is up), however you eat the damage first before the heal triggers (something like a reverse Bloodbath).
• Gain the effect of Eye for an Eye.
• The next attack you use heals you for 200% (or whatever #) of the damage dealt.
• Increase the damage absorbed by The Blackest Night to 40% of your maximum HP, or 20% for a party member. Increases Blood Gauge by 20. (#s might need tweaking)

Another thought would be to rework Dark Mind so that it acts as another universal defensive cooldown, but costs Blood to use instead.

Maybe something like this?

Dark Mind
Recast: 60s
Reduces incoming damage by 15%.
Duration: 10s.
Blood Gauge Cost: 50

Given the current state of DRK's damage numbers, this change would need to be supplemented by potency and damage buffs to make up for having to spend Blood to survive.

However, this might make the Blood mechanic even more interesting if you have a legitimate choice between spending it on offensive versus defence, and could combo nicely with TBN, as breaking the shield would allow you to follow it up with DM for further damage reduction once a minute.

[Dizzy_Derp]

Well at least your better than warrior. You get a shield and you do more damage that warrior now that you got a buff.

[Chrono_Rising]

Well at least your better than warrior. You get a shield and you do more damage that warrior now that you got a buff.

False. Warrior is above drk in dps and mitigation. Bloodspiller was buffed so that our utility was no longer a dps loss. As far as utility warrior still has slashing dark knight has TBN, as far as utility they seem about the same, very far below paladin. According to the sam I run with warrior is super helpful for their opener since warrior has the earliest slashing debuff of everyone now.

I think someone worked out in another post that warrior has less loss involved with its stance swap and than dark knight as well.