The final Dark Knight in 'Seven Knights Re:BIRTH' (hereinafter SKRB), 'Palanus', has arrived as a specialist for the arena's 'defense deck' meta. This hero boasts a unique kit that demands exactly one defensive and one support hero in the party, offering both synergy for allies and top-tier survivability. It seems like the relief the defense-deck crowd has been desperately waiting for. KookminTree has broken down the skills and core mechanics for you.

Q. Who exactly is Palanus?
A. A hero who utilizes 'Marks' to land defense-ignoring damage while keeping allies healthy.

Before diving in, you need to wrap your head around the 'Mark: Enegeria's Firing' (hereinafter Mark) activation conditions. It's a bit of a mouthful, but essential. Every skill—bar the passive—shares the same rule: you must have at least one defensive and one support hero in your starting lineup. While basic attacks trigger this at a 50% rate after skill upgrades, 'Steadfast Strike' and 'Operation: Extermination' hit 100%. Plus, attacking an enemy with two or more stacks of the Mark allows all skills to deal defense-ignoring damage.

Steadfast Strike hits all enemies twice with piercing damage and reduces turn-based buffs by two turns. When hitting enemies with at least one Mark stack, it also heals your entire team for 24% of the damage dealt. With skill upgrades, the physical attack coefficient jumps from 57% to 67%, and at Transcendence 6, it adds a guaranteed 100% weakness attack chance. Operation: Extermination is a straightforward double-hit AOE, though it lacks the extra utility of Steadfast Strike. The healing conditions and upgrade benefits remain identical.

The passive 'Commander's Potential' boosts damage reduction scaled to Palanus's attack power. It also features a unique 'Authority' mechanic. If she takes damage exceeding her current health, she survives with 1 HP—standard fare, but with a twist: she swaps her current HP with the enemy who has the highest health. It’s a cheeky way to weaken an opponent while staying in the fight.

Furthermore, when her HP drops below 30%, she cleanses all debuffs from the party. Upgrading the skill grants 'Immunity to all damage for 2 turns' upon triggering the Authority, and at Transcendence 2, it boosts healing received by herself, defensive allies, and support allies by 28%.

Q. What are Palanus's core buffs and debuffs?
A. Authority, Mark, attack-scaled damage reduction, and health swapping.

To expand on that damage reduction: for every 300 points of attack power, her damage reduction increases by 1.5%. It caps at 13.5%, requiring 2,700 attack power. Keep that magic number in mind when gearing her up.

At two stacks, the Mark reduces the target's turn-based buffs by one turn and grants Palanus a physical damage boost. This stacks up to five times and, crucially, cannot be removed by standard debuff cleansing.Resurrection is the only exception. In SKRB, reviving resets a hero's status, which means all debuffs and buffs—including the Mark—will vanish. Be aware of this.

Q. How should I set up Palanus?
A. Prioritize weakness attack chance before Transcendence 6, then pivot to crit and attack power thereafter.

The goal is simple: push past 2,700 attack power and stack crit. The 'weakness attack chance' setting is binary based on Transcendence 6. Once you hit that cap, Steadfast Strike and Operation: Extermination are guaranteed to land weakness attacks. Therefore, swapping the Tracker set for the Assassin set to boost crit rate is the smarter play. That said, if your Tracker set rolls are god tier, stick with them; the 4-piece set bonus of '35% increased weakness attack damage' is hard to ignore.

For weapon main stats, aim for weakness attack chance, crit rate, and crit damage—just remember to ditch weakness attack chance once you hit Transcendence 6. For armor, focus on damage reduction, block rate, and all attack power (%). If you've already hit the 2,700 attack threshold, swap the attack stat for more damage reduction or block rate. Survival is the name of the game in the current SKRB arena meta.