Tweet
(This is a copy/paste from a thread I made on another forum. Note: not all of these ideas are mine, and I don't actually like all of the, I just tossed them since others might want to see them)
I was going to just post in an already existing DRK thread, as I've done many times... in many threads, but being that only one is on the first page and it isn't quite what I want to talk about, I'll make my own topic.
You asked for it, so here it is.
My problem with the Dark Knight is that it is very reliant on its subjob to be effective. A DRK main is nothing by itself. All of our natural abilities, besides our 2-hour, are useless when solo-ing. No matter that though, I can accept that my job is balanced for party-use in a party-oriented game.
There are a few (more than a few) changes I'd like to propose for the class... many have been brought up before by other people, but I don't feel like going back and searching for their names. So just remember that I didn't think up all these changes.
Merit Points:
Ok... so Last Resort, Souleater, and Weapon Bash are marginally useful, and I can sort of see how reducing the recast on such abilities could help, our Merits really aren't in the same league when it comes to usefulness as other classes.
Over the past few updates, SE has appeared to be making an effort to make the Dark Knight more magical... so why not give us some Merit point upgrades that help this along?
My suggestions:
Dark Magic Potency
&
Dark Magic Accuracy
We have more Dark Magic spells than any other class in the game. We share the same level of Dark Magic skill as the Black Mage. So why not allow us to upgrade our proficiency with these Magical spells? Part of the reason we aren't as good end-game, on HNM's, as other classes, is that critical part of our job is cut out. It'd be nice if Merits could provide a good enough boost to allow us to land Absorbs, Drain, and Aspir on Gods/HNMs/whatever with reasonable success.
Two-Handed Weapon Proficiency
Perhaps this would give us a +Haste%. As another DRK brought up... Sillies I think it was, we are supposed to be a master of two-handed weapons, so why not let us learn ways to cut the delay down some? I'm not talking about making a Greatsword as fast as a Sword, but it'd be nice if we could improve the speed a wee-bit.
Two-Handed Weapon Accuracy
This might be combined into the trait I just brought up... anyway, why not, at end-game, allow us to get a slight (say +10 or +15) Accuracy bonus when using two-handed weapons? Enough that we could swap out a little more of that ACC gear and get some more +STR or +Attack.
Attack Bonus
And/or perhaps we could upgrade our natural Attack Up traits some more? Perhaps enough that we could use Sushi and still have better attack. We're supposed to have the highest Attack out of any other class, so why not let it be unrivaled?
Resist Paralyze
Hey, why not? Maybe allow us to upgrade this more so that it's actually noticable. =P
Arcana Killer
Same as above. Upgrades would cause the "paralyze" effect to go off more. Perhaps this would apply to Arcane Circle as well?
Changes to Existing Abilities & Spells
Last Resort:
I have several ideas for this...
A.) Dramatically increase the Attack/Defense modifier to say... 50%. Increase the hate generated too, if you want. Being that DRK works pretty well as an SC closer... this ability seems like it'd go great before a SATA-Weapon Skill. Unfortunetly the +Attack and -Defense modifiers are too small to be noticable. Keep the recast, keep the durration.
B.) Someone on Killing Ifrit suggested this... so here it is to the best of my memory: Increase the durration of Last Resort to somewhere around one minute, to one minute and thirty seconds. Maybe reduce the recast a tad, or leave it. As the Dark Knight levels up, this ability gradually grows stronger, in the end it winds up boosting Attack by some 40% and lowering Defence accordingly.
C.) I came up with this one just now. Increase the durration to one-minute. However instead of having Last Resort modify our Attack and Defense, have it make our attacks within the durration ignore a certain % of the target's defence. Maybe this % could increase with level and or Merits/special armor enhancements. Not a huge amount, mind you, but enough to give our hits a decent boost in damage. (or weapon skills) (alternatively, maybe this would just increase damage dealt by a certain%, sort of a reverse Phalanx)
Arcana Killer & Arcane Circle:
Keep in the paralyze effect if you want... but how about this trait gives us increased damage against Arcana and increased Physical/Magical Attack and Accuracy? Arcane Circle would be the same, only it'd effect the entire party in this way. Perhaps all the jobs with "Killer" traits and "Circle" abilities could have the same upgrade, only geared towards their target Monster type.
Allow these traits and abilities to be good enough that when you go to fight some Demons, you really want a Samurai along. Or a Dark Knight for Arcana. Or a Dragoon for Wyverns... you get the idea.
Weapon Bash:
I do not believe this ability should give TP. However I do think the "Stun" effect for both Weapon Bash and Shield Bash should be improved. As it stands, 90% of the time it won't even Stun a {Too Weak}, much less an IT. I will say that these abilities are good for stopping spells. (even though the animation keeps going, the spell has already been interrupted, the message is just late)
Blood Weapon:
Ugh... this is arguably one of the worst two-hours in the game. It does have its uses though, and it wouldn't take much to fix it.
1.) Increase the durration to 1 minute.
2.) Allow it to stack with Weapon Skills.
...and that's it. That's all it needs really. Perhaps you might also let it work on undead. I can live without that though. One last possibility: make the Hp drained from the target mob into additional damage. That way Blood Weapon wouldn't just heal us, but it'd double our damage as well.
Another note: I do not believe Blood Weapon should be made a regular Job Ability. Souleater is supposed to be dangerous. Allowing us to stack it with Blood Weapon every time, every other time, even every third time, would be overpowering.
Absorb-STAT spells:
SE may be one step ahead of me here with the new JSE... but in general, I think the 'damage' modifier in relation to Dark Magic skill for these spells should be sharply increased. When I first got these spells I could drain about 10 or so points. At lvl 70, I can drain about 14-18. By now I think that 25-30 would be more approriate. We'll wait and see what our new JSE does though.
Drain, Aspir, and Stun:
These are our... 'defining' spells to some degree. They work fine as is... while I used to think Stun should be moved up to lvl 40 so that Red Mages couldn't sub it and utalize it better than we can... I fought Fenrir the other day and after losing several times in a row, and losing 6k exp, I started to wonder if next time I might want to bring a 75 RDM and have him/her sub DRK. Then when the little bastard 2-hours, the RDM can do the same and keep him from moving with Stun while the rest of us tear into him.
Though, Aspir might be deserving of a slight boost. It doesn't seem to matter whether I cast Aspir on an IT, or a Too Weak, I can never seem to drain more than 90 or so MP. This is quite a bit at lower levels, but by my level it'd be nice to get back say... 150 or so. Dunno, like I said, Aspir and Drain are pretty good as is.
I was going to just post in an already existing DRK thread, as I've done many times... in many threads, but being that only one is on the first page and it isn't quite what I want to talk about, I'll make my own topic.
You asked for it, so here it is.
My problem with the Dark Knight is that it is very reliant on its subjob to be effective. A DRK main is nothing by itself. All of our natural abilities, besides our 2-hour, are useless when solo-ing. No matter that though, I can accept that my job is balanced for party-use in a party-oriented game.
There are a few (more than a few) changes I'd like to propose for the class... many have been brought up before by other people, but I don't feel like going back and searching for their names. So just remember that I didn't think up all these changes.
Merit Points:
Ok... so Last Resort, Souleater, and Weapon Bash are marginally useful, and I can sort of see how reducing the recast on such abilities could help, our Merits really aren't in the same league when it comes to usefulness as other classes.
Over the past few updates, SE has appeared to be making an effort to make the Dark Knight more magical... so why not give us some Merit point upgrades that help this along?
My suggestions:
Dark Magic Potency
&
Dark Magic Accuracy
We have more Dark Magic spells than any other class in the game. We share the same level of Dark Magic skill as the Black Mage. So why not allow us to upgrade our proficiency with these Magical spells? Part of the reason we aren't as good end-game, on HNM's, as other classes, is that critical part of our job is cut out. It'd be nice if Merits could provide a good enough boost to allow us to land Absorbs, Drain, and Aspir on Gods/HNMs/whatever with reasonable success.
Two-Handed Weapon Proficiency
Perhaps this would give us a +Haste%. As another DRK brought up... Sillies I think it was, we are supposed to be a master of two-handed weapons, so why not let us learn ways to cut the delay down some? I'm not talking about making a Greatsword as fast as a Sword, but it'd be nice if we could improve the speed a wee-bit.
Two-Handed Weapon Accuracy
This might be combined into the trait I just brought up... anyway, why not, at end-game, allow us to get a slight (say +10 or +15) Accuracy bonus when using two-handed weapons? Enough that we could swap out a little more of that ACC gear and get some more +STR or +Attack.
Attack Bonus
And/or perhaps we could upgrade our natural Attack Up traits some more? Perhaps enough that we could use Sushi and still have better attack. We're supposed to have the highest Attack out of any other class, so why not let it be unrivaled?
Resist Paralyze
Hey, why not? Maybe allow us to upgrade this more so that it's actually noticable. =P
Arcana Killer
Same as above. Upgrades would cause the "paralyze" effect to go off more. Perhaps this would apply to Arcane Circle as well?
Changes to Existing Abilities & Spells
Last Resort:
I have several ideas for this...
A.) Dramatically increase the Attack/Defense modifier to say... 50%. Increase the hate generated too, if you want. Being that DRK works pretty well as an SC closer... this ability seems like it'd go great before a SATA-Weapon Skill. Unfortunetly the +Attack and -Defense modifiers are too small to be noticable. Keep the recast, keep the durration.
B.) Someone on Killing Ifrit suggested this... so here it is to the best of my memory: Increase the durration of Last Resort to somewhere around one minute, to one minute and thirty seconds. Maybe reduce the recast a tad, or leave it. As the Dark Knight levels up, this ability gradually grows stronger, in the end it winds up boosting Attack by some 40% and lowering Defence accordingly.
C.) I came up with this one just now. Increase the durration to one-minute. However instead of having Last Resort modify our Attack and Defense, have it make our attacks within the durration ignore a certain % of the target's defence. Maybe this % could increase with level and or Merits/special armor enhancements. Not a huge amount, mind you, but enough to give our hits a decent boost in damage. (or weapon skills) (alternatively, maybe this would just increase damage dealt by a certain%, sort of a reverse Phalanx)
Arcana Killer & Arcane Circle:
Keep in the paralyze effect if you want... but how about this trait gives us increased damage against Arcana and increased Physical/Magical Attack and Accuracy? Arcane Circle would be the same, only it'd effect the entire party in this way. Perhaps all the jobs with "Killer" traits and "Circle" abilities could have the same upgrade, only geared towards their target Monster type.
Allow these traits and abilities to be good enough that when you go to fight some Demons, you really want a Samurai along. Or a Dark Knight for Arcana. Or a Dragoon for Wyverns... you get the idea.
Weapon Bash:
I do not believe this ability should give TP. However I do think the "Stun" effect for both Weapon Bash and Shield Bash should be improved. As it stands, 90% of the time it won't even Stun a {Too Weak}, much less an IT. I will say that these abilities are good for stopping spells. (even though the animation keeps going, the spell has already been interrupted, the message is just late)
Blood Weapon:
Ugh... this is arguably one of the worst two-hours in the game. It does have its uses though, and it wouldn't take much to fix it.
1.) Increase the durration to 1 minute.
2.) Allow it to stack with Weapon Skills.
...and that's it. That's all it needs really. Perhaps you might also let it work on undead. I can live without that though. One last possibility: make the Hp drained from the target mob into additional damage. That way Blood Weapon wouldn't just heal us, but it'd double our damage as well.
Another note: I do not believe Blood Weapon should be made a regular Job Ability. Souleater is supposed to be dangerous. Allowing us to stack it with Blood Weapon every time, every other time, even every third time, would be overpowering.
Absorb-STAT spells:
SE may be one step ahead of me here with the new JSE... but in general, I think the 'damage' modifier in relation to Dark Magic skill for these spells should be sharply increased. When I first got these spells I could drain about 10 or so points. At lvl 70, I can drain about 14-18. By now I think that 25-30 would be more approriate. We'll wait and see what our new JSE does though.
Drain, Aspir, and Stun:
These are our... 'defining' spells to some degree. They work fine as is... while I used to think Stun should be moved up to lvl 40 so that Red Mages couldn't sub it and utalize it better than we can... I fought Fenrir the other day and after losing several times in a row, and losing 6k exp, I started to wonder if next time I might want to bring a 75 RDM and have him/her sub DRK. Then when the little bastard 2-hours, the RDM can do the same and keep him from moving with Stun while the rest of us tear into him.
Though, Aspir might be deserving of a slight boost. It doesn't seem to matter whether I cast Aspir on an IT, or a Too Weak, I can never seem to drain more than 90 or so MP. This is quite a bit at lower levels, but by my level it'd be nice to get back say... 150 or so. Dunno, like I said, Aspir and Drain are pretty good as is.
Kuroeien
Comment