Anyone manage to make dagger builds work?

[CJones]

If so, please tell me how. I really wanted to make dual daggers work, but their lack of range, lack of poise and lack of stopping power means I almost always get hit out of any offense I attempt. Yes, I could use Quickstep or Bloodhound Step, but I shouldn't have to spend FP just to hit with normal attacks. Plus this means I lose the option to have any other Ash of War

Honestly, a lot of weapon classes seem nigh worthless except as a challenge. They made enemies in this game a lot faster, more aggressive, with longer attack strings, but they didn't update the weapon animations to match.

I've spent most of the game defaulting to the Bloodhound's Fang, because I get destroyed whenever I try to use anything else.

[Carnwennan]

daggers are solid, and you have build options. if you go faith black knife and erdsteel dagger are both insane. great knives are bleed machines when dual wielded, and the misericorde has the same 130 crit rating as the rapier. the downside is that the short rage means you need to make a way to get in. bloodhound step is the easiest, but it can be done without. you need to learn enemy and boss patterns without it though. jump attacks or parries to stagger and then get combos off is one method.

as for other weapons being better? well obviously there are better combos. Most weapon types are perfectly viable to beat the game with, but there are optimal options if you just want to wrecking ball through the game. greatshields are near broken and bleed is the king of PVE short of a few bosses immune to it. sorcery makes the early game boil down to throw rocks and stays very strong through late game. incantations are versatile enough to handle any situation. basically it breaks down to do you want to use something cool/fun, or take a path of least resistance.

[Lord Bob]

Originally posted by Carnwennan:

daggers are solid, and you have build options. if you go faith black knife and erdsteel dagger are both insane. great knives are bleed machines when dual wielded, and the misericorde has the same 130 crit rating as the rapier. the downside is that the short rage means you need to make a way to get in. bloodhound step is the easiest, but it can be done without. you need to learn enemy and boss patterns without it though. jump attacks or parries to stagger and then get combos off is one method.

as for other weapons being better? well obviously there are better combos. Most weapon types are perfectly viable to beat the game with, but there are optimal options if you just want to wrecking ball through the game. greatshields are near broken and bleed is the king of PVE short of a few bosses immune to it. sorcery makes the early game boil down to throw rocks and stays very strong through late game. incantations are versatile enough to handle any situation. basically it breaks down to do you want to use something cool/fun, or take a path of least resistance.

Misericorde even has a 140 crit rating.

[Carnwennan]

Originally posted by Lord Bob:

Originally posted by Carnwennan:

daggers are solid, and you have build options. if you go faith black knife and erdsteel dagger are both insane. great knives are bleed machines when dual wielded, and the misericorde has the same 130 crit rating as the rapier. the downside is that the short rage means you need to make a way to get in. bloodhound step is the easiest, but it can be done without. you need to learn enemy and boss patterns without it though. jump attacks or parries to stagger and then get combos off is one method.

as for other weapons being better? well obviously there are better combos. Most weapon types are perfectly viable to beat the game with, but there are optimal options if you just want to wrecking ball through the game. greatshields are near broken and bleed is the king of PVE short of a few bosses immune to it. sorcery makes the early game boil down to throw rocks and stays very strong through late game. incantations are versatile enough to handle any situation. basically it breaks down to do you want to use something cool/fun, or take a path of least resistance.

Misericorde even has a 140 crit rating.

and that explains the crit talisman, dancer talisman, misericorde setup used in the RL1 malenia fight I saw.

[Lord Bob]

Originally posted by Carnwennan:

Originally posted by Lord Bob:

Misericorde even has a 140 crit rating.

and that explains the crit talisman, dancer talisman, misericorde setup used in the RL1 malenia fight I saw.

Oof that sounds like a lot of damage.
I'm running a Faith build and sometimes use a flame art Misericorde, otherwise I would not deal any damage. Even with split damage and the crit talisman equipped damage output is still pretty good, I can only believe how high it is on a pure Dex build.

[Artorias]

I used the reduvia blood dagger most of the game. You just have to change your tactics with all the different movesets. It sounds like you need more poise.

[CJones]

Thanks for the advice. I'm up to Castle Sol BTW. Probably should have mentioned that.

Yeah, the pair of daggers I've been trying to use are the Misericorde and Reduvia. I've debated with myself which one to put in my right hand. Misericorde has the 140 crit damage, but I rarely have the opportunity to use it since daggers do so little stagger damage. The Reduvia OTOH has a ranged attack, but that kinda defeats the point of using 2 daggers.

Do you think Is the Winged Sword Talisman is worth using? Seems like it should be great for dual daggers, but the effect expires so quickly that I'm not sure. It really seems like the effect should expire in stages, just like how it increases in stage. I did actually beat Morgott using this setup, so against bosses at least, it's viable.

[Carnwennan]

Originally posted by CJones:

Thanks for the advice. I'm up to Castle Sol BTW. Probably should have mentioned that.

Yeah, the pair of daggers I've been trying to use are the Misericorde and Reduvia. I've debated with myself which one to put in my right hand. Misericorde has the 140 crit damage, but I rarely have the opportunity to use it since daggers do so little stagger damage. The Reduvia OTOH has a ranged attack, but that kinda defeats the point of using 2 daggers.

Do you think Is the Winged Sword Talisman is worth using? Seems like it should be great for dual daggers, but the effect expires so quickly that I'm not sure. It really seems like the effect should expire in stages, just like how it increases in stage. I did actually beat Morgott using this setup, so against bosses at least, it's viable.

the misericorde is best if you are parrying, so main hand use of it is best with either a buckler, or to stay on theme, the parrying dagger. a great knife would pair very well with Reduvia. winged sword is encounter specific. if it is a fight where you or your ash summon can create openings to combo with the full dual dagger chain it can be worth it. if not, another talisman like blue dancer may be worth more.

[ROSCO]

Dual reduvias are pretty sweet especially with bleed being OP until it is tuned. Dmg output from how fast they can activate the bleed is insane.

[Otto]

I'm a bit late to the party but daggers are simply not worth it imo. Sure reduvia and some bleed builds are good, but that's because bleed is OP rn. If it gets fixed (which it should) daggers will be pretty bad overall. I mean sure they can work. But any similar build with straight swords or curved swords instead, will simply be better. As you already mentioned they luck physical damage and range and most of them have locked ash of war. The only exceptions that are decent imo are black knife/blade of calling faith build combo and another interesting one is double erdsteel dagger with faith primary stat ,main hand with flame of the redmanes flame art (not fire) and offhand with frost. Somehow fire damage resets frost buildup,making its procs way more frequent and as a result the damage is pretty good. But that seems like a glitch to me as well,so if it gets fixed as well I don't see any dagger build actually being good. I just wish they made status effects proc way faster than any other weapon,cause right now the physical damage /range luck kinda make them useless imo.

[DragonSoundxSG]

I dont see why they wouldnt...they are a number of great talismans for successful attacks and Great Runes which give you HP.