So this is basically acheron with curse slapped onto it?

This doesn't really solve the balance between Acheron and Gran Faust.

1) You do not simply turn a sword into a trident.

2) A trident's design is strictly built on the idea of jabbing and impaling. That would be a piercing weapon over anything else.

3) You do not simply turn a trident into a mace.

4) By extension, you do not turn a weapon line's general properties from normal to heavy, nor shift its damage specialty from normal to piercing to normal in this or any other order.

6) You do not simply turn a mace into a claw.

7) By extension, you do not turn a weapon line's general properties from heavy to lightweight.

8) You DO NOT simply allow a weapon to inflict Curse.

9) You DO NOT, under any circumstances whatsoever within a game carrying online playerbase that invests on making and purchasing weapons, replace a weapon's entire line out of the game with something else entirely.

10) This resolves nothing at all in practice or in conclusion.

The only reasonable approach to replacing the Nightblade line I can currently think of would be to make the line in question its very own, perhaps with a new and different charge attack*, and put up a Poison Brandish line instead**. Otherwise there will invariably be far too much inconsistence and damage that will impact on the game's growth and players' overall experience.

* (A rough suggestion would be opting for a close focus on swift, singular slicing, something more in line with the blade's sharp and light appearance.)

** (Ideally along with taking up the weapon requirement for the Obsidian Edge, due to the general purpose and shape of both weapons being distinctively similar.)

Lately I've come to believe that status effects and resistances need some sort of revision.

As of now however, there is no reason for curse to be kept away as some kind of super status, as if it crushes everything in its wake-- this is simply not the case. I suspect it gets its reputation as such from how the developers have treated it as a rare and special status effect; i.e there are no curse themed levels and very few curse themed enemies, only faust has curse. If the developers are set on treating it as some sort of special super status, I would have to recommend some sort of buffs for it.

Curse does poorly when compared to other statuses on PvE, i think that curse was originally intended to be restricted to monsters because of how it works, cursing your weapons/items and lasting about 40 seconds, it does better against knights than it does against a monster wich will most likely die in about 5-10 seconds vs a knight, unless it's a boss. (Wich would only be jelly king as vanaduke cannot be cursed, then both RT and Snarbolax are immune to all kinds of damage while they're attacking)

So yes, curse is kind of a super status... against a player(Who lacks any kind of curse resistance or weapon slots btw)... It would definitely cripple and bother any unlucky knight who gets cursed, even kill him it he isn't careful. On the other hand, For PvE, the mechanics of the status are not very efficient or even practial, like Sandwitch-Potato said, there's other statuses that do better at dealing damage on a more effective way, curse could use a buff... like monsters refusing to attack a knight and running away while cursed (wich would fit gremlins quite alot) Just something that justifies the self-curse and painful charge of a GF for that matter. (or the rarity of a curse vial)

As for the OP:

GOD PLEASE NO

But what if you DON'T have another weapon slot or Curse resistance? What if you're lagging into a Phantom bullet? You're effectively completely helpless besides your Battle Sprite of all things for half a minute, or more. Can't even shield bash sometimes, and there's no way to tell if that was cursed.

Because "OmgAcheronsoOPplzdeleteomghalpTheyrepwningmeonLDanditsuckssss"

@Fehzor

I don't have any trouble whatsoever with the curse status.

55 seconds can be quite a while for people who don't dodge, or are trying for a speedrun. Certainly more annoying than something like Poison.

Despite whatever your prior knowledge about curse is, a large amount of players are so unfamiliar with Curse that they just keep attacking while Cursed and then wonder how they died. I'd thank you to not imply me being one of those people, however.

Also, Curses have a mental connection to shadows and sinister rituals and demonic, foul, pastries, not glorping jellies or large pieces of metal, so I'd rather they stay as Shadow, rather than Piercing/Elemental/Normal damage. But that's just me.

The point being Curse kills them a lot darn quicker than many other statuses would, and most people prefer to be alive, so they can actually do stuff.

Wouldn't a dark blade stabbing still be shadow? And I don't really see how a sword stabbing would be piercing, unless the tip was needle-thin or such.