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

I don't think Dread Spikes has changed since 75 (don't recall random resists related to mob level - it either worked or didn't, subject to reductions) - it's likely there's no check related to your skill/macc when you cast it, just stack HP. It'll be pretty obvious pretty quickly if you're getting resists on all high level mobs and not just MDB/DT/etc. 127 and WoE should be high enough to see resists already if this is the case.

Where are you finding information stating dark magic is the largest influence on absorb spells? The only place I see that (Absorb Spell), it doesn't even mention INT. Magic Accuracy tells you INT is the dSTAT for black magic. Dark magic and absorb spells are black magic. It doesn't explicitly state that absorb spells are affected by INT, but I think it's very likely that they are. Even Drain/Aspir are affected by INT (on the macc front) and INT is used in macc based stun sets. 1 INT = 1 Macc when it matters

But if you look here >>> Your text to link here...

It says Dark Magic is not to be confused with Black Magic It comes under "the umberella of black magic", in other words, you will find dark magic in the black magic list on the Auction House, but Dark Magic does not work the same as Black Magic.

INT will effect any black magic spells, and you could use INT on Dark Knight if you wanted a nuke set, but I can't see any indication that INT effects dark magic (except drain/aspir which I will get too). I was always told it was Dark Magic only. After deciding to stack INT to try and get more accuracy .. I was told no ... just no, don't do that. The DRK who told me this had a Ragnarok back when no one had a Ragnarok. He told me to use dark magic skill, and I sold off my INT rings etc.

Dark Magic is not Black Magic. Int effects Black Magic and help it's magic accuracy. It appears that Drain/Aspir are the exceptions to the rule (which is great because I can change my drain/aspir set to include INT) , but it's probably because they are more like nukes, they actually damage the mob unlike other dark magic spells.

Stun is a funny one. I very rarely use Dark Magic skill for it, I will stun whever, and it's extremely rare to see a resist. I have pretty high dark magic skill, and I have never stacked INT for it. There is no explanation on whether Stun is effected by dark magic skill or INT, but I would assume that it is effected by dark magic skill, because it does not damage the enemy.

I can't see any evidence that INT effects Absorb Spells. I was always told it was dark magic only, and bgwiki/ffxicylopedia don't mention INT at all.

So to attempt to wrap this up:
Drain/Aspir > Dark Magic Skill (Potency) + INT (Magic Accuracy)

Absorbs > Equipment Enhances (Potency) + Dark Magic Skill (Magic Accuracy)

Dread Spikes > HP (More HP absorbed) + Dark Magic Recast + Dark Magic Skill (Magic Accuracy)

Endark > Dark Magic Skill (Potency)

Bio > Dark Magic Skill (Potency)

Stun > Dark Magic Skill (Magic Accuracy) (?)

Cannot be certain whether INT effects Absorbs, Bio, or Stun. Also the actual stat "Magic Accuracy", is something which confuses me as well. Why use it when dark magic's accuracy is effected by Dark Magic skill or INT?

There is no stat given for dark magic (like Black Magic has INT, White Magic has MD etc.), so I would assume that Dark Magic does not have a stat like the rest. It doesn't say anywhere that Magic Accuracy doesn't effect Dark Magic. I assume it does, as it's still magic, but I can't imagine it being better than Dark Magic Skill ... or IMT where Drain is concerned.

Edit: Added more to the post above^

Sounds like he did it before Resolution? Then maybe he didn't make optimal decisions in his gearing/choices, idk? No evidence to support other than "someone told me" doesn't help the argument and if anything I'd think that could make the information less credible

Enfeebles don't damage the mob either but are affected by INT/MND, setting drain/aspir aside because of the damaging aspect doesn't really make sense


It's just saying Dark Magic is not a separate category, it is a part of the category Black Magic, like a subset. The spells are black magic, else they wouldn't be affected by Dark Arts (and Light)

It's funny how on the dark magic page, it says "Dark Magic skill determines the accuracy, potency, and spell interruption rate of Dark Magic spells." ... but on the Drain/Aspir page it says INT effects accuracy.

Also the DRK I was talking about knew the job inside and out like the back of his hand, so I trusted his word, and I passed on his knowledge to new aspiring Dark Knights on the Hades, and Cerberus servers. It was many years before Resolution came out. I'm just saying that because that's the reason why I never used INT in my gear sets more than anything. It sucks when I find out I didn't know something about a job I been playing for over a decade, ya know?

I think that if INT was truly meant to be used for Dark Magic, DRK would have equipment with much higher values of INT. I can see the only reason INT being included on some pieces of gear (Bale Feet) is for Drain/Aspir, Elemental Magic, and Enfeebling Magic.

Edit: Also I see what you mean about the wording on the black magic page.

If your reference was Goshtin, that would explain it.

If you want to know how magic works, it wouldn't be a bad idea to look at recent BLM, SCH, and RDM guides/suggestions.

I remember him, but no it definitely was not him. :P

lol'd hard
Would be too perfect! He touched me on my club :3

Not as simple as that. I am looking for answers about Dread Spikes (although it was already partially answered) and Absorb Spells more than anything else. Last time I checked ... only DRK can perform those moves. Also this guide has been dead forever, we might as well get some use out of it by finding some definite answers.

Question: For absorb spells magic accuracy, would you a) stack dark magic skill b) stack dark magic skill and INT or c) stack INT and Magic Accuracy.

they're spells, therefore it makes sense that they conform to the magic accuracy formula, just like any other spells. Not sure why you'd think it would be any different, considering bard songs are a different category of "spells" and it still conforms to the magic accuracy formula.

so i'd go for secret option - d) a mixture of INT Macc and skill.

Struggling to see where you find the statement of "Dark Magic is stated as being the biggest influence on whether they resist or not." though... is it written in the wiki?

1 skill = 1 macc = 1 INT (when it matters)


I don't believe there is a macc check on dread spikes. The potency is only calculated from your HP. Even with Blaze Spikes there is no "Will your spikes land!?" it just calculates the potency of your spikes and then the damage it does is consistent (subject to MDB,DT, fire resist or w/e and your MAB, but not your magic accuracy). It should be pretty simple to test this yourself anyway

Your text to link here...

After playing DRK for over ten years, I can say that I have noticed a difference when using dark magic skill as opposed to not using it. I have played the content where .. you know it's possible to land an absorb, but if you do it in TP gear, it's likely not going to work. I have no actual data on this, it's just years of personal experiences. Whenever I had trouble landing an absorb in the past, I checked whether I was in my dark magic set (for a long time I used the same dark magic set for everything) or not. Of course, we have dark seal / nether void now, but back then we didn't have nether void, and I mostly used Dark Seal for Drain.

I used to cast absorbs far too much. More then I should have really. I always noticed dark magic making a huge difference on whether it resisted or not. I can't say I have played around with INT or Magic Accuracy, and that's what I am looking for here. I can only assume dark magic skill is #1 to boost accuracy, but I can also see MACC helping, as MACC is universal. No idea about INT though. Sorry for rambling, trying to make sense of all this information, different sources say different things.

No .. yeah .. that description has sold me. The blaze spikes thing is pretty spot on. I just wish it didn't say the thing about dark magic on FFXIcylopedia on the Dread Spikes page. Quite annoying. I might have to do some testing as this is clearly bugging me.

This is akin to saying scythe skill matters more to accuracy of your attack than stacking accuracy because you've only stacked scythe skill on your tp set and it has worked for you(though not 100% the same, as magic skill is thought to have a bigger impact than combat skills in terms of accuracy unless i'm mistaken).

I'd be very very surprised if absorb spell doesn't conform to the magic accuracy formula that white magic, songs, elemental/enfeebling/other dark magic like aspir/drain follows. I could go try it out with sch/drk with my macc set, since i don't have a single dark magic + skill piece in that. but it's not really going to tell me anything unless there's comparable data.

Exactly what I was thinking. I don't have a mage job, so I could only do testing on DRK. Only problem is .. my skill is so high the only time my absorbs resist is against undead or dark based mobs. I would need something much higher level than me to test which stat is the most accurate. I'm starting to get too much of an headache thinking about it ... so I might just give in and use all my dark magic skill, with macc/int on the sides. It's much easier for me to stack dark magic skill equipment then it is to buy macc/int gear to replace pieces in those slots.

Edit: Lightbulb moment. I believe the biggest reason why dark magic skill has always been encouraged is because DRK lacked magic accuracy options in the past. It's only in the past few years that new magic accuracy equipment have shown up. I'm going to assume dark magic skill > MACC > INT for magic accuracy until proven otherwise .. even if I am still skeptical about INT as a factor.

Edit2: Browsing at the BLM guide we have here, the author states you should focus on dark magic skill followed by magic accuracy. Almost all of the pieces include dark magic skill, the odd few pieces have magic accuracy, and there is no INT in sight. So even though INT is meant to effect the magic accuracy of drain/aspir, magic accuracy would be more potent ... according to that guide.

And the rest of us are just going to follow the magic accuracy formula until it is proven otherwise.

May wanna look into all the rdm's that follow the m. acc rule. In fact I just re-adjusted my rdm gear for more m. acc over enfeeble. I land nearly everything on anything now. I may have dropped 50+ in enfeeble gear but I gained that in m. acc and land more. Obviously the more m. acc I landed the better off I was though.

You mean how each magic skill contributes to Macc in staged tiers where each tier has a different equivalency?
Ain't nobody got time for that!
(Iirc from 0~200 it's 1:1 and after 200 it's a random fraction per tier.)

Though that being said, dark magic skill is "better" than straight Macc for drains because it also increases potency. (Similar to how +15skill is "better" than +15acc because it also provides attack.)
As for drain spikes... Pretty sure it's just HP based.
Since if it wasn't, we'd see things like where the HP drained is > the damage taken.

I don't know how many times this has been brought up by different people in different sections of this forum, but this only applies to combat skills and it has not been proven to be the case for magic.

It is commonly considered that magic skill = magic accuracy > INT/MND/CHR, but 1 INT/MND/CHR = 1 magic accuracy when it matters so it's pretty much magic skill = magic acc = INT/MND/CHR. I'm talking about magic accuracy here, so obviously stacking on attribute or magic skill may give you more benefits on things that has varying potency.

Skill is a component of magic accuracy and is equal to about 1 magic acc (though there is debate on whether it's 1 or .9 past 200). The reason skill tends to be focused on is that skill effects potency of drain, aspir and bio which are the two dark magic spells BLMs worry about. Stun and Absorbs have their potency determined independent of skill and thus you are going to want to go with pure land rate while inserting spell specific pieces.

INT, MND and CHR don't directly increase Magic Accuracy, instead they are put through a function that compares them to the targets stat and then gives a bonus or penalty. Dark magic seems to be in the same category that enhancing magic is, there is simply no dStat function used and so you don't get a bonus nor a penalty. Enspells and Spikes are two other area's you can see this happening in. And though spikes do use INT to determine potency its a raw function and doesn't do any comparison to the enemies stat.

Do you have source for this? I have never heard or read about dark magic not being effected by a dstat function in the magic accuracy calculation. My stun set would def need some alteration if that is the case..

Enhancing magic simply doesn't have a magic accuracy equation, they're buffs, not attacks. you can't really get a half resist buffing a stubborn party member. So I don't think you can say it's in the "same category"

Trying to not get myself killed too badly on serac rabbits earlier,
this is my adjusted Abs-Acc set that works reliably when you can Dark Seal+Nether void for max duration+boost potency.

When I use dark seal+nether void on hard stuff, its always for Abs-acc so this feels like a relevant set.

Duration is 3minutes 30 seconds, gives +36 acc, and when it fades the absorb spell will have decayed to be +15acc.
I have dark skill merits so my dark skill is 443 in this set.
ItemSet 330181
If i could find a bard to borrow to sleep a rabbit and gimp my gear down till i see resists and then spam absorbs at it, it could be answered if .9 INT = 1macc for absorbs, or some other such relationship.

In regards to the earlier post, barring availability of +dark or +macc skill, I still think its best to throw something with high INT on.
I play rdm alot and I concurr with celoria that you do need to stack macc past a certain point of hitting +skill to dodge resist problems.

+Dark skill stuff is good, but I think you'd want to give serious consideration to macc in back/earring/neck/rings/ammo slot that are extremely high macc now compared to dark skill.

Thanks for that Sapphire. It makes sense that a ton of magic accuracy would be more beneficial than low amounts of dark magic skill in those slots.

Moving on from that though, I have made a new set just for Dread Spikes. I don't have all of these pieces yet, but it's something to aim for.

ItemSet 330182

The Ares' Flanchard +1 could be exchanged for Osmium Cuisses. At the moment, Osmium would give me more HP then Ares (with no buffs/food whatsoever), but I can imagine Ares' outdoing it as I get more.

Am I missing anything? Anything with better HP in any of the slots? Also the Thicket Gages are Elvaan only. If you are not Elvaan, you could try Boor Bracelets (+70).

*This post is outdated*

*Blink Blink*

Ohh yes it most certainly does. Enspells and Spikes both have magic accuracy functions. In both cases it's based on enhancing magic skill and there is no dSTAT function involved. Long time ago it was calculated on proc, so enhancing whenever the RDM's weapon hit the monster, or whenever the WAR's great axe hit the monster. This was made apparent when SCH/RDM's started casting aoe en spells on everyone and noticed how melee's would hit for 1~4 but PLDs would hit for full / half damage. Later SE published an update that changed the formula to being set upon cast. So right now if a SCH or RDM cast aoe enspells in 500 skill, you would get 500 for base magic acc then whatever is on your weapon and gear. Endark and Enlight both function the same way but with Dark / Divine skill instead of Enhancing skill.

Enhancing is more then Haste and Refresh.

My bad, forgot about enspells.

looking around in wiki, I can see that the potency calculation is shown to be purely enhancing skill related. But I'm struggling to see information on how resists are calculated. Is there work done on investigating that there is no dStats involved in enspell resist rate? Considering its' a white magic spell, it would make sense if it has a dMND in the formula. Does it even conform to the magic accuracy forumula where macc matters? or is it purely dependant on the caster's enhancing skills?

More importantly, my question was really asking why you think it's under the same grouping as dark magic.

Gavialis Helm has a bit more HP. Xaddi Path B can surpass a few of the slots you posted, if you want to go nuts with it. :p

Just curious, but I wonder does Dread Spikes account for Drain II's HP boost? I don't think I've ever tried it, but it sounds fun to Nethervoid Drain II + Dread Spikes with around 3k HP

Gorney Sollerets +1 augmented give more HP i think. Also Ares mask+1 is giving me about 90 hp

but cast time -10%

The head is for the recast more than anything. Not sure about Xaddi. Means getting them all again, making sure my macros target the new ones and not the old. What's the HP on those?

How much HP does Gorney Sollerets +1 give?

Spikes probably do work with the HP boost, as it's meant to use your maximum HP .. I should try it after doing a Drain II on Matamata with 9999 HP ;)

Long long long time ago, before bgwiki existed I wanted to test magic accuracy on RDM enspells and so went out and killed a bunch of greater colibri. I recorded a ton of data with parser and that's when I figured out magic acc for enspells was checked on hit vs on cast. Later I did further testing and that's when I found out that neither INT nor MND effected the magic acc of enspells. Similar testing with shock spikes seemed to suggest the same. For the whole dark magic thing, a long time ago there was a big debate about INT and it's effect on the dark magic spells. I believe the final consensus was that all evidence pointed to it having zero effect. This was years ago, maybe 07 or 08 I think.