What would a new tank even contribute at this point

[ForteNightshade]

First and foremost, OP, you really need to let go of this vendetta you have towards Warrior. It's not nearly the supposed god you keep insisting it is. Especially when you consider it was thoroughly outclassed for almost two full expansions.

Warrior has the best partywide mitigation in the game.

Shake it Off is not the best partywide mitigation. In fact, the whole reason they added the regen effect is due to mechanics like Styx rendering it completely inferior to straight mitigation. On the whole it's situational which is better but Paladin wins in this category by virtue of having two options. Don't get me wrong, Shake is very strong but it's not necessarily better than Missionary or Light.

Warrior has the best invuln in the game.

Holmgang is incredible. There really is no denying that. I'd argue new Living Dead is very nearly on par with it though because the Dark Knight doesn't have to invest additional resources to heal themselves. They just... do damage. The difference of 60 seconds is borderline irrelevant since nearly all planned usages will align with both, though there are some exceptions (Dragonsong comes to mind). Nonetheless, the devs have notoriously overvalued Hallowed Ground. They seem to think being invulnerable is somehow better than being unkillable. Such situations where that is true are so niche they aren't worth mentioning.

Warrior has the best sustain in the game.

No argument here. Warrior's sustain is absurd. Although, said sustain gets grossly overrated by far too many people who see it essentially becoming its own healer in dungeons and think it can perform those feats in Savage. Contrary to popular belief, Bloodwhetting is straight up worse than Corundum in a single target scenario, and while Dark Knight can't match either one for one, being able to consistently stack TBN + Oblation + Dark Mind absolutely schools both for raw mitigation potential. Speaking of which, Dark Knight has better overall mitigation than Warrior for this very reason while Gunbreaker kind of floats between both. Paladin still gets the raw end of the stick here if only because its sustain option is a damage loss.

Warrior ranks 1# or 2# for damage in almost all fights.

The irony is Dark Knight is still the meta pick because it bursts so incredibly well. Go look up any parse or speed group and you'll find they overwhelmingly still favor Dark Knight—to the point of occasionally bringing two. This has been the fundamental problem with balancing tanks the last two expansions. Dark Knight plays so ridiculously well under raid buffs that when it also boasted the highest damage profile alongside the best mitigation suite, well... there wasn't a reason to play anything else. For all your insistence of Warrior being the god king super tank, Dark Knight towered over so aggressively in both Dragonsong and Omega as to double up it up in clear rates when both were current. In fact, Dark Knight's raw burst potential was so oppressive it saw more clears of TOP than every other tank combined throughout 6.3.

It wasn't just good, it was downright incredible. At one point in time, if you aren't running Ninja, you'd Dance Partner a Dark Knight in the opener than switch to Samurai.

This is the first and only tier Warrior has even entered the conversation since Shaowerbringers. So while I agree general tank gameplay is relatively stale. Let's dial back the notion "everything is a Warrior clone cause Warrior's best!!"

[GoatOfWar]

First and foremost, OP, you really need to let go of this vendetta you have towards Warrior. It's not nearly the supposed god you keep insisting it is. Especially when you consider it was thoroughly outclassed for almost two full expansions.

And how realistic is it exactly for the average, or even above average player to even get any value out of Dark knight that you wouldn't already get out of Warrior but better?
Let's look at this static i've been playing with casually shall we? We have a machinist, uh oh! I'm missing out on crucial party buffs and so now i'm already better off playing Warrior even if i play perfectly.
Maybe there's casual content where i can get value out of Dark kni- nope. Warrior beats it at every piece of casual content. Old ultimates? Dark knight does less damage and doesn't even get a partywide.
I'm beyond annoyed with Warrior's current state in the game. It leaves so little space for my favourite job to be good anywhere else besides the microscopically small community of people doing speedkills.. And even there, under the perfect conditions, you hardly even get anything out of it. Meanwhile i have to feel bad for taking my job into any piece of content because it's just strictly worse than warrior. I don't play under the perfect buff window, in a group of perfect players. Why is this the standard we're setting for Dark knight players? Why the fuck should i have to feel bad for taking my favourite class into any piece of content?

Dark knight is the most selfish tank in the game and it doesn't even do more damage than the medic tank that already did everything else better. 6.3 struck a good balance, but the game feels terrible to play rn.
I don't really see much of a point in staying around long term if they won't fix the state of the tanks come Dawntrail. I don't want to play Warrior.

[ForteNightshade]

And how realistic is it exactly for the average, or even above average player to even get any value out of Dark knight that you wouldn't already get out of Warrior but better?

Ignoring the fact Dark Knight has the strongest mitigation suite, if you're in a casual group then it literally doesn't matter what you play. You already have the whole told equalizer of gear. So play whatever you enjoy. Frankly, I find more than a little silly you're insisting Dark Knight is terrible to play because it can't match Warrior in dungeons? Who cares? Seriously. They're dungeons. Not only are they so pitifully undertuned nowadays tanks can solo them (yes, even DRK) but Dark Knight is far from the only "unbalanced" job in a dungeon setting. How does nerfing Bloodwhetting suddenly make Dark Knight more fun? I'm not even against that either but if you put your enjoyment solely on how good a job is relative to its counterparts. That's on you then hun.

And just to comment on the buffs response. Unless you're group is running a purely selfish comp, Dark Knight still benefits more from raidbuffs than any other tank. Likewise, it's the strongest tank in TEA. Yes, it doesn't hold up well in the 70 Ultimates but that's SE being silly with ability distribution.

Dark knight is the most selfish tank in the game and it doesn't even do more damage than the medic tank that already did everything else better. 6.3 struck a good balance, but the game feels terrible to play rn.
I don't really see much of a point in staying around long term if they won't fix the state of the tanks come Dawntrail. I don't want to play Warrior.

The fact you say this when 6.2 into 6.3 was the most aggressively overtuned Dark Knight has ever been speaks to how you only care about it being the best and little else. As I said, the job wasn't good, it was oppressive. You're seriously going to argue Dark Knight having more clears of Omega than every other tank combined "struck a good balance"? Come on. If you don't want to play Warrior, don't. Play the job you want. It quite literally doesn't matter outside of very early prog. Even in said prog, it doesn't necessarily matter. My group week 1'd with a Red Mage.

Unfortunately, with how Dark Knight is designed, it simply can't be the strongest tank without dwarfing the other three. It plays too well in the two minute meta and essentially gets free resources whenever there's downtime. They would need to overhaul a lot of Dark Knight's current design to address that, which may not being to your liking. Alternatively, maybe they give enough to the other tanks to balance out their burst phase. We won't know until Dawntrail but simply cracking up Dark Knight's number isn't the answer unless you just want to be the strongest tank.

[GoatOfWar]

play whatever you enjoy..

Idk why you're singling in on one of the many content pieces i named where War is just better. And yeah, i play in a casual group. Which is exactly why i objectively should not be playing Dark knight, because i don't have the necessary party buffs to get anything out of the job that Warrior doesn't already do better. Don't come at me with this ''play what you want'' bullshit. Also, can this whole notion of Dark knight being better at soaking TB's fucking die already? Even with 5 mits up, after a TB it is me that needs healing, Not the Warrior. It's better everywhere. 6.3 struck a great balance, but it became more and more obvious (Even as per the dev's admission) that fights were overtuned. The dps gap was exacerbated by a timed buff the player got from the fight itself. There was nothing inherently wrong with a tank doing 3% more dps than another that already had it beat on every other front.

[Oizen]

strongest mitigation suite

*Magic Mitigation
I'd say PLD has the strongest mitigations overall. Especially with the reworks.

Frankly, I find more than a little silly you're insisting Dark Knight is terrible to play because it can't match Warrior in dungeons? Who cares? Seriously. They're dungeons. Not only are they so pitifully undertuned nowadays tanks can solo them (yes, even DRK) but Dark Knight is far from the only "unbalanced" job in a dungeon setting

Kinda agree, though I do think it should be noted that trying to wall 2 wall pull with duty support AI is significantly spicier on GNB or DRK compared to WAR or PLD. If you look at the data we have WAR packs about 1.5x as much self sustain as DRK or GNB (who are basically tied for lowest), and while the content is easy enough that a skilled DRK can navigate it,I don't think DRK could solo an EW dungeon easily. Its mits are strong yes but they're not 100% uptime, any damage you take would stick so you'd probably be forced to wait for cooldowns at some point (mainly living dead). Its definitely do able but not in the way say PLD or WAR would do it. But I don't think that matters much, I'd argue its hurting healers far more. WAR's design makes dungeon healers pointless.

Its optimal to run 3 dps and a PLD or WAR into a dungeon, healers are only there because duty finder forces it. I view that as an issue, yeah the content is easy enough where it doesn't matter but who wants to feel like a burden like that?

I honestly think the sustain creep the game is facing right now could spiral out of control very easily, and I'm worried that the next expac will be giving DRK and GNB their own Bloodwhetting, as thats usually how they handles tanks in this game. One expac a tank gets a cool thing, next expac all the tanks get it. Happened with Raidwide mits, Gap Closers, TBN equivalents, Given how much casuals complained about sustain for tanks this expac I really can't see a world where we don't see something like this.

Unfortunately, with how Dark Knight is designed, it simply can't be the strongest tank without dwarfing the other three. It plays too well in the two minute meta and essentially gets free resources whenever there's downtime.

Now this one I agree with, DRK is a balancing nightmare in EW simply due to the fact its the only tank with a real 2m burst, Yeah GNB has bloodfest, but thats no Living Shadow with 2 charges of Shadowbringer.
Honestly even if its not doing the most damage overall, a lot of fights heavily reward what DRK does over the others due to phase changes/downtime ect. Doing big damage in small amounts of time is always going to be superior to doing bigger damage across a long period of time.

I honestly view DRK a lot like old PLD and why it was reworked just as an opposite side of it. PLD played too little into the 2m burst meta, DRK plays too much into it.

[ForteNightshade]

Idk why you're singling in on one of the many content pieces i named where War is just better. And yeah, i play in a casual group. Which is exactly why i objectively should not be playing Dark knight, because i don't have the necessary party buffs to get anything out of the job that Warrior doesn't already do better. Don't come at me with this ''play what you want'' bullshit. Also, can this whole notion of Dark knight being better at soaking TB's fucking die already? Even with 5 mits up, after a TB it is me that needs healing, Not the Warrior. It's better everywhere. 6.3 struck a great balance, but it became more and more obvious (Even as per the dev's admission) that fights were overtuned. The dps gap was exacerbated by a timed buff the player got from the fight itself. There was nothing inherently wrong with a tank doing 3% more dps than another that already had it beat on every other front.

There's a lot to break down here. So let's begin.

First and foremost, there is no "objectivity" when it comes to which job you're playing unless you're in a hardcore group. I speak from experience having played my preferred job in a hardcore setting even when it wasn't good. I only swapped off Warrior (Dragoon prior to Shadowbringers) for Dragonsong and Abyssos due to how much better Dark Knight was. It's not BS to say "play what you want" in a casual static. It quite literally doesn't matter. You could bring two Dark Knights and easily meet the DPS check nowadays while performing the actual tanking aspect just as fine.

As for buffs. You only mentioned your static having a Machinist. While that does slightly reduce the overall potential for Dark Knight, you'd need to have a heavily leaning selfish comp for it to matter. Omitting one or two jobs from the "buff synergy" comp doesn't make that big a difference.

Have you actually played Warrior in Savage? Thrill, Equilibrium and Bloodwhetting are great but you still need to be healed. In fact, having healed most of the Savage fights this expansion, I've had to heal good Dark Knights less than Warriors. Fun fact about bleeds, which were rampant in Abyssos. They tick for less damage the more you mitigate. So all that healing Warrior has gets chunked through fast. A perfect example of this being P7S. Dark Knight always has Dark Mind + Oblation + TBN or Shadow Wall + Oblation + TBN for every single buster. They can nearly zero the damage at higher ilvls. Comparatively, Bloodwhetting gets shredded through and Trill is objectively worse than Dark Mind for anything not physical.

Back in Dragonsong, Dark Knight was the only tank you could pair with Paladin and not cost the healers GCDs in phase 6 due to Dark Knight having so much mitigation tools. It could freely give TBN to Paladin without going negative whereas things real spicy for Warrior and Gunbreaker attempting to do the same. Not so much an issue nowadays since they brought back Bulwark but still worth noting.

Finally, you keep insisting 6.3 "struck a great balance" despite there being irrefutable proof it did the exact opposite. What part of Dark Knight having more clears of Omega than every other tank combined screams balanced to you? Even after the buffs to Warrior and Paladin, both were close to 7-8% behind Dark Knight and Gunbreaker—more than double what you cited. At the launch of Abyssos, that number was a staggering 11-12%, one of the highest discrepancies in the game's entire history. You were pretty much griefing to not have a Dark Knight the first three weeks of Abyssos.

At no point throughout the entirety of Abyssos were the tanks ever remotely balanced. Frankly, P8S wasn't all that overtuned but rather several jobs simply couldn't keep up. Warrior, Paladin, Reaper, Machinist, Bard, Red Mage and Summoner were all leagues behind their respective counterparts. Dancer wasn't actually good either but barely decent. And since you need at least one phys range, they were grudgingly accepted. Abyssos, on the whole, saw some of the worst tuning we've seen since Heavensward. It was bad.

And just for clarity's sake, P8S was the only fight you could argue was overtuned. None of the others were, especially considering you could skip Cachexia 2 week 1.

If your deciding factor for whether to play a job is "it must be better than x job" then why not apply those same principles to your static? Machinist is, "objectively", the worst Phys. Range. All it offers over Bard/Dancer is Dismantle, which is a far cry from the damage discrepancy between them. Guess that means your Machinist needs to switch jobs too. Do you have a Red Mage? Black Mage is so hilariously better you better tell them to play it. Sage? Ehh, sorry. Scholar does nearly everything on par or better while dealing more damage. So need to switch.

See how quickly that logic falls apart? You won't get any objection from me if they nerf Bloodwhetting come Dawntrail but that doesn't make Dark Knight any more fun to play than it already was. Stop basing your enjoyment off whether the job is "better" and just play what you find fun. That's all that matters in a casual static.

*Magic Mitigation
I'd say PLD has the strongest mitigations overall. Especially with the reworks.

Which is the prevailing damage type for nearly every tank buster in the game. Even with the occasional physical variety, it's incredibly rare you won't find a consistent use for Dark Mind throughout the encounter.

Prior to the rework, Paladin was the only tank that actually needed outside support for tank busters in some fights and had no answer for bleeds. While much better since, I'd still argue Dark Knight is better overall, especially when you consider Hallowed Ground vs. Living Dead (new).

WAR's design makes dungeon healers pointless.

You certainly won't get an argument from me here. Warrior's sustain in dungeons is downright silly. Paladin sort of gets away with it since Clemency is a damage loss but on the whole, tanks have become far too self sufficient in nearly every department.

Dark Knight definitely can handle solo-ing dungeons but there's no denying it has a far spicier time doing so than Warrior.

At an absolute minimum, they should smack Bloodwhetting down to either a specific potency or limit the amount it heals. Preferably, I'd like to see tanks and healers have less tools so there's more of a decision making and reliance from both roles but that's a whole separate discussion, and not something I suspect SE will actually do.

Ironically, giving Dark Knight and Gunbreaker their own overpowered sustain might be enough to "reality check" the dev team, so to speak. We'll see a LOT more complaints if all four tanks can easily solo content. Bit of short term pain for potentially long term gains in a way.

I honestly view DRK a lot like old PLD and why it was reworked just as an opposite side of it. PLD played too little into the 2m burst meta, DRK plays too much into it.

Pretty much. It's rather unfortunate too because they've essentially painted themselves into a corner without reworking Dark Knight again. I suppose they could severely nerf Edge/Flood's potency and move it elsewhere to minimize the impact DRK has during raid buffs but that feels kind of lame.