(Written by Ryan S.) (Write for us!)

This guide covers how to max out everything possible to have the highest stats and killing power in the level 29 battlegrounds as a Rogue. If you want to get to 29 as quick as possible you should check out Zygor’s in-game leveling add-on walkthrough showing you the most efficient questing routes.

Index

1.      Gear

2.      Enchants

3.      Talents

4.      Glyphs

5.      Your job in the battlegrounds

6.      Warsong Gulch

7.      Arathi Basin

8.      Some friendly advice

1.      Gear

Head

Humbert’s Helm -Cheap, easy to get, and not bad at all.

Scaled Leather Headband of the monkey -better then Humbert’s but is a rare drop and can cost you a fortune.

Pathfinder Hat of the Monkey- Very Rare, but is definitely the best twink headpiece, even a 8/9, 9/8 will go for 100+ gold on my server and the 9/9 of the monkey goes for 1000 gold. The best twinks will have this item.

Neck

Wolfpack Medallion – great to use while you are getting the marks/honor for the WSG necklace, easily farmable too.

Scout’s/Sentinel’s Medallion The best necklace by far, costs 95 honor, and 20 WSG marks of honor.

Shoulders

BoA shoulders- Best choice in my opinion, but not all twinks have an 80, or access to these.

Mantle of thieves- very good shoulders as well, but very rare expect to pay 100+ gold on these.

Watchman Pauldrons -in my opinion these are not all that good and should only be used if u are a Flag carrier, or are lacking stamina.

Cutthroat’s Mantle of the monkey- Best looking shoulders by far, I would use these rather than watchman Pauldrons.

Cloak

Parachute cloak- definitely the best option, but it requires 225 engineering, it’s the best because it can be enchanted with +12 agility.

Tigerstrike Mantle- Also a very good option, but is not ilvl 35+ so cannot be enchanted with BC chants

Chest

Raptor Hunter Tunic- The only option for a twink can be given BC chants making it even better. Requires you to do a 4 quest chain that you should start at level 28, and you will need help from a higher level friend.

Tabard

Your Tabard doesn’t matter at all, but 2 really cool looking pvp tabards are

Private’s/Scout’s Tabard both costing 3 WSG marks and 3 AB marks.

Bracers

Barbaric Bracers- Very good, and very cheap, Second best twink option.

Emissary cuffs of the monkey- The best twink bracers, though very rare, they are definitely worth trying a few gnomeregan runs for.

Hands

Razzeric’s Racing Grips- the best gloves you can get, although you can put +26 attack power on them, +15 agility is much better for rogues.

Headhunter’s Mitts of the monkey- also a very good choice, in my eyes these are better than Wolfclaw gloves, but it is debatable.

Wolfclaw gloves- Another good choice these are the easiest of these gloves to obtain.

Waist

Defiler’s/Highlander’s leather girdle- The best 29 twink rogue belt, cost 175 honor points, and 20 AB marks.

Deftkin Belt-the best belt to use while waiting to get the AB belt

Ghostwalker Belt of the monkey- also a very good belt to use while waiting for the AB belt, but very rare.

Legs

Triprunner Dungarees- The only choice of legs if you are planning on making a serious twink.

Feet

Defiler’s/Highlander’s Leather boots-the best boots for a 29 twink, cost 175 honor and 20 AB marks.

Insignia boots- very good temporary pair of boots, almost always a pair or two on the auction house.

Harbringer boots- Best Stamina boots in the 29 bracket, buy a pair if u plan on being a flag carrier.

Rings

Deadman’s Hand- the best ring in my opinion, I farmed 43 runs to get this ring, and I think it is very much worth it.

Charged gear of the monkey, or of the tiger- hard to farm, but these are definitely worth it.

Legionnaire’s/protector’s Band- it’s a matter of preference in this over charged gear, but either way this is a very good ring too, costs 95 honor and 20 WSG marks.

Signet of Argas- Easily obtained through a quest, is worth getting while you are farming for the other rings.

Trinkets

Inherited Signet of the Horde/Alliance- is a must have, if u can’t get this then get the normal insignia of the alliance/horde.

Rune of Duty-a very good trinket, these 2 are the only trinkets I have ever wanted. Costs 118 honor and 30 WSG marks

Daggers

Torturing Poker- Absolutely the best dagger in this bracket, should be used in the main hand.

Scout’s/Sentinel’s Blade- Very good Daggers to be used in the offhand, costs 316 honor and 30 WSG marks.

Balanced Heartseeker- very good dagger to use in the main hand or off hand. I personally use it in the offhand with torturing poker in the main hand.

Ranged

Charmed Ancient Bone Bow- Best bow by far, can be traded for the BOA gun if you would like some more resilience.

Naga Heartpiercer-Best non-BoA Bow for a rogue in my opinion.

NightStalker bow- Another great bow, I would only use it if it dropped in a RFK and you didn’t want to run BFD.

2.      Enchants

Cloak-+3agi/+12agi (only if you used parachute cloak)

Chest-+6 stats, or +150 hp

Bracers- +9 stam

Gloves- +15agi

Legs- +32 armor

Boots- +7agi

Weapons- +15agi on both weapons

Ranged- +3 dmg scope

3.      Talents

Ambush Spec

Crit strike rating

Flag carrier build

4.      Glyphs

Glyph of Ambush

Glyph of Sinister Strike

Glyph of Vanish

When choosing glyphs it is really just preference whether you want glyph of Ambush, or Glyph of Sinister Strike. I use Glyph of Ambush because when I get an ambush crit for 1100 damage it makes a fight.

5.      Your job in the battlegrounds.

A rogue’s job in the battleground is to provide support, keep the enemy dead. It isn’t always best to get in combat. Use Sap a lot, especially on hunters, then distract people away from your flag carrier.

When you are carrying the flag make sure that you use your cooldowns, and make sure to communicate with your teammates, you wouldn’t believe how many times I’ve been going for the last cap and a huge group of enemies is coming up the tunnel only 3 seconds after a teammate said it was safe.

6.      Warsong Gulch

A very basic Battleground where you try to capture the opponent’s flag, while protecting your own from being captured. Teamwork will be very important if you are planning on winning many of these. If you can get in a Twink guild your best choice is to run Pre-made WSG so that you might be able to win a warsong in 10 minutes or less. I consider it almost impossible to get the 6 minute WSG victory achievement if you are not using a Pre-made group.

7.      Arathi Basin

My personal favorite Battleground, The objective is to contol as many of the 5 points as possible. To win an AB you have to communicate well with your teammates, call incomings EX. Inc GM would mean incoming gold mine, meaning there are enemies heading toward gold mine and it would be wise to have some of your team head over there.

8.      General Tips

1.      As an ambush specced rogue most of your damage will come from ambush of course, so if you see hunters coming stealth as soon an you can to avoid getting hunter’s mark.

2.      Don’t aim for the most damage in a battleground, try to have a good balance of flag caps, damage, and flag returns. The game isn’t only about stats, so if u have a bad game, but you still won give yourself a pat on the back, you must have been doing something right.

3.      Avoid hunters as best as you can, Hunters are the only class that I really have much of a problem on.

4.      Distract/sap people who are attacking your flag carrier.

5.      Distract will be a huge help when you are trying to catch up to that guy who is 10 yards ahead of you.

6.      Focus on teamwork, not how well you are doing.

7.      Sap hunters

8.      Have fun, If you keep losing take a break then come back, owning isn’t worth it if you aren’t having fun.

9.      Finally. Good Luck!

PvP in World of Warcraft is very challenging and has a high learning curve to become better at, especially if you are so used to the PvE elements and just starting out with Battlegrounds or Arena’s.

Fortunately there are a lot of different ways you can increase your skill in PvP, and this article will focus on doing so by utilizing the best add-ons.

Add-ons are a set of tools used to provide you with data and information so that you can make an intelligent split second decision. The reason why some players are more skilled than others is due to the fact that they utilize all their classes abilities at the right times, saving their survivability skills until they are completely necessary and their most offensive damaging or CC abilities when the enemy is most vulnerable. Add-ons are able to show you when this can occur.

Here is a list of the most essential add-ons any PvPer and Arena player should have:

1. Gladius

Gladius is a window pretty much exactly like Proximo for those who have used that. It starts off empty at the beginning of an arena match and when the gates open it detects who your opponents are and lists them in the window, showing an icon for their class, and the amount of health/mana they have.
This is extremely useful for a few reasons. You can make your strategy and coordinate your CC target and main target right away, you can tell what spec some classes are by the amount of mana they have, and if for some reason you lose your target (hunter Feign Deaths, or mage Mirror Images) you can click on their name in the window and it will target them again instead of you trying to click their character.
Note: Rogues and Druids (sometimes Mages) will start off stealthed/invis so gladius won’t pick them up until they come out, a good way to tell who someones partner is in a 2v2 arena or 3v3 is by their buffs. If you see a Mage and a (blank) but you notice the mage has Mark of the Wild buff on, it is pretty safe to say his partner is a druid.

2. Parrot

I would have to say out of any add-on I’ve used, this has increased my PvP skill and level of play the most.

Parrot is a floating combat text add-on that is highly customizable to show you pretty much any event that occurs between you, your target and your focus target. You set what abilities or conditions you want it to recognize as the trigger, set what you want it to do when that condition happens (play a sound, show text in a certain color, in a specific area on your monitor)

So for example, say you want to know the second a paladin bubbles, you just set the trigger as Abilitiy Divine Shield, make it display the text “Paladin is IMMUNE don’t attack!”  and play a sound at the same time (from a list of 10 different sounds built in). Then you can make a separate trigger for when the Divine Shield fades! “Paladin is vulnerable  attack!” Here are a list of some abilities and conditions I’ve set parrot to notice:

- Rogue Shadowstep, Mage Ice Block, Hunter Feign Death, Deterrance,

-Target Counterspelled/kicked

- Ice Barrier Fades (Set it to know when your essential buffs or abilities wear off)

- Water Elemental Pet, Evocation available (Set it to notify you when the cooldown is finished on important abilities so you can use it as soon as possible)

And so on, if there is enough interest I will make my parrot config available here for download since it takes a while to get every ability set up the way you want it to. When you get it set up properly this gives you a huge advantage to use your clutch abilities as soon as they become available and instantly react to any game turning abilitites your opponents use and instantly know when they become vulnerable again.

3. Natur Enemy Cast Bar

This add-on keeps track of all abilities/buffs used by yourself and your target in a castbar type of display. I have found this very useful for tracking diminishing returns (I’ll wait out the full 10 seconds betfore sheeping a target again so it lasts the full duration) and also NECB tells you when an opponents important abilities are ready to be used again, so you know that a mages counterspell is on cooldown but will be available in 10 seconds so get off that big heal now!

Those are the three major add-ons I suggest you get for PvP, are there any other add-ons you use strictly for pvp that has improved your skill?

How is your arena team doing so far in WOTLK? Aside from gearing up for PvP and picking the right PvP talents the only other element (and most important) you can change to get the highest rating is choosing the right arena partner.

With the way WoW balances classes it is a given that some classes will have better synergy with certain other classes. While it is great to just pick an arena partner based on friends and whoever you’d like to play with, this can really limit the potential you can achieve rating wise (Imagine a warrior/warrior team? yikes)

Keep reading to find out the Highest Rated Arena Teams

Take this with a grain of salt right now, PvP is currently unbalanced because it’s early and blizzard can not start the balancing act until it sees the results in the arena and can do further testing to bring everything into line.

However, this resource will always be the best place to see who the current top 100 rated arena teams are in every division (2v2, 3v3, 5v5).

How To Find The Highest Rated Arena Teams

Go over to http://www.sk-gaming.com/arena/ and you will have a very powerful tool at your disposal.

This database takes data from the WoW Armory and extracts the top 100 rated players, teams for each division and also the pvp specs each class from those teams use!

Here are some interesting pieces of data I found from my research:

Highest Rated 2v2 Arena Teams

Paladin/Death Knight (40.8%) – That is huge… shows this team has a huge advantage over any other team regardless of their gear or other factors.
Rogue/Priest (10.2%)
Paladin/Hunter (8.2%)
Paladin/Druid (6.1%)
Death Knight/Mage (5.1%)

As we can see from the top 4, these teams utilize a strong DPS class, such as a ret paladin, rogue and hunter while bringing on a utility/healer. Double DPS teams will have a hard time bursting down any paladin since they have their bubble and can heal their team mate at the same time. Ret paladin and healers are a deadly team for double DPS as well since Ret Pallies can deal out large dmg and heal their partner if it’s really needed.

Highest Rated 3v3 Arena Teams

Rogue/Priest/Mage (19.2%) – Combine great CC (sap/sheep) and a priest who can not only heal but has mana drains, power word shield, and you’ve got yourself a tough team… The only Top 8 Popular team without a Paladin.
Paladin/Hunter/Death Knight ( 11.1%)
Paladin/Rogue/Death Knight (9.1%)
Paladin/Warrior/Death Knight (7.1%)
Paladin/Warrior/Druid (6.1%)

Paladins seem to dominate the 3v3 arena while interesting enough the highest team composition doesn’t have one, Paladins ability to survive while his team mates deal ridiculous amounts of damage gives this team a huge advantage.

Highest Rated 5v5 Arena Teams

Paladin/Hunter/Priest/Death Knight/ Mage (5%)
Paladin/Rogue/Shaman/Mage/Druid (5%)
Paladin/Warrior/Death Knight/Shaman/Mage (4%)
Paladin/Warrior/Hunter/Priest/Mage (3%)
Paladin/Warrior/Priest/Death Knight/Druid (3%)

So, you NEED to have a paladin in your team if you are hoping to get above 2,000 rating. they are in EVERY team. Very interesting thing to find out if you are a part of a struggling 5v5 arena team without a paladin.

This resource has been very valuable to me when I am looking at current trends in the arena and I’m sure blizzard collects stats like this when considering how to balance classes.

Almost every team will have a possibility to get into the top 100 but it’s definitely an uphill battle compared to picking teammates which compliment each other very well from a game balance standpoint.

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With most of us starting to hit 80, our focus is now moving towards getting great pvp gear to be competitive in the arena and have fun in Battlegrounds.

A lot of complaints have been thrown around on the forums regarding damage being too high in WOTLK, you can be bursted down without even having time to react with a trinket and this does not make for a fun pvp experience.

Blizzards answer? get geared up and start stacking that resilience which negates the chance to be critically hit and reduces the amount that crits do to you.

So what is the fastest way to get the best pvp gear? I will detail the best use of your time to have the highest chances at the best gear.

In this article, our focus for getting the best pvp gear will revolve around how good the gear is divided by the amount of effort or time required to get that gear. While Deadly Gladiator gear is the best to get it will take a lot of rating to acquire in the arenas, which you may even need to have better pvp gear to get to the higher rating requirements.

PvP Gear

Here is a list of and requirements for the attainable gear from best to worst at level 80:

Deadly Gladiator Gear

Shoulders – 2,150 Arena Rating + 1,800 Arena Points
Head – 2,090 Arena Rating +2,250 Arena Points
1 Handed Weapon – 2,030 Arena Rating + 1,350 Arena Points
2 Handed Weapon – 2,030 Arena Rating + 4,500 Arena Points
Off-Hand – 2,030 Arena Rating + 1,350 Arena Points
Thrown/Wand/Gun/Crossbow – 2,030 Arena Rating + 1,200 Arena Points
Chest – 1,970 Arena Rating + 2,250 Arena Points
Leggings – 1,910 Arena Rating + 2,250 Arena Points
Hands – 1,850 Arena Rating + 1,350 Arena Points
Rings – 1,690 Arena Rating + 47,400 Honor
Wrist – 1,660 Arena Rating + 39,400 Honor
Waist – 1,630 Arena Rating + 62,000 Honor
Necklace – 1,600 Arena Rating + 47,400 Honor

Hateful Gladiator Gear

Shoulders – 1,775 Arena Rating + 9,600 Honor + 550 Arena Points or 30 Emblems of Valor
Head – 1,735 Arena Rating +12,000 Honor + 700 Arena Points or 45 Emblems of Valor
1 Handed Weapon – None Exist
2 Handed Weapon – None Exist
Off-Hand – None Exist
Thrown/Wand/Gun/Crossbow – None Exist
Chest – 1,675 Arena Rating + 12.000 Honor + Arena Points or 45 Emblems of Valor
Leggings – 1,645 Arena Rating + 12,000 Honor + 700 Arena Points or 45 Emblems of Valor
Hands – 1,615 Arena Rating + 7,500 Honor + 400 Arena Points or 30 Emblems of Valor
Rings (No Arena Rating Requirement) – 38,000 Honor
Wrist (No Arena Rating Requirement) – 31,600 Honor
Waist (No Arena Rating Requirement) – 49,600 Honor
Necklace (No Arena Rating Requirement) – 38,000 Honor

Savage Gear or Crafted Gear

I am not going to list all the requirement for Savage Gear, however I suggest if you have a decent amount of gold, around 500-800g, get your classes crafted PvP gear (ex. Frostsavage Robe for casters) as this is comparable to Savage gear and you can save all your arena points and honor for Hateful and Deadly Gear.

Fastest Way to Get the Best Gear

From the list you can see that Deadly Gear > Hateful Gear > Crafted or Savage Gear. However the requirements for the higher end gear requires Arena rating which may be unattainable until you get more experience or gear to compete.

You should always be trying to reach the highest arena rating you can achieve, but when you reach a plateau and feel like you are limited by gear, this guide will get you the most value for your time:

1. Vault of Archavon (Wintergrasp) 10man/25 man

By far the best use of your time, you can do the 25 man version, which drops 4 of the deadly version chest, hands and legs but they are class specific, the instance also provides 2x Emblem of Valor for everyone to use to buy Hateful gear if you are unlucky with drops. The 10 man version drops 2 of the Hateful pp gear which is class specific, the instance also provides 2x Emblem of Heroism which you can buy Hero’s Gear with.

*Tip – Since you only get one shot at the 25 man and 10 man version a week, try to find a group where you are the only one of your class in 10 man, and only two of your class in the 25 man, it may take you a bit to find a group but it will pay off in the long run.

Grinding Honor

Now that you are getting a shot at getting the Deadly and Hateful Chest/Hands/Legs once a week, your focus should be on filling out your worst gear slots that have the lowest arena requirements and provide the highest upgrade.

Most of this gear requires Honor, and in some cases only honor, so here is the best way to grind honor:

2. Do Wintergrasp Whenever Your Side is Attacking

As it stands right now it is pretty much impossible to win while defending due to the large amounts of lag the servers experience when a lot of people are in this zone, this provides you with a large amount of bonus honor and Wintergrasp Tokens when you are attacking that can be turned in for even more honor once patch 3.0.8 comes around.

Pick up these dailies before attacking Wintergrasp: Slay them all!, Stop the Siege, Fueling the Demolishers, and Victory in Wintergrasp (last one only available if you haven’t completed the daily BG quest)

These daily quests not only provide bonus honor and gold, but also give you Stone Keeper’s Shards which are used to buy some of the BEST shoulder and head pvp enchants, Wintergrasp Commendation, Kharmaa’s Grace, and Bind on Account gear that you can use towards gear to level your alts.

You can pick up these quests in the fortress while you control Wintergrasp, or at your sides flight path in Wintergrasp when you are attacking.  Fueling the Demolishers can only be completed when a battle is not occurring and your side owns Wintergrasp.

3. Complete the Daily Battleground

Pretty straight forward, you get +930 bonus honor from this daily and you will also get 1 or 3 tokens from the battleground which can go towards completing For Great Honor.

4. Do The Battlegrounds You Have The Least Tokens Towards For Great Honor

If you have completed all of the above, the best way to grind honor is to keep on completing For Great Honor which can be done unlimited times a day. The only limitation is you need to have a token from each of those 4 Battlegrounds, do the battleground you have the least or no tokens for and keep at it until either your side is attacking wintergrasp or you have to log. They removed Alteric Valley from the requirement list which makes this much easier to complete.

If you follow this guide I am confident that you will be getting geared up for PVP the fastest possible, be sure to be replacing the gear which provides the highest upgrade and seek out gear that has no arena requirements (Such as the Hateful Necklace) as early upgrades for maximum gain.

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