The Ultimate DRK Rework

[Dtrip19]

Yes, another one of these posts from a disgruntled DRK main from back in Stormblood. As always, please read the whole thing before responding, it is important to understand the whole rework before you comment on it. And before you say it, I know this will never happen, so don't bother reminding me, this is just what I want. Now on to the goals of the rework:

This rework is designed to achieve a very specific goal. That goal is to give a DRK player control over how exactly they contribute to a party, to allow them to make decisions on how to spend their resources to work either towards dealing damage or just simply surviving. On top of that, this rework is intended to restore the most important class identity that DRK had throughout it's history: it's resource management and the complex interactions between how DRK's can both gain and spend their resources. This design seeks to leverage all the beneficial changes that came to tanking with Shadowbringers (no stupid stance swapping and no enmity) while avoiding the homogenization and oversimplification that came along with it. This rework is intended to go along with a large scale overhaul to both Tanks and Healers, which I wrote about in detail on this google doc, but for the purpose of this rework, you can skip that if you're not interested https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...GwRIItIAbM/pub

Dark Arts (Added) – MP cost: 2400

Dark Arts was an essential part of DRK’s kit back in HW and SB and was the basis for complex interactions of the resources a DRK had available to them. For those who don’t know, Dark Arts allowed you to spend MP to empower the next compatible ability you used. The effects you could get from Dark Arts were extra damage, healing, a blind, and extra enmity depending on what skill you enhanced. I will go over what effects it should have when I get to the abilities that Dark Arts can be used with.

Edge of Shadow (Removed) – Now that Dark Arts is back, this skill is redundant and would overload a DRK’s hotbar. Dark Arts can be used for a variety of effects including damage, so to have this skill on the hotbar would invalidate the utility effects of Dark Arts as it would always be better to convert MP directly into potency unless this skill was nerfed into irrelevance.

Flood of Shadow (Changed) – No longer grants the Darkside Effect, MP cost reduced to 2400, Cooldown: 45 seconds.

Soul Eater (Changed) – Combo actions: Syphon Strike, Dark Arts Effects: potency increased by 200, restores HP equal to the damage dealt. Now only restores 10 Blood.

Power Slash (Added) – Combo action: Syphon Strike, Potency: 400, Dark Arts Effect: potency increased by 350, grants the Darkside effect (still increases damage by 10%).

This skill accomplishes two goals. The first is to give DRK a way to activate Darkside, as you would be without one now that edge/flood of shadow have been removed. The second is to make Power Slash the preferred weapon skill over Soul Eater if you are spending MP with the only goal to maximize dps. Since Soul Eater also grants healing when enhanced by Dark Arts, if healing is not needed, enhancing Power Slash is the better option for getting the most out of your MP.

The Blackest Night (Changed) – Now costs 2400 MP, no longer grants the Dark Arts effect, restores 50 Blood when the barrier is completely absorbed.

Syphon Strike (Changed) – Now restores 800 MP instead.

You will notice that all instances of MP restoration in the rest of this rework will happen in increments of 400 or 800, which is 1/6th or 1/3rd the amount needed for one Dark Arts or The Blackest Night. As any DRK main experienced in Stormblood, Dark Arts needed to be used way too often which made the class feel extremely spammy rather than satisfying because your MP generation was too high when your abilities restored MP in increments of 480 and 1200

Stalwart Soul (Changed) – Now restores 400 MP and 3 Blood for each enemy hit. Dark Arts Effect: Potency increased by 100

Blood Weapon (Changed) – Now restores 400 MP and 3 Blood for each enemy you deal physical damage to (includes auto-attacks). Duration: 15 seconds, Cooldown: 45 seconds

Salted Earth (Changed) – Now restores 2 blood for each enemy it deals damage to.

Abyssal Drain (Changed) – No longer inherently restores HP when hitting enemies. Dark Arts Effect: Potency is increased to 600 if it hits one target, or 300 if it hits two, Restores HP equal to damage dealt. Action type changed to spell, now on the global cooldown.

This will give DRK more flexibility with how quickly they can restore their own HP. Abyssal Drain will deal the same damage and heal the same amount as a Soul Eater even when used against 1 or 2 targets. It also is not spammable because it wouldn’t restore 10 Blood like Soul Eater, making it a strictly worse skill. However, it would still be very useful in a pinch when lots of healing is needed quickly.

Carve and Spit (Changed) – Delivers a threefold attack, each hit with a potency of 200, Cooldown: 45 seconds.

This button is simple, it will give a DRK three more hits during Blood Weapon each time you combine them just to round out the MP and Blood economy.
Quietus (Changed) – Now restores 400 MP for each enemy hit.
Bloodspiller (Changed) – Potency increased to 700

Delirium (Changed) – Deals damage with a potency of 300 and restores 2400 MP, action type changed to weaponskill, now on the global cooldown, Blood cost: 50.

This is another important change that achieve multiple goals. It helps to reestablish DRK as a heavy resource management class, allowing DRK’s to convert Blood into MP in a useful way even against single targets (previously this could only be done while facing multiple enemies by using quietus). It also differentiates DRK from WAR which fortifies the identity of both classes. The potency and MP numbers on this skill is actually very important. It deals 300 potency in damage, which is the same as the average potency of one of DRK’s weaponskills, meaning you barely lose damage from the usage of the global cooldown (It is slightly worse because you delay your resource regeneration from your combo actions). It also restores 2400 MP which can be converted into 300 potency if Dark Arts is used on Power Slash, meaning that you won’t be gaining any damage by using this skill over a Bloodspiller.