How bad are the issues with DRK?

[LegolasT]

First when people complain about DRK PLEASE make sure they are a 70 DRK because if they arnt don't take them seriously at all. Especially on the forums. I feel the tanks are balanced in a sense on what each can offer I do feel that the DPS factor should not be PLD WAR DRK tho. In fact I believe it should be DRK WAR PLD in DPS seeing that DRK has the most AOE and 2 fell cleave type attacks in DA Carve and spit and DA Bloodspiller its as if they designed DRK to he a DPS machine but didn't really give it the DPS to back it up.

[TankHunter678]

First when people complain about DRK PLEASE make sure they are a 70 DRK because if they arnt don't take them seriously at all. Especially on the forums.

Max level content is not the only content that is tanked. If a class does not feel functional compared to its peers at the same level blocks then there is a problem. Which is the case with DRK as it was re-balanced around an ability only available in 4 dungeons, 3 trials, and the current raid tier.

What about all of the rest of the content?

[ManuelBravo]

Max level content is not the only content that is tanked. If a class does not feel functional compared to its peers at the same level blocks then there is a problem. Which is the case with DRK as it was re-balanced around an ability only available in 4 dungeons, 3 trials, and the current raid tier.

What about all of the rest of the content?

Even in lower content if you know your job it shouldn't be an issue. I main DRK for my Tank role option, I can tell you it's not the job, it's the player. If a person can't adapt, or is even willing to re learn a job than they should change it to a different role rather then complain. Over all all jobs were changed so even using the amount of content for a maxed level is more of an excuse. A tank can adjust to any situation if they are skilled or at a minimum practice with the actions they have.

Due to tbn it should fall behind warrior and ahead of pld in the dps department

Says who? Statistics? If a person knows the their job the only way it can be outclass if there is a better player with better gear / understands their role. While I may not be the best tank I consider my self well trained and can out class some tanks that are both better geared or considered better than DRK. Results is all that matters.

[Dizzy_Derp]

First when people complain about DRK PLEASE make sure they are a 70 DRK because if they arnt don't take them seriously at all. Especially on the forums. I feel the tanks are balanced in a sense on what each can offer I do feel that the DPS factor should not be PLD WAR DRK tho. In fact I believe it should be DRK WAR PLD in DPS seeing that DRK has the most AOE and 2 fell cleave type attacks in DA Carve and spit and DA Bloodspiller its as if they designed DRK to he a DPS machine but didn't really give it the DPS to back it up.

Due to tbn it should fall behind warrior and ahead of pld in the dps department

[SyzzleSpark]

@ OP
Bad enough to where SE needs to fix them, but not bad enough that you shouldn't play it in casual endgame if that is what you want.

[Mnemosynia]

snip

You do know that statistics are a good control for the baseline power of a class taking skill out of account.

That being said the tank population, took a steep decrease in SB dps are sitting in 25min queues, you dont have to look very far to see most are dissatisfied even look at the live letter Yoshi had to talk about it aswell. I Dont understand how you people can go about saying theres no issue at all when even SE understands there are issues. There is no we are okay its based on personal skill we are not okay and just running along ignoring it is just gonna further depress the tank population further.

DRKs are in a bad spot OP just read the forums goto Reddit read the live letter ignore all the 70drks who say its okay, play the class you like of course but dont settle like all of these other DRK players who say its fine.

Leveling is bad.
Dps is bad.
Our cds bad.
Living dead is still the worst heavy tank cd.

Play the class but dont settle ask for fixes expansions should not make a job worse.

[LegolasT]

DRKs are in a bad spot OP just read the forums goto Reddit read the live letter ignore all the 70drks who say its okay, play the class you like of course but dont settle like all of these other DRK players who say its fine .

So ignore skilled 70DRK and listen to inexperienced DRK who just want to complain about a job they don't main or mastered??? Does that even make sense. I main DRK I been playing DRK since Heavensward and love the job. Do I feel that changes can be done yes, but I feel that it should be done more towards DPS. All the tanks have an identity PLD being the best in tanking and WAR is mitigation and seft-sustaining itself. To me DRK should be and has the attack tools to be the main DPS tank with WAR close behind in my opinion. the fact that PLD is out doing the 2 tanks in DPS makes no sense. But overall in the function of the tanks tho they are balanced IMO

[Lannybaby]

As a lv 70 drk, I'll tell you that this class is, as Xeno put it, brain-dead easy. The HW complexity is all but gone, and it's just effortless to deal high damage. Basically, DA all the things, keep your mana up, then DA some more, and you're pretty much golden. You can even deal good damage sitting in grit if you want. But if you ever want to do just a touch more, go ahead and turn off that grit. Mana management will be a bit tighter, but not too difficult either. Less sustain, but you hit harder.

[Rbstr]

The HW complexity is all but gone

Like, what complexity was there though?
I think people conflate complexity with being busy. What DRK maybe had was being fairly busy with oGCDs. It had a lot of buttons to push between GCDs compared to the other two tanks. That's isn't complexity in and of itself. (I'm not honestly even sure that it was more busy in HW, given how much DA use we have now)

You used pretty much everything on cooldown - not really complex, just button-pushy. There was no decision tree except if you had enough mana to DA Souleater. Functionally not much changed there, just the combo-endign button press.
Mana-managment is still there, except now you're trying to not over-top more than trying to not run out.

IMO DRK's problems are:
Dark Passenger is nearly never worth its cost. - Some kind of change to make it and its DA upgrade mana efficient vs. several targets or give it a more generally useful rider or something.
They might need an additional physical mitigation skill, while TBN is great vs. one-shot busters it's not so great vs. the multi-hit stuff that has often been used. PLD and War just have much more extensive mitigation options.
The probably need a bit of a DPS bump.

It does feel a bit weird pre-70 but many classes do in various leveling regions. It works fine though and 70 balance is way more important.

Overall I think the tanks are somewhat better balanced than before. It's not perfect since PLD is now an outlier, but its nowhere near the extent of HW's WAR imbalance. No tank should be "the damage tank" or "the mitigation tank". They should all off-tank and main-tank well. We're closer to that now, even if there are still issues.

[Kabooa]

Dark Passenger is nearly never worth its cost. - Some kind of change to make it and its DA upgrade mana efficient vs. several targets or give it a more generally useful rider or something.

Turning it to 'Physical' damage would let it benefit from Blood Weapon.