S30v will do just fine in a dagger design. It's better to concentrate on the daggers design. For example, a Besh Wedge, invented by Brent Beshara will hold up to damn near anything and will pierce anything with authority. Consider a Rex Applegate-Fairbairn combat knife or the stronger beast the Smatchet. A very large knife but also produced in a smaller version the mini.
In keeping things in perspective, if you should stab or pry something and the tip breaks, well you should not have stabbed or pried that material. The blade design is for stabbing human flesh. If it should break inside the person, their gonna be in bad shape for sure. It's not an outdoor, bushcraft survival knife. Although to have one would be better than nothing at all.
Now the dagger style knives I mentioned above, you could actually stab, dig and even pry in hard material. The very famous Gerber MK II for example, usually made out of a 420HC budget minded "wet far"t of steel, would be more prone to breakage then the others I mentioned. But with that said, many and I mean many Gerber MK IIs have seen combat and used for way more tasks than stabbing a bad guy and came out intact. Just put thought into what you'd like your dagger to do and choose the correct design. If its going to sit in a display case then what its made of matters not. If you want it thin and have a crazy sharp acute tip then reserve it for flesh only.
All in all S30v will be excellent. You know it's going to slash excellent that's for sure. I have and use many blades in that steel with thin tips from quality knife makers and have never experienced breakage. Hope this helps.
), they work fine even if they're made out of 420J2.
