Should Dark Arts Come Back in 6.0? If so, What Should the Skill Do?

[Anahlise_Auhn_Giinslai]

I'd personally be completely satisfied if tanks were given more complex and interesting rotations. We're going to bitch and whine no matter what they do anyways because of how consistently the dev team comes just short of getting it right when it comes to job design.

I can agree with the former, and the latter seems sadly true.

I disagree with this artificial dichotomy between 'dps' and 'tanking'. Doing damage is part of tanking. Positioning and moving bosses is part of tanking. Mitigation is part of tanking. Right now, all of these areas are lacking. You don't have to make tanks 'less about dps' to fix the rest of them. Just fix them all.

...The Former.. is a nuance matter of perspective, as you and me more than likely define and regard Damager And Tank in different manners, while I agree with the latter.. all aspects of the part that FFXIV Tanks play in battles and fight design, needs to be changed a bit, and made more relevant/demanding on the tank. while Healer players may or may not even complain less about their damage-dealing issue, if they were forced to need to heal a lot more and more actively.

[Shurrikhan]

I disagree with this artificial dichotomy between 'dps' and 'tanking'. Doing damage is part of tanking. Positioning and moving bosses is part of tanking. Mitigation is part of tanking. Right now, all of these areas are lacking. You don't have to make tanks 'less about dps' to fix the rest of them. Just fix them all.

The only reason that artificial dichotomy pops up is you have a group among veteran tanks who are seemingly fine with having virtually no agency outside of damage-dealing so long as they deal enough damage and others who would rather not accept damage-buff band-aids in place of greater breadth of play. One side yells that the other should get with the times and just accept it and ask around what little we're still offered, while the other would leave tanking out of boredom if things were streamlined any further and would rather not be forced to drop their tank jobs for having nothing left on them to do but be "blue DPS".

That said, I agree completely. Just fix it all, maximizing engaging play any and every way possible. How that engagement might be categorized is irrelevant so long as it is sufficiently deep, broad, distinct, etc.

[Lyth]

What we have isn't streamlining. The mistake that the dev team is making is in thinking that new players on the whole will be more likely to try out tanking or healing if there is less responsibility and less anxiety associated with the roles. They're also confusing responsibility with impact. Some players come in with a set mindset and expectations on what role they want to play (i.e. 'I'm a tank'), and if you don't deliver, they'll move on. Others are specifically looking to be a carry player, and will specifically seek out high skillcap roles with the intent to practice until they get good at it. Anxious players by default are going to deliberately avoid roles where their mistakes are obvious (i.e. tanks and healers), and you won't change that. You can't change players and their mindsets. What you can do is offer a gameplay experience that is enjoyable to the types of players who go looking to play a tank or a healer. You have to understand your target audience.

Even if, as you say, there are two camps of players, neither of them are going to be satisfied with the current state of tanking. If you're playing tank primarily to maximize your damage numbers, you'll have far more impact on an actual DPS job. If you're playing a tank primarily to support your team either by clever positioning or good use of mitigation actions, most of what you do is irrelevant outside of a few pre-scripted pass/fail checks. It's no surprise that if you're looking for a mix of both, that gameplay experience doesn't exist either. People may be happy to play a job with no responsibility, but nobody wants to play a job without impact.

[Chrono_Rising]

To echo Lyth strongly, Savage Blue Mage tanking has been one of the most fun experiences tanking in this game for me.

Debuffing bosses to make my team do more damage, healing more via white wind for my healers to save them GCDs, planning out mitigation like Chelonian gate to get a big attack off once in awhile, being able to upkeep HP increases, debuffing boss damage, and direct damage mitigation for myself. It feels way more engaging than you know the 4 current tanks.

And hey, you know turn these things into some dark magic flare along with an actual physical damaging based moves and your would have something closer to a dark knight (via enfeeblement and vulnerabilities) than you know, the dark knight job itself.

Its not streamlined, there are 100% cracks in it, but the existence of a different way of tanking is the source of my enjoyment. Not having a homogenized 1 size fits all form of tanking.

[currentlemon]

Hey, it's good to see that my post came back up. My opinion on Dark Arts hasn't changed. The skill needs to come back in 6.0. What has changed though is my opinions on what the skill should do. I don't think it should use the blood gauge. Either it becomes an MP spender that competes with Edge/Flood of Darkness or saps the DRK's health slightly.

[Anahlise_Auhn_Giinslai]

Either it becomes an MP spender that competes with Edge/Flood of Darkness or saps the DRK's health slightly.

Most of my old Dark Arts remaster ideas have hit either the "but that would be a damage loss" wall, or the "but that would be a liability" wall, so I am not certain at this point, how to design Dark Arts... Other than a boring or dull design that would kill the point of my attempts to re-design/re-master the ability... while on the other scale, my ideas also hits the "lazy and simple preferred" wall.
A (common?) issue brought up against if old Dark Arts were to return, is that some people express(ed) that it should not be a liability... (A lot of/some?) Dark Knight players would prefer that Dark Knight is "just as easy" and requires just as little effort, as the other tanks, while Dark Knight actions have to be equal to the other tanks, without Dark Arts...

so.. like, Dark Arts is not allowed to have offensive or defensive effects, under those limitations, because other tanks do not need to use a additional ability, for their defensive strength and damage potential to be as good as other tanks, and Dark Arts is also not allowed to cost MP or other resource(s), like BlackBlood gauge, under those limitations; as (a lot of/some?) Dark Knights do not want Dark Arts to be a liability or a "damage loss", or a necessity that the Dark Knight is reliant on(SB DA spam = ew.)...
to re-design Dark Arts under these guidelines has proven difficult, as a Dark Arts like this would be.. not much of interest, and little akin to the iconic and fun old HW Dark Arts... hie, I am not certain how to re-design Dark Arts...

My #1 most lazy idea at the moment, that may fit the bill, would be if Dark Arts is a oGCD ability with a CD, no resource cost, and its effect only slightly alters the effect of a action, changes what a action does, but this change has to fit every afore-mentioned guideline, or adds self-healing effects to actions; while Dark Arts itself could be either a short duration "all GCDs/oGCDs used in its duration" passive buff, or the action is a "stacks"-style passive buff that has you spend its limited stacks/uses at leisure.

[shao32]

I just have to agree, Tanks with low damage/oversimplified dps gameplay are just playable dummys and considering the lack of tanking gameplay mechanics we would be a pretty boring dummys. Tanks need to do damage and become a treat to our targets and that require better damage rotations and we need more diverse and fun mitigations tools, but for this ones is extremly necesary have encounters that make us want to use them the best we can and we lack on that field too saddly.

In resume we need the devs consider giving tanks more in general and make content work better with out kits, same for healers since tank and healers are in one same pack in terms or dealing with damage, a more engaging gameplay for our roles and the dumped jobs in this expansion is necesary if not mandatory.

[Colt47]

I personally enjoy the fact we have no positional attacks and can freelance how we want, as well as have the ability to focus on the fight instead of being target dummies for the enemy because DPS get one shotted by literally every attack in savage... unless they got mitigation up from a healer.

If there is one mistake in the design, it is the gap closer. Not every tool needs to add damage, and when it does it suddenly becomes something that has to be weaved into the regular rotation. Gap closers should never have been a damaging attack. Probably not the most popular opinion, but that is the big reason I shifted to warrior main.

In the end, if there are three skills and all skills are melee skills with 200 potency, they are effectively the same skill except for animation. Even skills that differ in power but just do damage as an OGCD are really the same ability with different potencies. It's a waste of button space.

Paladin is another job that needs work as well since it has 5 skills that are unusable due to shield gauge costs, 3 skills that shouldn't ever be used without requiscat, and two skills that should just be transformable skills in the rotation. Royal Authority -> Atonement and Requiscat -> Confiteor.

Dark Knight it's mostly just the gap closer being an attack. I'd shift the use charges over to Carve and split or something.

[Anahlise_Auhn_Giinslai]

...Dark Knight has a lot more problems than "just the gap closer", and every one of its other problems are a much bigger issue than Plunge.
Some Dark Knight players are fine with the current 5.x version of Dark Knight, but that is because those Dark Knight players are fine with the problems,
or do not/refuse to acknowledge that there are problems with Dark Knight, not because Dark Knight has no problems...

[Colt47]

...Dark Knight has a lot more problems than "just the gap closer", and every one of its other problems are a much bigger issue than Plunge.
Some Dark Knight players are fine with the current 5.x version of Dark Knight, but that is because those Dark Knight players are fine with the problems,
or do not/refuse to acknowledge that there are problems with Dark Knight, not because Dark Knight has no problems...

Yeah not going to argue with you there. I main warrior and it feels like a more button heavy warrior with a worse invuln. Not to mention it has the same kind of scatter brained rotation that Paladin has, but at least paladin has clemency and cheesing old content as a bonus for the frustration. The only two tanks that seem fairly streamlined right now are warrior and gunbreaker.