What's with daggers?

[my butt is erect]

So in all the dark souls games, I was never able to make daggers feel successful in a pve build. No matter what I'd do, they always felt weak/handicapped compared to every other weapon. Of course, outside of situations where you're getting easy backstabs/crits. Maybe historically they're more of a pvp thing?

I've yet to try daggers in this game. Do you have any insights or recommendations about making daggers useful? Are they inherently bad outside of niche situations?

Any thoughts about daggers in Elden ring will do.

[Heimdall313]

Reduvia is nice, very early. I keep it in the offhand though, since the blood blade spell is honestly just all flash and no fury. Trying to get Misercande or w/e, but for now Great Knife in the main hand. I lose a tad of crit damage, but Quickstep gets me a stupid amount of backstab. I am bad at parry, but if you're not, the bandits starting Buckler can slap some serious hits.

I don't have bloodhound step but I understand it's basically a better Quickstep.

I run dual Bandit Curved Swords (Bleed + Quickstep) for things like demi human mins, and Reduvia + Great Knife sneak stab and torture solo encounters. The swords are better but the knives are a lot better than expected.

[Stumpelwurz]

Originally posted by stopcock 3way:

So in all the dark souls games, I was never able to make daggers feel successful in a pve build. No matter what I'd do, they always felt weak/handicapped compared to every other weapon. Of course, outside of situations where you're getting easy backstabs/crits. Maybe historically they're more of a pvp thing?

I've yet to try daggers in this game. Do you have any insights or recommendations about making daggers useful? Are they inherently bad outside of niche situations?

Any thoughts about daggers in Elden ring will do.

Daggers are fine but in a few situations they really suck.

I allmost finished the game with reduvia+great knife.
Combining great knife with frost is nice due to the default bleed on it.

They suck especially on the tree bosses due to wierd hit boxes.
You simply cannot hit them standing in front of their face and you need to attack them from behind or side.

However.. Reduvia was kind of a game changer fighting many bosses.

Critwise of course regular dagger and the miscer.. whatever have the upper hand. I fought crucible knight in evergaol and a regular lvl 0 dagger outdamaged my level 3 broadsword.

[ReflexShift]

I like dual wield miseriecorde and at +25 do quite a bit of damage especially with ash blood art on them. Don't play online but they seem to be on par with other builds I've tried.

[DestinedLight]

Originally posted by stopcock 3way:

So in all the dark souls games, I was never able to make daggers feel successful in a pve build. No matter what I'd do, they always felt weak/handicapped compared to every other weapon. Of course, outside of situations where you're getting easy backstabs/crits. Maybe historically they're more of a pvp thing?

I've yet to try daggers in this game. Do you have any insights or recommendations about making daggers useful? Are they inherently bad outside of niche situations?

Any thoughts about daggers in Elden ring will do.

They aren't even worth it for backstabs, my axes, straightswords, and halberds do as much if not way more generally

[AMANE_KANATA]

Originally posted by DestinedLight:

Originally posted by stopcock 3way:

So in all the dark souls games, I was never able to make daggers feel successful in a pve build. No matter what I'd do, they always felt weak/handicapped compared to every other weapon. Of course, outside of situations where you're getting easy backstabs/crits. Maybe historically they're more of a pvp thing?

I've yet to try daggers in this game. Do you have any insights or recommendations about making daggers useful? Are they inherently bad outside of niche situations?

Any thoughts about daggers in Elden ring will do.

They aren't even worth it for backstabs, my axes, straightswords, and halberds do as much if not way more generally

in terms of normal attacks yes but with crits it all depends on what you use. I have yet to get a back stab but with parry’s I can instakill people with 1600hp (the highest hp I’ve fought from a player) as of now, but I’m guessing if I did get a backstab it would probably hit for 900-1100?

[Heimdall313]

Originally posted by DestinedLight:

Originally posted by stopcock 3way:

So in all the dark souls games, I was never able to make daggers feel successful in a pve build. No matter what I'd do, they always felt weak/handicapped compared to every other weapon. Of course, outside of situations where you're getting easy backstabs/crits. Maybe historically they're more of a pvp thing?

I've yet to try daggers in this game. Do you have any insights or recommendations about making daggers useful? Are they inherently bad outside of niche situations?

Any thoughts about daggers in Elden ring will do.

They aren't even worth it for backstabs, my axes, straightswords, and halberds do as much if not way more generally

They're slower, heavier, and higher reqs. Reduvia has basically no reqs, the Arcane is usually the hard part and Bandit starts the game set to equip it. My Golden Halberd way outdamages anything else I have for a backstab but its nearly useless with guard counter -> riposte crits. Bandit Curved Sword, Rapier (130 crit, only reason to use it over Estoc), Reduvia, Great knife, etc. are fantastic to counter and crit with, or just quickstep for constant backstabs. Highland Axe is 110 Crit and simply does not do what my Great Knife does (low level Str build and my bandit have 30 in Str / Dex respectively).

Main issue with daggers is the range tbh, against some bigger enemies and bosses you literally cannot reach them and need a sword or something else for horseback. Axe or straight sword you really don't even need an extra weapon if you're going shield and blade