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Dark Hunter
Can equip: Swords, Whips, Light Armor, Clothing
How the fallen have mightied. Dark Hunters were perfectly fine last game, they had some utility, though they preferred swords to dish out more damage. Since they were a mediocre class, Atlus decided they needed a buff, and boy did they get it! Dark Hunters are one of the best classes in the game, they have great utility in both weapons, you can go swords or whips with little issue, though I would recommend sticking to one, and they have great ways to make bosses easy as hell and very sad. They step on the Hexer's toes, which is dangerous to do in this game, so some aspects like binds and poison aren't as useful, and they're not amazing in regular battles, having ZERO attacks that are multi-target. But some of the skills of this class are just incredible and they fit into most teams super well.
So you've seen a few classes that got mega nerfed. How about mega buffed!? And boy oh boy, Dark Hunters went from a rather okay class to completely and utterly broken! It's another textbook case of EO2's wild class balancing, as while you have utterly terrible classes, you also have completely bonkers classes on the other end of the spectrum.
Oh hey this seems familiar, because this was basically their same stat line from before, they were pretty balanced overall, like the Landy, so there wasn't much to fix. Their TEC took a massive hit though, they had the second highest before, even if they never used it, but have slightly higher HP and TP, so overall I'm very happy with it.
Common Passive Unlocks
STR Up: Lv5: Ecstacy
TEC Up: Lv1: Unbind
Oh now this is nice to see, barely any requirements aside from ones you were gonna do anyway. One point into TEC Up for Unbind is a fair trade, though it depends if you need that skill, since Dark Hunters usually have a lot to do. Unbind leads into some nice passives, so it can be worth it for one point of TEC. You want to max out STR and Ecstasy is practically a requirement for Whip builds, so yes please! While Swords don't take much advantage of binds, they can still use Dominate so it just means they're doing other things afterwards that's not Ecstasy. AGI and VIT Up can be useful since they like both of them, and LUC Up has some fringe use of very slightly increasing bind and ailment chances, not much though. Since they have good HP and TP, can be worth making them better, but you have a fair bit of freedom in what you want to focus on.
Since they're a damage dealing class, STR Up is always a good investment to take. Some of their skills can get rather pricey, so they'll appreciate TP Up later down the line. While all classes will appreciate more durability, Dark Hunters will get a lot of mileage out of HP Up if you intend on making heavy use of their Bait skills. VIT Up can be another nice way to beef them up to take hits so they can deal counter damage. TEC doesn't really do much for them, so you can ignore that one.
I'd say AGI isn't great for them either since they're already a super fast class with Swords and especially Whips providing massive speed boosts. LUC boost could be handy since thier LUC is terrible and it has a decent amount of influence on infliction rates. But don't bother taking LUC if you're trying to boost up their defenses against ailments, as they have skills that are far more effective at dealing with those.
Whips/Swords
Whips Unlocks: Lv1: Viper; Lv2: Shackles; Lv3: Cuffs; Lv4: Gags; Lv6: Climax; Lv8: Ecstacy, Bait, Magibait
Swords Unlocks: Lv1: Hypnos; Lv2: Nerve; Lv3: Mirage; Lv4: Drain; Lv6: Petrify; Lv8: Bait, Magibait
Passive
Another mediocre weapon investment, but as always which one to choose? Well, both, because the bait skills are fucking amazing, but which to focus on? Whips has the best overall use, but Swords makes a good case for itself too. If you're using a Hexer then it's probably best to go swords since they work better with poison and binds, but oh no you're slightly less useful than the most busted class in the series, how terrible. Ecstasy and Climax are amazing but also require some setup, meaning you're relying on the other skills at the start of a fight, so you don't do the big unga bunga damage until later, unless you have Dominate ready to go.
Swords are mostly unique, though Hypnos is godawful compared to the Hexer's version, Paralysis is never great, Mirage has bad numbers, but Drain and Petrify are pretty top tier. So it's relatively even, depends on your party setup and what your want your Dark Hunter to do, they're incredibly flexible and even their bad skills still work wonders if there's no alternative, since they have alright stats and don't purely rely on damage like other, worse, classes. Even at their worst, Dark Hunters can still help in a variety of ways.
Whips and Swords were on equal footing in 1, though Swords edged out Whips a bit since they dealt more damage. Here it's all about the Whips! Whips are so goddamn broken in this game, with having access to Ecstasy and Climax. Not only that, binds also got changed big time. They were easier to land on bosses in 1, but bosses would use different body parts instead of wasting turns using skills from a bound body part. Not so in this game onwards. Everyone will gleefully waste their turns trying to use skills from a body part that's bound, so binds got hugely buffed in that aspect and are basically on par with ailments in being hard disables. However FOEs and bosses are overall more resistant to binds to make up for that. But landing one basically gains your party a lot of momentum. Swords aren't bad and a Dark Hunter can still contribute heavily with them, but they are considerably less effective than using a Whip.
Antisick/Antibind
Prerequisites: Unbind Lv3
Increases user's resistance to ailments/binds. Passive.
Neat. Little much SP to invest for my liking, but still neat. Since allies have a 100% resistance to everything, lowering it to 20% for the infliction formula will help a crapton. It depends if you think you need it, usually you can rely on Theriacas to just get you out of the jam immediately and most of the time it's not the end of the world if your party does get tagged, but having someone who will very rarely get tagged to then help everyone else is very nice. Still, because it's just neat to have in most cases, investing in TEC Up, then Unbind, then 5 points into these makes it not a stunning investment, but Dark Hunters will have some SP to spare. Just some. Up to you if you invest in one or the other, binds can be deadly, but also not, while ailments are usually annoying but nothing too dangerous.
If you're playing the Japanese version of the game, do not take these skills! While they do work on the Dark Hunter, they also affect your enemies, making disabling them way harder!
Anyways, they're very nice defensive pickups since the Dark Hunter's LUC is pretty bad, opening them up to getting disabled. Oh and remember tha ailment resistance affects everything that aren't binds. So Instant Death and Stuns are affected as well. Though you won't be seeing too much of the latter in this game, as only 2 enemy skills in the entire game can Stun. How much you take in these is up to you. Maxing them out might be a bit dicey, but a few points in them should be alright. I'd say if you had to invest in only one, to pick up Antisick, as binds aren't typically game ending, but ailments are far more dangerous and capable of leading to a party wipe since they're capable of hard disabling your party and preventing them from doing anything at all, while you can still use items and other such actions while bound.
Viper
Prerequisites: Whips Lv1
A single target Whip attack that attempts to inflict Poison. Whip skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Alright, first attack and it's... eh. Now this is pretty amazing early game since you can be dishing out like 160 damage by level 4 but after that it's not that impressive. It'll be the main whip skill you use when Ecstasy and Climax aren't around because if you land the poison it'll do the most overall damage, but otherwise it's kinda whatever. Still, it's a short and sweet skill to invest in that fails horrendously in stacking up to the Hexer's Poison, but such is life as an inflicter in EO2.
Ooh, talk about a massive buff. This skill only being 5 levels gives a much more compelling reason to pick it up. This is gonna be one of the Dark Hunter's bread and butter skills, as you can be dealing double damage for 6 SP and 8 TP, so by level 4 they can hit randoms really hard in the earlygame. Unfortunately that's about the best they'll be contributing to those, as they don't really have access to AOEs and the such, but hey, that's what your other party members are for!
Shackles/Cuffs/Gag
Prerequisites: Whips Lv2/Lv3/Lv4
A single target Whip attack that attempts to inflict Leg/Arm/Head Bind. Whip skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
There's a lot of binds to go around in this game, 3 classes have access to the full set and depending on team comp you can either use them in tandem or stick to just one set. Dark Hunter is in the middle of infliction rates but also does damage as well. It's mostly negligible since the whole reason you're using these is to shut something down, and that's very useful for specific enemies. Like always, Leg binds aren't that important, while Head and Arm usually depends on physical or magical attacks, so if you're gonna invest in these skills... you'd use a Hexer, BUT the latter two are usually safer bets. Of course you don't want to max all 3 skills, that's a huge waste of SP, but they do have their uses. Since you have a lot more options in this game, it's entirely possible for even a Whip DH to skip them entirely, especially since Dominate is just... so fucking good.
Dark Hunters don't really have the SP to max out everything here easily, so I suggest only going with 1 or 2 binding skills, if you go with them at all. Dominate completely overshadows these skills and Viper is already good for damage, but if you wish to be less cheesy, I recommend taking Gag or Cuffs as Shackles isn't too great. Don't worry too much about overlapping with a Hexer, as disables are hard to land on the big enemies, and multiple attempts at landing a disable are always good.
Ecstasy
Prerequisites: Whips Lv8, STR Up Lv5
A single target Whip attack that deals significant damage to fully bound enemies. Whip skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Alright, now we're talking, at face value this skill seems as bad as it was last game, since fully binding an enemy is no mean feat, however Dominate makes that requirement a breeze, you should never use this skill without it. After all, what else is your DH gonna do when an enemy is fully bound? Viper? Of course this requires having Dominate in a fight, which can make bosses a bit too easy, while also being ridiculous overkill for regular enemies, so it might not mesh with certain playstyles. You've gotta make sure you wanna use this as well, since it's quite an investment, not just the SP, but also your Force. It's definitely worth it though, goddamn this skill is good. In the right circumstances.
This skill was garbage in EO1 since it was basically unusable due to how hard it was to fully bind an enemy. Now, Dominate exists and it's one of the most broken skills in the entire game since you can nuke an enemy for 750% damage afterwards! The baits have higher damage potential, but a fully bound enemy won't do much, and that's the perfect time to hit them with Ecstasy!
Climax
Prerequisites: Whips Lv6
A single target Whip attack that inflicts Instant Death if an enemy is below HP threshold, healing user by remaining HP. Will always miss if enemy is above HP threshold. If enemy is immune to Instant Death but under HP threshold, deals regular damage. Whip skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Phew, that's a lot of specifics, but that's because this skill is so fucking dumb. Any enemy that isn't IMMUNE to Instant Death has, in essence, less than half health at max level. What a ridiculously easy requirement, but of course it's only useful on certain enemies. Firstly, most bosses are immune to Instant Death, probably because of this skill, while regular enemies are usually dead from a full assault if they're just above half health. Therefore this skill works best, and amazingly so, on the 2 bosses not immune to ID, as well as E V E R Y FOE. Yep, if you've got this skill, every FOE has effectively less than half health, which is RIDICULOUS! Not that it's too amazing, FOEs don't give exp, again, probably because of this skill, and there's no reason to fight them once you've gotten their drops, but still, I'm just nitpicking, god this skill is fucking insane.
The accuracy modifier is only for the regular attack the Dark Hunter uses if you use this against an immune enemy. For the instant death component, it can't miss ever once the enemy falls under the proper conditions.
And here's yet another broken skill! Climax is basically an FOE deleter since it basically makes FOE fights half as long. There's only one FOE it doesn't work on, and it's a fairly easy to deal with quest enemy. And FOEs in this game are possibly some of the strongest FOEs in the entire series, so being able to cut down the fight length is way more helpful than it would be in any other EO game. Heck it can allow you to bypass some FOE roadblocks more easily, and it makes farming their drops a lot easier.
It's a great skill, and you should max it out. Not to mention it can make farming certain bosses really easy, considering that killing bosses gives you massive benefits in this game. Do be warned, this skill doesn't really allow you to take on the FOEs in the first place. If they can crush your party long before you get them to half HP, this skill won't be able to do a damn thing, so it doesn't let you punch way above your weight class.
Hypnos/Nerve
Prerequisites: Swords Lv1/Lv2
A single target Sword attack that attempts to inflict Sleep/Paralysis. Sword skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
That was some cool whips, so let's see what swords have to offer. Torpor is such an insane skill that Hypnos has little use unless you're not using a Hexer. Like, Sleep is nice, but only one target isn't great. Paralysis also isn't great since it doesn't really do much, I've never been a fan of it and was one of the few sword skills I didn't use last game. Like they can be useful and using ailments is the whole reason for going swords, but if only they were more impressive. Still, the damage is good and the extra tag is nice, something you can use early game at least, especially if you get a good Sleep off and waste an enemy's turn.
In EO1, ailment resistance was coded as 1 stat, so there was very little reason to ever invest in a disable that wasn't the best one. Now every single ailment has their own resistance stat, so there's actual reasons to invest in multiple disable skills. However if you plan on having your Dark Hunter really contribute to random encounters, I highly suggest having them invest in Petrify for that and spam that. Though that's not going to work so well in big fights, so that's what these skills are for. These are gonna be the Sword Dark Hunter's bread and butter skills against FOEs and Bosses (assuming they're not spamming the baits anyway.)
As for which one to go for, Sleep is more of a hard disable, but will wear off the instant the target takes damage. But Paralysis isn't entirely reliable, though it's far more likely to last longer on average. I'd recommend investing in Nerve for big fights, as the damage amp component from Sleep can't be easily capitalized in this game either, while making it so an FOE or boss has a chance of losing half of their turns on average is a more enticing benefit. Wait a few more games for sleep bombing to be more viable.
Mirage
Prerequisites: Swords Lv3
A single target Sword attack that attempts to inflict Panic. Sword skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Alright, Mirage is usually different since Panic is quite the good ailment to just hand over to the player, so I'm sure it- ...oh no. It's one of THOSE skills, a level 5 skill that scales like a level 10 skill but stops halfway for no reason. Well Panic is useful but not with that infliction chance, damage is trash, everything about this skill is trash. Nothing else to do but completely ignore it.
Confusion in 1 was a rather powerful, but dicey ailment to use. Not only was it hard to inflict, it sometimes made enemies more dangerous as they could be attacking more often with Confusion active on them. From this game onwards, skills start to get vastly more powerful than regular attacks, so the downside of Confusion causing enemies to attack you barely starts to matter, so it's an ailment that's always a strong one to land. Unfortunately, this skill is complete and utter crap, so it's not really worth using this no matter how powerful Confusion is. Unfortunately, outside of the Hexer's Force Skill, this is literally the only way in the entire game to inflict Confusion. So uh, that ailment might as well not exist for players. Talk about a heavy nerf!
Drain
Prerequisites: Swords Lv4
A single target Sword attack that heals the user by damage dealt. Sword skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Now here's a level 5 skill that scales PROPERLY, Drain is great for your frontline DH, it really adds to their survivability and is a great skill to just spam with little issue. Quick to invest in and while it doesn't do amazing damage, it's a nice tool for most of the game, especially giving your Medic or War Magus less headaches in earlygame healing. Nothing too fancy, but it gets the job goddamn done fuck yeah.
This skill can be nice to spam to give the Dark Hunter some more survivability at the cost of dealing less damage and not being able to lock down their enemies. It'll make the DH less of a priority target for healing, which can take some stress off of your healers or whoever is thinking of tossing a Medica to a given party member. Whichever basic Sword attack you take is up to you, but most aside from Mirage aren't bad choices.
Petrify
Prerequisites: Swords Lv6
A single target Sword attack that attempts to inflict Petrify. Sword skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Now here's the main event, Petrify is the same as last game, so enemies hit by it will stick around for the rest of the battle, but it still has amazing utility, and not a bad infliction rate for what it does. It also has some cool power behind it, so even if you don't land it, it's still one of the strongest hits a Sword DH can do. Otherwise it's mostly useless in Boss and FOE battles and might be a bit much for various regular enemies, but landing one is still a great feeling, might as well, right?
This is pretty much gonna be the Dark Hunter's best basic attack skill to spam in normal battles, as Petrification can be great crowd control. A chance to instantly take out random encounters can help greatly, especially if your party is hurting for AOEs or other disables. However, unlike Climax, this skill isn't too great against FOEs and bosses, as FOEs are heavily resistant to this, and almost every single boss is immune to Petrification. Use Hypnos or Nerve against those instead.
Bait/Magibait
Prerequisites: Whips Lv8, Swords Lv8
Counterattacks physical/magical damage dealt to the user and those adjacent to user. Will still occur even if incoming attack is blocked. Whip or Sword skill with Cut damage, uses the Arms.
Holy SHIT this skill got one of the biggest buffs in the series. Before it was Sword locked, only had the physical version and the adjacent counter did around half damage on average. These skills require a higher investment, sure, but are also incredibly powerful if you know what's coming. Obviously you need to max them to make them at all useful and position your DH in the middle of a front row of 3, but if you get 3 counters, that's 1200% damage in one turn jesus fucking christ.
Also they still work even if an Anti skill or Painless blocks them, letting you do offense AND defense in one turn? Just incredible. But of course it's most effective against the right enemies, most magical attacks are party wide, but physical ones are a little harder to come by. And of course you need to survive the hit, but at least you don't need to take the attack to fully counter it. Even if you only use one weapon, you have to invest in the other mastery for these, they're just too good.
By far the best skills in the Dark Hunter's skillset, whether you go with Whips or Swords. And this skill isn't particularly unreliable as long as you know how the enemy works. As long as you plant your Dark Hunter in the middle of the front row with a 3/2 formation, even a single hit towards the front row will cause a 400% damage counterattack! Which is significantly more than any of the basic attacks in the Whip or Sword branches. You'll definitely want to grab these eventually, as the Dark Hunter can just utterly shred any poor enemy that activates multiple counters. And you'll be seeing plenty of AOEs as you get farther into the game, so these skills just get more powerful as the game goes on.
Unbind
Prerequisites: TEC Up Lv1
Unlocks: Lv3: Antisick, Antibind
Removes binds from a single target. Heal skill, uses the Head.
Hello again Unbound but called differently for some reason. Like with the Landy this skill is barely useful, you've seen the DH's kit, they have better things to be doing, but I guess you can use it. It's better to just go to Antisick/Antibind and more or less ignore this skill, but maybe if your Arm is bound it could be good? Oh shit, then it'd just be Arm Heal! NOOOOOOOOO!!!
If you do take this skill, 3 points at most is all I would put into here for the same reasons I listed under Unbound for the Landsknecht. Dark Hunters are pretty fast, so they can be a fast unbinder I suppose, though Therica As would be a better investment that doesn't require you to spend SP or TP.
Racket
Lures non-red FOEs in a certain radius to tile used and stuns them for a set duration. Field skill.
Uh, okay, these skills are sometimes helpful but using the items instead of wasting SP is generally preferable, especially since you never want to invest in these skills too much, so it's a lot of TP initially for not much result. You do want to avoid FOEs in this game so there's definitely utility, but I don't think it's worth it, I will show all the ways to avoid FOEs, I don't wanna fight them either!
There are parts of the game where FOE luring is required, but you can do that with items, and Dark Hunters themselves will never be required to do that. There is one part in the first stratum where this could be helpful, but outside of that particular situation you can probably just use the item instead.
Dominate
Inflicts Head, Arm and Leg Bind on a single target. Force skill, uses the Arms.
So here's like half the reason to use a Dark Hunter. This is one of the best offensive Force skills in the game, mainly because it will always work. Because of its insane infliction rate, only <1% resistances can avoid this, and there are none, lowest is 3%, so this skill will always, ALWAYS fully bind an opponent. Combined with all the other offensive tools in this game, this lets you get off some incredible strategies, and it's useful in regular boss and FOE fights to give you a breather for a few turns. Like all Force skills, you can't fire them often without plenty of Axcela IIs but this is one that you should really think about for lategame and postgame use. Of course it ties into Ecstasy beautifully and even Climax so you can take down FOEs with little trouble.
Oh hey, say hello to one of the best Force skills in the entire game, if not the best one! While the 1% speed modifier basically ensures the Dark Hunter will move last when casting this skill, Dominate basically ensures any poor enemy that gets hit with this won't be doing anything for a turn since disables can't be recovered from on the turn they're inflicted, and possibly longer depending on how long the binds stay on for. The higher the enemy's level is, the longer it takes for them to recover from a disable on average, so this skill gets even more powerful as the game goes on! If you combo this with a Survivalist's 1st Turn, you can guarantee 2 turns of lockdown since the enemy won't be able to do anything on the turn the Dark Hunter casts this, though this comes at the cost of putting a Survivalist in your party. This skill is also why people prefer to use Whip Dark Hunters.
While Sword Dark Hunters can still use this Force skill, an enemy that's locked down will highly be unlikely to attack while they're tied up, making the Baits rather useless while that's going on. With Whip Dark Hunters, you can nuke them down with Ecstasy, but Sword Dark Hunters have no such powerful skill to abuse, basically leaving those variants of Dark Hunters twiddling their thumbs while the enemy is tied down. And Axcelas make this skill flat out broken, essentially keeping an enemy locked down forever whenever all the binds fall off. Do keep in mind it's best to cast this when an enemy has no binds on them, as it won't override previous binds and the longer a bind stays on, the higher chance it has of wearing off.
Man that was fun to talk about, Dark Hunters got ridiculously buffed compared to last game and it shows with how nutty some of their skills are. Sure, some of them aren't great, but I really wouldn't call any of them outright bad. Uh, okay, Mirage is bad because it's missing 5 levels, but that's really it. It pales in comparison to Hexers in some aspects, but they're the most broken class in the series, oh no, how could this class be slightly worse in some aspects! There's always room for a Dark Hunter and they can focus on specific skills that make them incredible under the right circumstances, but circumstances can be made pretty easily, so it's really not a big deal.
Several absurd buffs to this class took them from rather mediocre to outright broken. It's not too hard to slot one in your party, and they're easily the 2nd most broken class in the entire game. The 1st is the Hexer, but we'll talk about them later.