DRKs just falling behind even more.

[Rasikko]

Don't forget that DRK sucks at holding aggro,

First of all, don't anybody believe that. It's not true.

Dude.. you can't expect to hold aggro by never using Grit.

[shao32]

Dude.. you can't expect to hold aggro by never using Grit.

probably he means DRK suffer a lot more on holding agro after the first combo on grit compared to the other 2 and turn grit on again its just a personal dps killer.

[Claire_Pendragon]

First of all, don't anybody believe that. It's not true.

Dude.. you can't expect to hold aggro by never using Grit.

He means in comparison to WAR and PLD. Which is true, and has been true even in HW. It was darn near mandatory for DRK to have a NIN in their PT in HW for keeping DPS above a PLD. Otherwise a PLD out DPSed a DRK from how much the DRK used power slash.

EDIT: For clarification, a PLD can use the threat combo in sword oath and lose their MP regeneration for DPSing. A WAR can use their threat combo for a DPS gain occasionally, and when its not a DPS gain, its only a 10 beast guage loss.
DRK loses BOTH the MP gain, AND the blood gain. Even with the changes to threat on moves, DRK is still king of least threat, and WAR with highest threat. (Also why WAR should open, for higher threat gain, and to pass that onto the DRK during vokes.)

EDIT #2: Also, current WAR can tank every fight starting in Deliverance btw, and never switching to defiance. Where as PLD and DRK can't. (There's also no reason for a WAR to do this, with the changes, but it was done in O4S)

[TouchandFeel]

Unfortunately, that all is still only part of the disparity.

PLD also has the abilities Circle of Scorn and Shield Swipe that are part of their regular rotation.
WAR, with the changes in 4.2, have Onslaught as part of their optimal burst rotation.

Both PLD and WAR have abilities that provide passive extra agro generation by being part of their standard rotation for doing optimal dps.
DRK has nothing of the sort.

One suggestion that I had in my old DRK rework thread was to make Unleash an OGCD ability like follows.


Unleash - Lvl.6 – Spell
Cast: Instant – Recast: 2s – Cost: 800 MP – Range: 0y – Radius: 5y
Deals unaspected damage to all nearby enemies with a potency of 50.
Additional Effect: Increased Enmity.
MP cost reduced from 1080MP to 800MP. Taken off the GCD.
The focus of these changes was to do two things; first I wanted to provide a stronger identity and purpose to Unleash since Abyssal Drain virtually overwrites it once obtained. Second, these changes make Unleash a good enmity generator that can be woven into the basic flow of GCD combat.

Making Unleash an OGCD that is approximately dps/cost neutral would help provide a "passive" agro generator that would have it's own unique style while addressing some of the other issues with DRK's kit such as redundant abilities and help minimize "from the ground up" reworking for the job.

[Claire_Pendragon]

Unleash - Lvl.6 – Spell
Cast: Instant – Recast: 2s – Cost: 800 MP – Range: 0y – Radius: 5y
Deals unaspected damage to all nearby enemies with a potency of 50.
Additional Effect: Increased Enmity.
MP cost reduced from 1080MP to 800MP. Taken off the GCD.
The focus of these changes was to do two things; first I wanted to provide a stronger identity and purpose to Unleash since Abyssal Drain virtually overwrites it once obtained. Second, these changes make Unleash a good enmity generator that can be woven into the basic flow of GCD combat.

While the oGCD is a cool effect, it now has to fight with DP.

[TouchandFeel]

While the oGCD is a cool effect, it now has to fight with DP.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say that it would then have to fight with Dark Passenger?
Was that perhaps a typo and you meant to type DA instead of DP?
If you did mean Dark Passenger, could you please explain how it would, as I don't quite get what you mean.
If you are indeed saying that it would then compete with Dark Arts for OGCD usage, that is actually part of the intended design.

It forces the player to have to decide how they want to allocate their MP depending on what extra effect they want to achieve, as opposed to the current situation of "DA everything because +140 potency". Basically the reduced cost makes it approximately dps neutral in comparison to a DA usage, it just differs in that it provides a different extra effect of additional agro as opposed to extra blood or mp (see the rework thread for those proposed changes) and is more spread out, requiring 3 ogcd windows to equal the cost and damage. It's not something you would be using during a Blood Weapon window where you are trying to burn MP as quick as possible with DAs so you don't cap and overflow on MP, it would be something you use in between times where you are parceling out your MP at a slower pace and you can easily trade of a DA usage for a few Unleashes without it being a dps loss.

EDIT:
Just thought of what you might have meant by "fights with DP".
If you mean that it then competes with or overrides Dark Passenger as an OGCD AoE damage ability, well yes it does with the current version of DP. However, as many feel the current DP is garbage or at best very underwhelming, the proposed change to Unleash is made under the assumption that Dark Passenger would get reworked and do something different or more, like what I did in the rework thread where I gave DP a damage down debuff, where they would fulfill different roles and their cost to dps ratios were approximately equal.

[Kabooa]

On a separate note, it probably still isn't worth using over Abyssal Drain in terms of aoe damage and threat.

It would also be spammed relentlessly since it would be +10 over using Dark Arts for the same cost, with Dark Arts primarily being utilized on C/S and when Bloodweapon windows force a potential overcap.