Help, I can't play my job!

[Mirage]

Oh cheers, I'll start investing in those. I'll go pick up a new peeler and start making another dagger. The level 99 one though is a bit out of my budget at the moment though, I'll have to make do with 2x evasion kilkas.

Two eva kilas will probably be fine too. At the max upgrade level, those daggers have just 1 dmg less than the Aluh Jamiya, although the Aluh also has more str and attack. With two of those daggers, you will also have a lot more evasion, but for abyssea use, it will probably be overkill to use two eva kilas when the rest of your gear is up to date and your skill is capped. At that point, you should probably use some other dagger instead of one of them.

Additionally, you should also consider maxing out str merits to increase your damage. Merit Haste Samba too, to get 10% haste when using it. That will speed up damage dealt, TP gain, and also make you skill up those daggers faster.

Also, which atmas are you using, and do you have evisceration unlocked? Exactly how high are your dagger and evasion skills?

[geekgirl101]

Wow, thank you Asymptotic! That's a lot to read on, I'm gonna bookmark that page. Thanks so much. ^^

[geekgirl101]

Also, which atmas are you using, and do you have evisceration unlocked?

Haven't got any atmas yet and currently working on unlocking evisceration. So much to work on, ugh.

[Mirage]

Ok. For atmas, the priority list for dnc (and just about every other melee job) is something like this:

1. Razed Ruins - Very big damage boost, that's about it.
(Dex+50, crit rate +30%, crit damage +30%)

2. Gnarled Horn - Medium damage boost, high survivability boost from counter and agility
(Counter +10%, agility +50 (i think), crit rate 20%)

3. Atma of Apocalypse - Increased damage and TP gain from TA, quick magic occasionally saves your ass with utsusemi recast, and auto-reraise lets you just keep going even if you accidentally die.
(Triple attack +15%, Quick Magic +10%, Auto-reraise)

4. Sanguine Scythe - Big HP boost makes big-damage attacks safer to deal with, increases damage dealt considerably when combined with RR and GH atmas. Enmity boost makes it a bit easier to hold hate.
(+20% HP, crit damage boost, and enmity gain boost.)

If you see anyone talking about getting any of these, drop everything you've got in your hands and join them. Especially if it's Razed Ruins, because people don't fight that NM as often as the others.

Keep in mind that you can't get AoA without having all zone bosses and catuare kills complete.

Of course, these aren't all the atmas you'll ever need, but for seal NM farming, I basically use three out of those 4 all the time.

Additionally, if you're going to tank an NM with another mage doing yellow procs, make sure that you have the Ni-version of the elemental ninjutsu spells, so that you can cover the nin procs, while the mage (BLM usually) covers most others.

[Byrth]

If you have some friends and want an adventure, you could try doing the 4 Salvage zone bosses to get access to "Atma of the Dark Depths" too:
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/bg/Atma_of_the_Dark_Depths
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/bg/Silver_Sea_Remnants_Guide
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/bg/Arrapago_Remnants_Guide
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/bg/Zhayolm_Remnants_Guide
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/bg/Bhaflau_Remnants_Guide

[Nawesemo]

1. Cap skill (takes asmuch effort as time) but is priority 1 if you want to do what the cool dnc do.

2. Play the job a lot, find out what works, try others sugestions, make up your own mind given any situation.

This game takes a lot of time. Time sink quests for moderate gains, but all of the moderate, add to a significant gain. Slowly but surly, but does take time... From chocobo licenses, to +10 to all stat abysites for Abby,.... But cap them skills. You'll see a huge difference in survivability.huge.

[Arcon]

I really wouldn't recommend evasion daggers at all. I have to admit I'm not as familiar with DNC as others, so feel free to correct me if you know better, but once evasion is capped (and it will cap, very fast) you'll rarely need an Evasion set at all for most mobs. When you do, you can replace some other slots with evasion gear that will be less of a drawback than missing out on two (potentially) great daggers. There's good evasion gear for several slots that will not impact as negatively on your performance as daggers, and you can switch between them and DD gear at any time without TP loss.

If you do Magian daggers, go for STR Thokchas. You can also do just one of those and get an Aluh Jambiya. It costs a lot, but that's just a few Dynamis runs worth of farming, way less than what it would take you to make a second Magian dagger, even with your skills and gear. Go do Dynamis and get a great dagger out of the money you'll make.

[Raksha]

I really wouldn't recommend evasion daggers at all. I have to admit I'm not as familiar with DNC as others, so feel free to correct me if you know better, but once evasion is capped (and it will cap, very fast) you'll rarely need an Evasion set at all for most mobs.

Sure but when you have basically no gear, no atmas, and uncapped skills, 2 evasion daggers is gonna be the shit.
The biggest reason to do evasion daggers over STR (for someone just starting out) is that they are super fast to make. I finished both of mine in a single weekend (up to geode stage).

So in conclusion I very much recommend getting at least one EVA dagger in your current situation.

[Mirage]

You're right in that at level 99 with capped eva and merits, a dnc won't need eva daggers all that much. Dnc does have less evasion than both nin and thf though, so I'm pretty sure it could help evade certain TP moves more easily. Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't many TP moves have an accuracy bonus?

It's still nice to have one of them though. Who knows what the future holds? Might be some enemies added in the new expansion that you can't cap evasion on as easily.

Also, for someone who doesn't have a lot of money (like i think is the case with this person), a fire path dagger is gonna cost a lot more money than a wind path.

[Byrth]

DNC has less evasion than THF (depending on gear) and more than NIN. I would also recommend making one Eva dagger because your sub slot is often the best place to trade stats for Evasion in the rare situations where you need it.

Before you make anything, though, go cap your skills. You don't need good weapons to skill up (the worse the better really) and they will make everything you do on DNC more efficient. You can probably do it by fighting EM-T crabs in Grauberg even without Atmas. Just get cruor buffs and keep yourself alive with Waltz.