What could DRK have learned from FFXI?

[Lyth]

...

Actually, anyone who knows Final Fantasy also knows that every game is different. The series is held together by a loose series of homages and references. Ragnarok is a spaceship. Shiva is a motorcycle. The Lucavi are espers. Paladins cast offensive magic. Ifrit takes damage from fire spells. Dark Knight attacks are fuelled by MP as a representation of their life-force instead of HP.

This seems like a strange place to bring out your pitchfork. But that's the nice thing about Final Fantasy. If you don't like how things are done in one game, there are plenty of alternatives.

That it's that way ---------------------------------------->

I think this needs a longer arrow.

[Reynhart]

Darkness Cecils one skill that they removed for the American release was so weak it wasn't even worth using.

Wow, that's heavy misinformation there. Darkness was a very useful skill...for AoE purpose. And the reason why it was removed was not because it was weak, but because they thought western people wouldn't be able to grasp the strategic use of character skills. Love the irony.

And outside 2 to 3 total fights in the ds remake you used it only once per those fights thats it.

You mean in the game where it's a toggle ? Sure you use it once per fight.

And for the record, in FF III, it's not a Dark Knight as in 暗黒騎士 but a Mystic Knight まけんし. It was only translated as Dark Knight in the DS remake...where it gained Souleater.

But boy darknight had "always used hp to deal damage" no it hasn't lol.

Yes, it has. XIV is the only exception in the main series. And how convenient to push aside every other Dark Knight incarnation in FF spinoff and affiliated games, where they do sacrifice HP everytime it's a job you can use.

Dark Knight attacks are fuelled by MP as a representation of their life-force instead of HP.

Which is a very bland representation because all casters are already "fuelled" by MP. At best, give DRK another ressource where using it all would be bad, not related to your HP...which, strangely enough, was close to how Darkside worked in HW.

[kazzel120]

I’m sorry but wow. I had a good chuckle at people trying to argue classic DRK is a tank, but trying to argue that souleater/darkness is not their iconic ability? Try to say that to anyone who knows FF and the reaction will be “HAHAHAHAHA... wait you’re serious?”.

Basically every main line entry that has had drk except FF2 (abilities weren’t a thing) and the original version of FF3 (added in the remake) has given them souleater or darkness. DRK simply has not had as many main line appearances as other jobs, not appearing in 5 or 9. If you expand the criteria it appears a lot more frequently, X-2, tactics-WoTL, ff-explorers, bravely default and here’s the description of the dark knight job from ff record keeper “A warrior who wields the power of darkness. Sacrificing his own life force to crush his enemies. The dark knight excels in an offensive role”.

Did you miss the part where i said XIV DRK is a tank? XIV DRK i said it again. And to get over it 4 years people still cry about DRK being a tank in XIV.

[Fal_Kearst]

Any job in XI could tank with /nin! UTSUSEMI BROKE AS HEEEEEELL. Also just give DRK in 14 a kraken club and let it be a zerg tank.

[Absimiliard]

Any job in XI could tank with /nin! UTSUSEMI BROKE AS HEEEEEELL. Also just give DRK in 14 a kraken club and let it be a zerg tank.

At least it won't have that suicide problem many of FFXI's DRKs did. We all did it, too. No one can deny failing to notice their blood weapon falling off and continuing to go ham until their own death.

[HollyWhyte]

Dark Knight was a popular requested job. They also wanted to obviously add one of each role in Heavensward. Dark Knight was chosen although it ended up being a tank because MCH was the DPS. Look at how much Clemency steps on healer toes when it comes to HP management. They probably figured a tank with HP costs or mechanics based on absorbtion would be a little too variable for your average healer to deal with and difficult to design encounters around. It wouldn't bother skilled players much, but FFXIV is pretty accessible so they didn't want the average DRK to constantly be killing themselves with poor HP management. Thus, we got FFXIV DRK.

Instead, it seems like they tried to keep the whole theme of draining yourself to fuel your abilities via MP instead of HP. It still impacts (or at least impacted, in past expansions) your performance to a decent degree and you get the "theme" of self-draining but without the risk of killing yourself and pissing off your healer. I'm not necessarily saying I agree with that but it seems to be the path they took so that the job is at least in the slight spirit of the whole dark knight theme.

As for enfeebling and enhancing, they used to have stuff like this on other things. Slash/pierce/blunt resist debuffs, Halone's Rage lowering STR, WAR lowering damage dealt by 10%, the various abilities like virus and the other one that escapes me at the moment that lower STR/MND/DEX. I wouldn't mind DRK having this but odds are if they did in a game like FFXIV you would have to have other jobs that do these things too, and considering they removed it from PLD and WAR they don't want to go that route. The only things that remain that do this are the role abilities, most likely again so you get some small sense of a "support" ability even though tank/dps/healer trinity doesn't leave any room for support classes that FFXI's more flexible system did. Personally I loved red mage's role as a powerful enfeebler and jack of all trades, but you won't see that in a holy trinity style MMO.

[Rasikko]

The only identity FFXI DRK had during the 75 era was Blood Weapon + Soul Eater = piss off the WHM.

[Fal_Kearst]

At least it won't have that suicide problem many of FFXI's DRKs did. We all did it, too. No one can deny failing to notice their blood weapon falling off and continuing to go ham until their own death.

THOSE WERE THE DAYS MY FRIEND!!

[Seku]

Actually, anyone who knows Final Fantasy also knows that every game is different. The series is held together by a loose series of homages and references. Ragnarok is a spaceship. Shiva is a motorcycle. The Lucavi are espers. Paladins cast offensive magic. Ifrit takes damage from fire spells. Dark Knight attacks are fuelled by MP as a representation of their life-force instead of HP.

This seems like a strange place to bring out your pitchfork. But that's the nice thing about Final Fantasy. If you don't like how things are done in one game, there are plenty of alternatives.


I think this needs a longer arrow.

Ragnarok is different in a lot of games.
Shiva may have been made into a motorcycle, but she kept the fact that she uses ice as a main method of attack. They also didn't try to make her into a tank.
Lucavi being espers? Not sure what this is suppose to mean. In every new game Summons are named something new.
Paladin's are known for having access to white magic in general. Of Their main thing is being a warrior with white magic offensive included. The main thing is that their not a DPS with 0 curing ability.

So no, this is a normal place for people that have been fans of the job to pull out their pitchfork.

Even going by loose references, FF14's Dark Knight doesn't even do a good job at that.

[TouchandFeel]

And for the record, in FF III, it's not a Dark Knight as in 暗黒騎士 but a Mystic Knight まけんし. It was only translated as Dark Knight in the DS remake...where it gained Souleater.

まけんし (ph. Ma-ken-shi) does not translate to "Mystic Knight".

Kenshi is literally swordsman/fencer and Ma is a descriptor that basically means "supernatural with a dark, ominous or scary connotation" or can at times mean conceptually "cursed" or "demonic (in a more Japanese sense)". It's something that is hard to describe or perfectly translate into English. So saying that it was "Dark Swordsman", "Dark Fencer" or something along those lines is not far off and closer conceptually than "Mystic Knight", where "Dark" is more the conceptual idea, like in dark forces or dark magic, as opposed to the literal like darkness in a dark room.
Also just a note, the kanji version of the name is used/referenced here and there for Makenshi as well (魔 剣士) and not just the Romaji (まけんし).

In regard to the job translated to Mystic Knight that came later, 魔法剣士 (ph. Ma-hou-ken-shi), that translation is much more fitting.
Mahou translates to magic, but specifically the Western idea of magic like wizards and the like. So Mahoukenshi means Magic Swordsman, Mystic Swordsman, Magic Fencer, etc. and Mystic Knight is not far off.

The later more literal name given for Dark Knight is exactly that, literal. 暗黒騎士 (ph. An-ko-ku-ki-shi), with ankoku translating to literal darkness, as in the lack or absence of light, and kishi meaning basically "knight", 騎 - this kanji (ki) refers to equestrian/having to do with riding a horse and 士 (shi) refers to a person of skill, expertise or of standing just like in kenshi (剣士) <-- see the character at the end there. So basically a person skilled in riding a horse which conceptually means basically a cavalry person which means a knight.

In essence the later name used for Dark Knight was an evolution of the name used in the Famicom version of FF3, taking the idea of a Dark Swordsman and going super literal to fit the narrative of FF4 where Cecil is literally a knight in the service of the kingdom of Baron.
So Makenshi (魔 剣士) is the precursor to Ankokukishi (暗黒騎士) and the foundational concept is the same.

I hope that from now on the "Makenshi means Mystic Knight"/"It was called Mystic Knight in FF3" thing is appropriately binned and I never have to go over this explanation again.

P.S. And before anybody brings it up, although the kanji for ma (魔) appears in mahou (魔法), the darker connotations of ma do not carry over to mahou as mahou is very specific in being the Japanese idea of "Western magic" which doesn't have any good/bad/dark/light connotations inherent to it.