DRK fast paced Blood Weapon + Delirium

[Cirdan-Faust]

I really like the idea of blood weapon as a sustained buff. The current "sustained buff" of darkside is just silly. I think Delirium could still be more impactful. I would like to see some interaction between Delirium and Living shadow to promote another level of strategy.

[AC9Breaker]

I personally really like where DRK is right now. In fact I think all the tanks are in a pretty good spot right now and nearly evenly balanced out with just enough of a twinge in differences to make them unique and fun.

[DRKoftheAzure]

I personally really like where DRK is right now. In fact I think all the tanks are in a pretty good spot right now and nearly evenly balanced out with just enough of a twinge in differences to make them unique and fun.

In terms of general play DRK "Unique" gimmicks being The Blackest Night, which you might as well not even bother having because you would have spent that 3k MP on Edge/Flood of Darkness/Shadow anyway if the shield does break(which makes it a not fun gimmick mind you), guessing physical tankbuster or magical tank buster with Dark Mind, and then Living Dead simply exists because it's THE worst invuln out of all of the invulns, and Living Shadow is just a watered down Demi-Bahamut(which MCH also got btw) which means it's better to use Bloodspiller instead, which makes the number pointless gimmicks that are not fun and/or boring at 4.


WAR gimmick are... Infuriate, guaranteed Direct Crits, Shake It Off gimmick and choosing between Raw Intuition and Nascent Flash, A.K.A. gimped Bloodbath, Fell Cleave until Upheaval is up, and Holmgang being the second worst invuln in the game, with only one of these being potentially good(guaranteed Direct Crits) if WAR had more than just Storm's Eye(which is worse than Edge/Flood of Darkness/Shadow because it's a GCD and locked behind a combo), with everything other gimmick needing a rework and I would rather WAR's damage up would be locked behind Berserk than Storm's Eye.


GNB has Burst combo, which feels slow when you first unlock GNB until you unlock Continuation(which should be available as soon as you unlock GNB), their Invuln has the potential to be good if Aurora was a lot better and doesn't "ghost"(activate recast but doesn't activate the effect itself), Brutal Shell could also be a lot better which would also make make Heart of Stone better.


PLD has Clemency, Hallowed Ground which is the best invuln in the game so long as it doesn't "ghost" but it's recast does need to be shorter, Divine Veil which I would rather it be a an AoE heal that shields, Cover which used to be good but got nerfed to the point where you might as well use Intervention because tether range sucks on Cover(just like DRG Dragon Sight), Passage of Arms which needs to a be a heal field that shields and regens, and the magic spam burst that got transferred to WAR as Fell Cleave spam, and DRK as Bloodspiller spam which looks awful because of physical attacks needing more variation in animation outside of one animation spam, which is why the re-worked Sword Oath needs some more time in the oven by baking Rage of Halone and Royal Authority into it with 3 Sword Oath stacks/Atonement being available at level 50, a trait that makes Sword Oath stronger with less stacks with Rage of Halone the second Sword Oath Weaponskill at level 60, Royal Authority the third Sword Oath Weaponskill at level 70.

But tanks DPS rotation boils down spam 1-2-3 ST or 1-2 AoE for 60-90 second and then press 1 GCD button 5-7 times(if you're unlucky enough to see max. #) along with another button spam 3-4 times(if you're unlucky enough to see max. #) which is basically the big complaint for tank rotations in general.

[AC9Breaker]

wall of text

Didnt read all of that but you don't sound too happy with tanking classes. Maybe try playing something else?

[DRKoftheAzure]

Didnt read all of that

Then take your time to actually read it. Just a suggestion.

you don't sound too happy with tanking classes.

HUGE understatement.

Maybe try playing something else?

I would but DPS que times suck and not a lot of level 80 dungeons to keep me interested in even playing in general while waiting for the next expansion...

[OdinelStarrei]

Didnt read all of that but you don't sound too happy with tanking classes. Maybe try playing something else?

People have said similar things to me honestly.
"If you hate DRK and tanking so much, why do you keep playing them and complaining about it?"

There's two reasons for me. One, my entire character identity (not RP, but what I like to do in the game) revolves around tanking well. Ever since late-Midas, I've made it a priority to be competent in every tank, since back then, that was rare and people relied on me for that. It was and is incredibly difficult for me to mentally accept the fact that years of putting my heart in one role, and putting my soul into one job in that role probably wasn't worth it. So, sunk cost fallacy on top of being too stubborn to give up.

Two, I literally cannot switch off tank because of how the savage gear progression works. I'm i498, missing my ring, a few shellacs for BiS accessories, and raid weapon. I've already dumped over two months of tomestones into tank gear. Switching off it would drop me down to i480 pentamelds at best, in a role I haven't been meticulously optimizing or playing in relevant EX and above content in 3 years. I pug everything, so I have to play my absolute best, with the best gear possible, or I'm griefing random players. It's why I don't play anything but DRK in savage right now, because I know it has the largest margin of error, and I can safely turn my brain off and watch the party/mechanics.

I wish I could just drop DRK and switch to a GNB main, at least I'd be pressing more buttons. At a high level, you aren't mentally engaged with the core tank gameplay, regardless of actual fight complexity, and this kills DRK harder than anyone else. Think about how many things were added for tanks, and how many things were taken away/simplified into non-mechanics. For people who've been playing for a while, this is a massive contrast, and is similar with what happened with healers. If you have a room called "Tank Role" full of people of different sizes with a high skill ceiling, everyone can fit in, everyone has room to grow taller, there's always someone to teach, and probably someone to look up to. When you then suddenly reduce the ceiling by half of it's height, everyone who was trying to reach the ceiling has now EXCEEDED it automatically, and is bending over trying to even fit in the room. That's what's happening right now.

The first step in fixing this is adding back in uniqueness to tank identity, and wide-sweeping role changes are not possible right now. Notice the amount of suggestion/complaint threads pertaining to specific jobs, even I broke a personal rule and made one. Ideas that are not even feasible in design, ideas that are intricately thought out, and everything in-between. Because we're desperate for absolutely anything to change. It's boring. So bring back what worked in HW/SB by making mana faster, make Darkside matter, GCDs faster, BW and Delirium not awful skills. Anything, even an attempt would be welcome. That way, I can be actively engaged in the job of which I experience the majority of the game. Seriously, fix blood weapon, every time I use this skill and not get the fifth hit for some reason despite a 2.38 GCD and a delayed weave I get actually angry make it like bunshin FFS.

And people wouldn't be nearly as insistent if SE would just say something about tanks or healers. Healers have gotten small changes, but things like bringing back Energy Drain were not done lightly, I think. And those changes don't change the core of what happened to the healer role in the ShB transition, just the actual jobs. Tanks? We've gotten AoE Reprisal, +5 seconds on 30% CD, and small WAR defensive adjustments. Nothing else, and certainly nothing revolving around individual job mechanics. No dialogue, no acknowledgement of feedback, no discussions, no statements, absolutely nothing of substance for 10 months. "Wait until next expansion." And that's discouraging. I would love it if they would just say "We're not changing anything, deal with it." so I can stop hoping for DRK and the role to become better than they are right now.

tl;dr Things used to be fun, they aren't now, are we all screaming into a void?

[Hierro]

Maybe try playing something else?

Funny how that's a point of yours. If you truly enjoy this iteration of DRK, and weren't too happy with its style beforehand, why didn't you just play WAR back in stormblood? Or how about WAR in this current expansion? You're playing the same job today anyways.

Part of the thread's draw attention to and hopefully thereby rectify that DRK lost its identify as the fast tank. And no, before anyone else suggests, playing GNB is not a suitable replacement-- it is far too inflexible and slow compared to SB DRK's glory-days.

[ArianeEwah]

Hello again, I updated the opening post with 2 new versions.

While I would like to go further -and I actually have- but I will hold it back 'til after the next LL. I am actually curious what YoshiP is going to say about tanks... well, IF they say anything about them that is...

@OdinelStarrei: You're speaking from my soul and heart. A wonderful post about the current state of tanks, especially regarding DRK.

@AC9Breaker:

In fact I think all the tanks are in a pretty good spot right now and nearly evenly balanced out with just enough of a twinge in differences to make them unique and fun.

I strongly disagree when you talk about uniqueness. Yes, tanks are in a good spot balance-wise, but in a terrible state design-wise. GNB and PLD do in fact differ enough from WAR and DRK, to be "unique", but -ho boi- that's a whole other story for WAR vs. DRK. Both do in fact have the same design mechanics, heck, SE didn't even bother to hide it. Delirium is Inner Release; Darkside is Storm's Eye on oGCD, but more silly; Blood Gauge = Beast Gauge; Blood Weapon is Infuriate, but weaker and less reliable, and hasn't even been addressed since ShB launch (holy f-). The only difference between DRK and WAR is DRK has more buttons and spams more oGCDs than WAR. But the outcome is almost identical.
In regard to tanks and identity, -as I said- Odinel has stated it pretty well.

[AC9Breaker]

I'm pretty popular, haha

[MerlinCross]

I'm pretty popular, haha

posts like this smell of bait.

Why yes I might have fallen for it but just throught I'd point that out.