The Definitive Dark Knight Guide

[Giantbane]

If your talking out of tank stance yeah C&S always used with dark arts however in grit without blood weapon I tend to only use it if I have Hugh mp at the time simply because I'd prefer getting healed a bit since I tend to play very aggressive in terms of my hp. It's really only 50 potency more than buffed soul eater. In grit if I have the mp I'll dark arts it other wise I prefer to just SE more often. There's no difference in any of my parses prioritizing either in fights.

How do you play very aggressive in terms of your HP while being in Grit (where the heal makes a difference)? just stand in AoE?

50 potency is looking at it wrong. DA adds 120 potency to SE (over delirium), DA adds 350 potency to C&S. The difference is 230 potency.

[Hysterior]

What's the point of Unleash once you get Abyssal Drain?

[Misha_Tameshigiri]

Unleash's use is being slightly cheaper MP-wise.
Abyssal Drain costs about 100 more MP at level 60 in exchange for being usable at range and dealing slightly more damage (120 potency versus Unleash's 100), and giving an HP drain effect when used with Dark Arts.
If you're not going to use Dark Arts on Abyssal Drain, it comes down to a matter of taste.

Also I personally just don't like the animation for Abyssal Drain.

[Drtoxicmedica]

How do you play very aggressive in terms of your HP while being in Grit (where the heal makes a difference)? just stand in AoE?

50 potency is looking at it wrong. DA adds 120 potency to SE (over delirium), DA adds 350 potency to C&S. The difference is 230 potency.

Right. But between the 2 it's a difference of 50 potency. And it's simply to add to overall hp recovery as apposed to pure dps. not save my ass levels of healing but to help ease healing needed. Regardless of how you look at it there have been no difference in my dps numbers using C&S for mp while in tank stance. So that's how I use it. Unless I need to do delirium I just double up on buffed souleaters. Mind you I only use it for mp while in tank stance thats it. rarely am I in tank stance the whole fight and if I am in grit it's because mitigation is helpfull. But i mean heaven forbid I don't buff C&S spit everytime sorry.

[Emitans]

I'm only 55 but I find that my MP is usually at around 85%+. Should I be using it more for damage? Not having many aggro problems.

[Misha_Tameshigiri]

You should be using Power Slash as little as possible.
It's your lowest potency combo, and with Darkside on it is a net MP loss.
In trash pulls you might not want to burn your MP too much (you need it for the next trash pull) but versus bosses you should be using Dark Arts Souleater as much as your MP will allow.

[Meythia]

Unleash's use is being slightly cheaper MP-wise.
Abyssal Drain costs about 100 more MP at level 60 in exchange for being usable at range and dealing slightly more damage (120 potency versus Unleash's 100), and giving an HP drain effect when used with Dark Arts.
If you're not going to use Dark Arts on Abyssal Drain, it comes down to a matter of taste.

Also I personally just don't like the animation for Abyssal Drain.

Unleash also does not break current weaponskill combos like Abyssal does. Besides, having the radius AOE around yourself can be quite more comfortable than around a target hitboxwise. (big enemies tend to eat the whole radius up even when small ones are directly next to them, See A2(S))

[Sleigh]

Not sure if it's been discussed but, where does Pot fit in to an optimal in-raid opener? The lack of ramp-up and large amount of oGCD usage leads me to suspect it'd be extremely early on, if not pre-pull or immediately after Unmend.

[Lawson_Grey]

I use pot right after Unmend for the reasons you stated. Since I use Dark Arts prepull > Unmend > Scourge + Carve and Spit > etc, I'd like to have that Pot going ASAP to affect Scourge and Carve and Spit, and then the rest of the opening rotation along with all the off global cooldowns.

Take care if you're not MTing as this usually rips aggro for a second even without grit.

[AIex]

I use pot right after Unmend for the reasons you stated. Since I use Dark Arts prepull > Unmend > Scourge + Carve and Spit > etc, I'd like to have that Pot going ASAP to affect Scourge and Carve and Spit, and then the rest of the opening rotation along with all the off global cooldowns.

Take care if you're not MTing as this usually rips aggro for a second even without grit.

Just out of curiosity, why would you unmend if you're not the MT? I think if you omit that, you'd be fine on aggro.