Dark Knight: The Mage Frontier

[Tan]

Alright this thread is kinda out there and I'm sure that I will get a lot of people saying "Wtf are you thinking?" but its an actual desire of mine to mess around with a casting "mage" type DRK and see what I can do with it.

Particularly I wanted to see if I couldn't solo some random NM's by DoT kiting (since I have W.legs) or if this job couldn't be useful in Dynamis on Statues, or on other mobs where physical damage is relatively ineffective like Jailer of Fortitude.

My main job is PLD and like 5 other DD jobs so I'm lacking the majority of magery gear like HQ staves, torques etc. But I'm mainly just curious as to what people would suggest for gear slots as theres probably a lot of stuff I'm overlooking.

I know most of my enfeebles probably aren't going to stick vs anything extremely high level so if I do solo or attempt to solo any mobs I'll primarily be using Stun/Pathing issues to get ahead of mobs and stay alive.

Yes, I know this isn't too practical and I'm in the process of leveling RDM to do this type of stuff, but I was really interested in seeing if I couldn't pull this off.

And if you don't have anything useful to say don't bother posting because I'm not interested. Primarily I'm looking for critical suggestions of gear, merits, technique etc. and also any input or experience from anyone else who might have tried to pull this off.

I'm probably looking for a few different casting sets and an idle set. Anything I have an * next to I don't have and probably will invest in or attempt to obtain as necessary.

Proposed Weapons of Mass Destruction
Bio 2
Drain
Drain 2
Tier 2 Nukes
Bind
Sleep
Poison II

Heres my current gear or proposed current gear sets:
Also note that some pieces could likely be replaced by HQ things for better results:

Idle/Kiting Set
Main: Terra's Staff
Sub: Bugard's Strap +1*
Ammo: Phantom Tathlum*
Head: None
Neck: Parade Gorget or Orochi Nodowa* (Depending on what I need)
Earring: ?
Earring: Ethereal Earring (In case I get hit)
Body: Vampire's Cloak (Ares would be better but thats a long ways off)
Hands: Askar Manopolas
Ring: Jelly Ring
Ring: ?
Back: Boxer's Mantle
Waist: Swift Belt
Legs: Blood Cuisses
Feet: Askar Gambieras

Drain/Dark Set:
Main: Dark Staff (Pluto's is the obvious Upgrade)
Sub: Bugard's Staff +1*
Ammo: Phantom Tathlum*
Head: Homam Zucchetto (Drain Set) or AF Helm (Dark Set)
Neck: Dark Torque* or Lt. Gorget* (Would Lt. Gorget be worthwhile?)
Earring: Phantom Earring* (Are INT + earrings going to provide any benefit for a drain set?)
Earring: Dark Earring*, (Abyssal Earring would be best but I have Knight's)
Body: Corselet*
Hands: Relic Hands*
Ring: (Are INT rings worth it?)
Ring: ?
Back: Abyss Cape* or Merciful Cape* (Which would be best overall? Obviously Merciful would be good for Bio if I hit a tier w/ it, but is it necessary?)
Waist: Forest Rope* or Swift Belt?
Legs: Relic Legs*
Feet: ?

Bind/Sleep Set (Heres where my personal ideas/choices get a little shady)
Main: Ice Staff (Bind), Dark Staff (Sleep)
Sub: Bugards Strap +1*
Ammo: Phantom Tathlum*
Head: Homam Zucchetto
Neck: Enfeebling Torque*
Earring: Phantom Earring*
Earring: Phantom Earring*
Body: Corselet*
Hands: Homam Manopolas (For Haste?)
Rings: Diamond Ring*
Ring: Diamond Ring*
Back: Abyss Cape*
Waist: Forest Rope* or Swift Belt
Legs: Homam Cosciales (For Haste?)
Feet: Relic Boots*

Nuking Set
Main: Appropriate Staff
Sub: Bugard Strap +1*
Ammo: Phantom Tathlum
Head: Homam Zucchetto
Neck: U.Pendant*
Earring: Moldavite Earring
Earring: Phantom Earring*
Body: Relic Body*
Hands: Relic Hands* or V.Mufflers*?
Ring: Diamond Ring*
Ring: Diamond Ring*
Back: Abyssal Cape*
Waist: Forest Rope*
Legs: Askar Dirs
Feet: ?

Haste Set
Head: W.turban
Hands: Homam Manopolas
Ring: Blitz Ring*
Waist: Swift Belt
Legs: Homam Cosciales
Feet: Homam Gambieras

Potential Subjob Choices?
/PLD - This was what I was thinking as my kiting SJ, simply for the Auto-Refresh and the Sentinel incase I need to get hit while I'm getting a head start. Cures are an added benefit if Drains are down.

/BLM - Don't really see this being that useful besides the MAB and Elemental Seal as DRK gets access to pretty much all the spells a 37BLM does. Although the conserve MP would be handy vs other SJs.

/SCH - Probably the SJ of choice for kited fights (where I'm not doing the kiting) and or for Dynamis. Sublimation for keeping the MP filled. Also allows the option to heal (if needed) and provides access to things like Dispel, unas and Conserve MP, and also Max MP Boost. Changing from Dark Arts to Light Arts if I was curing would be annoying though.

/RDM - An alternative kiting SJ and maybe even instead of /SCH as you can do everything a SCH does but you get Gravity and Phalanx, and also access to cures without having to change Arts.

/NIN - Another alternative kiting job, primary benefits would be shadows.

Potential Merits
(Not much you can do here besides meriting magic skills)5/5 Dark Seal is the obvious one.
Elemental Magic, Enfeebling Magic and Dark Magic would be others.


Disclaimer: I apologize for spelling and or stupid choices of gear but it was late (yada yada yada). Again if this seems weird, it probably is and its probably not the most useful application of a job (You could ask why not level BLM or bring a BLM instead of a casting DRK) but I simply don't see myself leveling BLM for this but will eventually get RDM to 75, however this is a kinda in the mean time and also for other DRK's out there who might have an interested in pulling something off like this.

Anyways, as I said before I listed all these gear choices, advice, suggestions are appreciated and desired, DRK can't do this, don't bother trying etc. comments are unecessary as it won't prevent me from atleast attempting this.

Many thanks and let the replies roll~

[wyred]

You make me sad

Update:
Apologies to the threadstarter for the above comment.
Playing PLD more now and I must've lost my passion for DRK.

[rydiu]

this is bad and you should feel bad.

[Therin]

I've done a lot of solo and duo sky/sea with DRK/NIN, all you need is a Pluto's Staff, some Dark magic skill gear (Crimson hands, AF legs, Torque, AF1+1 head), two sources of Refresh (Parade Gorget and Plastron or Ares's Cuirass) and Crimson Cuisses (the big item).

Despot solo, Ulli solo, Faust duo, Zipacna duo, Genbu duo, Olla duo, Ix'DRK duo, Jailer of Fortitude duo and so on. DRK/NIN can also solo a lot of the new kitable ZNMs. That's about the extent of it, though.

And for the record, don't nuke on DRK, ever.

[Tricen]

Still kind of makes me wonder why SE gave DRK nukes in the first place... Probably because they gave PLD Banish and Holy... >_>. SE should give DRK warp. At lv37. :3

[fishstix]

I exp'd as drk/blm.... in 2004 xD

but yeah, a drk solo'd the marid with dot and crimson also

[orson]

You make me sad

this is bad and you should feel bad.

This forum is for asking questions or discussing certain aspects of the game. That means that a topic that is generally more of a personal kind can be posted here without fear of being shot down in the advanced section. Let me make this clear, from this point on, if you are caught trolling in this section you will be punished. I have asked the moderators of the forums to keep a very close eye on this section because it's getting out of hand. If you can not read this section of the forums without being nasty, don't even click it. (That means if you are going to respond to a post in this section, that you can not simply say that you didn't read it, stop crying, or start name calling.) We are very lenient in the advanced section regarding this, but not here.

To be honest worst part is this guy is actually being serious and making for an interesting discussion. Drk has good potential at soloing things and he's not saying go mage it up in merit parties or some crap. Obviously there's some stuff he's not familiar with like how drain/aspir spells best improved but overall it's a legitimate post.

To the OP though. Dark magic is about the only one that you'll reliably be wanting to use and stacking Pluto's Staff + Dark Magic gear is the most important thing. Int and MAB don't really seem to help drain spells. As for sub job given that Stun, Bio, Drain, and Aspir are going to be the only reliable spells you have subbing a mage job wouldn't be that great. Stick with /Nin unless you could mitigate enough damage to make /Dnc an option. The beauty of solo though is that it's your call if you really think that Sch or something along those lines will work better you're not really risking anything except your own exp. Like Therion said refresh and +movement items are exceptionally useful for trying to solo.

[RKenshin]

What Orson said, you're in the wrong section if you want to poke fun at people's ideas or questions without even adding anything meaningful to the topic.

If you don't like the idea and have nothing useful to add, then don't post, simple as that.

Disagreeing is fine, but not mocking with no reason.

And with that said I think that DRK can do well mimic-ing a RDM type solo'er, as Therin exemplified. Obviously it's not nearly as effective as RDM, but it's a lot better than most people probably give it credit for.

[Ophannus]

drks started with elemental nukes first when FFXI was released. Absorbs were added later on a few months latr once they relized the immense suckiness that is elemental magic without magic attack bonus traits.

[Kaddisfly]

If you're ever in the position to do so, pick up some MAB gear. I remember a couple members in an old LS of mine just toying around, one was a NIN the other a DRK both loading up on as much INT/MAB as possible and duoing some things mage style.

I wish I still had the screenshots but both of them were using elemental spells (NIN obviously elemental ninjitsu) and were hitting for respectable amounts of damage.

O.P., I suggest you give this a shot and post your results, I know I for one am interested as I'm always interested in seeing "outside of the box" ideas and tests. Good luck on it!

[Tan]

O.P., I suggest you give this a shot and post your results, I know I for one am interested as I'm always interested in seeing "outside of the box" ideas and tests. Good luck on it!

Thanks this was really what I was trying to do. This game has been out for such a long time and it really seems that everything "original" has been played out, tested, beaten out, cried over, rejected, etc. A casting DRK job and a casting NIN job are really two things I haven't seen explored and were curious to try. I'll give it a shot and if its a horrible horrible flop, well some people expected that but if I can pull something cool off I'll post it here (ZNM Marid is not cool so don't expect that lol).

As to Therin "Don't ever nuke on DRK" why do you say that? It seems that they have singificant access to a shitton of MAB gear, and Tier II nukes are relatively damage/mp efficient in my opinion. I know when I was trioing Ix'drk w/ RDM RDM PLD, one RDM was doing tier 3's 375~ the other was doing tier 2's 200~ so it seemed to boil down to the same damage/mp. I guess more or less I'm wondering if with a total of 27MAB from gear, the +15/15% from a HQ Staff, Obi Effect as needed, /RDM (+20MAB) or /BLM (+24MAB) and a B+ Elemental magic skill if a DRK couldn't put up some respectable numbers nuking (250~300+).

Also a question about Drain damage and resists. Dark magic skill is the primary goto item, but how much MACC would trump an a Dark magic slot. i.e. Abyss Cape vs Augmenting Cape etc. And whats the skill tier for max damage on Bio II?

[Callisto]

You should've lotted that Dark Grip last night.

At any rate I believe the highest tier for Bio II is 291ish skill(8/tick I think?), should be very easy for a DRK to hit.

Other little things, for rings on Drain/Aspir, I don't remember if you had Uthalam's or w/e already, but Balrahn's + whatever that MAcc+2 ring from Chigre is would be your best bet. Swift Belt for recast all the way on Drain/Aspir.

For the feet slot on nukes/debuffs I'd have to look up what's out there later, but I'd be inclined to say Wood M Ledelsens. Enfeebling/Elemental Earrings over one of the Phantoms. V. Mufflers all the way. Aside from that I'll look at more shit later and see what's out there, work filters b& BGWiki now

Edit: Get a Corselet so I can borrow it for my PLD nuking build!

[Tsuko_Asura]

I've done a lot of solo and duo sky/sea with DRK/NIN, all you need is a Pluto's Staff, some Dark magic skill gear (Crimson hands, AF legs, Torque, AF1+1 head), two sources of Refresh (Parade Gorget and Plastron or Ares's Cuirass) and Crimson Cuisses (the big item).

Despot solo, Ulli solo, Faust duo, Zipacna duo, Genbu duo, Olla duo, Ix'DRK duo, Jailer of Fortitude duo and so on. DRK/NIN can also solo a lot of the new kitable ZNMs. That's about the extent of it, though.

And for the record, don't nuke on DRK, ever.

Absolutely not trying to be a dick, but I don't really think some of those belong up there. Faust, Zipacna, Olla - You were able to duo those because of the RDM.

But, to add to the list, Genbu and Ix'MNK should be easily soloed, and Ix'DRK should be just as easy if you have someone to strip the adds of you.

[Callisto]

I meant to add that as well, but Tan's seen me deal with Zip enough and fail to Bind Faust enough to know better than to try it on DRK, lol. Despot is still entirely plausible, assuming you get an Aquilo's and some Enfeebling gear.

Add: Actually I think Olla would be possible as well, albeit a stupidly long fight. Bio II + gtfo, stun if it tries to catch you in a teleporter room w/ an -aga.

[sleekmotorwurkz]

Ive always kind of wondered this myself, (not enough to even look up comparisions between drk elemental skill vs rdm or whatever) But I started thinking about it when I saw the drk znm marid solo. I wasnt going out for an all out nuking build but just what i use now.

Suggestion though. If you are serious about elemental nukes, get the elemental obis. Right now I only have dark obi because thats all I use. I would stick with relic hands over v. mufflers because chances are no matter how much you stack, you'll still get resists.

All in all, I think it would be fun to toy around with, but I dont have the motivation. DRK/NIN can tank pretty much anything a pld can without sentinel or invincible. They can also dot-kite anything a rdm can without needing to stick gravity to live. Its just not as efficient, so ive never bothered. If we have rdms and plds available why bother (in my opinion).
That, and it would probably take longer to solo anything worthwile on drk then it would to level rdm to 75.

[Antec]

Also for enfeebling, I would use your AF body for enfeebling skill+5.

[Kaddisfly]

Tan and Callisto I assume you are both on Ramuh. Hit me up in game sometime wouldn't mind teaming up and comparing some parsing results on some of these odd-ball combonations.

[Tan]

Also for enfeebling, I would use your AF body for enfeebling skill+5.

Shit why did I drop that lol. Enfeebling Skill +5 vs 7 MACC then? Basically AF Body vs Corselet.

[Callisto]

Shit why did I drop that lol. Enfeebling Skill +5 vs 7 MACC then? Basically AF Body vs Corselet.

That's debatable, but I'd take 7 MAcc over 5 skill.



And I'm totally not saying that b/c I want you to get a Corselet to lend me.

[Khrno]

Only 'big' NM that I've actually soloed kiting is the Marid znm (yea I know It's a joke), but I've duoed many stuff with rdms, as far as you can keep your MP up (Aspir or Auto-Refresh), Drain/II and Bio II are awesome, that's all you need, besides Stun, if it's possible or needed, Abs-TP so you can run in pull hate to make mob stop SE + Guillo and run away.

That's a quick method to take IxMNK down in about 10-15 min. Oh yea and dread Spikes, but that just before any attempt to SE Guillo, if not it is just a waste of MP.