MapleStory Dark Knight Skill Build Guide - Remastered Destiny Update

Dark Knight is the 4th job Explorer Warrior class in MapleStory that wields pole arms and spears to attack enemies. The class was once the most popular in the whole of MapleStory, with the 3rd job class Dragon Knight now no longer existing (it has since been renamed to Berserker due to the skills being completely revamped). Dark Knight is one of three paths players can take as an Explorer Warrior.

Dark Knight Overview

• Warrior - First Job Skill Build
• Spearman - Second Job Skill Build
• Berserker - Third Job Skill Build
• Dark Knight - Fourth Job Skill Build
• Dark Knight - Hyper Skills
• Dark Knight - Fifth Job Skill Build
• Changelog

As an original class of MapleStory, Dark Knights sit between the defensive Paladin class and the hard-hitting Hero class. Dark Knights have gone through a rough transition from being the most popular class in the early MapleStory years. Their 4th job when first released was very crippling (it required you to have low HP in order to do high damage!) and other classes overtook them as the best training and bossing classes in the game. Then they went through a complete revamp in MapleStory Red update, which removed many of their well-known attacking skills such as Dragon Buster.

All Explorers got a major revamp in the Destiny V.233 Patch update, including Dark Knight!

That being said, the revamp also boosted their overall damage and gameplay mechanics. Like most classes, they also have a Flash Jump skill for greater mobility.

Training wise, Dark Knights are decent mobbers with their main attacking skill Dark Impale. The class works best when it can jump around the map slashing at mobs with Dark Impale due to it's wide range and fast animation cast. Not to mention it does up to 6 lines of damage per hit! Dark Knights have great survivability due to their ability to steal %HP from mobs on attacks.

Bossing wise Dark Knights have some great skills. A combination of Sacrifice and Gungnir's Descent means you can hit bosses really hard damage wise. They also are able to "cheat death" using their 40 second i-frame skill to get invincibility. Whilst their Hyper Body skill does give +60% HP to all party members, it's no longer needed due to boss mechanics now using HP% attacks. 5th Job skills also help increase the viability of Gungnir's Descent by reducing the cooldown of Sacrifice and also add more map control with cooldown large-area attack skills.

Explorer Warriors can job advance into either Dark Knight, Hero or Paladin.

• Weapon: Spear
• Job: Warrior
• Class: Explorer
• Shared Cash Shop Inventory: Explorer Jobs
• Legion Block: +Max HP (1%/2%/3%/4%/5%)
• Link Skill: Invincible Belief (+restores you HP when your MAX HP falls below 15%)
• Primary Stat: Str
• Inner Ability: +1 Attack Speed

Warrior First Job Skill Build

You can max all your skills in 1st job. Follow this skill build:

• Slash Blast (+1), War Leap (+2)
• War Leap (MAX)
• Slash Blast (MAX)
• Upward Charge (+1), Leap Attack (+1)
• Warrior Mastery (MAX)
• Upward Charge (MAX)
• Leap Attack (MAX)
• Iron Body (MAX)

First job Warriors use their Slash Blast mobbing skill to power through the early levels. War Leap is their Flash Jump skill and should be gotten to a decent level so that you can get around maps much faster for training. Iron Body and Warrior Mastery are both passive buffs.

With the revamped Explorer patch, you get two new skills for vertical mobility called Upward Charge and Leap Attack.

Skill Description & Overview

Spearman Second Job Skill Build

You can max all your skills in 2nd job. Follow this skill build:

• Spear Sweep (+1), Evil Eye Shock (+1), Weapon Mastery (+1)
• Weapon Mastery (5)
• Agile Arms (MAX)
• Spear Sweep (MAX)
• Weapon Mastery (MAX)
• Final Attack (MAX)
• Evil Eye Shock (MAX)
• Hyper Body (MAX)
• Iron Wall (MAX)

Spear Sweep is your new main attacking skill as a Spearman. Get your Agile Arms skill up to a decent level before you start maxing out Weapon Mastery to give you that extra attack speed, Physical Training and Final Attack for some great damage buffs. Your Evil Eye Shock skill is pretty decent; it activates in short bursts to damage mobs around you.

Hyper Body and Iron Will are both useless at this stage.

Skill Description & Overview

Berserker Third Job Skill Build

You can max all your skills in 3rd job. Follow this skill build:

• La Mancha Spear (+1), Cross Surge (+1), Evil Eye Shock II (+1)
• Lord Of Darkness (+1), Evil Eye of Domination (+1), Hex Of the Evil Eye (+1)
• La Mancha Spear (MAX)
• Cross Surge (MAX)
• Lord Of Darkness (MAX)
• Evil Eye Shock II (MAX)
• Evil Eye Of Domination (MAX)
• Hex Of The Evil Eye (MAX)
• Rush (MAX)
• Endure (MAX)

La Mancha Spear is a slow attacking skill. It's great on small maps, but on larger maps it can feel very cumbersome to use. In third job you get two great buffs: Cross Surge (+50% passive final damage!) and Lord Of Darkness (+30% Crit Rate, +8% Crit Damage!). Your Evil Eye starts to become more useful too, with three new buffs being applied to it. You may want to consider putting a point into Rush, but I rarely used this skill.

Skill Description & Overview

Dark Knight Four Job Skill Build

You can max all your skills in 4th job. Follow this skill build:

• Dark Impale (+1), Final Pact (+1), Barricade Mastery (+1)
• Dark Impale (MAX)
• Barricade Mastery (MAX)
• Final Pact (MAX)
• Revenge Of The Evil Eye (MAX)
• Dark Resonance (MAX)
• Maple Warrior (MAX)
• Gungnir's Decent (MAX)
• Power Stance (MAX)
• Heros Will (MAX)
• Magic Crash (MAX)

You now have access to your best mobbing skill in Dark Impale. The updated Dark Knight has a lot more passive buffs added to it, so it's best to max Barricade Mastery and Final Pact as soon as possible.

The rest of the skills are more useful during bossing; Final Pact will give you a 40 second i-frame and Gungnir's Descent are great bossing attacking skills. Magic Crash and Power Stance will also make bossing more relaxing.

Skill Description & Overview

Dark Knight Hyper Skill Build

Hyper skills are available at level 140. You get Hyper Skill Points as you level towards 200, but not enough to max all the skills, so choose wisely. These skills mostly help increase the damage of your current skills.

• Final Pact - Damage
• Final Pact - Reduce Target
• Evil Eye - Hex Reinforce
• Gungnir's Decent - Reinforce
• Gungnir's Decent Boss Rush
• Dark Thirst
• Nightshade Explosion
• Epic Adventure

Dark Knight Fifth Job Skill Build

Upon reaching level 200, you will now have access to the V Matrix, which acts as your new fifth job skills. Each class gets their own skills to use, along with boosting nodes to increase the damage of existing skills. To obtain new skills, you open up items called Nodestones, which drop from every mob in Arcane River. You have limited number of slots in your V Matrix, so you want to obtain perfect nodes for maximize your character's damage.

Dark Knight's Nodes should include:

• Speak Of Darkness
• Radiant Evil
• Calamintous Cyclone
• Darkness Aura
• Trinode: Dark Impale, Nightshade Explosion, Gungnir's Descent
• Trinode: Final Attack, Evil Eye, Rush

All 5th Job classes should try to also obtain these:

• Decent Holy Symbol
• Decent Sharp Eyes
• Decent Speed Infusion
• Erda Nova
• Rope Lift
• Weapon Aura

Skill Description & Overview

Changelog

06/09/2022 - Updated for Destiny V.233 Update

26/03/2021 - Added new 5th Job Skill from the Awake update.

23/10/2020 - First update