Dark Knight Megathread

[Kalaam]

He's right at pointing problems, but terrible at coming up with solutions.

[ArthurATDayne]

He's no different from anyone else complaining about DRK or class problems and not smarter either, a lot of his "solutions" are dogshit. A lot of what he complains about were already brought up in this thread and way back already too so the complaints aren't unique or special.

Like Shurrikhan mentioned above, he complains about "little depth" in DRK but pushes for further homogenization, i.e. TBN 25s CD no Mana cost, and further simplifying. He sounds like someone who doesn't know the class in detail and just plays it to fill out a To-Do Checklist/achievements for Social Media.

[RyuDragnier]

Sustain problem can be fixed if Blood Gauge attacks restored HP when used, making Delirium both a burst and a self-sustain. This also gives DRK the flavor of having to constantly attack in order to stay up and running (and gives it a way to take the burden off the healers for Living Dead).

Oblation needs to be put into Dark Mind so it's available at a pre-TBN level and so the mitigation isn't worthless when there's no magic damage in a fight (seriously, why is it okay for DRK to be the only tank with a self-mitigation ability that cannot be used unless a certain damage is present!?).

Change the 82 trait to one where TBN also gives a heal when it ends. A smaller heal if not broken, a burst heal if it's broken.

Changed Enhanced Unmend to a trait that gives 2 charges to Abyssal Drain and Carve and Spit.

Make it so Walking Dead prevents you from taking damage after being taken under 1HP, give it a lower threshold to heal through (50%), and keep the invuln active even after the threshold has been hit until the WD duration ends.

Things I just thought up on the spot that are better than what we have now that would make DRK feel much better.

[Marxam]

Do you guys think that we will get a buff on tuesday?

Any change, if at all, will happen at the 6.05 patch when they also release Savage. Personally I was hoping they would at least change TBN's duration to 8 secs to match the other tanks cd duration, when the media tour was going on but they didn't even do that so idk.

[jetfire117]

He sounds like someone who doesn't know the class in detail and just plays it to fill out a To-Do Checklist/achievements for Social Media.

You can like him or hate him, but you know this statement is wrong. He's a tank main that has played since 2.0.

[MiniPrinny]

So, I've been batting these ideas around for a while and figured I'd finally share them. I've been playing DRK since Heavensward and I've seen the job take a lot of forms and figured I'd consolidate the best parts of the job into something more concise and idealized with an actual vision. That being DRK is a master of self-shielding and quick attacks. I'll be going over the new mechanic first.

Dark Arts: This is a third gauge for DRK that ticks down over time. While active Dark Arts reduces the delay between auto-attacks as well as weaponskills and spells by 15%. It can be gained and maintained through Blood Weapon, Living Shadow, and the Blackest Night.

Of course, those three abilities have to be changed as well, so here they are along with a much needed upgrade.

• Blood Weapon: Grants or extends Dark Arts for 20s up to 60s. While under the effect of Dark Arts weaponskill and spell recast time and auto-attack delay is reduced by 15%.
  Additional Effect: Grants five stacks of Blood Weapon.
  Blood Weapon Effect: Increases Blood Gauge by 10 and restores MP upon landing a weaponskill or spell.
  Recast: 60s
• Living Shadow: Conjure a simulacrum of your darkside to fight alongside you. While under the effect of Living Shadow all offensive actions performed by you will be copied by the simulacrum at half potency. Any healing or MP the simulacrum would receive from these actions is instead transferred to you at half potency. As you use actions the vitality of your simulacrum will reduce based on the action used. Weapon skills and spells will reduce its vitality by 10% and abilities will reduce it by 5%, the simulacrum fades when its vitality reaches 0%.
  Duration: 35s
  Additional Effect: Grants or extends Dark Arts
  Dark Arts Duration: 30s
  Blood Gauge Cost: 50
  Recast: 120s
• The Blackest Night/Oblation: Creates a barrier around target that absorbs damage totaling 25/30% of target's maximum HP.
  Duration: 8s
  Grants or extends Dark Arts when barrier is completely absorbed.
  Dark Arts Duration: 15s
  (Oblation) Additional Effect: Grants Night’s Shelter
  (Oblation) Night’s Shelter Effect: Reduces damage taken by 10%.
  (Oblation) Night’s Shelter Duration: 8s
  Restores 750 MP when barrier is completely absorbed or expires.
  MP Cost: 1500
  Recast: 15s

Next up is DRK's passive healing and general gameplay. As a tank, DRK has long struggled where the other three tanks excelled in terms of passive healing and their lack of direction the past two expansions has been curious at best. I hope to mitigate this with quite a few changes. Those being the following:

• Syphon Strike: New Combo Bonus: Restores own HP
  Cure Potency: 110
  Combo Bonus: Creates a barrier which nullifies damage equalling HP restored
  Duration: 30s
• Souleater: Cure potency reduced to 150. New Combo Bonus: Creates a barrier which nullifies damage equalling HP restored
  Duration: 30s
• Flood of Darkness/Shadow: Deals unaspected damage with a potency of 300/460 to the first target and 55/65% less for all remaining targets.
  Additional Effect: Grants Darkside, increasing damage dealt by 10%.
  Duration: 30s.
  Extends Darkside duration by 30s to a maximum of 60s.
  Recast: 1s
• Edge of Darkness/Shadow: Removed.
• Stalwart Soul: Now obtained at level 40. Combo potency reduced to 130 until level 72. Doesn't increase Blood Gauge until 72. New Combo Bonus: Restores own HP.
  Cure Potency: 20 (upgrades to 30 at level 72)
  Combo Bonus: Creates a barrier which nullifies damage equalling HP restored
  Duration: 30s
• Carve and Spit: Now restores own HP.
  Cure Potency: 750.
• Scourge of the Wretched (Trait): Replaces Unmend Mastery. Upgrades Souleater to Scourge. Casting Stalwart Soul reduces the recast timer of Abyssal Drain and Carve and Spit by 5s.
• Scourge: Delivers an attack with a potency of 120.
  Combo Action: Syphon Strike
  Combo Potency: 340
  Combo Bonus: Damage over time
  Potency: 35
  Duration: 15s
  Combo Bonus: Restores own HP
  Cure Potency 175
  Combo Bonus: Creates a barrier which nullifies damage equalling HP restored
  Duration: 30s
  Combo Bonus: Increases Blood Gauge by 20
• Salt and Darkness (Trait): Now a trait. Enemies standing in the corrupted patch of Salted Earth who take damage from weaponskills or spells performed by you explode in unaspected aether, dealing damage to themselves and enemies near them with a potency of 75.
• Dark Will (Trait): Replaces both versions of Enhanced Living Shadow, gained at level 90. Grants a stack of Dark Will upon executing either Bloodspiller or Quietus. Up to three stacks of Dark Will can be had at one time. Grants a healing effect to Bloodspiller and Quietus. Bloodspiller cure potency: 150. Quietus cure potency: 25 per target.
• Shadowbringer: Deals unaspected damage to all enemies in a straight line before you with a potency of 600 for the first enemy, and 50% less for all remaining enemies. Replaces Flood of Shadow while under the effect of Dark Will.
  Additional Effect: Grants Darkside, increasing damage dealt by 10%
  Duration: 30s
  Extends Darkside duration by 30s to a maximum of 60s.
  Dark Will cost: 1.
  Recast: 1s

I realize that is a lot to take in, but we're not quite done yet. There still remains my ideas for DRK's defensive holes, those being Dark Mind, now renamed to Dark Dance and Living Dead.

• Dark Dance: Reduces magic vulnerability by 20%, reduces physical vulnerability by 5%, and increases parry chance by 50%.
  Duration: 10s
• Living Dead: Grants the effect of Living Dead. When HP is reduced to 0 while under the effect of Living Dead, instead of becoming KO'd, your status will change to Walking Dead and you will gain Necrotic Thirst.
  Living Dead Duration: 10s
  While under the effect of Walking Dead, most attacks will not lower your HP below 1. If, before the Walking Dead timer runs out, HP is 100% restored, the effect will fade. If 100% is not restored, you will be KO'd.
  Walking Dead Duration: 10s
  While under the effect of Necrotic Thirst all incoming healing is increased by 50% and all weaponskills and spells used by you restores your own HP with a potency of 250. Effect fades if Walking Dead is removed.
  Necrotic Thirst Duration: 10s

Dark Dance needed to happen for a long time, especially if one were to remove Oblation. While Dark Dance isn't as strong as Camouflage or Thrill of Battle, it none-the-less provides DRK with a much needed third cooldown in dungeons, especially at lower levels. Meanwhile, Necrotic Thirst is both thematic to Living Dead and is an idea so old it's a devil-wrought miracle it hasn't been implemented yet.

As a final thought, these numbers are all rough, but the goal remains the same: make DRK into DRK again. A blazing fast gameplay style for a tank combined with specialized tools for tackling opponents.

[Shin96]

Having played a bit of DRK in 6.0, I've assembled a bit of a diagnosis for this job.

Here's what I like so far:

● Higher APM; the recast time is lower.
● The reduction in Bloodspiller stacks
● Using Salted Earth more effectively
● The job has slightly increased in fun

What's bad:

● No self-sustain options and minimal HP generation methods
● Carve and Spit and Abyssal Drain sharing a recast timer
● Shadowbringer and Salted Earth are not enough to make up for the lack of skills
● Delirium still is resemblant of Inner Release except it's now 3 stacks

Overall, a very tiny improvement on the catastrophe that was 5.0, but nonetheless a needed one.

What's missing:

● Oblation should have HP regen at the very least
● 2 more weaponskills to break the monotony
● Unleash and Stalwart Soul shouldn't be spells
● A DoT similiar to Reaper could prove entertaining
● The gameplay loop is solid but there's room for change

Additionally, I highly recommend to remove Living Shadow because it adds virtually nothing to gameplay and is quite effectively an annoyance. Let the player partake in damage instead of having a glorified DoT do it.

[Danelo]

He's no different from anyone else complaining about DRK or class problems and not smarter either, a lot of his "solutions" are dogshit. A lot of what he complains about were already brought up in this thread and way back already too so the complaints aren't unique or special.

Like Shurrikhan mentioned above, he complains about "little depth" in DRK but pushes for further homogenization, i.e. TBN 25s CD no Mana cost, and further simplifying. He sounds like someone who doesn't know the class in detail and just plays it to fill out a To-Do Checklist/achievements for Social Media.

He has a platform to call attention to what most players think is a problem. I don’t see a problem with calling it out and honestly I welcome it.

The depth is gone. That’s a design decision from the top and across the board to make balancing easier on devs and to attract casual players. DRK could be fun though.

It seems like most suggestions he has are about as thought out as a lot of things said here. Just ideas, not perfect but a different direction. They all need maths to be work out.

I’ve switch to PLD since it and WAR seem to be the most loved and rarely get screwed for long.

If you love DRK... I don’t believe you unless you are playing something else as your main

[ArthurATDayne]

You can like him or hate him, but you know this statement is wrong. He's a tank main that has played since 2.0.

Seriously? He played that long and still sounds like he doesn't know shit. Goes to show, it doesn't matter how long someone plays.

Besides, DRK changed quite a bit from HW, SB to SHB so it doesn't matter what happened before in the past, what matters is what you know and can take advantage of right now.

[jetfire117]

Seriously? He played that long and still sounds like he doesn't know shit. Goes to show, it doesn't matter how long someone plays

Well that's an ironic statement. He literally has to know his stuff because he "optimizes" for his raids or whatever. That's why he cries and moans still because that's where he sees they keep making the same questionable job choices ever since heavensward.