parrying with which item?....

I have always been trying to experiment with the parry rate and constantly tryingto sharpen my edge for perhaps pvp. Sadly I still lack the confidence to try it I have tried a +5 crest shield which is based totally on timing pretty much. I tried exerimenting with the parying dagger but the lack of shield worried me. Any advice on ppl who usethe dagger..? Also the dark hand. Good? Idk if its my imagination but I can parry more than other things with it.

Would love everyone's input on this. Thanks!

I love the parrying dagger for PvE. Thing is, it has a slight delay in its parry, so compared to other small weapons or shields, it's less effective for PvP. Because of the lag, in PvP, you have to parry sooner than you would in PvE. Sometimes you have to parry straight up before they start their attack. That's why you see so many people randomly parrying during a duel--they're trying to predict that you'd attack. I've had some success with it, but I've parried just as often with my bare fist than I have with the parrying dagger in PvP, with fewer tries! So for PvP I would recommend something other than the dagger.

^ I'll take that as a long version of 'its not practical'? :pale:

I've used it for a full run in PvE, it's wonderful, in PvP you have to be one classy bastard to use it effectively. I'll give anyone who uses it against me and extra bow.

i normally use the dark hand for parrying and blocking on my light armor build

since it has very nice parry timing and the black hole shield helps me keep on the move and block something costing a bit of my health

JY4answer wrote:^ I'll take that as a long version of 'its not practical'? :pale:

Yes.

I found the parrying shield useless as I could parry better with Solaire's shield and use the awesome phisical defense it has, not sure about the dagger tho

Shield and parrying dagger require you to predict more and you need quite a bit of poise, mostly you'll be parrying whilst facing them then quickly locking off and turning to your back and parrying again, all people do is try to backstab so yeah.

Hm. So if I wanto parry stick with the dark hand as I used to use?

Give the rapiers a shot. They have a very quick parry animation with a short cooldown. The parry window is shorter than the parrying dagger, but the speed of the parry makes up for it. In other words, it should be possible to use it in pvp (you would'nt need to predict the attack, ala parrying dagger). I have one build that uses it, although my lack of poise for that build reduces its effectiveness (any parry build should have good poise so that you have multiple chances to parry).

Edit: Fyi, as far as I know, the parry animation for the darkhand is identical to the unarmed parry. It's not a bad parry (quicker and more effective than medium shields).

Does noone else just use a bog standard shield to parry with in PvE???

I parry with my hand in PVE

I made a character who is specifically designed for parrying, it sounds dumb i know
Anyway, i use a +5 Chaos Estoc (a +5 Chaos Great Demon Axe would be better but i hate heavy slow wpns) +14 Target Shield, Hornet ring, Favor ring, Mother mask + light armor.

It's a low lvl 40 char but has 40 Vit + gear = 1800hp wich lets me take quite a few hits if i fail to parry, also if i get stuck in a stun-lock i try to wpn switch out of it (works most of the time).

It's a fun little setup. I gave up on the Target Shield & moved to Medium shields to practice more strict timing.

Anyway, like the guys said, in PvP you need to time your parry before or the second they start to swing, PvE parrying is a breeze since you learn the mobs attack patterns but humans + interwebz lag = guess parrying.