Proposed Dark Knight Changes

[superluminalflower]

Dark Knight's current problems are that it is boring and repetitive to play, consisting largely of hammering the same button between every GCD while repeating the only DPS combo over and over again with no alternative combo ender, let alone an upkept buff or dot, with fewer and lesser defensive options than the other two tanks, little to no self-sustain, and very little opportunity for burst or any sort of interesting or fun optimization of its damage. These problems call not just for potency changes, but a revision to its entire playstyle and toolkit to bring it somewhat more in line with how it was in HW, but still retaining its current blood gauge system in some form. A lot of people have said that the primary thing they like about DRK is the speed of the job, so that should be made front and center in a more interesting way than "press this same oGCD button over and over again before almost every GCD". My primary proposals are making the speed granted by Blood Weapon a central part of the job that is always there, not just during Blood Weapon's duration, and making the blood gauge simpler and more user-friendly as well as fueling solely offensive oGCDs.

Here's my proposed changes:

Dark Arts
MP cost increased by 50%

Siphon Strike
Remove Dark Arts effect

Souleater
Remove Dark Arts effect, remove HP restoration, now gives a 10% attack speed buff that lasts 30s (so it would be used for every fourth combo, like Storm's Eye), also increases blood by 20

Bloodspiller
Now combos off of Siphon Strike, restores HP regardless of stance, also increases blood by 20, retains Dark Arts effect, potency decreased as it will be used a lot more

Power Slash
Now increases blood by 20

Dark Passenger
Remove Dark Arts effect, now single target, cooldown reduced to 1s, MP cost removed, potency changed to be the same as the Dark Arts bonus potency (currently 140), now costs 50 blood to use

Quietus
Remove Dark Arts effect, now an oGCD weaponskill with a cooldown of 1s, still costs 50 blood to use and regens MP per hit as before, potency nerfed to be less than Dark Passenger

Delirium
Remove old effect, remove blood cost, now increases the potency of blood gauge actions and Dark Arts bonus potency for GCD actions by 100%, duration of 12s

Blood Weapon
Remove attack speed boost, now increases blood by 10 for every weaponskill executed under its effect instead of the prior blood gain effect, still restores MP per hit

Blood Price
Now increases blood by 10 for every instance of damage taken under its effect instead of the prior blood gain effect, still restores MP per instance of damage taken

Sole Survivor
Now additionally has a Dark Arts effect: grants a large HP regen over its duration

Grit
MP cost reduced or removed, additional oGCD action added that turns it off (the action to turn it on would still be a GCD though)

Also change potencies across the board to keep DRK's overall damage with the Souleater speed buff similar to how its damage currently is without it

These changes would make DRK play faster than it currently is outside of Blood Weapon, and would also make it more dynamic, with more depth to gameplay than just hammering Dark Arts every GCD with only a single DPS combo. The resource management of blood would also be a lot simpler and less messy in terms of numbers than it currently is, increasing at easily predictable intervals in consistent amounts, with spending blood gauge being similar to SAM, albeit a whole lot simpler. It would also be burstier than it currently is, while not being as ridiculous in its damage distribution as WAR. The Sole Survivor HoT as well as Bloodspiller absorbing HP regardless of stance (similarly to Storm's Path) would improve self-sustain. Adding an oGCD action that turns Grit off would remove the current danger of double-clicking it back on by accident when trying to deactivate it, as well as making it much less clunky and weird to deactivate. Reducing the MP cost of Grit would also make it easier to regain enmity and improve defenses in dungeons if you run out of MP during a big pull while it's off or forget to put it back up after a boss.

Another thing I would want is for Dark Arts to be reworked slightly so instead of immediately consuming MP to give you a buff that then modifies the next action you use with a Dark Arts effect, it instead gives you a buff that makes the next action you use with a Dark Arts effect consume MP then to give you that effect. So like, instead of the way it currently works (you use Dark Arts, MP is immediately consumed, next action with a Dark Arts effect is buffed), it would consume MP later at the time the action with a Dark Arts effect is used. The reason for this is so that the ability does not become usable midway through a GCD, but is always available at the start of a GCD, preventing the clipping that commonly happens after Siphon Strike when the MP doesn't show up until halfway through your GCD and then using Dark Arts clips your next GCD because you couldn't use it before the MP showed up. This would potentially create issues with wasted MP if the player is near cap though, so another potential fix to this problem (and probably a better fix) would be to drastically reduce the animation lock of Dark Arts, or remove it entirely like NIN mudras.

[Aniya_Estlihn]

Why on earth would you want the speed boost from blood weapon removed?

[superluminalflower]

Why on earth would you want the speed boost from blood weapon removed?

Did you read the post? It would be removed because Souleater would give the same speed boost except all of the time.

[Aniya_Estlihn]

Did you read the post? It would be removed because Souleater would give the same speed boost except all of the time.

I did but isn't that a bit much? I get what you're trying to do here, but that just seems... really, excessive and also kinda strange.

[superluminalflower]

I did but isn't that a bit much? I get what you're trying to do here, but that just seems... really, excessive and also kinda strange.

Why would that be a bit much?

[Aniya_Estlihn]

Why would that be a bit much?

I just have to question why anyone would want a speed buff tacked onto a combo-ender to add what essentially would be huton-lite to DRK's GCD... At that point, Blood Weapon may as well just become a trait in it's current form and always give a speed boost to Dark Knight rather than make it a personal buff to reapply via your weapon-skills, as that's essentially what you're suggesting; plus with how few GCDs we have it would always be up so there'd be no point to the effect being tied to Souleater in the first place. It's just... an odd thing to suggest. Personally, I'd much rather they remove the stance lock on Blood Weapon and Blood Price than remove the speed boost from BW altogether and then add it to the GCD... it's just kinda strange.

I miss being second in speed to Ninja like we were in Heavensward, but turning Dark Knight into a tanky Ninja with an easily applied Huton just seems overdone. I do agree that a four tier combo would be nice, and I personally question why Bloodspiller wasn't that combo in the first place, but not to add a speed boost effect. That's just weird.

[DRKoftheAzure]

What about this?

• Blood Weapon: Remove Grit restriction, add the effects of "increase damage dealt by 10%" and reduce recast to 30 seconds. Grit effect would be "Ignores Grit damage dealt penalty"
• Bring back Scourge but have it combo off of Hard Slash, same base/combo/Dark Arts potency as Syphon Strike, is still a Damage over Time effect but also reduces target's magic damage dealt by 10% and increases target's magic damage recieved by 10% and DoT tick generates 1 blood while on hit generates 3 blood
• Power Slash: Add Dark Arts combo potency of 650 and generates 10 blood
• Syphon Strike: Generates 5 blood.
• Bring back Dark Dance
• Blood Price: Remove Grit restriction, add the effect additions of Blood Weapon but with the effect of "increase HP recovery via healing magic by 10%" instead of "Increased damage dealt." Reduce recast to 30 seconds.
• Souleater: Make "convert physical damage into HP" baseline and increase blood generation to 20
• Dark Passenger: Change Dark Arts effect from inflict blind to "reduces target's Accuracy by 20%"
• Dark Mind: Add "decrease physical vulnerability."
• Dark Arts: Remove "Dark Arts fades upon use" restriction on all effects that are affected by Dark Arts, remove timer on Dark Arts and add the effect "Darkside fades when MP reaches 0" or make duration NIN's Huton
• NEW Weaponskill at level 49: Debilitate, combos off of Scourge with same base/combo/Dark Arts potency as Damage over time potency 50 for 30 seconds and reduces target's physical damage dealt by 10% and increases target's physical damage received by 10% and uses the Heavensward Delirium animation because it looks cool. Also have it generate 10 blood and 1 blood per DoT tick
• Abyssal Drain: increase potency to 150 and make "Convert Damage dealt into HP" baseline with Dark Arts potency of 350.
• Sole Survivor: add "increase targets damage received by 10%." Any enemies that would be nearby in 10 yalms radius would be marked with Another Victim that lasts 30 seconds and Increases the damage they recieve for 30 seconds or change effect to "convert physical damage dealt into HP"
• Delirium: change name to "Blood Force" and change effect to "Restores HP and MP by 20%".
• Quietus: change cost to 25 blood and 1 sec recast
• The Blackest Night: Just make The Blackest Night be like WAR's Inner release on top of having 20% HP Shield but can only applied to self(Shield has to break or fall off for that to take effect).

[superluminalflower]

snip

The play style would be nowhere near ninja, also nowhere did i suggest that Bloodspiller would be a fourth tier combo, it would be an alternate third tier, so the rotation would go SE combo > BS combo > BS combo > BS combo > SE combo

[Bec]

DRK of the azure half the things you just said would break the job entirely, let's go over that
1. unchained with 50% uptime. obviously completely broken in every way possible
2. 100% uptime 10% damage down combos were unilaterally removed bc they were also, entirely broken
3. Power slash is now your dps combo, this is unworkable for the same reasons trying to MT while your WAR OT is spamming BB
4. dark dance was bad for the same reason parry was bad and was solely there to proc reprisal
5. DP...what??? more rng is not fun at all
6. the entire point of dark mind is it being magic...why not make raw intuition parry magic now? makes zero sense
7. the entire point of blood price being unusable for damage was to not force a MT role, also the other additions are blatantly overpowered
8. ...hypercharge...but a weapon skill...infinite 10% raid damage up???? are you out of your mind?
9. aNOTHER raid damage buff that the other tanks entirely lack for a good reason
10. i don't see the point to delirium at all
11....TBN....I don't even know what to make of this. this is probably the most overpowered ability I could think of

Are you actually trying to contribute to the discussion or are you more interested in showing everyone your deviant art oc class? Bc you didn't even bother to respond to what superluminalflower said, you just took the opportunity to plug your own (completely overpowered in every way) idea.

[Bec]

On a more relevant note, I helped superluminalflower come up with this class rework idea and I'd love to see more constructive critique!