Future Of DRK

I know it'll never happen, but a single target instant KO Death spell would be cool. Give it a long cool down and low acc so it doesn't overpower.

I still like my idea >_>

Increase drain a tad more and more with absorbs..meh.. and more blm magic spells.. cud be a difinitive way of making DRK a lil more unique!

lol'd hard, this is great

Just my two cents here...but I always did dream of Absorb-GIL and Absorb-EXP. lmao.. But Aspir II seems like it'd be given to us.

DRK is a DD which is supposed to use their magic to increase their damage and cripple the enemy at the same time. EG. Absorb-TP = TP for the DRK and less TP for the mob.

But the simple problem is, currently a DRK that casts does NOT increase their damage. In fact it is pretty well documented that when you have even a moderate amount of haste then casting often actually reduces your DoT. And the amount you ‘cripple’ the enemy is a joke in the grand scheme of most fights.

So in reality, a DRK who casts more than 1-2 spells per fight (opening with absorb TP and stuns when needed) is going to get ‘destroyed’ in the parse with no appreciable benefits. This then reduces DRK to a normal DD, which tbh they aren’t the best at. As Raen said the gap isn’t as big as some people want to think, but it is there.

IMO DRK needs some faster casting dark magic, something you can fit between swings in a moderate haste situation, or only cancel 1 swing at high haste levels. This would not completely remove the penalty of casting, but it would make it closer to ‘worth it’. An improvement in m.acc would be welcome, but that’s not the root of the problem, simply an added annoyance.

Also exping on mobs which don’t have piercing bonus and reflect magic would also help DRK a lot. But god knows what the exp camps of the future will look like.

IMO, Insurgency should have been a King’s Justice/Drakesbane style WS, with decent mods/fTP and possibly the ability to crit (although personally I am not a fan of critical WS). What we actually got was ‘Guillotine -1’ which can do T3 skill chains. Skill chains are pretty much dead, and if you wanted to SC->MB a mob you wouldn’t bring a DRK, even if he has Insurgency. So I really don’t know what SE was thinking with that.

But there is a lot of time/exp between 75 and 99 so SE could do a lot of things to help DRK out.

Absorb-TP is greatly under-appreciated. I'm a freak of nature in using it, averaging 40tp/cast or better in both MJSP Merit and Dynamis, and match numbers or even out-WS SAMs by doing so. Get a 300 skill set and some practice (and lay off the damn birds) before you discount all of DRK's magic.

K-Parser now parses both Dread Spikes and Absorb-TP usage on my suggestions over at the alla boards.

Something else that irks me: I don't get the impression that Hasso and Seigan actually increase effective casting time at all. They function more like negative fast cast, and I don't notice the long downtime of casting after the spell 'peaks' (as without Hasso/Seigan) to suggest that any greater amount of time is consumed.

Might sound crazy, but an idea I had in my head awhile back was to give DRK a trait that basically eliminated the delay timer of casting adding onto the time it took to take another swing. So rather swing, wait, cast, wait longer, swing. It would be more of a swing, wait, cast, swing. Catch my drift? Or would that be totally OP?

Trait or ja that greatly increasing dark magic casting speed, acc, and duration(of abs spells) i think would be good. As well as some random new dark spells(dark, aspire 2) on the climb to 99. Making Insurgency worth a dam would also be nice but i doubt that. Other then that im guessing more atk bonus for us? be nice if they gave drk something like crit+ trait or some useful melee trait as well
my 2 cents

For spells I do see Virus potentially being a new spell for them, the Mycophile (though a Fungar mob) is a Drk that happens to cast Virus and how your Dark magic skill is would be how much mp and/or tp is being ticked away from the enemy.

What about Aspir II? though I see it being more used for blm then drk...

or perhaps Charon? though it'd just be a drk virsion of Mijin Gakrue which would make many QQ

As for other spells besides Virus I also see Break as a potential drk spell, would be a longer "stun" as it petrifies the enemy for a period of time. Confuse could be another its in Altanaviewer and I don't think theirs any mobs that have casted it like Break & Virus (if there has been please enlighten me) Altanaviewer also has Absorb ATT as well.

And *if* drk's get given Death as a spell it would more then likely work out like Banish-III and Doom like Dia-III (ignoring mobs that use the actual abilities lol)

Just my 2 cents, back to lurking I go.

This.

DRK WS are totaly gimped on many point, modifiers & accuracy are a big problems for Guillotine, but if i'd sujest a new magic, it would be Ultima ^^; /dreamer ON

Bit of a necro, my bad.

I'm surprised it hasn't been brought up, you know damn well SE's gonna cockslap DRK in the face and just throw us Absorb-STR II, etc, etc lol.

I'm gonna have to agree with some of the people on here saying that DRK is "okay" for the moment, I can generally keep up with/beat most War's from my linkshell on parses without using Souleater.

Talking to a few people in my linkshell that actually like DRK aside from just a zerg job, we all pretty much agree that the only thing that needs certain adjusting is Scythe mechanics/weaponskills. Even if it's just a minute change to mods, or something, it would make a nice difference. I hate seeing my WS averages at like 700-800(remember I don't use Souleater in merits, I know, suck less, get better healers, hurrdurr), compared to Wars/Sams being 900-1k+ lol.

Magic? Screw magic lol. I'll admit, Drain II is awesome for topping my HP build when zerging, or when solo/lowmanning. But other than that, don't think I've touched an Absorb-stat, Bio II(left to the Rdms now), Stun(also left to Rdms or Schs)**, tier2 elemental spell for atleast a year or 2 now haha.

**yes I am in an endgame shell before people start questioning that.

If blu could use scythe, was a bit more emo, and had it's spells named by a '80s metal band groupy you would have the perfect blend of magic and melee needed for the drk role.

Seriously though some .5 sec cast spells that are on par with Blu's big spells and you'd have a winner.

RDM and SCH get stun now?

I would like to do more dmg I guess... I don't know what your gear looks like but w/o using souleater my DRK does pretty good ws. In a merit party with a brd and cor my DRK does 1100~1400 on mamools. With spikes of 1700 or so. Using souleater I did a 2500. Wonder what I would do with an Apoc... /drooool

I don't have OMGgear but decent. Hecatomb body/feet AF+1. Maybe you should look at your gear. The dmg portion of DRK isn't flawed only the ability to fully utilize it's magic.
Abs-Haste I say! more haste would be hot. Some form of MP regenration would be sweet. That would let me use my spells more often. Sure a rdm can refresh you etc but thats MP overtime. Some form of insta-MP recovery would be cool. (Other than Aspir)

I think you're overestimating your damage a bit.

overestimating my numbers? I have screenshots if you don't believe it

Average != Spikes

I also doubt the veracity of those numbers as averages <_<

I'm sure you can hit those numbers but I don't think you'll average between 1100 and 1400.

averages ~1100 at birdies with Chaos Roll for comparison.

EDIT: I've modified this set since I posted since I noticed an oversight of mine. Snow Gorget was there instead and produced said result.

Call me nuts.. but I think DRK will be the new Merit Party Job of choice for 2010~2011...

Here's why, all the melee jobs have had their "spotlight" for merit parties, with exception of DRK.

If I remember correctly..went something like this..
MNK-Bone parties in King Ramp tomb
WAR-Did great on dhalmels in bibiki bay, and so did BST. WAR was also the original job of choice against imps in caedarva mire.

RNG-Along with WAR, a great caedmire party was all about having a RNG or two in a party, since amnesia wouldn't really hit them too easy and WS's were just basically spammed.


SAM/THF Once Nyzul exit to Bhaflau was introduced, SAM's and THF were the best you could find. SAM's penta's typically did more than a DRG, and DRG's were still not even a big prime choice on Colibri at this time of this area being released.

DRG -Drakesbane!! This brought DRG into the merit party spotlight, over shadowing most SAM's, and at least evening the playing field. DRG's are now the prime current merit party job of choice

DRK-With a small spotlight on some tree's in caedarva mire outside of Nashmau, DRK hasn't really had a good merit party rapport.


VERDICT!:
With the WOTG expansion going into northland region, and with the level cap being raised I could very well see SE adding mobs that are.. Weak to slashing, weak to dark magic spells, and possibly aracana type. An abundance of these would make for the perfect DRK merit party (Which is long over-due). Especially, if its a magic casting mob, which would make DRK's great for stun. Just my 2 cents, but this is what I see happening.

That's what my ws set looks like. I have 8/8 scythe merits as well. Champion's Galea has STR+4 ACC+10 WS ACC+15 Attk+5

Yes it is possible. I did not say average 1100~1400, you did. I just said i can do those numbers. If you want an average then i average 1175 according to my high and low. But not counting spikes. But i constantly put out 1100 np on mamools.

This very strongly implies you mean an average of 1100~1400, though I apologise if this is not the case.

I don't know how you'd do an average of 1175 with that set (it's a good set, don't get me wrong) unless you're getting Minuets and stuff. Even then, somewhat suspect... idk.

Drk does have a pretty insane amount of atk thru job traits. 8/8 scythe merits does wonders but that is my average 1175 with that setup. I was getting double march, chaos roll and exp role or sam roll idr. Parsed it just so i wasn't talkin outta my *** when i presented the numbers. I'll post it sometime just at school atm and don't have my files.

It would be cool, if scythes changed to piercing damage, instead of slashing.

1175 Seems to be about the Max possible with Perdu, without a Double Attack or Souleater. I have a whole Shabang of gear, Adaburk, Nept+1 and still 1175 is about what I was hammering out with Perdu. I recently upgraded to Severance (Attack+15 STR+4 one) and the average now is around 1350 (with Chaos Roll). I prefer to Use HEcatomb Subligar instead of Black Cuisses, for Some reason I just see better results with them. Also I use Fierce over Warwolf, if Fierce is better will require a bit more testing.

Another point to make, is I use Justice on Insurgency/Guillotine. EVERYONE gives me ***over that, saying "Baaaw get a snow nub" (Which I do have for Samurai) but I always, without any doubt, notice better results with Justice over Snow.

What food did you use to get an average of 1175 on mamools?
Were you killing puks aswell or were you at the nyzul camp? Kinda looks right if you were eating top tier meat like Hydra Kofte or Red curry, but wouldnt that mean your acc would suck a bit? Only way i could see numbers like that and high accuracy is if you are getting madrigals >.>

Ooh, you got an Apoc :o congrats!

One guy mentioned it already, but noone seemed to pick up on it: Endark.

Supposing that it was powerful enough to be worth a damn, I can see an enspell fitting in very well. It combines both the melee and magic aspects of drk, as well as being something that would hopefully have a long enough duration to be worth casting.

If it gave +20% hate-free additional effect dmg to melee swings, I can see it bringing DRK back into the fold, providing superior dot to make up for the lower WS frequency than SAM.

Aside from that, we really need more fast cast to make spells worth casting. Maybe a JA stance to vastly increase casting speed?

On the melee side of things, I'd really like a new scythe WS, single-hit preferably. Switching to GS for spinning slash is fine and all, but how many people have enough free combat merits to be able to max out all their jobs' primary weapons, never mind secondary?

In addition to that, how about a pure dark magic-dealing WS too? PLDs get far too easy a time spamming Atonement on melee-resistant mobs, give us something even better than that so we can pull hate and resume our rightful suicidal role.

yeah i think something like that was already mentioned somewhere. that ja to vastly increase attack speed lol desperate blows