The Ultimate DRK Rework

[TouchandFeel]

Responses inserted into quote below.

My responses will be numbered to correspond with your points

1) This is actually a good point that i forgot to consider. I think this would be easily fixed by maintaining the current 300 cure potency on souleater and simply bumping it up to 600 when enhanced by Dark Arts

You initially said that it would be based on damage dealt. Also changing the cure potency on Soul Eater doesn't fix the problem because the frequency of using Soul Eater is indeterminate. Even if you adjust the cure potency to compensate for the projected frequency of use, what happens when players don't adhere to what you thought they would do? If they decide they don't want to use DA+Soul Eater for the heal because the resource cost is better spent elsewhere like for the extra potency provided by DA+Power Slash, the increased cure potency means nothing. If instead they decide to just go all in on DA+Soul Eater it forces a dps loss for excessive survivability gains and still leaves DRK with no real "passive" defensive/sustain tool in their kit like the other tanks just get. The proposed changes, even with an increase to Soul Eater potency, just create a messy situation that ends up being problematic for the job.
Simply put, changing the "passive" survivability aspect of the DRK kit, the constant heals from Soul Eater, ends up stopping it from working as intended, removing that aspect from the kit and unless you want to potentially mess up DRK that same consistent background boost to survivability needs to be added back in to the kit elsewhere and in a way that it will work in all encounter situations. You did not do that, leaving the DRK kit with an integral piece missing.

2) you must have missed it, but at the end of Power Slashes description it says it would give you Darkside for 30 seconds, stacking up to 60 seconds, basically just storm's eye but it can stack twice, so my intention was for the skill to work exactly as you said it should.

I did not miss it and what you are saying is not how I said such an ability should work, I was actually saying the exact opposite. I said that additional combo-enders like what you proposed would inevitably have to be tied to either a buff like you suggested or a DoT, both of which are things that other jobs already do and adding them to DRK would not really make them any more fun and just make them more like other jobs which is something that has become a real point of contention among tank players of late.
I then went into how another tank job that many seem to love the game-play for, despite a lack of a second combo-ender, handles breaking up combo rotation monotony. I then asked why can't DRK go more in that kind of direction or some other direction opposed to just falling back on "just add a second combo-ender".
So again, I read what you suggested, understood it clearly and did not agree with it.

3) Not true. This version of blood weapon works almost identically to the StB version, and Blood Weapon was by far the most powerful and important ability you had against large groups, you just had to know how to use it. If you used your resources properly, you could chain quietus and abyssal drain back to back for the whole time you had blood weapon active. Used in this way, blood weapon generated an insane amount of resources for you and allowed you to heal for an insane amount while dealing lots of damage too. The new aoe combo is the for when blood weapon is not available, essentially it replaces the utility of blood price by giving you something to do while blood weapon is not up.

Yes, the ability itself would be very close to what there was in StB however it then essentially negates the AoE combo and game-play we have now in ShB.
I also didn't go into it before because I have frankly gotten sick of having to argue this point, but DA+AD spam is in of itself not actually fun game-play. If spamming Bloodspiller during Delirium is considered boring game-play, which I agree it is, then why is spamming a different ability fun. It's only seen that way because of how grossly overpowered it was with the self-heals. Remove how overpowered it is and I guarantee you that people would immediately begin to complain about it not being fun. As for it being overpowered, well I shouldn't have to point out where the problem with that is. Then on top of that you proposed making it far more powerful in single-target while still keeping it spammable. Sure you don't get 10 Blood from it, like you would from the Blood Eater combo, but being able to spam a 600 potency damage and cure ability is more than a bit too much. Intentionally designing imbalance is not something that should be done.


4/5)Your concerns that you have for TBN and Delirium would not be a problem at all. In fact, the way those two abilities work negates the issue that either could cause on their own for DRK. If you spend MP on TBN and get blood back in return, you can never find yourself in a position that you don't have enough MP left because you can always turn it back into MP with Delirium. Another way to look at it is, if you have 50 blood but no MP, you can use Delirium to get the MP you need for a TBN, then once the shield breaks you are refunded, making it a 0 sum game, almost identical to how current TBN works. The only difference here is that now the neutral resource is blood instead of MP.

As for giving DRK a burst window for raids, if people are so adamant that DRK has one, they can always change Living Shadow to have a shorter duration but higher dps so that all of its damage fits into a 10-15 second window.

It's not neutral though. The crux of your argument that it is "neutral" is your proposed change to Delirium, which you made a GCD weaponskill that costs 50 Blood, can be used whenever resources permitting and has a potency of 300. Because it is a GCD ability, that means it will displace or delay other GCD abilities. You attempted to compensate for this by giving it 300 potency. However that value is flawed because it doesn't account for many other factors such as timing of encounter phases affecting what GCDs can be fit in and where, and accounting for non-combo GCD usage among other things.
Basically it falls into the exact same problematic situation as Bloodspiller did in StB where because it is a GCD the potency to aim for compensating is a moving target. Then on top of that you made the potency gain from DA on other GCD abilities variable, which just muddies the water even more because it then makes the value of the MP resource variable and I won't even get into trying to codify the value of other things gained from MP expenditure through DA like self-healing.
It's for exactly all these reasons that the devs changed to the new mechanics that separated MP from Blood, because there were to many variables and too many extraneous things that were nigh impossible to quantify the value for.

Also just look at the values you presented just in terms of the potency value of Blood when spent. We will also ignore the delaying or replacing of a GCD since both abilities being looked at are on the GCD and so both do that.
Bloodspiller provides 700 (as said in your proposal) potency and costs 50 Blood within 1 GCD.
Delirium provides 300 potency directly and either another 200 or 350 potency through DA within 1 GCD (since DA is oGCD) equaling 500 or 650 potency.
That means that Delirium is a potential loss of 200 or 50 potency.
Now if instead the MP from Delirium is spent on TBN to break it and gain another 50 Blood we have side-stepped the above potency loss but have brought ourselves back to the same cross-roads as before and have also used up a GCD to do 300 potency, displacing other potential GCDs that could have done more or less damage, creating the ambiguity that I already talked about.
If we then assume that Bloodspiller retains the current 600 potency, it becomes a likely loss of potency versus Delirium. If instead we say that Bloodspiller lands in the middle with 650 potency, it then becomes potentially equitable with Delirium plus DA, but only when used on Power Slash and then you still have the problem with Delirium to TBN and the ambiguity there.
Trying to throw together two different resources that fuel both GCDs and oGCDs and make them interchangeable ends up just being messy and no matter how you try to compensate by tweaking numbers it just has too many variables to get right.

As for making Living Shadow DRK's burst, if people think Delirium is boring and not fun to execute, what do you think people will feel about Living Shadow?
Living Shadow is generally okay right now because it is something extra that you layer into your burst to add to it while still performing your standard burst mechanics. Reducing DRK's heavy burst mechanics down to a single button press will not go over well and definitely not be fun or engaging.

6) My version of DRK does generate MP more slowly than StB DRK, but it still generates a lot more than current DRK. Currently, DRK generates enough MP to cast 3-4 TBN's per minute. My version would generate enough to cast 7-8. On top of that, since TBN rewards blood which can be converted bacj into MP rather than strictly a free Edge of Shadow, that blood can instead be used to cast another TBN, letting you theoretically chain them infinitely if you get them to pop every time
So no, quantity of TBN's would not be an issue in the slightest.

I mistakenly mixed up the mention of 400 MP with the stated 800MP gained from Syphon Strike, so I will retract point 6.

[cactuarzzzz]

If any drk main have time can you take a look at what I came up with?> https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...t-won-t-happen.

[bundythenoob]

I don't quite understand why so many players are so ready to dismiss DRK threads created by their fellow DRK players with potential ideas to change how the job plays. most of these threads only came about because the older DRK players are unsatisfied with the SHB "rework" in the first place. if you just think about it for a second, despite the job having "more people playing it than ever" why is it that there are so many ideas floating around on how to make the class play better? why are there so many opinions on what makes DRK fun and not fun? why are there so many DRKs complaining on the forums?

its not as if DRK players want the job to be some elitist experience that only the top 1% can minmax, we just want the job to return to its unique playstyle roots, and not to feel like a WAR clone, which also does injustice to WAR mains. is that too much to ask?

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

I don't quite understand why so many players are so ready to dismiss DRK threads created by their fellow DRK players with potential ideas to change how the job plays. most of these threads only came about because the older DRK players are unsatisfied with the SHB "rework" in the first place. if you just think about it for a second, despite the job having "more people playing it than ever" why is it that there are so many ideas floating around on how to make the class play better? why are there so many opinions on what makes DRK fun and not fun? why are there so many DRKs complaining on the forums?

its not as if DRK players want the job to be some elitist experience that only the top 1% can minmax, we just want the job to return to its unique playstyle roots, and not to feel like a WAR clone, which also does injustice to WAR mains. is that too much to ask?

Think most players myself included at this point, typically dismiss DRK threads, simply because we're fed up with yet another DRK rework thread, if they were less abundant and let's be honest, a lot have terrible suggestions included within said posts, people might be a bit more amenable to these sort of threads. Thing is most people are not gonna be happy unless it goes back to HW DRK, but unfortunately that probably won't work with how the current tanks are designed.

[bundythenoob]

Think most players myself included at this point, typically dismiss DRK threads, simply because we're fed up with yet another DRK rework thread, if they were less abundant and let's be honest, a lot have terrible suggestions included within said posts, people might be a bit more amenable to these sort of threads. Thing is most people are not gonna be happy unless it goes back to HW DRK, but unfortunately that probably won't work with how the current tanks are designed.

from my point of view, most of these threads exist because the people who plays these jobs have ideas on how to make the job they are passionate about a little more fun. most of the ideas might be terrible to some players, a few might be good to others, but I think the fact that so many people just want the job to be fun over being balanced shows that square enix took a huge step backwards with the current design. the STB and HW designs for certain jobs might not have been "balanced", but if they're more fun to play than the current SHB iteration, then why bother playing them at all?

I've been playing this game since ARR, and although i occasionally lurked here, the only time i ever came to complain on the forums was during SHB when I realised that after a year of the expac being out, square had made NO changes aside from a WAR QOL (which was an oversight that they should have just implemented on release)

I just hope that people aren't too blinded by loyalty or something to realise that square really messed up this expac, and that the criticisms and complaints come from a place of love, and from people who want the game to be both fun and rewarding to play, which atm it is not, (if you're a tank or healer player from the past) despite what "the numbers" would say. i'm not even sure why more people aren't pointing out the fact that only 4 devs are working on the battle systems for all of the 17 or so jobs in the game, and that those devs even admitted they dont like playing tanks or healers.... hell' I'd give them advice for free if it meant that the game could see a return to form.

[TouchandFeel]

snip

Many of the rest of us have also been playing since the beginning of ARR or even before with beta or 1.0, and a decent amount of us have been active on the forums and have been engaging in tank discussions since the very beginning.

Since the very beginning discussions on balance and whether things were fun or not, and lets not forget lot and lots of complaints, have been a constant thing. Players complaining about tank jobs is not something new and honestly, I recall there being far more complaint threads on DRK during Stormblood compared to what we have seen so far in Shadowbringers. There were also plenty of complaint threads during Heavensward as well, for example there were quite a few threads that complained that DRK being a tank wasn't "true to the job's identity in the series" and that DRK should be made a DPS instead, and of course a bunch of DRK complaint and "the job needs fixes/needs to be reworked' threads. Seriously, just go back and look at the tank forum threads during Heavensward and Stormblood and it becomes quite clear that many players did not have the rosy outlook on DRK during those times that some like to espouse these days.

As for the devs "not listening" and "doing nothing", what exactly are they supposed to do when so much of player feedback and recommendations are all over the place, often contradictory and just as often plain bad ideas. The few times that some of us have stepped up and tried to create an understandable consensus among DRK players on what the big problems were and what sort of things we wanted, we actually tended to get good results and saw changes that reflected what we said. Except for Living Dead, seriously SE just fix that damn ability already.
Anyways, if you look back on a lot of the complaint and rework threads for DRK through HW and StB you can actually see a direct correlation between them and the reworks that we would end up getting later. Sure sometimes we didn't get exactly what we wanted or the changes didn't go as far as we would have liked, but we talked, a lot, and the devs did listen. It only seems to some like they don't listen because people like to live in their own head-space where the way they want things to be is "the consensus" and the way things should be done, and if the devs do something different they obviously aren't listening. Not to mention people also tend to suffer from a heavy dose of rosy retrospection.

So just because some of us disagree that "Square really messed up this expac", although many of us do agree that mistakes were made and some fixes should happen, and that we disagree with some of the complaints or ideas presented, guess what we have our own complaints and ideas, that doesn't mean we are "blinded by loyalty", "balance obsessed elitists" or whatever other negative labels that tend to get leveled in situations like this. We just simply have our own thoughts and feelings on things based on our own experiences and fueled by our own passion for the game and the job.

[aodhan_ofinnegain]

....

I get that the posters are passionate, just don't expect the reader to share in the same enthusiasm, when they see the 100th DRK rework thread (hyperbolic) on the forums. It's understandable that it's impossible to keep everyone happy, and ShB DRK isn't it's finest iteration to date. But too many of the same threads, saying the same thing, can leave readers in a constant state of eye rolling.

I'm by no means impressed with tanking in 5.0. I am happy old stances and aggro combo are gone, it felt only WAR gained any benefits, while PLD and DRK got shafted if and when they needed to use em, which shouldn't have been a thing in the first place when playing your job.

As a PLD main since beginning of HW, I have a strong ideal that balance must be adhered to when devs design the jobs, because no job should be left out. It doesn't mean devs should have gutted jobs in that pursuit, but balanced be damned is a burning train wreck waiting to happen and would leave some job unplayable. Personally I'm more on the boat of encounter design needs to be improved upon by SE that gives tanks more to compensate what's been removed instead of designing fancy orchestrated fights that cater to DPS.

I'll be honest, the biggest decline to combat has been due to casuals complaining jobs/ fights are too difficult instead of putting the effort in, and SE listen to them. Sooner SE stop listening to them sooner the game can "return to form."

[TouchandFeel]

Personally I'm more on the boat of encounter design needs to be improved upon by SE that gives tanks more to compensate what's been removed instead of designing fancy orchestrated fights that cater to DPS.

I agree wholeheartedly and feel that encounter design is what really needs to be leveraged to give tanks more direct engagement for the role and to feel like a "tank".
To me being a tank is about keeping control of the fight and making sure that the boss is doing what you want it to do. The design of essentially a tank and spank while navigating general mechanics that affect the whole party doesn't really convey that feeling.
The general mechanics, the tank busters, the dps checks and the stuff they have done so far are good and they should keep doing that, but they need to start adding in more things specifically for tanks to have to control and manage asides from being able to take a beating.
A few things that come to mind are making boss positioning a more important and dynamic thing in encounters, more aggro drops/resets/multi-enemy boss fights that require swapping targets between tanks and other such things forcing tanks to have to utilize on-the-fly aggro tools like provoke, and more mechanics requiring the tanks to actively protect other party members with their abilities. Stuff like that. Then give the tanks more abilities to deal with those mechanics like a stronger defensive to use on others but on a longer recast.
I feel doing things like that would do a lot to make the tank role feel more unique and sell the fantasy of being a protector.

[bundythenoob]

I agree wholeheartedly and feel that encounter design is what really needs to be leveraged to give tanks more direct engagement for the role and to feel like a "tank".
To me being a tank is about keeping control of the fight and making sure that the boss is doing what you want it to do. The design of essentially a tank and spank while navigating general mechanics that affect the whole party doesn't really convey that feeling.
The general mechanics, the tank busters, the dps checks and the stuff they have done so far are good and they should keep doing that, but they need to start adding in more things specifically for tanks to have to control and manage asides from being able to take a beating.
A few things that come to mind are making boss positioning a more important and dynamic thing in encounters, more aggro drops/resets/multi-enemy boss fights that require swapping targets between tanks and other such things forcing tanks to have to utilize on-the-fly aggro tools like provoke, and more mechanics requiring the tanks to actively protect other party members with their abilities. Stuff like that. Then give the tanks more abilities to deal with those mechanics like a stronger defensive to use on others but on a longer recast.
I feel doing things like that would do a lot to make the tank role feel more unique and sell the fantasy of being a protector.

The argument of tanking being better designed sadly is a lost cause when it comes to this game, mostly due to the developer's intentions of being casual friendly. In terms of savage and ultimate, yes that's where the devs have the room to implement the most tank-like gameplay ideas, and I believe they will continue to do so going forward, but sadly those ideas will not see the light of day when it comes to the dungeons, trials, and even normal raids.

looking at it from the beginning with their ARR combat design, square has designed most of the game to get people to focus solely on their rotations and maximising output, and then adding difficulty with enemy positioning, mob patrol routes, or even having small dungeon gimmicks to keep the players on their toes by the lv 50 content. sadly though, as the years have gone by, they have toned down the difficulty, and so if they tried to add anything that would be fundamentally tank-like, not only would they need to overhaul 90% of the game, but the players themselves would have to actually put in effort to beat even the daily faceroll content that they've become used to.

it's my strong belief that the designs of dungeons and trials were acceptable because tanks and healers had more complicated designs in their job kits to make up for that, but now that the jobs have been simplified, the holes in those cracks are starting to show.

so now the question becomes.. does square make the jobs perform better while keeping content brainded, or do they make content much harder and allow jobs to stay brainded? (i say why not both, but that requires the playerbase to git gud as opposed to facerolling everything)