Some simple DRK changes, and why they would improve things.

[SyzzleSpark]

- Re:

Most of your points I can get on board with even if they aren't addressing issues that are a personal priority for myself. So I'll address the one core disagreement I see, the mitigation.

Active mitigation is all fine and good, and I don't have an argument with that.

What does bother me is that there is so much cost associated with mitigating on DRK, and TBN should be more of a gain when you master it. It is a mechanic, and you do have to, as you rightly point out play at it for a while in order to maximize it from a mitigation standpoint, but because of the mana-to-blood interaction, its clearly a DPS mechanic as well, or at least one that interplays with it.

I'm fine with DRK being the active tank and that was certainly what I enjoyed about it in 3.x, and your assessment of DA's parity with things like Berserk is great. Imagine however that Berserk shared a recast with one of WAR's most powerful defensive cooldowns, and you start to see the problem I have with TBN - it draws from your DPS with no real payoff for the active-timing mini-game it forces you to play. Again, I'm fine with DRK being the active tank, but right now its that AND the resource tank. I'd be 100% fine with having to time a 5 or even 4 second TBN if I got a significant DPS payoff for my initial investment of mana, because mana is by-and-large a DPS resource for DRK, not a mitigation one (although 1.5 of our 3 non-invuln/non-cross role CDs use it, which is a whole other problem). If you invest in stocks you're not doing it to break even, you're investing it for that resource to grow and accrue value. Right now it doesn't because 50 Blood only barely breaks even with 2400 mana and in some cases is even worse, albeit only slightly.

So I'll grant you your arguments about mitigation, but in doing so I can't neglect arguments about DPS (after all we are discussing DRK) - and if TBN and the remainder of our CDs are to stay the same (with the exception of your buff the DM which I agree with), TBN needs to offer significant payoff. Having to play that minigame just to break even with what other tanks can do by pressing a single button and then twiddling their thumbs for 20 seconds is definitely a cute variance in design mechanics, but its still more work on the part of the player, and while that can be fun, like you said, its nice to be rewarded for it and currently you are not, relative to the initial investment. The potency value of whatever resource a popped TBN grants you should be higher than the initial investment. This gives you something to maximize. I emphasize maximize here because in learning fights and learning to time it properly you can hit a slightly higher DPS ceiling which would make it both subjectively fun AND objectively rewarding. Its not just a gimme, you put in more work to get that mitigation and invested your DPS resource, so you should be rewarded with higher DPS than if you had failed.

If I had to select just 1-2 solutions and try and come to a compromise between our opinions, I'd go for this (I'm also going to cheat and chose 1-2 for mitigation and 1-2 for DPS):

DPS:
1. Revert DP completely to its 3.x form.
2. TBN procs DA when it pops and cuts the recast timer of C&S by 3s per pop.

Mitigation
1. DM works on physical damage as well, 10% base 20% DA, and lasts 20s.
2. Grit MP cost gone or Grit MP cost increased to 2400 and made oGCD with 1-2s recast.

As a personal aside, for those of us on the east coast without gigabit ethernet that got screwed by the DC move, I'd actually like to see the animation lock on all our oGCDs including Plunge reduced. Double weaving used to be such a joy and now its a bigger part of the job than ever, and yet for many of us it has gotten worse.

[Crater]

Phone posting from work for most of the day so I cant really reference your post as well as Id like, but I can agree a little more with that (albeit Id Prefer 15/30 DM at 10s).


This breaks my own rule about only small changes, but in my DRK dream journal Id rather see TBN at a 1200MP cost, with a 30 Blood return (ie you gain 20% overall on the exchange). Id also change the cooldown to 5s, with a stacking debuff that increases the MP cost by 25% per stack, 5 stacks per cast, and one stack is removed every 3 seconds and every use of Bloodspiller.

Id also fold the Delirium bonuses into BW/BP (so 18s/20s durations, respectively), and change Delirium into a skill with a 30s cooldown that activates DA for 40 Blood (again about a 20% gain) and is reduced in cooldown by 5s for every use of a DA-boosted skill.

The idea would be to maximize MP/Blood by juggling Blood and MP back and forth using Delirium and TBN, using DA as a pressure Release for MP, and Bloodspiller for Blood.