Warrior An Updated Guide to Dark Knights

Edit#1million: This is an absolute boomer guide, aged poorly with much saltiness over the state of DKs. As of September 2024, DK is a fine class to make and there's solid hope for the upcoming balance changes. You can click the next spoiler if you want to drink delicious old DK tears, feel free to point and laugh at the sad clown as you make your new and improved DK as you look back at how things were.

I won't tell you much of what's written is still accurate, it's been too long and I don't even feel like rereading it. All I know is that the first spoiler is inaccurate now

Spoiler: Important note for anyone who wishes to create an endgame character

As of September of 2022, there are classes that you shouldn't make if your concern is in reaching late-game. At the top of the list is the Dark Knight, as it has fundamental flaws that either make them useless in most content or else mule-able for their niche. If you aren't concerned with going beyond level 150 or so, then ignore this message, but for those who do want a long term character I recommend looking into anything other than DKs.

They have been terrible choices for over a year and I don't see that changing in the future either. Please take my advice and roll almost anything else.

Spoiler: AP Distribution

Spearman like hitting stuff with big sticks. Longer sticks than the other classes of warriors. Strength makes you hit stuff harder. You like strength. Dex makes you hit stuff accurately. You kinda like dex. Int gives you more MP which you could magically turn into more HP. You're confused by int.

For rolling your initial level 1 stats, I'd recommend going for 10 int and 4 luk, str and dex can really be any numbers. I'd recommend the 10 int because I strongly recommend to HP wash your DK, it's not fun to realize you can't damage a boss effectively because they will 1ko you if you zerk, so the goal will be 18,750 HP by some future point, covered in the guide later. The 10 int is to get free MP right away, and the 4 luk to not have to reset.

After that invest mostly in strength. If you suck at hitting stuff and have no moneys, invest in dex. If you want to hoard HP and have no moneys get some int.

Most people cap around 40-60 dex if they're playing casually. 40 int is usually where people stop investing in int, with this number they get 4 more mp per level, which can be changed into 52 hp. But people do get more int by getting gear that gives int, and wearing it when they level.

I started out with decent amounts of dex and with good amounts of funding. There's no shame in having dex or int, the damage you lose is sort of marginal. If you're having trouble hitting something, switch to an accuracy piece of gear over an attack piece, and if you're still having trouble then add more dex when you level. It's not necessary to overthink it like some people do, all it does is add a bit to the total AP reset cost. Eventually vote cash didn't matter to me, and I could reset however I wanted.

Spoiler: The beginning ~ 10-30

I hope you know how to get to level 10. Honestly I'm disappointed in you, reader, for even clicking this section, for taking so long to discover the virtues of letting your life descend into 2003 mushroom game. I also hope you have enough sense to put points into max HP increase first, because it helps save yourself a few washes. By the time you're level 15 and have the HP skill maxed you should have just shy of 600 HP. After that, Slash Blast is preferable over Power Strike, mobbing is always much better exp. Or mix it up. Really it doesn't matter much in the few hours it takes to reach level 30. I'm pretty sure everyone knows this stuff by now, but here's a skill order:
5 Improved HP Recovery
10 Improved Max HP Increase
20 Slash Blast
20 Power Strike
6 whatever you feel like, it really doesn't matter

Spoiler: Pole-arm vs. Spear: Levels 30-70

Here is where things get a little more interesting. Spears deal 5x primary-stat damage when stabbing, and 3x primary-stat damage when swinging. Pole-arms do the opposite, their swing is stronger. But, with both spears and pole-arms you will be swinging the weapon 60% of the time and stabbing 40% of the time. This means that a pole-arm with the exact same stats will deal on average 10.5% more damage during your first and second jobs. From your third job onward, you control whether you swing or stab, so that fixes those issues.

Frankly there's more of an FM factor to whether you choose to use spears or pole-arms first once you hit level 30. Maybe you find a decently cheap Maplemas Tree and a Fishing Pole in the FM, then you should invest in spears first. Their speed makes up for the slight edge in damage that pole-arms have as they are Fast(5). Most of the speedier pole-arms are still 1 bit slower, at Normal(6), and they include a large number of common items such as snowboards, surfboards, roses, and the Guan Yu Pole Arm. Pole-arm scrolls are also generally considered junk, making them cheap, and making their higher damage even easier to achieve for a newer player. Personally, I've used pole-arms for everything until 4th job, and I only started to use spears when I began bossing and had enough damage to 1ko mobs. Overall, the choice doesn't matter much levels 30-60 but after that point it's important to invest in a pole-arm for your third job grinding. For SP it's pretty simple, invest in either spear or pole-arm, max HB, then max the other.
19 Spear/Pole-arm mastery
6/11/20 booster, depending on your patience level
3 Iron Will
30 Hyper Body
Finish booster/1 last SP in your original mastery/20 in the other weapon's mastery
20 in the other skills booster
8 SP in anything other than either final attack

Spoiler: Level 70-90: The smackening

Congratulations on making it to level 70. This has given you a wonderful power: The ability to control whether or not you smack your enemies or poke them. It's a scientific breakthrough that took your character too long to figure out.

You'll probably want Dragon Fury: Pole-arm as your first skill. It'll be useful earlier than Spear Crusher and there is a very noticeable range difference between the two skills. Dragon Fury: Pole-arm affects a very wide area and it is wonderful for killing the masses of mobs you'll find in the common training spots. Because of this you'll want to be using a Maple Karstan, Blood Snowboard, or a Maple Snowboard, but the Maple Karstan is preferred for the accuracy that it gives.

As for when Dragon Fury: Pole-arm outdoes Slash Blast, it's with level 5 Dragon Fury: Pole-arm. At level 4, which you should reach at level 71, it deals ~97.6% of the damage Slash Blast does. But you like flashy things so you're probably gonna use your new skill anyway. Also the numbers will be much more consistent.

You can really only make the argument that Spear Crusher is useful levels 11-15, where it's pretty mediocre damage, or levels 26-30, where it becomes actually good. It's a lot of levels to wait for a skill and it makes for a pretty mediocre leveling experience 70-79, so Pole-Arms are the more efficient choice for training.

In comparison Dragon Fury: Pole-arm is useable at level 71 and deals massive damage by the time it's maxed.

The alternative build order is to go Dragon Roar first, but the rather short range of it in the early levels make it rather difficult to use at CDs. I can't remember the exact level where the range can hit CDs, but it's roughly around level 20, or perhaps more, so you'd be dead in the water if you want to use it to train until level ~78 or so. It's also viable to go some Dragon Fury before investing in Dragon Roar fully, without losing too much damage, it just slows down the 70s a bit.

As to where you'll be training: CDs are the main spot, preferably in a party. You smack them to death, then they go and spawn more, further increasing the smacking potential. From the middle you're also able to use roar to agro the other sections and help pull them towards any partners you have, as a real DK bro.

If CDs are full there are other options as well, such as Mannequins just downstairs. They aren't the full meme farming machines they were in years prior, but they should lead to some good rates of exp.

There's also Wolf Spiders, but they're sort of beefy and hit hard, so it might be challenging. Windraiders and the Ghost Ship are other good options as well.

After getting my Pole-arm Fury up, the next investment went to probably my favorite skill: Dragon Roar

Spoiler: Level 90-120: Maple Scrolls 5: Revenge of the Dovahkiin: 3D

As you've killed millions of mobs, you've walked on the carcasses of so many dead bodies, plants, mushrooms, magically living merchandise, and you've probably noticed something that's becoming more and more apparent: I can't get much more than 6-7 million exp per hour here. That, my friend, is a tragedy.

There is good news however, as you are a descendant of the Nords, a true son of Skyrim, and you are capable of using your voice to end their lives. It comes at a cost though, about a third of the blood in your body is generally expelled everytime you scream, and there is a good chance you may lose a lung in the process. Such is the power of your voice. There is an answer though: It comes in the shape of young supple priests. Young priests who are lost and alone, tired of playing ghostbusters on a staircase, with no real skills that don't involve buffing other people. Find these level 81-89 priests, and offer them a chance to join your genocide. The benefits for both of you will be bountiful.

Find a proper map, and SCREAM until everything is dead, until your priest is deaf, until you feel your essence leaving your body, until the pools of blood cause your boots to slip. Just hold that button down and have the priest hold their heal button down, as they should be good at that by now.

You'll want to loot the other layers every 3 minutes. This is when loot disappears. It's not actually that difficult to keep track of either, your Pole-arm booster lasts for 3 minutes and 20 seconds. When that skill is almost up, it's a visual reminder to go loot.

There are a couple spots where Dragon Roar is effective. The earlier spot is back at CDs, where you can stand in the middle and scream to your hearts content. As an old man, I haven't been able to test it here but I hear good things. Just be sure to share the loot with the priest, they are saving you loads of money for some fast exp.

If your little priest buddy is level 89 you can take them to Galloperas, and there is a safespot where they can heal you without getting hit. This spot is on the bottom layer, directly in the middle on a little staircase of a Targa statue[Or was it Scarlion?]. The DK stands on the top platform and screams their heart out, while the priest takes care of that pesky "attempting to commit suicide by screaming" problem. If the DK jumps down though, the magic attacks from the bottom gallos will knock the priest off. For this reason your priest should loot the bottom platform by just leaving their pet out.

Dragon Roar can probably be utilized elsewhere, but these are my two favorite spots. Maybe Ulu 2 could be good, but in the current climate it's unlikely you'll find a map.

Otherwise you can go to himes, with or without a priest, and the exp for both of you will be good. There's not a lot to it, gather them up in the middle and smack everything. Solid exp if you get the rhythm down.

Spoiler: 3rd job SP build

It's pretty straightforward.
Somewhere between 5 and 30 Dragon Fury: Pole-arm, depending on how much you want to scream
3 Sacrifice(Pre-req)
30 Dragon Roar
20 Elemental Resistance
30 Spear Crusher
30 Dragon Fury: Spear
11 Sacrifice

ELEMENTAL RESISTANCE IS A MUST! The damage reduction is huge for the attacks you'll later be tanking in Horntail, and without it there'll be much larger portions of the fight where you cannot rely on 15% pet pot, as the damage will be greater than 4500.

11 Sacrifice is fine for general usage later on, when you need to get into zerk range.

Power Crush works now. Is it needed? Ehhhhh, bishops have dispel which does the same thing. It's mostly useful in CWKPQ for getting rid of the Warrior's attack buff. For now you can pass on it, but if you ever find yourself no longer in need of a pole-arm you can reset into it. Or invest in it after level 19x+

And Dragon Blood is trash, it isn't even as good as Coke Zero Pills. Ignore it.

Spoiler: 4th job and beyond

The first few levels of 4th job are quite boring. It's difficult to reliably zerk at most normal places level 120-124 but it's doable at the softer spots like CDs if you want to return, which will likely bring you into 1ko range with your Purple Surfboard while you are low HP. You should also be a massive enough tank to use power elixers from mob drops though to pretty well completely sustain yourself on drops alone, so that's nice. Gallos are also fairly zerk friendly.

Another thing to do is to just enjoy the cathartic killing in Temple of Time. I did it slowly over time starting around level 100 and continued forward whenever I could 3ko the next mob. You can get off three attacks on these mobs before they're able to use their magic attack on you, so it's very easy to zerk here at lower levels and not get hit. It also makes for a great break from all the normal places. Rush seems to have a long cast time which causes mobs to cast before you can slay them, so for the most part I just killed whatever was in front of me and slowly learned about HP conservation and potting as a DrK.

Ravana is a solid boss to kill that Dark Knights are uniquely qualified to kill most of the time. The requirements are enough HP to use berserk at around 5500 HP, doing 10k lines for knockback, an alt or a friend to enter, and Sky Skis if you want it to be completely braindead. You can use slower weapons, but you'd have to Rush him more often and can't achieve a true pin.

Mechanically Ravana is a rather easy boss. He doesn't activate any of his attacking skills if he is facing right, his attacking skills are used either when he faces left or he is directly on top of you. It's because of this that you can just rush him into the left wall, and when he uses a non-attacking skill he gets pinned and will not be able to reach you. If he isn't pinned he will slowly approach you if you're using Sky Skis, and a little faster if you're using a slow spear. You can just jump back and rush him again if he gets close. Slapping him with Sky Skis will also pin him eventually, but the slaps need to be 10k damage which might be tough early on.

My Ravana kills look something like this:
buff > summon > rush > stab x100 > jump back and buff > rush > jump back and buff > rush > stab x100 > repeat everything until he's dead.

Doing this I don't get hit by Ravana. You can go the entire fight without using an HP pot if you understand the pin and his attacks. He drops some good weapons too. If you kill him daily you can expect to see 1.5-3mil in NPCables. If you're lucky you can find the Sunbursts to summon him in the FM for ~200-300k each as well.

Things start to open up after 129. If you have 25k HP after HB you can reliably Zerk at Bigfoot. Or if you're a brave boy you can zerk without enough HP.

It's fairly easy for Dark Knights to kill Bigfoot too. Lead him to one edge of the map, jump over him[When hopping over him, his bandaged toe is actually what you're trying to dodge, touch anything else besides his little piggy.] and rush him into the wall. From there simply attack him until he is dead, while tanking his new 2021 stomp attacks. Do this until he's dead.

Any weapon works for Bigfoot nowadays, there used to be certain methods of achieving a pin but they were removed. Once you know what you're doing you can go to Evil Dead and Evil Rising and kill Bigfoot there. The Elder Wraiths will pester you and bring you below 1ko range but once you've mastered the mechanics of Bigfoot you can just shrug it off and never get hit by him. The Soiled Rags and Elder Ashes make for decent extra profit too.

The best option for grinding late game is Shaolin Temple's 7f. It has some beefy boiz, with tons of HP and tons of exp. You should be able to hit the Silver boiz and the fish no problem, but the golden boiz require around 270 accuracy to hit 100% of the time. GM buffs are very helpful for this. Grinding solo is decent, it caps around ~35mil exp per hour, but if you're training with a partner you can reach 60mil+ exp per hour. That's even faster than leech for the most part. You just gotta git gud and have your partner git gud too.

Pole Arms are a great option at 7f. Their range and mobbing potential leads to about the same exp as spears, maybe even slightly better exp, but the effort you need to use their is nonexistent. You can just swing from the shelves and hit everything. Spear Crusher has a tiny range in comparison, and you have to get finicky with trying to train, rather than watch Netflix you lazy buffoon.

Skill build:
First 3 SP: 1 Rush, 1 Beholder, 1 Berserk
Max Berserk
Max Beholder [The bonus to weapon mastery is applied without Beholder actually being up, so you can just treat this as a passive +20% weapon mastery, a very nice damage boost.]
Max Stance
Max Maple Warrior or max Achilles or max Aura/Hex of the Beholder

Maple Warrior if you don't have another character with it, Achilles for taking less damage everywhere and making things less scary, and Aura for some decent healing. Aura of the Beholder doesn't put you above 55% of your HP which is nice. So that won't ruin your zerking and save a bit on pots. Hex is decent for free accuracy, but I still prefer Aura. From levels 21-25 on Hex of the Beholder you get a small attack buff of 3-15. It doesn't stack with anything, really it just replaces coke pills if you want to spend the SP there. Level 20 is still good accuracy, with some mediocre defense.

Ehhhh, at this point you're a big boy. After you get all of that it's all just preference anyways. Maybe Rush after that? Monster Magnet for Pink Bean? Other nonsense that doesn't matter?

Spoiler: Horntail

The big-ass spooky lizard. He can be a lot of fun and is some really solid exp for anyone level 155 and up. Like generally around 40mil exp for a 12 man run and like 75mil in a 6 man run. It makes him one of the main sources of exp later on and there's generally profit to be made by clearing him.

Dark Knights are always wanted, Hyper Body is always desired and the cleave damage for portions of the fight makes them a solid choice in any party. There are what I consider 4 sections of the fight, and they range in difficulty but for the most part Horntail isn't very challenging for most of the fight.

First things first: Before entering, set your pet-HP to 15% and remove your item pouch. To get 15%, set it to 0 and move your slider 3 increments up. Your pet should heal you when you reach 4500 HP now.

You'll want to use 40% pots for most of the fight, specifically the beginning and the end. I also use Triangular Sushi and Ice Cream Pops to heal 6k and 2k HP when I recognize there's some sort of danger.

Mana Burn is a big enemy. I use Sorcerer Elixirs because of how they stack to 150 but I tend to use a ton of them. You'll also want mana pots on a keybind because pet-mp doesn't like to trigger when it's the mana-burn attack that reduces the MP, it needs to be a skill.

You'll also want some all-cures.

On an average Horntail run, I will use ~250 Ginseng Roots, ~100 Triangular Sushi, ~50 Ice Cream, ~500 Sorcerer Elixirs, and ~50 all-cures. Depending on strategy/party composition, you could be using a lot more so these are the very minimum you should plan to use. If you have 2 runs, bring at least three times these numbers to stay safe.

With all of this, you are ready to fight.

Preheads
These are mostly a cakewalk. They generally don't deal more than 3-4k damage but they do have 1/1 attacks. They aren't really a danger to you and your HP generally stays full if your pet is doing his job right. I never really feel like my life is in danger.

The first person who enters the maps is the target of HT's seduce.

If you think they're boring then you are doing them lazily. Gotta turn off your Stance to keep it interesting :^) You can dodge just about every 1/1 that comes your way, and with an input buffer you can prevent yourself from falling on Prehead #2.

In Prehead #1 the 1/1 attack is the Crystals crashing down at your feet. When the spikes appear you can jump(and attack), and timed properly, you will dodge the 1/1.

In Prehead #2, The proper place to stand is behind the rope in front of HT. The 1/1 is the pillars that appear on the bottom that summon lightning. You can just move out of the way. If you can't feasibly dodge, then stop your next attack by holding the "up" key on your keyboard. If Stance fails, and if you are behind the rope, you will be knocked into grabbing the rope, saving yourself the shame and humiliation of having to climb back up. It also works for the map-wide lightning attack, which comes a fair bit quicker. It doesn't save a lot of time overall, but at this point you're just flexing on the scrubs who have to climb back up after getting knocked down.

Legs and Tail
This is where the real fun begins. Big damage, big booties, big money. It's a pretty straight-forward section, just start cleaving everything to death. As far as positioning goes, you can be at two different spots. Mainly I go to cleave Left Head and Mid-head on the second platform from the top of left side, and if Mid-head cancels I move down to the second position down below. You'll want to be on the lower platform directly above where you enter, where you can hit Legs, Left Arm, and the Wings. Always make sure your HP is above 10k here, and use your Sushi to maintain that number. It's also smart to stand closer to the middle of the platform as the wings will clip you while they are buffing the rest of HT, and if it's buffing attack it will clip for buffed attack damage without delay.

Wings can knock you forward, sending you into the Legs, which will deal 11-12k damage. It can be hard to see in a 12-man, so sometimes it's better to just camp 12k+ and be accident proof.

With Haste you're able to hit Wings + Left Arm + Left Head from this platform by jump attacking. You'll see lazier cleave just killing Wings and Arm - smugly look down on them, knowing full well that you are performing optimally and that they are scrubs to be condescendingly spoken to. You'll just have to be sure to watch the Left Arm attacks, as when it lowers to shake its fist your jump attack will miss, and the same goes for when the head chooses to raise itself for an attack.

If you can do these jump attacks while being the Seduce target, watching arms for seduce animations, and getting on the rope to save yourself from the seduce, all while maintaining zerk 100% of the time, then you have ascended into a respectable Dark Knight. Congratulations on the galaxy sized brain as you have cracked the code and deserve my salute.

Post-Legs and Tail
This section is a bit less stressful than Legs and Tail, but there are still some things to look out for. The outstretched wings can extend out and physically hit you though, so you're going to want to stay above ~7.5k HP, as they can hit for roughly that when they are attack buffed. That is the most dangerous part of this section, but so long as you keep that 7.5k in mind you will be safe. After the wings are dead though the highest damage I generally see is ~4550.

With the Tail dead there are a couple rotations people tend to employ. Generally what you see is either Right side first, Left side first, or split party.

On the Left side you'll be at the top again, striking Mid-head and Left-head. When MH cancels I'll jump down and jump cleave LH, Wings, and L-Arm, generally just watching LH animations to know I'll hit it. When getting onto the LH/MH platform, I'll pot to above 12.5k, as falling is a pretty normal occurrence when jumping up, it's fairly easy to go right into LH. If the heads are buffed by Wings then the damage increases to over 16k, so if you don't know what the Wing buff animation looks like it's safer to pot above that and Roar back to zerk range. Once LH goes down most people tend to move to the right side.

On the right side, you'll want to cleave Right Head and Mid-head. It's a tough spot to get to but there's a couple tricks to get into the correct spot. The first requires haste, and from the tippy-top of the rope you'll you'll jump left onto the platform hugging RH's face. This should put you on the correct pixel to hit both MH and RH, but if you're slightly off you can jump straight in the air and tap your left arrow key to move one unit over. It's a reasonable spot to get to if you know these tricks, other folks don't like how precise you need to be but those scrubs just need to git gud.

When MH cancels on right side I move down to R-Arm/Wings/RH. Generally I just ignore all LH and RH cancels unless MH is also canceled. If I'm worried about R-Arm mass seduce then I stand back a bit, until I'm standing a couple pixels in front of the rope, so that most of the attacks miss R-Arm but still hit RH and Wings. If RH and MH are canceled I move to the lower platform and hit R-Arm and Wings, as from the spot where you hit RH you miss attacks on Arm when it casts skills.

If the party is split I tend to just stay on the left side, and when MH cancels I go to the right side in order to Hyper Body the rest of the party. With other cleave in the run I'll stay on the right side until MH ends the cancel and just hit RH/RA/Wings, before moving back to LH/MH.

When HT is dead just jump down and loot everything you see, it drops a lot of valuable stuff like Maple Warrior 20 which can sell for a lot, especially if you don't offer splits to anyone. Or don't do that if you want to run more than 1 HT on this server. It's up to you.

Spoiler: Equipping your character

There is really just one question you need to ask when deciding what equipment to buy next: Can I hit everything I want to hit?

If the answer is yes, then invest more in gear that will give you more damage.

If the answer is no, well there's always more dex and accuracy gear.

Not all gear is created equal though. One important concept to wrap your head around is the cost per stat point increase, and from there deciding what is best bought next. Capes and earrings are both pretty similar, with their scrolls offering 2 dex from 60s and 70s, and 3 dex from 10s and 30s. But there is a big difference in cost between cape and earring dex scrolls, the earring scrolls cost close to ten times what cape scrolls do. A decent order to buy accuracy gear by expected cost per return could be as follows:

[authors note: prices are all ooooooold, so try to ignore them]
Zakum Helmet - Honestly nothing else really comes close to the sheer number of stat points you get for the cost. ~15 strength, ~15 dex, ~20 accuracy, and ~15 int for washing. In total the run will cost you about ~12-20mil and will give you a massive stat boost. Buy as soon as you can.
Blue Crusader Chainmail - Bathrobes are too weak and you get free extra dex by scrolling these instead, and they're also available in the Ludi Armor Shop. Overall dex 60s are cheap and you could conceivably get some overall dex 30s to make a 10 dex 9 slot chainmail and just slam some 60s on that. You'll end up happy with a decent set of armor that'll last you until your ready for gearing up at level 100.
Your Weapon - Weapon accuracy scrolls actually give a lot of stat points for their very low cost. This fact is offset by how often you'll be changing your weapons, ideally you'll have something new every 15-20 levels until you reach Sky Skis and the Purple Surfboard.
Dex cape - You can get a cape free at level 25 from a quest and buy some 60s for cheap. Low cost low return and it can easily be switched out as you need it for a Black Raggedy Cape.
Red Snow Shoes - (At least I think warrior ones are red?) In El Nath you can find warrior shoes with 7 slots. If money is on your mind it's recommended that you use Shoes for Avoid scrolls rather than shoes for jump, as they are leagues cheaper, though the Shoes for Avoid 30s can be pretty rare in the FM.
Dex Gloves - For when you really want to hit something and you can't. I find their use to be good more early Mannequins but for not much else. Attack gloves are just too important.
White Raccoon Mask - This is a piece of equipment that has a large initial cost, but decently cheap scroll. Eye accuracy 60s are cheap and each offer +2 accuracy. It's not difficult to make a 10-12 accuracy mask and currently would cost ~12mil as of October 2018. To be really cheap get the Broken Glasses from LPQ and just throw the eye accuracy 60s on them.
Earrings - Type of earring doesn't really matter, but if you can get lucky with the Glistening Earrings from Ellin Forest PQ they will likely serve you very well.
Silver Deputy Star - At 20-25mil this is one item that has a decently high cost for what you get out of it. 5 in all stats is alright, and it makes a good boost and is great for washing, but there are other equipment slots that can be filled. You can also wait until you're level 80 to get one for free.
Sad Mask - A drop from Crimsonwood Keep Party Quest that will run you somewhere in the ballpark of 10mil for a face accessory with 9-11 accuracy. They're a very solid piece that can be scroll for dex, but that can wait if you have other things to buy.
Scrolled Zakum/Scar Helmet - A very frustrating and expensive experience for what you get out of it. 5.5mil for a 60% chance of 2 more dex. Yikes. Alternatively you can use Helm Accuracy scrolls which are much cheaper but make for a much less satisfying looking helmet. Also much riskier as they come in 70s and not 60s.

After you've filled out your slots, it's time to upgrade. There isn't much of a guide to that, it's personalized based on where you did well in scrolling or where you failed.

But other than that, there's offensive gear to think about. For most of my career I had three sets of gear: the attack gear, the accuracy gear, and the int gear for leveling. It makes for a pretty chaotic inventory, but nevertheless I could just replace pieces as needed to hit the accuracy of whatever I was facing.

It's important to set an accuracy goal at some point. To hit Horntail Head B 100% of the time you'll need to have 166 accuracy, but for most of the fight you'll need slightly less, as Head B has the most avoidability. With a bishop using bless you'll only need 146 accuracy. Toad also has the same avoidability, so you'll also need 166 accuracy for him, just at level 180 instead so you don't have the accuracy malice.

Spoiler: Sky Ski vs. Faltizan

There are traditionally 2 different classes of weapons people tend to use as their end game weapon, and they're divided between speed 6 and speed 7 weapons.

Sky Skis are speed 6, normal, and the Dragon Faltizan/Pinaka/Pooh Pooh Shovel/Stormshear/Flairgrave are all speed 7, slow.

There are a lot of options for speed 7 weapons, but overall the Sky Skis will usually outperform them, even with a ~15 attack advantage. Sky Skis with booster can perform 64.5 attacks in a single minute, while other spears can only perform 60.6. Essentially, the Skis do 6% more attacks per minute than other spears do.

Personally I only used slow spears for Bigfoot. Everywhere else I enjoyed the added mobility of being able to react sooner, especially in Horntail where you can put in as much effort as you're willing. So I'm an avid fan of Sky Skis, they allow for a less clunky playstyle and if you're already 1ko'ing the mob, the only thing that actually matters is speed.

Spoiler: HP Washing

Enjoy the massive NX sink. You won't need a ton of int, but the NX is still costly, so let's get into some of the numbers:

A spearman gains an average of 66 HP per level past level 15. Advancements do not increase their HP any further.
At level 15 You can expect around ~580 HP once Improving Max HP Increase is maxed(I literally made another famehoe to check this)
This means that at level 130, you can expect to have pretty close to 8170 HP if you don't wash. (115 levels x 66 HP per level + 580)
At level 150 you can expect about 9500 HP unwashed.

As a Dark Knight you'll want to have 18750 HP, so that with Hyper Body you'll have 30k HP.

Spoiler: The basic principle of HP washing

To wash you need more MP than the minimum possible. That's the floor of your MP. If you have more MP than your floor, you can do an HP wash.

How do you increase MP though? Leveling up with AP in int gives you extra MP. 10 int would give 1 extra MP. 50 int would give you 5 upon level up. Int from gear counts, so you can use that while you are leveling to get some extra gains. Let's say you have 30 AP put into int and you have gear that gives you 20 more int. Overall you have 50 int, and when you level you'll gain an extra 5 MP.

Now that you have extra MP, you can do a wash. Since you just leveled you have 5 AP. Put 1 of those AP into HP, the rest can go into Strength or Dex or wherever you'd normally put them. Now that you have a point in HP, you are able to take a point out of MP because they both share the same AP pool.

You can enter the cash shop and for 3100 NX you can buy an AP Reset. Use the AP reset and you'll be able to reduce your MP and be able to put that point anywhere else, you'll want to put it into your main stat. So after this is done you'll have traded 4 MP for 52 HP, and still have all of your AP in your stats, which is good. You've artificially increased your HP by gaming the system.

Going for it later and letting the natural HP increase is cheaper NX-wise, but seeing 30k early is really satisfying. Take pride in being an unkillable tank.

Getting 18,750 HP by 130:
18750 - 8170 = 10,580 HP to wash.
You gain an average of 52 HP per wash.
10,580 / 52 = ~204 washes.
Each wash takes 4 extra MP. So to completely wash you'll need 816 extra MP
This means that you'll need a combined total of 8,160 int over all of your levels.

This means you'll need to level once with 8,160 int. If you can't do that then try leveling 102 times with 80 int. Same thing really. 80 int isn't the hardest thing to get by level 50. 20-40 base int won't kill you, and some cheap int earrings/cape will help until you get a zhelm. Honestly you can undershoot int because you tend to get extra MP just leveling normally. You get a decent number of free washes.

In total it'll take 620k NX to wash 200 times. It'll be even more NX with base int. 200 washes can also be equated to 4 months of voting.

Now let's save some money. Getting 18,750 by level 150:
18750 - 9500 = 9250 HP to wash.
9500 / 52 = ~183 washes
At 4 MP each wash that'll take 732 extra MP

It's a moderate decrease but at the same time you have much more time to accumulate that extra MP. Starting at level 30, you'll only need 60 total int over 120 levels to achieve the total amount of MP. A lot of players can get that amount of int without adding any base int if they have started on a mage and get a z-helm.

In total that will cost 567k NX to wash out the AP out of MP. It'll save you like 10 days of voting, but probably more from needing less/not needing base int.

I'll probably add more later, especially regarding gear and whatnot. Me and many other DK's are also willing to answer any questions you may have, feel free to ask.

 

*Or* you sell the helm dex 60s and buy other equipment that gives you more accuracy per meso. :^) Don't get me wrong, I love Master Chronos and they're probably one of my favorite young training spots but at the same time if other gear is lacking I would sell those scrolls in an instant. It's sort of a part of the philosophy that comes with playing MMO's, looking for the most efficient path to reaching the best possible outcome.

You are correct about the washing bit! And I should also try more to make it known that my HP washing numbers are generally ballpark ranges. Ellin Ring and the Deputy Star will account for a total of ~4 fewer washes, but sometimes it's just easier to keep things simple and use just the direct numbers and averages rather than resorting to a whole mess of 'if's', 'and's', and 'but's'. The numbers are mostly to give a general idea of the time and NX investment it'll take to make a perfect DK, but everyone's journey is different.

My own personal journey doesn't include the monster book ring, at least not yet. There are usually two things I consider when I think about what content to do: First I ask "Is it something I enjoy?" and secondly "Is this an efficient way to do things?" The first usually trumps the second but at the same time I find a good amount of happiness in doing things efficiently. For me the monster book just isn't enjoyable, and from a time usage standpoint I don't see it to be very efficient. If a player enjoys it then go right ahead and collect cards, but for me I think about the tangible benefits my character could have achieved in the time it took to collect those cards, be it more levels or money. 40 hours of card collecting could be 40 hours of training instead, and there is a very real difference between where each of those options will leave you.

 

At level 61 you need 210 accuracy total to 100% hit them. For 75% hit-rate you need 184 accuracy.

Also I should probably mention somewhere that GM Buffs give 100 accuracy. That means that no matter how bad you are you can probably do mannequins at level 60, at least for half an hour.

Amorian baskets help, they give 40 accuracy for 10 minutes. I started seeing a few for 20k in the FM yesterday, definitely worth the purchase.

Mannequins are definitely doable at level 64 though, Maple Karstons are so nice with their 20 accuracy.

 

Added 4th job garbo. I'm a big boy DrK now. Bump for that.

Also BF is a 10/10 experience for any aspiring Dark Knights. Would recommend.