Help my SK (and a few questions)

Discussion in 'Fighters' started by gaymer77, Jun 15, 2017.

  1. gaymer77 Active Member

    http://u.eq2wire.com/soe/character_detail/446696062983

    First that's my link to my SK. Now the all important stuff. I'm needing help with reforging and gemming my SK. I was told that the highest you should be getting your hate modifier is 100% but is that really accurate? Does getting past 100% not scale or is it a hard cap 100%? I know some of my gear has no adornments which is actually part of why I'm here. I've been told previously that I want potency gemmed but my question is what do I put in the slots that are white since I'm not aware of potency being a lvl 100 adornment. Or maybe I should say that I know lvl 100 potency adorns exist but atm I don't have the funds for Wantia so anything cheaper would be appreciated. But if potency adornments aren't what I should be using, then what else instead? Also I see these special (at least special to me) purple adornments (like Foundation of Excitement & Foundation of Ruin & Ascension of Magic) but when I've went to put them in without having even 1 in already it just won't let me put it in. How does one equip those or maybe I should be asking is what circumstances must be applied before I can? Finally what weapon adornments should I be using?

    As far as the reforging goes, what is ok to have less of (flurry?) while adding to what I do need?

    Thanks for your help and reading this. Much appreciated.
  2. Revco New Member

    http://eq2library.com/guides/

    That should start answering some of your questions. Also, scroll down your EQU character page, you can hover over stats for a brief description.
  3. Earar Well-Known Member

    in wrists and gloves, u definitly need 12.5% hate gain.

    you don't always need 100% .. if u only do heroic, u don't need 100%.

    get the 20% hp boost adorns from PG ... they are OP.
  4. Mercychalice Well-Known Member

    If you are going to be running heroics, 100% is fine. Most raid tanks I know run about 130% in case they get debuffed during raid. If you're not going to be raiding, and main or off tanking, that's not really a concern.


    Again, there are Potency runes in PG., and they are much, much higher than the Wantia ones. This will take some effort, but PG. can make your toon really shine.


    These come in sets of 3 for a full set bonus, and apply like every other adornment into gear with a purple gem slot. A set that is pretty much a must have for all classes: Paixao. It comes with potency, mitigation, and fervor - everything a growing tank needs. Sets to consider in the other slots: Pingyuan Diqu: full set of 3 adds 25% to max health, and +250k to base HP. Last set is up to you for choices - one set (Zhu Kunnen) adds a 4% ascension ability boost to one skill from each class, and the other (Aniqualacion) adds fire damage to 3 spells, each from a different ascension class. It can be worth it to only part of the Aniqualacion set to gain the 100k ability mod granted from having 2 runes of the set.

    For the most part, falls in line with the above for white and purple slots. However, start working on getting your ascension up to 5, and getting started on your epic weapon. It gives an orange slot, and the orange rune gained at the end is OP (even if it is a little broken at times with the fervor casting). The orange rune grants fervor, 100% max health, and 200k ability mod. You definitely want this. Also, in doing the sig line for KA, make sure to get the 32 quests done for Obulus Frontier. I know there's a guide somewhere on the forums for this. It grants access to buy the ethereal shield that every tank has been using (you'll get a base item, and have to buy the upgrade.)

    Looking at your character, I will state the obvious that will come with future runs through dungeons: upgrade your gear since better gear = better re-forging. Things to re-forge into first: hate, and max your strikethrough. 100%. It will help you a lot. As someone suggested, do some PG runs for some health adorns, and at least the ring and orange adornment from there, if nothing else. Also, with added gear, cast speed or get the runes from PG for double cast (since half your skills are spells, and it affects your ascension skills too, if you were unaware...). (Also, getting your Tome of the Ascended will help immensely with this since it has quite a bit of double cast on it as well. It comes from all 4 ascensions being completed.) As for re-forging out of things, it's kind of hard to do because an SK uses it all, unfortunately, so it's better to try to find gear that has double cast already on it (as well as any other skills you feel need a boost). Mostly, personally, I re-forge out of attack speed down to about 300 or so. However, since they granted us a pet with our epic weapon, I no longer re-forge out of DPS, since DPS affects the pet. I try to keep it above 600, more if I can manage it. Also, some tanks go for it, others do not: personally, I max my ae auto attack, though it's arguable whether auto attack does any good or not.

    Bonus Tips: If you will be running heroic dungeons, find someone to heartbound to as much as possible. The added fervor is excellent, and heartbound is as changeable as underwear. You can change who you're bound to as it much as you want.

    Upon looking at your AA: (keep in mind, your epic weapon allows being in offensive stance the ability to still use defensive capabilities gained from aa. However, upon obtaining your weapon, it may be worthwhile to create separate specs for offensive and defensive stances as some bonuses applied to defensive stances related probably will not apply once you start using the offensive stance, like the stance bonuses in the second line of the shadows tree, and the top abilities in the 2nd and 4th lines of the dragon tree...)

    *Crusader Tree: I find the first (str) line to be fairly worthless. There isn't much gained from it. It looks pretty, but for the amount of points sunk into it, you can get better gain through re-forging. Suggestion: Take the agility line and max out Trample and Higher Ground ( 1-10-10) and take the stamina line for more health, and if you like, Divine Aura (I use this instead of Legionnaire's Conviction), and definitely take Crusader's Faith at the bottom. It makes your group heal you. It's extremely useful. Fearless morale is wonderful this expansion, I'd leave it alone for now (at least until they put less fear-based mobs in the game). Legionnaire's Conviction, I don't use. This is purely personal preference.

    *Shadowknight Tree: Suggestion: Drop the 5 points in Dreadful Nightmares at the bottom, and put them in Innoruuk's Caress at the top. It increases the taunt amounts granted on your buff. Also, find some way to put 5 points into Enhance: Shadow Coil. It puts a small lifetap ability on this skill, and it comes back fairly quickly.

    *Shadows Tree: 2nd line: add points into a stance increase. 3rd line: Drop the 5 points in Knight's Stance and put them into Gallantry to increase taunt amounts. 4th line: Since you didn't add points into putting the lifetap ability onto Harm Touch in the shadowknight tree (and it's useless anyway since you have the Reaper's Mist from the Prestige tree), drop the 5 points in Siphon Essence and add the points into Death March to increase taunt amounts. Also, shuffle the points from Unholy Veracity to Malevolent Protection (grants a small heal chance upon a successful block.).

    *Heroic Tree: 1st line Move the points out of ability mod (103 ab mod is not impressive for the 10 points sunk into it) and put them into max health. 2nd line: move the points out of ability reuse (you'll get more on gear or can re-forge into it easily) and put it into potency. 3rd line: if you took Crusader's Faith from the Crusader Tree, enhance it here. There is the ability to make Aura of the Crusader come back more quickly, and personally I take this instead of Stone Wall, but the choice here is playstyle dependent. Max out Resilience. 4th line: take Zealous Smite (grants the ability to cure the group and works if you become stifled or charmed. Very useful.)

    *Dragon Tree: 2nd line -up to you if you go to the bottom. Personally, I forget the last ability is a heal so I never use it. However, very top ability, Dragon Scales, increases max health granted by the defensive stance, and the 4th ability, Layered Scales, grants increased mitigation granted by defensive stance. Useful to max out. 4th line, second ability, Ancient Advance: grants added damage to single and encounter taunts. Useful.

    *Prestige Tree: personally, I put points into Soul Tear instead of Field Commander, since it makes any ability with a lifetap effect grant a little added mitigation. Right side is excellent. I suggest dropping the 3 extra ticks in favor of the increased heal amount added to Reap. This is purely personal preference though.

    *Shadowknight Prestige: Left side, Enhanced Vigor, max it. Not just on Shadowknight, but every class. It's pretty much a must-have ability. As for the others, I would suggest choosing what you're low on. Most of the time it's crit bonus, and that's where my points are. I chose to put 7 points in crit bonus and 7 points in potency because I chose only to take Earthshock and didn't take Diamond Flesh. Again, personal preference. I never used the Diamond Flesh when I had it, so it was wasted points for me.

    Hope these are helpful points for you to consider. Be sure to look around too, so that if you find a really good Shadowknight on your server, perhaps they'll talk shop with you as well. Good luck, and Have fun! Happy hunting, fellow Norrathian! :)
    Oradim and Katz like this.
  5. gaymer77 Active Member

    Thanks for this link. I actually had it before & lost it. The only thing is I don't see any WHITE adornments shown on what I should be equipping. Do you guys have any recommendations for those?
  6. Semperfifofum Well-Known Member

    One tip I have is that if you don't have good options, then adorn for things you can reforge out of. I end up adorning casting speed in some places because it allows me the freedom to reforge out of casting speeds. However a lot of zones debuff casting or the mobs do, so don't rely on exactly 100% or you'll be waiting a lot.

    Because the SK has many skills that are dots which increase hate on every tick, I'm not sure if 100% hate is totally necessary, but I did get it that high anyway. I also use block adorns wherever possible because better than 100% block increase will still be reflected in the Uncontested Block.

    Then there are other theories... it's sometimes better to rely on damage reflection and use a two-hander instead of worrying about block. You have to trust your healer if you go that way, and get used to your health bouncing. I think that makes it more fun and I've played it both ways. At the moment I'm using a shield and worrying about block but both paths are valid imho.

    A couple of years ago I'd have worked hard to get 100% strikethrough but I don't find it necessary now. The thing I focus on today is debuffs to mitigation, and coordinating with mages to dispel those effects that can be.

    My priority in white adorns is: defenses (parry, block), mitigations, strength, adorn of weaponry (crushing, piercing, etc), any type of casting which I will then reforge away and get my hate gain, accuracy and strikethrough from. I opted for the foundation set that includes +100k ability mod because the incandescent ones don't do much.

    Some of the foundations, etc adorns must be applied when the item is not on your character sheet, but in your bag. Unequip it and try again.I know you didn't ask, but the unequip and then apply adorns is also true for merc gear adorns.

    Not saying it's the best way, but I like it, seems to work well. I'm just doing heroics or soloing atm, so I didn't spend the plat on all the foundation purple adorns, for purples I've used dps or recovery speed stacking adorns.

    I'm not convinced that 10% crit chance adorns are useless though. If I was saving plat, I'd probably test whether 20x10% crit chance would be better than trying to figure all the other slots out. https://u.eq2wire.com/item/index/1963739023 Lots of places that can fill in, even 10 of them gives you an additional 100% but yeah I can see why people abandoned them. (that page shows superior, the affordable greater ones are 10%) Atm, the best use of those is the forearms on the merc armor.

    Legendary/ Fabled crits also apply to hate gains :) so white crit adorns may not be a waste for heroic tanks. I haven't gone that way mainly because I think the 92 str x as many slots as possible gives me a better buff overall.
  7. Earar Well-Known Member

    2 hander ?? in Kunark ???

    for adorns, the 12.5% hate gains are a must (gloves and wrists)

    then it depends on what u need. I know SK can get some nice stat boosts from AAs .. so if u boost those stats in AA and the stats from gear, u may need less some of them.

    u need enough AoE auto (100%-
    u need enough attack speed
    enough HP
    u can use parry adorns, block ones, depending on what u need. Issue with adorns is that u may need some stuff when gearing up but can take tham away as u level up and get better gear.
    100% hate gain is always usefull .. double cast for SK is really important, U still need strikethrough (don't know if 100% necessity on SK) and maybe a bit of accuracy (20% max)

    but if u can get the 20% max HP adorns from PG and the ring of championship + lvl 4 orange adorn, your health will go up .. and if u have enough HP, lots of stuff get easier :)

    rely on mitigation gear and jewelry, to boost your mit and reforge. U sually I did reforge my Ab mod into hate gain/strikethrough. So I ended up loosing a lot of Ab mod, but tanks need a lot of stats compared to other classes.
  8. Mercychalice Well-Known Member

    Personally, here is how I have been working towards gearing my SK via white adornments:

    Head, Chest, Forearms, Legs, and Waist - Nerve HP adornment from PGs
    Shoulders and Neck - Extra attacks adornment from PGs
    Hands and both Wrists - Incandescent Adornment of Aggressiveness, Superior (12.5% hate gain each)
    Feet, Primary, Secondary and Ranged - Raw Power potency adornment from PGs
    both Charms and Cloak - Modified Power ability mod adornments from PGs
    both Rings and Ears - Increased Criticals crit bonus adornments from PGs
  9. gaymer77 Active Member

    Ok maybe I'm just doing this wrong but why is everyone saying put the 12.5% hate gain in my gloves and wrists when with 5 mastercrafted hate gain purple gems you're already at the 100% hate gain (plus 300 stam, 3% mitigation increase, and 3% block chance from set bonuses)?
    Semperfifofum likes this.
  10. Melt Actually plays the game

    Because those purple gems are terrible in comparison to the crafted KA ones and you should avoid using them at all costs.

    Go for the set that gives you the 100k ABmod, the %HP set, and the 4 fervor set. That should take 7-8 slots of purple runes. The rest, get bolstered endurance/attributes. The method of obtaining these is available on eq2library, linked above.
    For white adorns use these:
    http://u.eq2wire.com/item/index/1023747645 (HP)
    http://u.eq2wire.com/item/index/2000298703 (Potency)

    Also, replace every single piece of jewelry you have on. General rule of thumb (which I'm sure I mentioned when you asked about your berserker a few weeks ago.) If it has less than ~650% potency, DO NOT USE IT.
  11. gaymer77 Active Member

    First off you don't have to be such an *** when you reply to someone. I have the jewelry on that I do because it offered the most potency of the pieces on the broker. Would you rather I use nothing instead of something with less than 650 potency?

    Secondly I have the HP set & fevor set in my gear. The other wasn't even recommended on the guide that was posted above on what adornments to use. Aspect of Paixao (at least 2 from this set for mit increase) Aspect of Pingyuan Diqu (suggested full set for max hp increase). Those are the TWO sets of KA purple adornments that are recommended on http://eq2library.com/ka/class-optimization/#tank and the rest are TOT purple gems. I have a full set of Aspect of Paixao & a full set of Aspect of Pingyuan Digu. I went with the hate gain purples because everyone was more or less saying not to reforge anything which is where I had initially planned on getting my hate gain from.
  12. Fairin Active Member

    Purple adorns are as follows. you have 5 square slot (cloak / belt / weapons) and 7 "armor slots"
    3set pot/mit/fervor
    3set pot/combotime/maxHP
    2set pot/100kabmod
    1set Cloak Adorn form chel (5 fervor) - useful subsitute would be the cloak adorn off the crab using the same raid portal for chel

    ^ these adorns will fill your cloak + belt + all armor pieces

    for your weapon purples you will want bolstered attributes + 2 of whatever you like, as PQ gear lacks a purple slot these will be gone eventually... personally i use bolstered endurance and ethernean will, for more mana for ethereal assassin.

    for white adorns. charmslot: casting speed(or primary stat), everything else. maxhp adorns from pq there is no alternative you are a tank. HP is king.

    20k mit is sufficent for everything, the bare minimum to start tanking KA would be around 15k mit but they fuxed with the numbers recently so just go with 20k for now.

    For your gear, if it is under 650 potency ditch it, buy twark off the broker if you have too / cant find it from solos keep in mind bloodytooth gear generally has less crit bonus than twark handcrafted. making it -very bad- for new players to come back buy a full set of mastercrafted then go fail cause the gear sucks that much.

    platnium infuse your gear, if you cannot afford to infuse your gear go harvest a prismatic shard in vespyr they are currently selling for 200k each (on AB). doing a max plat infuse on all your gear will net you 600 crit bonus before tithe / pristege using that plat to buy infusers (handcrafted / heroic skyfire) will get you 200 more.

    reforge for the stats you need in this order - hategain - recovery speed - strike through - aoe auto - accuracy - abilitycasting speed untill 100% doublecast.

    sacrifice stats such as haste / multi / dps mod to their minimums (200 haste 100 multi 0 dpsmod)

    only reforge crit bonus if you are overcap of course. taking right side pristege will net tons of crit bonus based on your potency levels

    once you have enough crit bonus from gear you can do an elite left side pristege spec for even more potency

    it is more important to cap critbonus than potency.. when it comes to pristege

    it is also more important to have enough health to survive longer than 2 seconds on any given encounter so maximize hp so your healers don't complain about your squishiness. - no body likes a 2 hit wondertank,

    as for your last question. auto attack stats only matter if you're doing a very specific build of geomancer, and really only shines when your a warden / inquis or have an inquisitor in your group and timed perfectly with the troub epic ect... very specific useage of tereene destruction.... OR public quests =) but having the base there for auto attack procs is important.

    minimum potency for any class to start out in KA is 11k
    the minimum crit bonus for any class to start out in KA is 3k
    the minium HP for any class to start out is 3million (4 if tank) however this number has changed since they fuxed with outgoing mob dps, and sits somewhere between 5 million for squishies. and 10million for tanks now.

    this is obtained with doing the entire sigline for the offhand reward. the tradeskill class cloak.10 points of divine potency tithe and crit bonus and a correctly made spec that focuses on what their gear needs to min/max

    http://u.eq2wire.com/soe/character_detail/446679414033 here is a character i made in full twark 0 tithe 0 enhanced vigor and bleh spec with right side pristege and stuff, also 0 infusions
  13. Melt Actually plays the game

    Every piece of jewelry you have on I can think of a better replacement for off the top of my head. I can copy the list here for you if you'd like. You just seem to not be looking very hard.
    The purples should be as I said. Fervor, HP and ABMod. Fervor goes a very very long way, once you pass 10k potency. (My SK is at 13k with full crafted gear.)
    I wasn't trying to be rude in that response, though I have every reason to be.
    Mathafern likes this.
  14. Tupperbeast Active Member




    Here is my view what you are missing in the whole, the people have given the many good tips and what you can change which decorations you need my Main is itself Sk. If I look at your sk gine me on first on your AA points are not Max does this first, the rest comes by itself. Why because your skill is simply measuring AA-tree, and a standard setting of the game.

    You need to reinstate heroic zones: 15k + pot - 200000 AB mode - 100% Hate - 100% Reuse Speed - 100% Casting Speed - 125% Multi Ataack is all you need - 200% Attack Speed - Dps 600 is not a must you can Tank with 200-300 too - 100% AE Autoattack - 100% Strikethrough - Flurry 100% is nice - 100% doublecast is a boost too - WDB 100% is fine - CB 4150 -4230 - Pot is the base Comes later with Deity Points and stuff and infuser - Crit Chance 1500 - 2000% - Fervor is a must too Comes with Adorns heartbound and Items - HP 10000000 Comes with rune and max Hp skill from AA - 20000000+Hp Comes from Epic 2.0 + Infuser + PG Adorns and other stuff PG

    Resolve: (190 t1 240 t2 290Challenge Group buff) 338 Expert+challenge self buff.

    Now work on Sig Line Kunark Ascending Nice Weapon + Nice Shield Reward after 30Quests and TOT Sig Line.
    And you get Access to Ascension Trainer is a def. a must have for more dps and Epic 2.0

    I know a forum should be there for questions and help but the best way to get to know your char and how it has to work, you have to make yourself.
    Questions are always nice and good but the best way to do it is simply to design your own char to work on how to use training dummy and ACT to, for example, its dps to refine its Spell order to learn what makes what spell.

    If you have done all this, take guild members or friends and test the slight T1 zones so you can work on your Gear Progress work in the game and with each item it will be better.

    most Data from http://eq2library.com/guides/ not up do date.


    I do not want to say that I am the best sk player but I belong to top tanks to do this and without raids. I have both my Aggro and Dps optimized up to the last so I can hold without support against Top Dps people Aggro. It costs only a lot of work and time to optimize it as also belong to the long farms of Deity points. If you later raid you have to increase the one or the other values to the maximum, then all stuff from PG would make sense but for current content, if you only solo or heroic are running this does not have to.
  15. Jaxxan D'Arkon New Member

    I am a ShadowKnight. http://u.eq2wire.com/soe/character_detail/867590257582

    I know how tough it was as a ShadowKnight to become a KA Heroic Tank straight out of ToT. With time and effort you can meet your goals.

    As a ShadowKnight you are the Offensive Tank and should play as such. Don't forget this.

    Don't worry about mitigation for now, it's not as important as getting your health and potency up. Always choose mitigation plate armor pieces, but your other pieces don't have to have mit on them at this point. Potency is your focus.

    You can use AA's to help bring your <6 million HP up towards 9million+ with Enhanced Vigor in your Prestige ShadowKnight tree. There are other HP AA's that can also help you with this. Take 3 hours to learn your AA's and create your own build focusing on Damage and +Healing with a secondary focus on Threat/HP/Tanking.

    For white adorns, get all of the tier1 white potency adorns from the PG's and fill out the rest of your white slots with tier1 HP adorns from the same PG's. You won't need to spend any plat for wantia adorns by doing this.

    You will find, with 6K potency, that everyone is tanking except for you in dungeons. You should do everything that you can to raise your potency as high as possible. You should take high potency gear in favor of every other stat (even mitigation) at this point.

    When your potency is up around 15k, the biggest damage increasing thing that you can do (and your threat comes directly from your damage output) is getting your doublecast as close to 100% as you can.

    You will accomplish this by reforging into casting speed. At one point I had 800 Casting Speed. This is acceptable if you can reach 100% doublecast. As you gain better gear, you will be able to reforge out of casting speed while maintaining 100% doublecast. Don't sacrifice doublecast. White Casting Speed adorns may also help you achieve this milestone.

    When this happens you will find that tanking has become a little easier. But you will still be very reliant on Chaos Cloud to hold threat.

    Consider getting Yelinak's Focus in the Dragon AA Tree so that you can reset your abilities, also consider 2 points in Chaos March in RightSide Prestige so that you can reset your Chaos Cloud. These two abilities will allow you to keep pulling big groups without keeping your group waiting on your cool downs, as long as you're smart about using your abilities.

    For Cyans, go farm Ossuary by yourself to start. Watch out for the bone spider, he'll one shot you. Decent Offensive Focus One-handed and Secondary cyans drop in there. Cazic Thule x2 drops a decent 22 potency cyan. Also work on Zek Timeline, there's a nice 1handed potency cyan reward in there somewhere.

    You're going to reforge a lot along your journey. It's ok to completely murder offensive stats like DPS and attack speed. Ability Modifier reforges pretty well. The best bang for your buck is reforging crit bonus, but only when you have over 4000cb.

    Consider plat infusing all of your gear. All those legendary items, consider infusing up to 100p. The crappier fabled pieces, consider infusing up to 180p. When you get nice gear, max infuse it. The bonuses from infusing are not to be taken lightly. They will make a big difference.

    This turned out to be a lot longer than I intended.
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  16. Instagib New Member

    All of Jaxxan's point are excellent, but I think he left one out that I see tanks do all the time to gain potency. It's something I wanted to smack Jaxxan for doing so many times, and that would be swapping your stances.

    PLEASE stay in defensive stance if you do not have the mitigation to swap mitigation for a bit more potency.

    You can gain 2-3k potency swapping from defensive to offensive stance but you lose a lot of your mitigation and temps( damage blockers/reducers) by doing this. It does you and your group no good for you to gain said potency if you wind up taking the dirt nap a few seconds later.
  17. Jaxxan D'Arkon New Member

    I'm in Offensive Stance 99% of the time. I have my epic spells which let me use my defensive temps in offensive stance. Only on progression raid mobs will you find me in defensive stance. For the original poster, Instagib makes a valid point, but when you get epic2.0, it's a non-issue for shadowknights.
    Semperfifofum likes this.
  18. Instagib New Member

  19. Jaxxan D'Arkon New Member

    What stance you happen to be in has no bearing on the original posters topic. Thank you for trolling me.
  20. Mathafern Well-Known Member

    Jaxxan's advice is excellent. The one item I would add is that in this expansion, cyan adorns (craft material) drop from experts, run expert spire once a day and you'll get set up pretty quickly.

    I also run offensive stance unless tanking a raid mob that is T2 or higher.
    Semperfifofum likes this.