Dark Knight Megathread

[Lyth]

Doing something with Sole Survivor next expansion is interesting, as ItsUrBoi suggested. It could be implemented as a single target lifesteal-over-time effect as per Vallerie's post. It could give you something extra on mob death.

On that subject, given the Expiacion upgrade on PLD, I think that they might merge down Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain into a single new animation that unifies both effects now that they share a cooldown. For example:

Abyssal Strike: Three-fold attack that deals unaspected damage to target and all nearby targets nearby it.
Additional Effect: Grants Sole Survivor and inflicts Scourge
Scourge: Damage over time. If target dies under this effect, restores your HP.
Sole Survivor: Restores HP over time to player.

I can understand why people preferred those actions to be separated, but it was likely done as an emergency measure to try and make the oGCDs more manageable during burst. That's also why Salted was deliberately moved to 90 seconds. I don't think this would be reverted, but the two effects should be more consistent across single target and AoE. It seems strange that you have self-sustain in one situation but not the other.

I'd agree with fulminating and Amira's point that DRK really needs a new GCD. An additional combo action, either branching off of the main combo or off of Bloodspiller could be a way of adding a bit more variety to the GCD gameplay, as Zairava suggested. I think this is an important way of making downtime more interesting outside of burst, which is definitely a problem.

I think all tanks could use a second look at their mobility tools, given some of the fantastic additions to melee this expansion. Taking the damage off Plunge like baklava suggested is one way to do this, but there are other types of movement abilities as well. I'm personally a fan of fixed distance movement abilities, like you see on DNC or RPR.

The idea of merging with your shadow as Zairava suggested is an interesting idea. What I think is more likely is that we may see a finisher (sequence?) based around Living Shadow, as ataren provided some examples. It would be fun to see Omnislash and Lionheart show up as level 100 actions.

[Guts-BSM]

i'm gonna say this every once in a while, we need selfheals. idc how as long as we can heal ourselves. i'm not gonna shut up until they give us some d**n heals.

[Mitracia]

i've decided to put away the greatsword for this expansion for a couple of reasons:

1) The button bloat is insane. Whenever I start a pull I feel like there are 100 things I should be pressing and the sad part is that none of them feel satisfying. Sometimes I can't wrap my mind around what should be prioritized in big dungeon pulls.
2) The self sustain is painfully bad. I miss when I could spam dark arts and abyssal drain. Now, I don't like spamming dark arts, but at least I could mitigate a ton of damage.
3) The theme of dark knight feels lost. I love living shadow, but the rest feels like a mix between a dark caster and actual greatsword skills.
4) I think that mp management should be gone or be less punishing when it comes to TBN. I can't wrap my mind around why it costs mp when the other tanks' similar tankbuster skill doesn't cost anything and it's almost equally as good.

Sorry for the rant. I love the theme and aesthetic of DRK, but after tasting warrior leveling I can't go back anymore :/ .

[Oizen]

i'm gonna say this every once in a while, we need selfheals. idc how as long as we can heal ourselves. i'm not gonna shut up until they give us some d**n heals.

Unironically use the new HP potions they added for the new deep dungeon.

Shits pretty good

[Guts-BSM]

Unironically use the new HP potions they added for the new deep dungeon.

Shits pretty good

pardon my ignorance but hyper potions or something else ?

[Marxam]

i'm gonna say this every once in a while, we need selfheals. idc how as long as we can heal ourselves. i'm not gonna shut up until they give us some d**n heals.

Why would you need heals when you could ask for more shields? If TBN was on a 10 sec recast instead it would be broken by most regards, even with the mp cost. Fact of the matter is that TBN functions under the concept that if you took 0 dmg, why do you need a heal? DRK also heals every combo rotation via souleater so to say that DRK has no access to heals is not true. Of course this is all speaking at savage, which your job is tuned to. Anything below that is not regarded, hence the fact that WAR is still great in dungeons ever since 2.0.

They had 10 years to fix how busted WAR can be in dungeons when it comes to self sustain but you know what, they only doubled down on it with nascent flash which can heal you and a party member. The only reason why they kept it is because in savage content it is comparable to DRK in most situations and neither is op. If they really wanted to fix the self sustain in dungeons for DRK they could have replaced Enhanced Unmend to Enhanced Stalwart Soul and instead of reducing plunge recast by 5 secs, it reduces the recast of AD/C&S. Problem fixed. It would work out even better now because there is rarely, if ever, a situation in savage where you want to use unmend because of uptime strats and the insanely large hitboxes.

I expect them to actually add 2 charges to TBN at some point in the future.

[Zairava]

Why would you need heals when you could ask for more shields?.

Because, even if in far fewer cases than before, you can still die during living dead in single target situations by yourself. It was the same reason why people wanted stacks on blood weapon: You can miss that last GCD. Shields are not helping you remove that debuff in single-target, more healing is.

Healing through LD in mob packs is not an issue because you literally remove that debuff instantly in aoe.

You aren't using Souleater because it has passive sustain, you're using it because it's in your 1-2-3, that one Souleater you use during Living Dead isn't going to save you from dying if you miss that last GCD. That's why even having just one CD via any method that gives us self-healing would be of massive benefit. Because shields are effective hp, not healing. Dark Knight is by far the most defensive tank once it hits 70, which isn't much up for debate. It's just behind on some minor sustain it needs to be completely self-sufficient.

I don't even mind how DRK feels now when it comes to survivability, but I'm not going to pretend it isn't lacking in sustain. It doesn't even need to be anything huge.

I don't see them ever giving them 2 charges of TBN purely because of how powerful it would make it. It is good, but outshined by the other tanks cooldowns they received in endwalker, but would VASTLY outperform them if it had two stacks. Especially with how high our HP is going to end up next expansion, it would be essentially ShB TBN but even more cracked. Also no, having some minor sustain isn't necessarily going to make DRK immortal, TBN prevents incoming damage, but healing does not. If it were such an issue, they could just shift some mit around. (putting oblation on one use instead of 2 stacks, for example).

As a sidenote: When you mention TBN getting two stacks, I feel like that was the original plan for lvl 82, but they decided to make oblation instead, which is mostly paired with tbn anyway.

[Zairava]

Snip

So, there's several issues I have and see with this. I'll mention what I do agree with and provide input or ideas regarding them, though.

Regarding defensives:
->TBN no longer has an MP cost. CD increased to 20 seconds, duration increased to 8 seconds. Dark Arts removed.

• Both parts of this. TBN should stay as it currently is, if they were to remove the mp cost, not only would they make it 25s and not 20s, but making it 8s instead of 7 wouldn't increase it's effectiveness since it would still be breaking in a mere couple seconds in mob pulls.
• Even if Dark Arts is a mere shadow of what it once was, outright removing it from TBN wouldn't be beneficial for the job overall. It is the only remaining cooldown that interacts with the kit that isn't just "you heal upon hitting thing(s)". It also is the sole thing that gives DRK any real skill expression.

->Dark Mind changed to granting 10% damage reduction, with a further 10% reduction against magical. 60 sec CD. At level 82, this upgrades into Oblation, increasing the magic damage reduction to 20%, grants 2 charges, each with a CD of 45 seconds.

My only comment here is that it should remain on 60s cooldown. Having it on 45s with 2 charges would make it far too powerful.

->Abyssal Drain removed. C&S has AoE falloff and gets a bigger animation.

I would like to refer to Lyth's idea for this, just modified a bit:
Abyssal Strike: Three-fold attack that deals unaspected damage to target and all nearby targets nearby it.
Additional Effect: inflicts Scourge
Scourge: Damage over time of [X potency] for 15-30s
It goes without saying that I would like an animation for Abyssal Strike that's incredibly similar to Scourge, being that it literally applies it.

New defensive:
->Sole Survivor: marks target and nearby enemies with "Another Victim" status. When surrounded by 3 or more enemies, also grants "Blood price".
"Another victim" effect: dealing damage to this unit heals the DRK who applied this mark for a potency of 250. Lasts 10 seconds.
"Blood price" effect: getting hit by any attack grants 25 MP and 1 blood. Last 10 seconds.

• It is called Sole Survivor, after all. It should remain purely between the DRK and one target.
• That another victim effect is horrifically overpowered. If every party member's attack on that mob heals the DRK you would be essentially immortal in every scenario that isn't a wipe mechanic, irregardless of the potency.
• 25mp and 1 gauge wouldn't really be all that useful outside of trash pulls. As much as I would like having Blood Price back in the form of it's own defensive, it never will because that would be tying a defensive to offensive output in the form of a damage gain, which is a damage loss whenever you aren't MT.

Regarding existing offensive attacks:
->Syphoon strike restores 1000MP and Souleater gains 15 blood.
->Darkside's damage bonus increased to 15%.
->Using Bloodspiller combos into 2 new attacks. Each attack costs 25 blood, including Bloodspiller.

• Quietus removed, Bloodspiller has a new animation or the same animation but much stronger to justify having AoE falloff damage.

• Unless we are buffing the gauge generation significantly it would be better just to make Bloodspiller cost 50 and give us access to said combo actions after bloodspiller for free.
• I'm fairly certain Bloodspiller being turned into aoe would warrant a new animation on it's own, which I am for.

->Delirium works as fallows:
When landing a GCD consumes 5 seconds of Darkside. If Darkside is not active the effect is canceled and put on 10 sec CD.
If the effect is active gain 15% SkS and accelerates the rate at which the Bloodgauge fills, increasing it by 2 every quarter second.
Toggle this on or off freely.

• I am..at a toss on this. This could potentially work but without much higher mp generation than we do now we could potentially run out of it due to TBN needing 3k reserved. (This would be a tad more lenient if TBN got the mana cost removed, though)
• I think the gauge generation would be best if it was 5 bonus gauge generation per GCD used. You lose 5 Darkside, you gain 5 more blood gauge. not counting that incredibly high tick rate, 2 every quarter second could throw some people off and potentially cause misalignment and clipping due to the faster GCD rolling from the skill speed boost. On the topic of the SkS boost, make it a haste since your aoe GCD's are spells.

.

->Living Shadow before level 100, works the same it does now. At level 100 works as fallows: ( blood cost removed )
Merge with Fray, becoming one with your inner darkness, increasing the potency of all attacks by 150 potency for 20 seconds. 120 sec CD.
Gain a much visually stronger effect of Darkside, similar to RPR's Enshourd.

I've stated my agreement with this in the past. However, I still think it should be on a 3-5 stack system. 20s may be too long and therefore too powerful, and there is, as ever, the issue of missing a gcd.

->Blood Weapon removed.

No. Why? Syphon strike being upped to 1k mp restore wouldn't be enough to warrant this, and we still would need this for gauge generation regardless.

[ItsUrBoi]

• It is called Sole Survivor, after all. It should remain purely between the DRK and one target.
• That another victim effect is horrifically overpowered. If every party member's attack on that mob heals the DRK you would be essentially immortal in every scenario that isn't a wipe mechanic, irregardless of the potency.
• 25mp and 1 gauge wouldn't really be all that useful outside of trash pulls. As much as I would like having Blood Price back in the form of it's own defensive, it never will because that would be tying a defensive to offensive output in the form of a damage gain, which is a damage loss whenever you aren't MT.

I mentioned when the DRK attacks the marked target it heals the DRK who applied the mark.

[Zairava]

I mentioned when the DRK attacks the marked target it heals the DRK who applied the mark.

Ah, I misinterpreted it then. I was reading it as all attacks from anyone in the party, not just the user, my bad