Rogues have 3 talent trees, the first is assassination, the second is combat, and the third is not subtlety, its “utility”. And, since “utility” doesn’t show up on the meters, you are left with 2 choices for DPS.
Table of Contents:
1 – Stats.
2 – Gems & Enchants.
3 – Specs and Glyphs.
3.1 – Combat.
3.2 – Assassination.
3.3 – Subtlety.
4 – General tips and Rotation.
1 – Stats:
Rogues have 4 key stats for DPS:
1 – Hit: you can’t do any damage if you don’t hit anything, so this stat should be your priority till you get it up to ~340. You need 220 hit rating to be hit capped with your special attacks, 346 hit rating to be hit capped with poisons, and ~600 to be hit capped for white/normal melee attacks. You shouldn’t try to go above 350 hit rating because at that point you are giving up other valuable stats for a very small DPS increase.
2 – Agility: this is the most useful stat after hit, as it gives you attack power, and crit.
3 – Attack Power and Crit: personally, I like attack power over crit rating because I like my non critical hits to hit hard, rather than have spiky unreliable damage.
2.1 – Gems:
These 9 gems are all you should ever need. If you need hit rating, it is better to go all out hit rather than get a mix of stats. Nightmare Tear is a good addition to a Blue slot, as it is slightly more beneficial than the Balanced Dreadstone.
2.2 – Enchants:
Enchanting only:
Engineering only:
Hyperspeed Accelerators (340 haste rating every minute).
1600 – 2000 damage every 45 seconds
Leatherworking only:
3.1 – Combat
This build is centered around Sinister Strike, and it augments this ability through several talents, such as Improved Sinister Strike, Aggression, and Blade Twisting. There are also a few other talents that affect this ability indirectly, such as Lightning Reflexes, Weapon Expertise, Vitality, Savage Combat, Relentless Strikes, Malice, and Lethality. With Blood Spatter, this build also increases the damage done by your rupture by 30%. All of which are passive bonuses, i.e. you do not have to push a button for them to become active.
This build has only 3 moves that require precise timing to use effectively, Adrenaline rush, Blade Flurry, and Killing Spree. The use of these three moves is situational, and does not have a massive impact on your DPS.
This spec is designed for axe/sword specialization, and those 5 points can be placed in any of the other weapon specializations to suit your weapons.
The optimal choice for glyphs for this spec is Sinister Strike, Rupture, and Killing Spree. As for minor glyphs, the only one that would help your survival is Vanish.
3.2 – Assassination
This build is centered around Mutilate, and has a few abilities increasing its potency, such as Opportunity, Puncturing Wounds and Find Weakness. There are also a few talents that affect this ability indirectly, such as Malice, Lethality, Focused Attacks, Relentless Strikes, and Close quarters combat. With Blood Spatter, this build also increases the damage done by your rupture by 30%, and Improved Poisons. All of which are passive bonuses, i.e. you do not have to push a button for them to become active.
To use this build to its maximum potential, you have to learn to cope with the random number generator, so you can maximize the benefits from, Turn the Tables, Cut to the Chase, and the combo points generated from Seal Fate.
The optimal glyphs for this spec are, Mutilate, Rupture, and Hunger for Blood. As for minor glyphs, the only one that would help your survival is Vanish.
Combat and Assassination roughly do the same amount of damage, so it’s really based on preference. Combat is the fast paced tree, mainly because the main attack only 40 energy and the Combat Potency talent. Assassination is a bit slower than Combat, mainly because its main attack needs 60 energy, 55 energy with the glyph.
3.3 – Subtlety
If you are planning to use this spec, you should know that it is completely based on utility, and utility doesn’t show up on the meters.
This build is centered around Hemorrhage, which is more of a “utility”, i.e. increasing the damage output of your fellow raiders, than your own damage. There are two abilities that directly increase the potency of Hemorrhage, and that is Slaughter from the Shadows and Sinister Calling. It also has a few abilities that increase its damage indirectly, such as Serrated Blades, Deadliness, Precision and Malice. This build passively increases the potency of rupture, and also, your attack power and agility.
The main objective of the subtlety tree is survival and utility, damage is a secondary concern. There are a vast number of tools available to you for survival, such as Sleight of Hand, Preparation, Ghostly Strike, Elusiveness. Although there is a bit of randomness due to Honor Among Thieves, you would hardly notice it, and may be considered as a passive buff.
4 – General Tips and Rotations:
As a Rogue, there should be only two things that stops you from dpsing, and that is your energy regeneration, and the chance of you dying if you don’t stop dpsing.
When your DPS reaches that alarming rate where you pull aggro off the tank, rather than stopping, simply vanish and use Tricks of the Trade on the tank, and open even harder, this does several things, by using vanish, you reduce the risk of pulling aggro, by using Tricks of the Trade on the tank and opening even harder than before, you are setting a cushion for the other DPS, and they can DPS harder as well.
Here is a rotation I use in the combat spec:
Garrote > Adrenaline Rush > Sinister Strike till you get 5 points > Rupture > Sinister Strike till you get 5 points > Eviscerate, or Envenom if you have 5 deadly poison stacks > Killing Spree > Blade Flurry > Slice and Dice > Sinister Strike till you get 5 points, rinse and repeat till the boss is dead.
The basic idea of this rotation is to keep up Rupture and Slice and Dice up at all times, and follow up an Envenom with a Killing Spree when possible. Chaining Envenom and Killing Spree increases your damage dramatically, because of Envenom’s after effect, which increases the application of Deadly Poison by 75%, this lasts 1 second for each combo point used.
Here is a rotation I use in the assassination spec:
Garrote > Mutilate till 5 points > Rupture > Mutilate > Slice and Dice > Mutilate till you get 5 points > Eviscerate/Envenom (Envenom if you have 5 Deadly Poison stacks), rinse repeat.
The basic idea of this rotation is to keep up Slice and Dice by utilizing the Cut to the Chase talent, and keep up rupture up at all times.
After looking at all three specs, I hope you realize the pros and cons of each spec, and also realize the value of passive talents.
Here is a rotation I use in the subtlety spec:
Garrote > Hemorrhage till you have 5 points > Rupture > Hemorrhage till 2-3 points > Slice and Dice > Hemorrhage till 5 points > Shadowstep > Eviscerate > Hemorrhage till 2 points > Slice and Dice, rinse repeat.
The basic idea about this rotation is to keep up Rupture up at all times, as that is where the majority of your damage is going to come from, as it’s effect is increased by 60%, thanks to Serrated Blades and Blood Spatter. You should also combine Shadowstep with your Eviscerates as it increases the damage of your next ability by 20%.
Lastly, the easiest way to increase your DPS is by “chaining” your cooldowns, i.e. using them one after another in quick succession, rather than using them all at once, and use your cooldowns as often as you can. This does two things, first, gives you sustained DPS over a period of time, and second, by using your bigger cooldowns first, you can get them to be up again faster. For example: if you are combat spec, you have Adrenaline Rush, Blade Flurry and Killing Spree. There is a right way and a wrong way to use these cooldowns:
Wrong way: Using Adrenaline Rush and Blade Flurry at the same time, and follow it with Killing Spree. Doing this will put your Adrenaline Rush and Blade Flurry on cooldown at the same time, and they wont be up for another 3 minutes. A lot of people think that their DPS will increase by using them both at the same time, because blade flurry increases your haste by 20%, but what some don’t realize is that Adrenaline Rush makes your Sinister Strikes’ instant, so Blade Flurry is wasted.
Right way: Using Adrenaline Rush, then Blade Flurry, then Killing Spree. By simply using them one after another, you can greatly increase your DPS. What this does is use your biggest cooldown first, so when you use Blade Flurry and Killing Spree, and you can use Adrenaline Rush roughly 40 seconds sooner, because it has been cooling off while you were using it and the other cooldowns, and when you do that, you can use your other cooldowns faster too.
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Hey Nessmrten,
First and most important thing I noticed about your rotation is that you SnD way to late. You need to get it up asap and keep it up at all times.
Check out this post
http://www.wowcontender.com/blog/pve/combat-rogue-pve-build-and-rotation-patch-3-3-3/
Awesome info! Helped me raise my rogue’s dps from 7K to over 9K in ICC.
Hi friend!
As Roguepawn said you have to keep enabled SnD all the time!
All the information really helped me thank you
It is a 3.2.2 raiding guide. Rupture was dropped from optimal rotation and SnD was added in 3.3, rotation as of 3.3 is sinister strike until 5 combo points > SnD > SS til 5cp > Eviscerate.
That spec is sooooo fail!
IF you are assassination you are uber fail now because of the ~10% decrease in poison damage. Assassination is based around poison damage and now in BiS gear, math says that Assassination will be ahead of combat by 500 dps, on a single target fight with minimal movement and no target switching. If there is medium movement and any kind of target switching, combat pulls ahead by quite a little bit.