The Definitive Dark Knight Guide

[Aiurily]

if you pot>plunge you're gonna miss a GCD for your pot because of plunge animation delay

if your MT is pulling with tank stance/shadewalker then might as well do something like this

da>unmend right after your MT tomahawks>str pot>scourge>salt+bw>1>c&s+da>2>plunge>3>dp>1>low>2>da>3>pot off>1>bw off

vid on opener

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sRjzaEX4tM

pros
2 dark arts souleaters buffed by str pot
everything in your kit is buffed by str pot. scourge, salted earth, c&s, plunge, low blows, dark passenger, all the good stuff, buffed by +10%~ more damage.
plunge, because its after the 4th gcd, is buffed by slash debuff

cons
you don't do unmend>plunge to the target; but not really a big deal; go compare how long it takes for you to walk to the boss from unmend range, compared to how fast plunge takes you there (after its long animation delay for startup) both ways, you ride your GCD anyway
using salted earth with another oGCD in the same GCD can be awkward

[Violette]

@Above: Love the opener, similar to my own as OT. Have you done much testing for unmend>potion+plunge>scourge? I can't pull it off with my latency, but I think/wish it can be done.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

I'm sorry to revive this somewhat aged thread, but I'm making a thread myself and want to ask you guys a couple of questions.

How does a Dark Knight overcome it's weaknesses through its own abilities?
What makes a Dark Knight different from the other tanks in terms of philosophy and ability implementation?


EDIT: Keep in mind this is an "at a glance" description that I need and it needs to be clear and concise.

[Violette]

I'm sorry to revive this somewhat aged thread, but I'm making a thread myself and want to ask you guys a couple of questions.

How does a Dark Knight overcome it's weaknesses through its own abilities?
What makes a Dark Knight different from the other tanks in terms of philosophy and ability implementation?


EDIT: Keep in mind this is an "at a glance" description that I need and it needs to be clear and concise.

http://pastebin.com/fustXj3R

Had to put it in pastebin as even at a glance explaining it so people could understand was well over 2000 characters.

[Shining_Tiger_Excalibur]

http://pastebin.com/fustXj3R

Had to put it in pastebin as even at a glance explaining it so people could understand was well over 2000 characters.

Thank you VERY much for this.

[Freyyy]

snip

For your first question, I guess DRK's weakness is its lack of physical mitigation against an eventual physical tank buster (which currently doesn't exist in Savage but could be implemented for the next set of raids), which can be compensated with proper use of Reprisal and Dark Dance alongside their other universal CDs (Shadow Wall and Shadowskin), making their physical mitigation not that far below PLD in reality because they basically only lack Sheltron, Reprisal playing Rage of Halone's role and Dark Dance playing a weaker Bulwark role with more uptime. They also have a very good self-sustain against common damage like auto-attacks with Souleater and they shine when it comes to mitigate magical damage as they are the strongest tank for that thanks to Dark Mind. Their raid utility is quite non-existent if there is a MNK in the party but their awesome DPS while MTing is also raid utility in some way.

For your second question, what makes Dark Knight different is definitely its MP management mechanic. While not that hard to master, it's still a unique trait they get which defines their gameplay. It's also very fast-paced with a lot of offensive abilities to weave in between your GCDs, and even more when you pop Blood Weapon (which increases your attackspeed). Its gameplay can feel similar to a PLD in some fashion but it's a whole different approach. It's more offensive, more aggressive and also more complex. Where PLD feels like they're ready to jump between the enemy and an ally to protect him using its body as a shield, DRK feels more like they're ready to jump ON the enemy to outright kill it before it even gets the chance to hurt his ally. They feel like two opposite sides of the same coin.

DRK also has a unique feeling when it comes to taking damage. A DRK likes taking damage as it results in him benefitting from it for its abilities. Whether it's a physical attack that you can eventually parry to get a low blow proc or use Reprisal, or just any attack with blood price on which makes you gain MP for each hit you receive. The more often a DRK gets hit, the more power he can obtain. I think it's pretty representative of how Dark Knights were sacrificing their own HPs in order to deal more damage in older FF games. Here you just benefit from being hit. You like pain. You enjoy it.

[Linkan]

Hello there, I plan to start doing A1S with my FC soon and I'd like to know what's the minimum ilvl required to MT and OT it?

Also, I feel my vit is too low for having all those str acessories. Right now, I sit around 14700 HP unbuffed (ilvl 188), Also, all my points went to str instead of vit. If I swap it to Vit I believe i'd reac 15300 HP (16000 in a party).

What should I do? My HP is too low? Should I move points from str to vit?
Thank you in advance.

[Violette]

Hello there, I plan to start doing A1S with my FC soon and I'd like to know what's the minimum ilvl required to MT and OT it?

Also, I feel my vit is too low for having all those str acessories. Right now, I sit around 14700 HP unbuffed (ilvl 188), Also, all my points went to str instead of vit. If I swap it to Vit I believe i'd reac 15300 HP (16000 in a party).

What should I do? My HP is too low? Should I move points from str to vit?
Thank you in advance.

Alright, for A1S you will be hit 3 times by a move called Hypercompressed Plasma, which will deal 25000 damage(ish) unmitigated. In these, you will always have 20% + 20% + 30% reductions, along with Delirium (int down) and for 2 of them you will have a further 30% from Shadow Wall.

This translates to being hit for between 7-11k each hit (dependant on lack of shadow wall), which can be followed by a crit auto attack which can hit for upwards of 5k (ilvl195 and one hit me for 5.6k last night).

What does his mean for your health pool?

It means your safety is just above 16k health in a party with food, to survive all mechanics as long as your healers aren't goofing around.

Now, currently I equip several slaying accessories and have all 35 points in Strength, which along with my large amount of ilvl200 gear and my 2 fending accessories (prototype ring/bracelet), in party with food puts me at 16.5k hp, which is plenty for this figt.

So what I recommend to check your hp in party with food, then adjust it till your health is at the 16.3-16.8k zone. For learning, having more health is never bad and when you're feeling safe and your healers are knowledgeable on the mechanics is when I suggest moving your health down to 16.5kish. However, anything lower than 16k is asking for death on multiple occasions.


Hope this helps!

[Linkan]

It does! Thank you!

[Disc]

I'm not a fan of using Shadow Wall on the first & third Plasmas. I prefer using Shadow Wall right after the first set of adds die & before the Gunnery Pod & Royal Fount go off.(to keep Grit off until second set of adds spawn) You should never take more than about 11k damage, so any VIT gear or shielding from the healers will keep you safe. I usually go 2STR/3VIT/Full STR attributes until content is on farm, I don't ever put on more VIT than that unless healers are noticeably struggling or ask.