Grail Knight DLC Guide

Guide for Grail Knight mechanic/talent, two DLC weapons, and some build theory.

Career General Overview

Career Orientation

A melee frontline with consistent team buff and stagger ability. High skill floor, fairly low skill ceiling.

Pros: Can deal very high burst damage. One of the few careers that have access to both high single target damage and crowd control in the same build.
♥♥♥♥: Fairly low moveability. Extremely vulnerable to specials, even worse than Slayer/Flamethrower player. Doesn’t have any good/consistent form of damage reduction as a frontline.

Basic Stats

Base HP: 150
Career Skill Cooldown: 60 sec
Unusable Weapons: Spear, Halberd, Spear and Shield, Blunderbuss, Repeater Handgun, Handgun, Empire Longbow

Perks

Knight's Challenge	Deal 25% more damage to the first enemy hit.
Thirst for Glory	Increase movement speed by 10%.
Bastion of Bretonnia	Using shield can block Warpfire Thrower attacks. Cannot block Warpfire Thrower ground fire puddle.

Career Skill & Passive

Blessed Blade	Markus equips a blessed blade and slashes down with great force, smiting any evil creature caught in its wake and dealing heavy damage.	A guaranteed crit low cleave strike. Stagger all types of enemies including Boss. Goes through all types of shields. On Legend you can oneshot-bodyshot Chaos Warrior. On Cataclysm you need Level 15 talent Smiter + headshot or Smiter + 2 properties to bodyshot, or simply use the Level 10 talent Virtue of Knightly Temper .
The Lady’s Favour	Upon entering a mission the Lady of the Lake grants 2 random Duties for the Grail Knight and his party to complete. Upon completion of a Duty the party is granted a Benison for the rest of the mission.	The full team can contribute to Quest. Once they are finished, Benisons are team-wide buff.

Finishing the Quest can give you a Benison of the following type:

Quest	Requirement	Benison (without talent)	Benison (with talent)	Icon
Find Tomes	Find 1 tome. Discard the tome after finishing the Quest doesn't remove Benison buff.	Damage Reduction (10%)	Damage Reduction (15%)
Find Grimoires	Find 1 grim. Discard the grim after finishing the Quest doesn't remove Benison buff.	Health Regen (1hp/5sec)	Health Regen (Currently 1hp/2.5sec, which is 100% stronger)
Slay Elites	Kill elites. Recruit-Veteran-Champion-Legend-Cata needs 15-15-20-20-30 kills.	Power Level (10%)	Power Level (15%)
Slay Specials	Kill specials. Recruit-Veteran-Champion-Legend-Cata needs 10-10-15-15-20 kills.	Attack Speed (5%)	Attack Speed (7.5%)
Slay Monsters	Kill 1 monster.	Cooldown Regen (10%)	Cooldown Regen (15%)
Slay Enemies	Kill enemies. Recruit-Veteran-Champion-Legend-Cata needs 100-125-150-175-200 kills.	Not available	A Strength Potion is auto equped by Grail Kngiht if he has empty potion slot. Otherwise it will be dropped at his current location.	No icon

Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part I)

LeveL5 Row

Lady's Generosity	Staggering enemies with a melee attack grants temporary health. Health gained based on stagger strength.	Should be used only when you use shield weapon most of time.
Lady's Wrath	Melee killing blows restore temporary health based on the health of the slain enemy.	Should be used most of time due to your high single target damage.
Gift of the Grail	Healing yourself with a First Aid Kit or a Healing Draught also heals your nearby allies for 20.0% of their maximum health. Clears any wounds.	Should be avoided most of time as a frontline elite killer.

LeveL10 Row

Virtue of Ideal	Killing enemies increases power level by 8% for 10 seconds. Stacks up to 3 times.	Faily consistent damage on all types of units As a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave. It’s useless for boss damage most of the time, but otherwise current version of this talent has 90% coverage through the whole game, especially on high difficulty with an aggressive playstyle. You can pair some movement speed talent/property to help you find enemies to keep the power boost.
Virtue of Knightly Temper	Critical Strikes instantly slay enemies if their current health is less than 4 times the amount of damage of the Critical Strike. Half effect versus Lords and Monsters.	Inconsistent but huge damage on all types of units Works on all types of units. On Boss the multiplier is reduced to 2 times the amount of damage of Critical Strike. For horde, one crit can basically wipe out everything in front of you. For elites, your single target attack can oneshot most of them (E.g Xsword heavy crit can oneshot-bodyshot Chaos Warrior on Cataclysm, 2h hammer light/1h mace heavy oneshot-bodyshot SV/Bestigor on Cataclysm). If you use this talent, build around crit chance.
Virtue of Heroism	Damage of heavy attacks increased by 30%.	Consistent damage for specific loadout on all types of units The most consistent talent in this row. Works on both heavy attacks and your career skill. You should only pick this talent for certain weapon combo. Pick one weapon clear horde with heavy attacks, and pick one weapon to kill elites with heavy attacks.

LeveL15 Row

Bulwark	Enemies that you stagger take 10% more damage from melee attacks for 2 seconds.Deal 20% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 40% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.	Barely increases your team's horde damage. Should be picked only if you use a shield most of time.
Smiter	The first enemy hit always counts as staggered.Deal 20% more damage to staggered enemies. Each hit against a staggered enemy adds another count of stagger. Bonus damage is increased to 40% against enemies afflicted by more than one stagger effect.	Increases your single target DPS. Should be picked most of time.
Enhanced Power	Increases total Power Level by 7%. This is calculated before other buffs are applied.	Does not benefit a melee based career as much as other talents. Should be avoided.

Talent Mechanic & General Usage (Part II)

LeveL20 Row

Virtue of Duty	The Lady's Favour grants an additional Quest.	Low RNG + long term weak buff Adding one Quest/Benison to The Lady’s Favour passive, 3 Quest/Benison in total. Choose it to minimize RNG so you have a higher chance of getting desirable Benison.
Virtue of Purity	Increases the potency of the blessings rewarded upon completing a Quest by 50%.	High RNG + long term strong buff Making Benison more impactful to the gameplay. Especially when you get good RNG on the Benison.
Virtue of the Penitent	The Lady's Favour now grants a repeatable Quest that rewards a Potion of Strength to Markus upon completion.	Low RNG + short term strong buff Adding one repeatable Quest/Benison to The Lady’s Favour passive. Killing a certain amount of enemy as a team will give a Strength Potion. The overall best talent in high difficulty, especially Cataclysm. It minimizes RNG the most, and 2~3 Strength Potion can kill patrol/boss very easily on any difficulty. However, on lower difficulties where there are fewer enemies and full book runs are more common, its usage is minimized.

LeveL25 Row

Virtue of Stoicism	50% of damage taken is regenerated as temporary health after 5 seconds.	Inconsistent damage reduction After not taking damage from enemies for 5 seconds, you heal 50% of the last damage you took as THP (After damage reduction calculation. Friendly fire does not reset the regen amount or timing). Basically a weaker version of Slayer talent ‘ Oblivious to Pain ’. It’s very useless for tanking constant small damage (E.g horde, gas, blightstorm). For high damage hit from elites, it also requires you to be able to tank one of the strong attacks first (Elites overhead does 100 damage on Legend, 150 on Cataclysm) and avoid any other damage for 5 sec. It can save your life sometimes, or allows calculated hit-trade, but requires a bit of skill and luck. Synergize better with slow heavy hitting weapons like Two-handed sword.
Virtue of Discipline	Timed blocks increase power level by 20% for 6 seconds.	Direct damage boost that requires skill/practice After triggering a Timed Block, increase Power Level by 20% for 6 seconds. The Timed Block window is the same as Witch Hunter Captain talent ‘ Riposte ’ and the same as weapon trait ‘ Parry ’ (0.5 seconds). As it’s a power boost, it increases your damage/stagger/cleave. It does require a good amount of practice & enough Block Cost Reduction/Stamina Regeneration to be effective on high difficulty. Unlike ‘ Riposte ’, it last X second, not just one hit. Thus if you can trigger it with high coverage, it’s a strong damage boost talent.
Virtue of the Joust	Increases push arc and stamina regeneration by 30%.	Consistent utility tool Increase Push Angle, Stamina Regen and Block Angle. Simple & consistent. Worst case scenario it can help you when you are panicking and spamming push, giving you a better chance of surviving when fighting patrol/being surrounded. In other cases, it’s a free crowd control tool for low stagger weapon, enable more combo on weapons with strong push/push attack, and for a more aggressive build you can drop Stamina Regen on your Trinket to get movement speed/cooldown reduction.

LeveL30 Row

Virtue of Audacity	Adds a second stab attack to Blessed Blade, dealing devastating single target damage.	Boss damage Heavy single target damage talent. The second hit is also a guaranteed crit single-target strike and dealing huge damage (oneshot-bodyshot Chaos Warrior on Cataclysm by default), stagger all types of enemies including Boss. The second hit also goes through shield.
Virtue of the Impetuous Knight	Killing an enemy with Blessed Blade increases movement speed by 35% for 15 seconds.	Low use case Utility Compared to the other two choices in this row, this talent needs more execution and have less use case. Greatly increase GK's moveability & dodge dance ability. Better paired with weapon with high cleave/stagger to charge your career skill faster for high movement speed coverage.
Virtue of Confidence	Changes Blessed Blade to a horizontal slash that cleaves through and staggers multiple enemies.	Patrol delete/Shield breaking/Elites in horde Has the best utility and highest use cases in this talent row. Does not reduce the base damage. Increase the career skill cleave to infinite and turn it into a horizontal attack. It can cleave through all the units it hit and at least stagger them. Extremely good for bursting out of a bad position, or dealing with high density situations.

New Weapons Overview - Bretonnian Longsword

Career Accessibility
All Kruber careers
Basic Stats
Stamina:
6 stamina/3 shields
Dodge:
120% dodge distance, 3 dodge count
Block/Push ability:
Same as normal weapons.
Crit chance:
No extra crit chance.
Mass modifier:
Light attacks/push attack all have Linesman. Heavy 1&2 have Heavy Linesman.
Additional notes:
Light attack 3/push attack/heavy attack 3 break shields.
Heavy 1&2 do not get stopped by armour. It cannot damage more than 1 armored unit without crit/headshot/strength potion. Can damage more than 1 Mauler by default.
Holding left click after full charge Heavy Attacks can block incoming attacks like normal block.

Bretonnian Longsword is a special weapon in Kruber's melee choices: the only high dodge weapon with no obvious disadvantages. It works like a Halberd, but with slower attacks, better stamina management, better dodge and better stagger. And Bretonnian Longsword has a unique block mechanic: when you fully charge your heavy attack, you can block with your weapon. This makes Bretonnian Longsword very easy to use in situations where you need to face multiple elites at the same time. However, even when you have more opening to deal damage with your heavy block, the single target DPS on it is not very high. Overall a very good stand-alone weapon.

Pros: High cleave. Good crowd control. Good dodge among two-handed weapons. Unique block mechanic. All-round weapon.
♥♥♥♥: DPS cap is fairly low.

Recommended Weapon Combo:
Against horde:
When Swift Slaying is not active OR fighting low density horde, use combo light attack - block cancel. Mixing some push can increase crowd control.

When Swift Slaying is active AND fighting high density horde, use combo light attack - heavy attack.

When fighting horde with elites inside, use combo heavy attack - heavy attack - block cancel.

Against elite:
When fighting elites for high dps, use push attack, then chain heavy attack - light attack.

When fighting elites for high stagger, use chain heavy attacks.

Against monster:
When fighting monsters, use push attack, then chain heavy attack - light attack.

New Weapons Overview - Bretonnian Sword & Shield

Career Accessibility
Grail Knight
Basic Stats
Stamina:
10 stamina/5 shields
Dodge:
100% dodge distance, 4 dodge count
Block/Push ability:
Front block angle is 120°(60° less than normal shield weapons).
Push strength and block cost are the same as normal shield weapons.
Crit chance:
No extra crit chance.
Mass modifier:
Light attack 1&2/Heavy attack 1 have Linesman.
Additional notes:
Push attack go through shield.
Light attack shield bash use shotgun bash profile. Meaning less range/stagger/damage/THP regen than normal shield bash.
CANNOT go push -> heavy at all.

Pros: High dodge among shields. Good single target damage. High crowd control capability. Good at dealing with complicated situations.
♥♥♥♥: Low horde damage.

Bretonnian Sword & Shield is a very strong shield weapon. Compared to base game Sword & Shield, you trade a little bit of horde damage/crowd control for higher mobility, higher single target damage and more flexible combos. Although you don't have first hit shield bash like old Sword & Shield, there are multiple good and fast combos to chain into it, thus crowd control-wise it's still very strong. For single target, you have many useful moves in both light and heavy attacks, and they can either chain into each other or chain into shield bash for creating more damage window. Meanwhile, Bretonnian Sword & Shield has better dodge than normal shield and has basically no slow down during attacks.

Recommended Weapon Combo:
Chain bash:
Chain bash can stagger all types of unit (except monster). A great way to stabilize your position/stagger multiple elites. It can also farm temporary HP with stagger very efficiently.
Use combo push - light attack to chain bash.

Against horde:
When fighting horde, use combo light attack- block cancel.

Against elite:
When fighting elites with good headshot opportunity, use combo push attack - heavy attack.

To damage and stagger elites, use combo push - light attack - heavy attack.

To damage elites without stagger, use combo heavy attack-light attack - heavy attack

Against monster:
When fighting monster, use combo heavy attack-light attack - heavy attack.

Sample Builds - Legend

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2034609078

Sample Builds - Cataclysm

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1831243904

[Royale w/ Cheese]

Default one and other two talents are 8.95 damage cleave/14.92 stagger cleave.
Confidence 14.92 damage cleave/59.68 stagger cleave + Tank.
You can check this guide for all career skill cleave value, it's in one of the appendix: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1816101198

[ProtoShel]

Just curious, what does Virtue of Confidence change the cleave of blessed blade to? I assume the default is 2.24 or something like that.

[Royale w/ Cheese]

@Athos42
Yep

[Athos42]

@Royale w/ Cheese Thank you! So I gain nothing by switching from Shield + Sword to two-handed sword if both items have the same power level.

[Jekadu]

Belated reply, but: thanks, the shorter cooldown was really what I was looking for when it came to differentiating between Blessed Blade and Locked & Loaded. Being able to use your ultimate on a much shorter cooldown without spending a talent point makes it play differently in a full run and recontextualizes the last tier of talents.

[Royale w/ Cheese]

It's fixed damage, affected by your Hero Power/charm/potions/other buff.

[Athos42]

Does anybody know if the weapon dealt by "Blessed Blade" depends on the weapon I have equipped? Or is it a fixed amount (scaled to difficulty maybe)?

[Royale w/ Cheese]

Well it's a melee attack, which means you need to get in density and pick key targets in close range to get value while lock & loaded can be used in safe distance.
But beside that the long CD/headshot reward makes lock and loaded ceiling higher. And in real game, consider BH & GK thp generate difference and their max health/tool kit, lock and loaded also has way lower floor. One of the reason GK is way more popular than BH.

[Jekadu]

I've been trying to work out what makes Blessed Blade unique compared to Locked & Loaded. Like, comparing them strictly 1:1 without taking class kits (too much) into consideration, when is Blessed Blade more *exciting* to use? Where does it shine mechanically that Locked & Loaded doesn't?

[WhiskeyTangoFoxtrot]

Thank you very much! I totally read over that section so my apologies for not reading it fully