(Don't) Fear The Reaper: A Dark Knight Guide

Please don't.
I understand that a lot of players come in seeing big Torcleaver numbers, but jumping straight to Caladbolg is a great way to get new Drk's blinded to the other aspects of the job.
We've all seen way to many crappy Torcleaver goes BRRR Drks that have no idea what half their JAs do and have never cast a spell in their life.
Caladbolg is a great weapon that can lead to real bad tunnel vision without being put in proper context.

Learn the job with a Lycurgos first, and then move on to Apocalypse or Caladbolg.

As for AF I assume you mean Artifact Armor, so I'll go ahead and rank the REMA armor sets:

Ignominy (Artifact)
Get +3 body and legs for sure. Body is the top WSD piece, and legs are top notch as a TP piece.
Get at least +2 hands. These open up the option to use Weapon Bash to open skillchains for self magic bursting, which can be an excellent way to gain a massive HP boost with Drain 3. Ignominy +2 or +3 hands will let you make a Compression SC with Weapon Bash to Keen Edge, Nightmare Scythe, and Infernal Scythe among other WS, but these ones in particular for keeping your target alive to burst.
Head and feet have their uses, but are comparatively low priority compared to body hands and legs.

Fallen (Relic)
Head is 100% required. This is quite possibly the single most important piece of Drain gear. You don't need it at +3, but I would recommend that you at least get this piece to +1 for it's ilvl factor.
Fallen's legs +3 are the other critical +10 WSD piece, along with AF body. These aren't as expensive as they used to be, and you will need a Dynamis Jeuno [D] wave1 clear on Dark Knight.
The other pieces aren't as important. Hands are a nice drain piece, body is fine for fast cast and magic WS, feet are a bad joke.

Heathen (Empyrian)
Legs for Nether Void bonus (Pair Nether Void with Dark Seal for big, long drains)
Body for Dread Spikes
Don't worry about the other pieces too much.

I wish I could like that post 4 times.

got this and apoc!

I want to make it clear that I do not hate Caladbolg or Torcleaver, though I do get mad when Torc decides to miss.

My issue is that Caladbolg can do so much damage on so few braincells that it becomes way to easy to discard everything else to become a Torcleaver machine.

There are times where the best Dark Knights will slap on Caladbolg, hybrid gear, fulltime hasso, and proceed to just press the torcleaver button every time they are over 1000 TP. It is an incredibly basic playstyle that has a fair amount of overlap with something like a War/Sam (Not to diss on Warriors) that can very safely put out big numbers with minimal input. A good Dark Knight knows the context as to where and when to do this, and that is fine.

A bad player can see the aforementioned good player and mimic them, and by doing so win a parse. And that goes to their heads. I'm sure most if not all of you have seen some trash player with an ego the size of Jupiter who thinks they are Altana's gift to Vana'diel because they pressed the Torcleaver button more than the other guy. If players existed in a vacuum this would not be a problem, but we are playing an MMO here, and this inevitably turns into people claiming that this is the one and only way to play Dark Knight.
And that is not a healthy thing to be promoting.

For reference, here are two example sets:
ItemSet 37987025% haste, -50% flat DT with cape, plenty of store TP multiattack and PDL
ItemSet 379871And a Torcleaver set that works fine.

These are not perfect sets, but my point is that anyone can win a parse with them. There are only 24 pieces of gear between both of those gear sets. They don't even need Gearswap. We are in an age where many players try to skip progression and go straight to the pinnacle of endgame, via progress from other jobs, internet guides, or straight up buying their account. And by doing so they miss out on the opportunity to actually learn what Dark Knight is.

So for all you would-be Dark Knights out there, please don't just make a Caladbolg and try to skip to the top of the parse. Take the time to ask the question "What can Dark Knight do?" Be curious, explore, make mistakes, and learn the job by playing the job.

I guarantee you will have a much more enjoyable time playing this game if you do.

Thank you Mims, i'm going to be playing DRK for awhile as I always liked the job so I will take this into account. I super appreciate it!

I'm glad that helped, Gwen!
Sorry that I went on a bit of a rant, I want to be clear that that was in response to Negan's blanket response of Caladbolg for a new Drk, and not some kind of assumption about where you at in your own progress.

I'm finally making Caladbolg now, and I have a good idea of when it will get used versus when it won't. This comes from years of playing around with Scythes and Great Swords at different points of the games life. You badly need to be doing both if you care about this job.

Also, the most important thing I tell any DD is you should only be doing as much damage as your party allows. What does that mean? Well, if you're spamming Torcleaver and take hate while your tank is struggling, don't bother switching to a damage taken set and get killed, that's your mistake. The other DD might have been behind you in damage, but they are better because they know the limit.

Being a good DD isn't about mindlessly spamming TP and WS macros, you need to be aware of your situation. DRK can STUN. Yes, I have saved so many lives with Stun and Weapon Bash it isn't funny. Sometimes you sacrifice your damage so the enemy doesn't kill your tank with its latest nuke. Damage is not more important than survival. You do more damage if everyone is alive, so be a team player and stop watching your scoreboard.

PS: Keep Endark up all the time. That's one of the biggest things new DRKs won't know. Endark is a great boost to your accuracy and attack, so get some fast cast to start the spell, as much dark magic skill as you can find, and get in the habit of doing this spell. If possible, time it between switching targets.

These are all great points. It's important to keep in mind the people you're playing with. Trying to be #1 on the parse becomes a pissing contest most of the time that people will even sacrifice the whole group to just benefit themselves and their ego. I don't even get it sometimes. You have people worried about parses, all while they're running auto-buff and auto-ws...what are you doing?

Best recommendation is to seek like-minded players. Find people that don't care about topping the parse and just about getting things done. There certainly are people out there that strive to be the top of the parse AND get things done without hindering the experience of others in the group (or trying to act high and mighty). Great for them.

DRK specifically has access to a lot of utility. Utility that when used lowers their DPS. Tossing out a weapon bash? Casting stun? Setting up Drain III? Absorb? All involve a cooldown, delaying your damage. I enjoy making use of the utility DRK has to offer. Is it always necessary? Absolutely not. Especially with the power creep.

I'll say this, not every group is elite or has automated mules taking care of the buffing / healing, which leaves room for error. Error that leads to deaths. DRK has options at their disposal to mitigate the impact of those errors. Have had plenty of fights go south in a group setting and while everyone that was trying to crank out the highest #s lie on the ground dead, I've long since switched to Apocalypse and kept myself chugging along...

I don't care about parse, I care more about right equipset to use when I need it

Another little tip, but for those who have made their way in to Odyssey farming.

Remember that you have the spell Tractor, and if you can get hold of a Shobuhouhou Kabuto, you can save others from sticky situations. WHM KO'd next to some undead? No one can raise them? Tractor them out. Raise them. Carry on.

This man is ready for anything.

holy crap, i should really start paying attention to those seasonal events!

Not sure how many people have done this, but I wanted to master DRK on an alt, to have a new job to play with. I actually have Lycurgos for RUN and I considered building around that but ultimately I ended up doing Dolichenus and Decimation. Two sets, only piece of JSE being +2 neck:

ItemSet 374848

ItemSet 378013

Very simple to put together with Sakpata gear and relatively inexpensive. For mastering the job, it works incredibly well with a either a COR or any other Savage Blade job. I got the idea from Simon I think it was when I was debating DRK vs WAR on my main. Decimation does pretty well, good and consistent numbers, but it does require you to be attack capped or it doesn't work, at all. Unfortunately I'm not learning the job just hitting two buttons but I figure I can learn it later.

How do other DRKs handle Sheol C mobs that resist slashing? I've been wanting to test out loxotic mace on DRK but not exactly sure where to start since we don't have access to black halo. I assume the next best thing is judgement? Does anyone have a set for these club WS's?

I thought Judgement is stronger anyways.

Judgment is superior to Black Halo, so yeah.

Probably want something like this for it.

ItemSet 379953

Regal and Niqmaddu work if you don't have Empanada and Karieyh. Possibly Sulevia's leggings +2 over Sakpata's feet, but I'm not positive.

Judgment is basically a Savage Blade set

Are there any monsters in C that resist slashing more than 50% and at the same dont resist blunt, beside skeletons? DRK has no Fencer and Last Resort haste doesn't apply to 1h build, so generally your 2h REMA will be better than Loxotic, unless its something like skeletons, where I think they resist slashing by 75% in C and they take bonus blunt damage.

Rather than switching to blunt, the solution to skelleys in Sheol C is to have your White Mage toss a Banishga II after the your tank has gathered the mobs and done a tag. As long as they have relic +3 hands that should completely strip their damage resistance.
Generally Drks just brute force the slashing resistant mobs with powerful WS and skillchains. In my experience Odyssey groups do well with 1x Drk and 1x flexible damage type DD, like War or Sam, so that when you get slashing resistant mobs on a halo one DD can focus on Nostos and the other can focus on Beastmen, as appropriate to resistances.

That said I've been working on my Warrior for when I need to be the flexible DD in my odyssey static, as opposed to an extra tanky, very one-shotty DD.

As someone who runs sheol:C in a static for the past few months, I've been on COR for about 90% of our runs. But I do have DRK, and tried very hard to bring it at times just for flexibility. But I'm competing against other static members with excellently geared DRG, WAR, or SAM- all with high performance Slashing and Piercing options (DRG- polearm and naegling, WAR- gaxe and shining one, SAM- GKT and shining one).

I built up a loxitic mace+1 and a judgment set because slashing on the Lamia Agon mobs in particular is a complete losing concept, and results in more TP moves that slow the whole group down. Using either Caladbolg or Redemption with typical buffs (march x2, minuet x2, chaos/sam rolls), 2 WSs ~1500 TP each would not kill the lamia, but 2 Judgments ~1750TP will. Its still not as efficient as letting a piercing job take them, and I found that if the accompanying Nostos family was susceptible to Slashing, me sticking on those while piercing jobs handled the Lamia was faster still than trying to force Loxotic+1 into the mix.

I do use it on skeles as you mention, and it certainly is the right move there, but its not nearly as versatile as the jobs with slashing/piercing vs slashing/blunt.

Caladbolg TP exactly 50% faster than Loxotic, so you can make like 2x 2600 Torc in time you do 2x 1750 Judgment.

Agon Lamia do; the Sheol C Agon beastmen actually take -62.5% from their worst damage type, not -50%.

Skeletons also appear twice as often as other families since both nuking Skeletons and melee Skeletons are considered separate possibilities for groups.

Thoughts on this for a defensive hybrid set?
ItemSet 380121

The cape would be Dex, DA, atk/acc, acc, dt-
25% haste
-50% DT
51% DA
2% TA
38 STP

do -10% PDT on cape instead of -dt you can drop defending ring for another moonlight.

Sakpata is too good if a Hybrid IMO.

I also recommend 2 Hybrids one with 25-30 DT and one that caps.

This is not hybrid set, its DT set. This set is way too low with meva, which is far more important than capping DT imo. Hybrid set for DRK is 5/5 Sakpata with Niqmaddu ring and Chirich ring. Even if Sakpata is R0 in this set, its almost the same damage with uncapped attack and it wins easily at attack cap. It has tons of meva, 50% pdt and 25% haste (your set only has 20% so works only with Last Resort, without it its a huge drop in dps). R20 Sakpata easily win for attack capped (8%+) and uncapped (4%+). Also 5/5 R20 Sakpata with Chirich/Niqmaddu is 55% subtle blow with Auspice.

Just check the set I posted a while back. Still haven’t been beaten on a parse with it equipped.

I mean by people in shell I'm guessing? Or just damage overall? Sorry just confused on this statement. If it's just about hybrid set yea the set isn't that great tbh. I personally wouldn't use 5/5 sakpata the stp I value higher than I should in a hybrid set also being at 49% dt vs 50 aint gonna make a big difference.

I use 4/5 sakpatas in my hybrid. Shout group ambuscade/dyna/whatever since sakpatas came out. I don’t play enough to have a linkshell right now.

Not seeing why you say this is a 20% set only good for Last Resort- once the Seething Bomblet+1 is augmented it hits 25% haste just fine. Not saying your other comments about embracing meva is inaccurate- sakpata was a huge gift for DRKs and WARs on par with Malignance release- just a comment about the haste level.