The Current state of DRK

[GrizzlyTank]

The issue with plunge was resolved by merging Blood Weapon into Delirium.

Already by that change the rotation was less cluttered.

#BringBackPlunge

[Zryn]

DRK and TBN is advertised as this tank that can throw out TBNs/mits more frequently due to its reduced cooldown but losing mp generation is literally a nerf to TBN and if you have one not pop it feels even worse now.

I would really like to see Carve & Spit and Abyssal Drain's cooldown untied from eachother. Abyssal Drain is a button you literally never use currently because most people will just play war or another tank in dungeons anyway. Change Abyssal Drain to PLD's holy spirit where doing your 123 will give you a proc for a free one (and put this at a lower level since the removal of plunge and mp generation nerfed DRK in all legacy content). This would help a lot with self-sustain and make the people that complained about the reduced oGCD's happy. You could also add stacks to it where you could use your 123 multiple times (lets say up to 3 times for example) and each stack will increase the damage and healing of your next drain, that way you dont HAVE to use it after your 123 and can use it when you actually need it.

As for TBN, if our mp generation is not improved then this really is counterproductive for what TBN is supposed to be, it needs to either have its mp cost and edge proc removed and instead make it feel more impactful (25sec CD + some type of heal for example), or reduce the mp cost of edge and tbn to like 2500mp or something. In my opinion having a chance for a dps loss because of the use of a mitigation is really dumb, no other tank has anything like that.
Salted Earth and Salt and Darkness also feels awful to use, they should do something more than just damage, like a regen if youre standing in salted earth and a big heal when you pop salt and darkness, for example.

Also for the love of god please put Dark Missionary at level 70 or below like all the other tanks. Bringing a DRK into ucob or uwu is just griefing your party. Oh and increasing Living Dead heal potency just a tad since if youre running 2.5 and proc LD right after a gcd there is a chance you wont heal yourself to full, which is just dumb.

Changes similar to these would help dark knight IMMENSELY.

[daydreamdrooler]

@zimmerson. I dont really ever go on forums but I have been playing since ARR and have been a main drk since it launched with HW. I put together a small google doc of some changes I thought would be cool. it still needs tweaking but I figured I would actually go through some forums and post it and see if I could get ppls thoughts and maybe even get yoshi-p's eyes on my sheet. Let me know what you think.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?gid=0#gid=0

[Jeeqbit]

DRK's pretty fun. I leveled it recently. It can be as good as Warrior with survival if used right (regular TBN+cooldowns) and using Abyssal Drain as a heal on trash when you're low.

I do agree it felt more varied and fun when its cooldowns weren't all on 60s and had 5 stacks, but it's alright as well. I think the biggest problem with it right now is the burst at the start. There's just too much at the start and it could use a progressive unlocking of those actions, such as one oGCD unlocking another which unlocks another so that you don't have a million buttons to press at the beginning. I also think Salted Earth procs the next attack too fast to overwhelm you even more. Getting used to Living Shadow not glowing also takes a bit and maybe they should make it do that.

When I mained DRK in Shadowbringers, I got pretty bored of it until I stacked Skill Speed. I tried not stacking it and got miserable, so I went back to it and found it fun again. So having some speed element would be nice for people playing it long-term.

As for making Dark Mind not mitigate just magic, that would homogenize it with all the other mitigation. The exact thing the community is complaining about! The community literally can't decide here.

Being magic-only means you actually have to use your mind to identify what is magic and what is not and what the best use-case for it is. Dark Mind, like the other tanks' Thrill of Battle, Camouflage and Bulwark, have things they are good at and things they are not and are better used in the situations they are strongest against.

For example, Thrill is good when you want to buff your heal and shield potency or rarely if that extra HP will somehow help, Camouflage is going to work best against trash due to parry (especially those dealing physical damage), and Bulwark is going to work best against things not using DoTs. Likewise, Dark Mind works against magic (sprites and casters).

Honestlyy i think oblation should be an evolution of TBN and give TBN at a lower level let's say 60 and then at 82 it evolve into oblation

Also second this. It must have been easy for the developers to see that there would be yet more weaving trouble for DRKs if they want to use Oblation and TBN together, perhaps with a third CD. I'm already weaving lots and I need to use Oblation in addition to all my mitigation and damage CDs, just so I can show the party that I'm "using my kit". If they were merged it'd help.

[Zimmerson]

My POV comes from the view of raiding/ultimates - I've been doing the savage tier and M1S/M2S/M3S hardly have any magical attacks whatsoever, basically rendering Dark Mind useless. Sure, it has it's place in M4S, but most of the raid tier it's pretty much useless, meaning DRK only has:

Oblation x2
Rampart (all tanks have that)
Reprisal (all tanks have that)
Shadowed Vigil
TBN
Dark Missionary (yes, but this too is magic only, i'm more on about self-mitigation)

It wouldn't be as bad if DRK could at least heal itself some more - the problem is, DRK doesn't have the Potency (Damage) to risk taking. Why take DRK when I can take a WAR that can do more DPS and heal myself, or take PLD and heal myself with some of my attacks and have overall better mitigation than DRK, or GNB with the HoTs, Heart of Corundum and Great Nebula, etc.

Every tank can fully use its mitigations, no matter whether it's physical or magical, yet DRK is railroaded towards magical, making physical attacks hit harder due to less mit. I genuinely think Dark Mind needs changing, but that's just me.

[Jeeqbit]

My POV comes from the view of raiding/ultimates - I've been doing the savage tier and M1S/M2S/M3S hardly have any magical attacks whatsoever, basically rendering Dark Mind useless. Sure, it has it's place in M4S, but most of the raid tier it's pretty much useless

I've not done the new savage raids yet, but if it's really that much of a problem, can't the other 3 tanks share some of their excessive mit/healing? I often gave flash to DRKs as a pity heal last tier lol.

I do think they could do something else, maybe buff the heal on Souleater since Abyssal drain's heal is only good on aoe.

[Bibine_Bine]

It can be as good as Warrior with survival if used right (regular TBN+cooldowns) and using Abyssal Drain as a heal on trash when you're low.

Absolutely not. WAR can literally solo max level dungeon bosses. Can DRK do that?

[Jeeqbit]

Absolutely not. WAR can literally solo max level dungeon bosses. Can DRK do that?

Sometimes. For example, I solo'd the last boss of Amaurot as a DRK a few times in Shadowbringers, which wasn't actually easy. I saw a DRK doing this in some EW dungeons. But anyway, I was referring more to trash because the majority of bosses don't hit hard enough so are often soloable by any tank if they are soloable at all. The main exceptions are leveling dungeons depending on the mechanics because they hit harder.

This is perhaps even easier to acheive due to the addition of Orthos' potions, the heal effect added to Living Dead and the upgrade for Shadow Wall.

[Oizen]

I apologise for this being in so many parts - I just feel very strongly about the class and wanted to get this all off my chest as it feels as if the class isn't getting any love/attention from the Developers.

Thank you to those who read it all, whether the TL;DR or the whole post. I hope you have a wonderful morning/afternoon/evening/night, wherever you are.

Just a heads up, you can bypass the character limit on these forums by posting, then editing your post. Its a bit weird.



I hope they do something with the job this expansion as its not in a great spot, and this is the most light I've ever seen on it since ShB. I dont expect much, especially after how DTs been going but we can pray.

[LisseyCrowe]

I'm not a big Dark Knight or Tank player, but I did level all jobs and occasionally return to it so consider this a very casual view of the job.

DRK to me felt and still feels like I'm just pressing my buttons for the sake of it. I'm not building towards anything, nor looking forward to anything. It has an "active" phase but it's basically just a bunch of cooldowns being up at the same time. The fix doesn't need to be (in fact it probably shouldn't be) "here's a 1 minute CD rotation" but I don't have enough experience with the job to say what it should be, other than "I like how PvP DRK uses HP for stuff, I'd like to see that".

One random idea is some form of mitigation (perhaps a TBN rework) who's potency scales depending on how much HP you've spent before casting it. I don't know how well that would play though.

But yeah, I don't know, sorry if this isn't helpful. DRK just doesn't give me the impression that it has an identity. The other tanks don't have that issue, Warrior feels like a brute, Gunbreaker like a skilled merc, Paladin like a holy protector. Dark Knight looks edgy, but playing doesn't make me feel edgy at all. Living Dead does more to the job's identity than the rest of the kit, you could recolor the skill VFX to red and call it Flame Templar and could probably get away with it.