What about creating an ACTUAL Dark Knight?

[Shurrikhan]

sacrifices their own HP to protect themselves

That makes no sense whatsoever in a tanking scenario. =p

Sacrifice HP. Gain defense. Now the HoT placed on you is no longer overhealing and the following tankbuster won't one-shot you, so long as you're topped off before it.

How does that "make no sense whatsoever" for a tank action? You're literally smoothing out damage intake, exploiting lulls in damage to prevent spikes.

[Reynhart]

Dark Knight Cecil's Stats are actually superior to Kain's for the level range that they appear together (and only really start exceeding DK Cecil's at the levels where you should have Paladin Cecil).

It's not that uncommon to reach lvl20 before changing to Paladin. At that point, a lvl 20 Kain would trump you in HP. In fact, a level 1 Paladin Cecil has around 50% more HP than a level 20 Dark Cecil. How can someone say that Dark Knight was a "high HP, high def" job in that game ?

[Kabooa]

It's not that uncommon to reach lvl20 before changing to Paladin. At that point, a lvl 20 Kain would trump you in HP. In fact, a level 1 Paladin Cecil has around 50% more HP than a level 20 Dark Cecil. How can someone say that Dark Knight was a "high HP, high def" job in that game ?

Because for the first half of the game, you're paired with almost exclusively Wizards of some variety.

[ADVSS]

In 2.0, WAR had literally one "mitigation" skill with Thrill Of Battle. The increase in healing received wasn't even tied to Defiance but to rage, which forced them to not use Inner Beast. PLD would have been a nightmare to heal too if it only had rampart and Shield Oath didn't reduced damage by itself.

Youre absolutely right, but pre fix the hp fluctuated so chaotically at times, it was like watching a good HW or SB DRK's mp gauge during a big pull, and was crazy. At times you didnt know when to heal, or not(youd def heal because you dint want them to die at all) but then this idea, paired along with yours:

Sacrifice HP. Gain defense. Now the HoT placed on you is no longer overhealing and the following tankbuster won't one-shot you, so long as you're topped off before it.

How does that "make no sense whatsoever" for a tank action? You're literally smoothing out damage intake, exploiting lulls in damage to prevent spikes.

Paired with a now streamlined defensive kit, would definately work. The question now would be all about tuning it - pretty possible I think.

Oh man Cecil Harvey, FF4... I could go on and on about that one. For instance how its stats were deliberately halted around level 50 or so, max hp around 5k at 99, etc. The fact that every character was put in as a drkcecil if you recruited them before their time (dummy/placeholder char/ stats too). Even more hillarious is that PLD cecil and DRK cecil seem to be most likely 2 different characters entirely(you cannot beat zeromus without having PLD cecil in your party. Its a wipe, and game over during the crystal of light part) Ah man, to be fair to add to this, i wouldnt rely too much about the drk cecil stats, they very deliberatedly made it worse on purpose. Most definately the 1 will stat the entirity of its levelling, which was magic defense, i think? (magic tank my :kupo

[Reynhart]

Because for the first half of the game, you're paired with almost exclusively Wizards of some variety.

It's not because they're squishier than you that you are an actual tank. Before XIV, there was no DRK iteration than can be close to a tank. The most important part is that it never had any skill that could be related to tanking.

Son to go back to the "themes" of Dark Knigh before XIV, it was basically :

• Sacrifice HP for damage
• Absorb HP/MP/Stats
• Inflict status

And, like I said, you can probably make a tank out of this, with abilities costing HP to do damage, and a drain line of spells. Technically, you could use the absorb line as a justification for mitigation (Like putting Vulnerability while reducing damage received, absorbing defense, etc...)

Youre absolutely right, but pre fix the hp fluctuated so chaotically at times

What seems wasted to me is that because they only half-baked the "tank with high HP" concept, they completely thrown it away in 2.1. After all, since PLD had Rampart and Sentinel, WAR could have multiple "tier" of ToB, Inner Beast could have stayed at 300% damage converted into healing, but with any overheal increasing your max HP for a few seconds, etc...

[MagiusNecros]

How can someone say that Dark Knight was a "high HP, high def" job in that game ?

FFIV is character driven and not class driven.

FF3: Heavy Armor, AoE specialist, ignores defense

FF4: Used as a plot point to transition into a PLD, shares AoE from FF3. Which uses HP and has a CD of 2 turns.

FF8: Darkside command from Guardian Forces which expend HP to deal damage.

FFX-2: Status Immunity, HP sacrificing attacks

FFXI : Heavy Armor, skills that focus on absorb/drain, debuffs
Tactics:Heavy Armor, HP and MP absorb, HP sacrificing attacks

FF4HoL: Darkside action to sacrifice HP for damage

BDFF/BDFF2: Heavy Armor primarily Helmets, HP sacrificing attacks, stat increases on receiving damage, blow up when you are KO'd dealing AoE damage on death, ability to absorb all magic damage and convert it into MP and take no damage, cast doom on self to boost all stats, Minus Strike which lands attacks they do damage based on missing HP. Hitting an enemy say at 10/500 HP will make it land for 490 damage.

FF Dimensions: HP sacrificing attacks, Draw Attacks which is a provoke to focus on the DRK, Last Resort is another ability that inflicts doom on self to buff stats, Final Thrust is an attack based on hit point total and low success rate at high HP, HP absorb.

A general breakdown of DRK over the series shows prominent use of heavy armor and HP sacrificing attacks with the occasional status immunity and interesting anti magic tank skills.

Mostly prominent in the BDFF subseries.

It's all on the wikia for you to gloss over.

[ADVSS]

And, like I said, you can probably make a tank out of this, with abilities costing HP to do damage, and a drain line of spells. Technically, you could use the absorb line as a justification for mitigation (Like putting Vulnerability while reducing damage received, absorbing defense, etc...)

What seems wasted to me is that because they only half-baked the "tank with high HP" concept, they completely thrown it away in 2.1. After all, since PLD had Rampart and Sentinel, WAR could have multiple "tier" of ToB, Inner Beast could have stayed at 300% damage converted into healing, but with any overheal increasing your max HP for a few seconds, etc...

Yeah, it's really interesting that you bring this up, which is a really good perspective on how they couldve done things differently, at least starting in HW, but even more so the direction leading outward till now. I think I'm gonna need to Edit this in a bit, you got me thinking. In that given hypothetical, like you said they changed up WAR identity quite a bit, but left that identity to where it might have been better suited for a DRK later down the road. I often wonder, how drastically job identity got lessened due to the cross role line up of additional skills over the latter(HW and before SB), Hmmm.

[MaraD_]

It's not because they're squishier than you that you are an actual tank. Before XIV, there was no DRK iteration than can be close to a tank. The most important part is that it never had any skill that could be related to tanking.

FF4 introduced a system where you HAD to have at LEAST 2 people take more melee dmg, and at least 2 people dealing less melee dmg, but resisting it.
Almost every character had an option for being put in the back row (with the exception of PLD Cecil)
But unlike me as a child, who put everyone in the back row, and just turtled every fight, i was forced to put people in the front row.
everyone who had means to help survive the melee attacks of the front row, also had melee options that actually did decent dmg.

In short, if it was able to go to the front row, it was a tank.
but not everything that could go to the back row was a tank.

FF5+ changed this, and the jobs that had back row options sometimes lost those options starting from this game. (While also losing some of their survival)

back on topic:
2.0 made the mistake of keeping rampart/sentinel/shield oath as -X% of an enemies dmg, rather than being like foresight, raising your own def by a %.
this caused the issue we still suffer from today, that causes tanks to be too limited in their unique mitigation options.

[SakiKojiro]

FF4 introduced a system where you HAD to have at LEAST 2 people take more melee dmg, and at least 2 people dealing less melee dmg, but resisting it.
Almost every character had an option for being put in the back row (with the exception of PLD Cecil)
But unlike me as a child, who put everyone in the back row, and just turtled every fight, i was forced to put people in the front row.
everyone who had means to help survive the melee attacks of the front row, also had melee options that actually did decent dmg.

In short, if it was able to go to the front row, it was a tank.
but not everything that could go to the back row was a tank.

FF5+ changed this, and the jobs that had back row options sometimes lost those options starting from this game. (While also losing some of their survival)

back on topic:
2.0 made the mistake of keeping rampart/sentinel/shield oath as -X% of an enemies dmg, rather than being like foresight, raising your own def by a %.
this caused the issue we still suffer from today, that causes tanks to be too limited in their unique mitigation options.

All of this is really an issue of how awfully sterile the game is as a whole.

Everything is a set specific percent that doesn't scale. Defensive cooldowns should have actually scaled on a stat, or multiple stats, instead of just "Flat buff or percentage of some type". WAR used to have a few things kind of like this, and it was my favorite job.

Hell now even MP is a flat amount across the board. I've been criticizing SE for years on their completely sterile padded room of a game, well now those hens are finally coming home to roost for everyone else. They didn't know how to balance things in the extremely non-lenient system they built for themselves, so to balance they just homogenized even further.

[ADVSS]

All of this is really an issue of how awfully sterile the game is as a whole.

Everything is a set specific percent that doesn't scale. Defensive cooldowns should have actually scaled on a stat, or multiple stats, instead of just "Flat buff or percentage of some type". WAR used to have a few things kind of like this, and it was my favorite job.

Hell now even MP is a flat amount across the board. I've been criticizing SE for years on their completely sterile padded room of a game, well now those hens are finally coming home to roost for everyone else. They didn't know how to balance things in the extremely non-lenient system they built for themselves, so to balance they just homogenized even further.

Yeah, youre right, at one time Dex even helped up parry/block rate, str helped block str/parry%, things like this, back in 2.0. Heck its so bad now, you cant even meld main stats anymore. See? Man.....
I keep saying I just really dont like the direction they keep heading with it(middle of HW), well you put it bluntly at least, as to why. I'm still interested in talking about making a good identity for DRK, but this probably confirms its futility. Current DRK is probably the future of all the tanks before too long.