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

Ok thank you! Abs/drains are the only thing that makes DRK more appealing to me than just playing WAR. If you couldn't land magic you might as well play war at that point imo.

Exactly! And with a stonking 50 Magic Accuracy, 217 Magic Damage, and 50% Absorb Potency before you start adding anything else .. it's reassuring. The new Flamm gear means you think about landing even less, which is very welcome indeed.

I always took this line on the ffxicylopedia as an indication of how to gear for Insurgency: "Appears to be heavily modified by attack."

Obviously most WS are modified by attack, but Insurgency seems to get extra boost from it. No idea why the note is there and not on BGwiki as well. Again it's one of those clarification things .. is it really heavily modified by attack? Or is it there because someone guessed years ago despite no real testing?

If you have doubts on mechanics always use bgw, it's up to date with the latest testings available for everything.

Wikia is only good for quests and the bestiary.

Clearly. I just wanted to know why that line was added all those years ago with no one challenging it. Common knowledge? Overlooked? Perhaps it is heavily modded by attack but no one tested it? I'm fully aware of the upsides and downsides of BGwiki/FFXIcyclopedia .. I grew up with them lol. I remember when there was no such thing as BGwiki and people used ffxi-atlas lol.

What move speed gear does DRK get access to?
Also yeah, insurgency attk modifier is weird. I don't understand why it says that.

Blood Cuisses. Otherwise you're looking at Carmine Cuisses +1 to get the 18% speed.

Oh wow I didn't even realize drk was on wlegs.
Thanks!

Sure are! Not too hard to farm up these days. Just a bit of luck on Kirin, and he's a pushover for any i119 player.

I know that this was kinda touched on in other pages but haven't seen much info up to date with the actual numbers behind it. I already know that Rag is the better GS that DRK has access to, but past few days I've been curious about the numbers between AG Rag and AG Calad and I'm having an issue finding a more up to date DPS sheet to try this myself.

The main situation I'm looking for is the white dmg when using 3000TP Torcleaver AM3, then in the confines of the same fight, the Reso number difference between Rag/Calad using the same gear with same buffs.

Yes I know Rag has the hidden effect without being behind a WS, will have less issues with acc as they start to drop down, yes I know Rag will be the clear winner in this contest, i just want to see by HOW MUCH Rag will beat Calad.

White/tp dmg on Calad during AM3 is of course higher. 50% triple dmg procs = 100% increase in white dmg. Rags OD2.5 and 24% crit rate worked out ~40% (off the top of my head?? sorry) increase in tp dmg. BUT your ratio of ws/tp dmg is always going to be greatly in favour of ws dmg. So, of the lets say on average, 25-30% of your dmg which is tp dmg - you have increased that proportion but ws dmg (the vast proportion of your dmg) is unchanged. With Rags crazy accuracy you can introduce more store tp and multistrikes into your sets to up your ws frequency.

I crunched the numbers previously and Calad will win (wasn't by very much) during AM3 and that's assuming you are accuracy capped on Calad. The reality is it will only win if you start a fight (with a target you can cap hit rate on without rags acc) with AM3 already up and it ends before you have to renew it.

I use AG Rag and it's a great wep. I badly wanted a 2h empy as I love seeing the big tp dmg numbers but I couldn't justify it.

If you want rocking white dmg, try dacomania :D that will put a smile on your face for sure.

I would love to see a Dacnomania Zerg.

Someone make it happen!

^^This is exactly what we need to setup on Asura rather than that parse.

Go to Reisenjima, pick a normal monster, magic burst it, and have 5 DRKs DSNV Drain 3 it. Then pop a t4 and pull out the Dacs!

Of course, I'd need to reclaim my lost Dacnomania that hit the floor last month, but this would be so much fun.

Awesome, thanks for the answer. Been thinking of something to dump my HMP/cinders(yes I know Calad takes dross), into a weapon but couldn't decide on which one I wanted, tons of people on my server doing sword and dagger, and I wanted to try looking into something different. I might just do Calad since I don't have a Rag made, should also AG my Apoc so that I can swap between the two different types of tactics depending on the kind of fight that I'm going to be doing.

If you remember off hand, what are the numbers between Torc and Reso? Pretty sure on this Reso will win based on it being 5 hit and wearing way more multi hit than what most amounts of WSD gear can keep up.

Is there anyway to update this guide? If there isnt I am really considering to make a new one. New guide would not be for new players but aim for endgame career DRK who already know what LR stands for and does. I think this one for a beginner gives a good enough overview. I just feel I am always jumping to different pages on different posts and it drives me nut. I would like to condense it.

If this is interesting to you please let me know. If I can get at least ~15 ppl wanting something like this I will use my time do do a end game drk guide. I think I would call it "iDPS: Endgame DRK guide". It would be nice to have because I can continually update with the help of asura drks which make up like 80% of the endgame drks anyhow. We are a pretty close group anyhow.

new drk guide plz!!!!!!!!!!!!!! need more end game drk sets

Im up for it! :D

Yes!

Yeah reso is a better ws. Torc is still strong but reso replicating ftp to mutlistrike procs, its ftp scaling and STR mod makes it the ws of choice. This is what it comes down to really - in the time you've saved up 3000tp for torc and am3 (which is calads only selling point) you could have popped off 3 resolutions which out weigh the gains in TP dmg. That's why it will only outperform rag if you started with am3 up and didn't need to renew over the fight.

Everyone's making dagger or sword because they're very competitive main hand choices and never go unused as they are the best offhand choice. Unless you really want to be different as you say (calad does have a very cool model!), I would sell up and make a rag. It's cheaper, doesn't require the abyssea items, can be used on war (for which it's a great, often optimal, weapon) and will outperform calad in most situations.

New guide would be cool.

A New guide would be cool, but there is no reason to reinvent the wheel. The original guide is pretty thorough, just not updated. You would only need to include updated gearsets for AG weapons, and provide a general range of augment stats (BIS) to give the user a general idea.

For instance, on the BLU guide, Herculean set is considered BIS as long as it has at least TA+4%. Additional Stats only make it better. You could use that as a reference so you're not crunching numbers trying to see what's better: Valorous Legs or Odyssean Legs (and for what scenarios). That's a lot of work and is highly subjective.

Good Luck. Ping me if you need assistance.

I like that there is interest, and Buukki way ahead of you there :D

The Guide would not reinvent the wheel. I would actually omit all the Job ability, sub job stuff and all the extras that none ever read.

I will assume anyone using the "Advanced drk guide" is already a career drk and has a base knowledge. I will probably reference that they look at original if they are that new. The aim is more aimed to people participating in 128~+ content.

By no means am I the most fit to make a guide, but I know with the knowledge and help of others the info can be funneled to me and then published. Only having Apoc and Rag AG means much input will be needed from other in regards to other weapons.

As for gear sets I always find less is more. Meaning I will aim for a HQ set (best HQ gear, augs considered 80% their maxes), a NQ set (best NQ gear, augs considered at 60% of maxes). I do not plan to do more than that for each weapon, as everyone who would read this guide should have access to T2+ gear. This is also great to show newer DRK's what really is expected to be able to be an endgame DD (not the easiest world to move into). I am thinking to have for each HQ and NQ an avg acc set (1100+) and a high acc (1250+).

Yeah, holding to 3000TP is the cost of 3 Reso's in action but that's why I was asking about the dmg comparison to try and offset that a little.

I was getting HMP/cinders to maybe make an Almace because I know how good it is for the job, which is exactly why I see so many people with the thing. But unlike my Calad, which I had made back when abyssea was actually new/coming out with the new updates, I don't have Almace or Rag fully made yet, so that is less time/money used in the upgrading process. Plus I'm currently in the process of finishing the Aeonic for BLU anyway, and having one REMA sword is good enough for me atm.

Anything special Ignominy burgeonet +1 gives over the NQ AF1 helm for souleater?

I guess you need to fulltime the helm during souleater so having one with actual stats is good?

That's right, the bonus is only active while it's equipped.

I use it with my dacnomania blood weapon build, not worth it for standard apoc use imo

Any advice for someone returning to DRK regarding where to start with sets?

Haven't really used it since Neo Nyzul days, but I've got an unaugmented set from Yorcia Skirmish that I got from gearing THF at the time and a Ragnarok (granted it's not even 99 at this point so probably not worth the effort to i119 it?)

I've had a quick look at this thread but I'm still not sure what direction I should really be going in. Scythe/GS etc.

Ragnarok is one of the strongest weapons in the game, as for choice of scythe vs GS. That is up to you. I have seen impressive numbers with both weapon types. GS will win in dmg, but scythe is no slouch.

I would appreciate that very much since I also find this thread outdated and information on gear sets is now scarce as most career DRK's have also retired.

I've recently come back to the game this August after a 3 year hiatus, plenty of things have changed. Mind you the last time I played, Voidwatch was the main focus and people were making their Bandwagnarok's.

One of the biggest changes I've found that quite annoys me really is that you seemingly can't build an aftermath set for a regular i119 Apoc anymore as most equipment slots have haste in them. =/ (Unless someone else out there has a set I can use as a reference?)

Until I finish AG'ing my Apoc, I feel like I am gimping myself during aftermath. Also to note, to those with AG Apoc, how much time in seconds does the Haste 10% translate to towards your JA's?

Last but not least, I used to script my own gear sets for windower but notice that there's such a thing as lua now. Can someone explain to me the basics and how to make it work? Also, does anybody update KParser's memloc anymore or is there a new parser out?

Thanks for all future responses. I look forward in reading them! :)