Dreams
fastest shadowstep in the west
OUTDATED
As the title suggests this is a Warlords of Draenor guide and thus is outdated as of the Legion prepatch (19th/20th of July 2016). I might eventually make a rogue guide for Legion, but I'm keeping this one up in case someone needs it for a WoD private server or whatever. I'll leave a link to the Legion guide here if I make one.
As the title suggests this is a Warlords of Draenor guide and thus is outdated as of the Legion prepatch (19th/20th of July 2016). I might eventually make a rogue guide for Legion, but I'm keeping this one up in case someone needs it for a WoD private server or whatever. I'll leave a link to the Legion guide here if I make one.
70 Rogue Guide
Table of contents:
1. Introduction
2. Character build (gear,professions,spec,talents)
3. Gameplay tips (macros,openers)
Introduction:
Hi, I'm Dreams and I've played rogue under different names such as Thought, Failbait, Complex, Odeezy and Manyfacedgod in the EU 70 bracket.
I have been maining the 70 bracket for almost 6 years with no breaks. I've always loved researching and theorycrafting, and have for a long time been one of the "go to guys" when it comes to any information on the bracket. I primarily play the bracket for 2v2 arena.
With WoD and the new arena scaling system, the BiS items for all classes have been confusing to a lot of people. And with the recent huge spike in 70 activity, I get a LOT of questions. And that is the primary reason I'm writing this guide; to help any new rogues get started by simply directing them to one place where they can read everything for themselves. No grandfathered items, enchants or glyphs are listed here because it's a guide intended for new players.
Character build - Gear
In skirmishes and battlegrounds every piece of gear you are wearing scales up to ilvl 283, including really low level items. This makes gearing for PvP more interesting than it has ever been before.
Luckily you don't have to spend months of your life and thousands of gold testing hundreds of items to figure out how the scaling works, because we (me and Fx, a fellow guildmember) have already done that.
Some slots have multiple pieces of gear listed. This is because the BiS for some slots is debatable. The item listed first is my personal preference.
All the items are wowhead links so you can check out where to get them yourself.
Head:
[Brutal Gladiator's Leather Helm]
Neck:
[Necklace of the Deep]
[Shattered Sun Pendant of Might] (Aldor version)
[Enchant Neck - Gift of Versatility]
Shoulders:
[Brutal Gladiator's Leather Spaulders]
[Master's Inscription of the Axe]
Cloak:
[Cloak of Unforgivable Sin]
[Vengeance Wrap]
[Enchant Cloak - Gift of Versatility]
Chest:
[Merciless Gladiator's Leather Tunic]
[Enchant Chest - Powerful Stats]
Wrists:
[Deadly Cuffs]
[Enchant Bracer - Greater Assault]
Hands:
[Brutal Gladiator's Leather Gloves]
[Enchant Gloves - Major Agility]
Waist:
[Belt of One-Hundred Deaths]
[Eternal Belt Buckle]
Legs:
[Leggings of the Immortal Night]
[Primal Leg Reinforcements]
Feet:
[Footwraps of Wild Encroachment]
[Enchant Boots - Major Agility]
Rings:
[Dark Iron Ring] of agility - click here for detailed information about this ring.
Note: Unless you primarily play double dps it can be worth it to use at least 1 Dark Iron Ring of the monkey.
[Aquamrine Signet] of agility
[Band of the Eternal Champion]
[Enchant Ring - Gift of Versatility]
Trinkets:
[Searing Words]
[Flashing Steel Talisman]
[Inherited Insignia of the Alliance] For non-humans
Weapons:
Subtlety:
MH: [Crux of the Apocalypse]
OH: [Ribsplitter] of agility / [Blade of the Unrequited]
Assassination:
MH: [Crux of the Apocalypse]
OH: [Blade of the Unrequited]
Combat:
[Ribsplitter] of agility x2
Enchant (all specs): [Enchant Weapon - Dancing Steel]
Gems:
Ignore socket bonuses, gem straight agility. ([Delicate Crimson Spinal]/[Delicate Cardinal Ruby])
Metagem: [Relentless Earthstorm Diamond]
Exceptions:
[Glinting Shadowsong Amethyst] - Depending on the socket bonus on each individual item it might sometimes be worth not going full agility but instead bend slightly to get a socket bonus. This is the case with one item on the BiS rogue list: [Belt of One-Hundred Deaths]. By going for a agi+crit gem in the blue socket instead of just ignoring the bonus and getting pure agi, you are losing 2 agility but getting 10 crit, which is worth it.
[Enchanted Pearl] - This gem is a must for every spec and every class in the 70 bracket. Its tooltip is actually bugged. It says +4 all stats when you look at it in your bag / on wowhead, it says +1 all stats when you look at it socketed in some of your gear, but it actually gives you +13 all stats. It's the most powerful gem available at our level, but sadly you can only use one. It also has another great property; it's a prismatic gem, meaning it fits any socket color. Place it strategically to obtain a socket bonus you wouldn't otherwise have gotten if you gemmed straight agility. If you're using the exact gear from this guide, I would recommend putting it in the yellow socket in your chest.
Character build - Professions
With the intended removal of all combat bonuses from professions in WoD, there are very few of them left. What's interesting is that most of them doesn't require you to keep the profession in order to keep the bonus, meaning you can unlearn the profession after enchanting/gemming your gear to make room for another profession.
Here is a list of all the professions that give you a stat boost in skirmishes and wargames:
Leatherworking:
Required skill level: 395
Profession bonus: [Primal Leg Reinforcements]
Non-profession alternative: [Jormungar Leg Armor]
The bonus works after unlearning leatherworking.
Inscription:
Required skill level: 400
Profession bonus: [Master's Inscription of the Axe]
Non-profession alternative: [Greater Inscription of Vengeance]
The bonus does not work after unlearning inscription.
Jewelcrafting:
Required skill level: 360 (also requires Revered or higher with The Consortium)
Profession bonus: [Crimson Sun]
Non-profession alternative: [Delicate Cardinal Ruby]
The bonus works after unlearning jewelcrafting.
From the information above it's easy to figure out how to get the most out of professions: Learn jewelcrafting, get the Crimson Sun, unlearn jewelcrafting and then train inscription and leatherworking for the shoulder and leg enchants. You can also learn leatherworking first and then drop it to learn jewelcrafting and inscription. To clarify, the only profession you need to keep even after enchanting your gear is inscription.
If you are lazy or limited on gold, just go for leatherworking alone. It gives you the most significant bonus by far.
Character build - Specialization
I'll start by saying that all rogue specs are perfectly viable. Unlike in PvE, each spec has a pretty significantly different playstyle in PvP.
My personal preference. Subtlety has the most burst damage of all the specs. Its energy regeneration mechanic (Slice and Dice), while not the strongest, is the only unpreventable one and the easiest and cheapest to maintain. Therefore you will generally have more energy and combo points to spend on damage and control over the other specs.
Pros:
- Highest burst potential
- Best energy regeneration mechanic, allowing for more freedom and creativity
Cons:
- Relatively low damage outside of openers
Arguably the best spec for rogues because of the current meta. Assassination is really good at training a target into the ground, making it ideal for killing healers. Its energy regeneration mechanic is Rupture, which provides more energy per second than any of the other specs, but also requires time to set up and can be BoP'd, stoneformed, etc.. It also doesn't last as long as Slice and Dice, and therefore requires more combo points to keep up.
Pros:
- Highest dps, most pressure when training
Cons:
- Gameplay can be boring because things like swaps and restealths generally aren't rewarded
I consider this the weakest rogue spec in the bracket, but as mentioned above, it's still perfectly viable. Combat has the worst energy regeneration mechanic of them all: Combat Potency. It requires 100% uptime to work and even then averages less energy per minute than the assassination mechanic. However, because of Revealing Strike you can get some really nasty eviscerate crits. It's also the only spec that doesn't need a dot on your target to do damage, which makes it the best spec for swaps.
Pros:
- Highest eviscerate crits
- Can swap targets effortlessly
- No dots - able to gouge killtarget (to peel or to wait for kidney dr, etc)
Cons:
- Bad energy regen - less room for creativity
- Less consistent damage than assassination
- Less burst than subtlety
Character build - Talents
In case you didn't know, you can change talents completely free in the waiting room before arena games start. You should always adjust your talents depending on what you are playing against and with.
Tier 1:
You should always play Subterfuge. The other talents are not even worth mentioning, unless you're playing some weird combat spec where you vanish -> nightstalker -> eviscerate. But at that point you might as well just roll a feral druid.
Tier 2:
Deadly Throw - A 70% physical slow, 6 second duration and no cooldown. This talent is amazing for kiting and peeling melees. The only downside is the high energy cost. The damage is complete garbage even with 5 cps, so you should only spec deadly throw for the slow, and always cast it with as few cps as possible.
Nerve Strike - After it's nerf this talent has seen a lot less use. You can pick it over deadly throw if you are playing BoS and wall is going to be useless in the match.
Combat Readiness - This is arguably one of the best defensive cooldowns in the game. It's only downside is that it only works against melees. It's a 20 sec wall with 50% reduction, which is insane.
Tier 3:
Again, only one talent worth mentioning: Elusiveness. A 30% spammable wall, hard to argue with. It requires some getting used to. If you can predict enemy bursts or swaps and pre-feint them, this talent is very valuable. It's also nice to have something to spam when you're just trying to live a cc on your healer etc.
Tier 4:
Step vs BoS.
I prefer shadowstep when playing with a ranged or healer, or when facing a healer. Step-kicks are really powerful in a bracket where a target with no heals can easily drop 100>0 in a matter of seconds. Shadowstep is also a nice tool to land a kidney on a rogue with evasion up.
Burst of Speed is more of a defensive option. A sprint that clears snares on a virtually non-existent cooldown = infinite kite potential. Nice for getting restealths, really frustrating to play against, but a lot less offensive power.
Character build - Glyphs
The two main glyphs that you should almost always use are:
Glyph of Blind - When you want to blind someone you should always be able to do it asap, and not wait for any dots there might be on the target to disappear. This glyph is required 9/10 times for swapping and peeling.
Glyph of Energy - 20 extra energy is really good in combination with subterfuge, especially as subtlety. However, this glyph is standard for the other specs as well.
If you're playing a certain strategy against a certain comp where you know you will only attack one target the whole game, you can replace Blind glyph. The two other main glyphs are Glyph of Evasion and Glyph of Garrote.
Gameplay tips - Macros
Macros help enhance your gameplay, shortening the time it takes to do certain things as well as simplifying some mechanics. It's of course recommended that you keybind every ability. I believe that keybinds are so personal that there is no point in making a "keybind guide". But I will say that rogue is in the very high end of classes in terms of the number of keybinds it takes to play them optimally.
Targeting Macros
These are in my opinion essential in PvP, but are also some of the hardest macros to get used to. Playing with arena target macros is a big improvement to your fluidity and reaction time. The six lines below are six different macros.
Code:
/target arena1
/target arena2
/target arena3
/focus arena1
/focus arena2
/focus arena3How do you know which one is arena target 1, or 2 or 3? Pretty simple. When you look at your enemy arena frames, the top one is number 1, second one is 2, etc.:
Focus Macros
Focus macros are macros that casts an ability on your focus target instead of your target. There are two main ways to do focus macros, and which one you use depends on your keybind layout.
The first way is modifier macros. For this to work you need the keybind for your focus ability to be on the same key, but with a modifier. For example: If my Kick is bound to R, and I want my focus Kick to be bound to shift-R (shift being the modifier) I can use a modifier macro. However, if my Kick is bound to R, and I want my focus Kick to be bound on a different key, let's say F, I have to make a more traditional macro.
Here is how to make a focus modifier macro:
Code:
/cast [nomod,@target]Kick
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]KickClick below for a full list of all my focus macros with explanations:
Code:
#showtooltip Kick
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Kick
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Kick
/cast [nomod,@target]Kick
Code:
#showtooltip Blind
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Blind
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Blind
/cast [nomod,@target]BlindCODE]#showtooltip Kidney Shot
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Kidney Shot
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Kidney Shot
/cast [nomod,@target]Kidney Shot[/CODE]
Kidney Shot macro.
Code:
#showtooltip [talent:4/2]Shadowstep; [talent:4/3]Burst of speed
/cast [@mouseover]Shadowstep
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Shadowstep
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Kick
/cast [nomod,@target]Shadowstep
/cast [mod:alt [MENTION=5940]party[/MENTION]1]Shadowstep
/cast Burst of Speed
The macro also has a shift modifier for focus, and a focus kick line so you can double press the macro to quickly shadowstep -> kick your focus. It also has an alt modifier to shadowstep to party1, which is always your partner in 2v2 arena. Again, you can easily change the modifiers to your own preference by editing the macros.
Code:
#showtooltip Cheap Shot
/cast !Stealth
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Cheap Shot
/cast [nomod,@target]Cheap Shot
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Cheap Shot
Code:
#showtooltip Garrote
/cast !Stealth
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Garrote
/cast [nomod,@target]Garrote
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Garrote
Code:
#showtooltip Sap
/cast !stealth
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Sap
/cast [nomod,@target] Sap
/cast [mod:shift,@focus] Sap
Code:
#showtooltip Gouge
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Gouge
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Gouge
/cast [nomod,@target]Gouge
Code:
#showtooltip [talent:2/1]Deadly Throw; [talent:2/2]Nerve Strike; [talent:2/3]Combat Readiness
/cast [nomod,exists,@mouseover]Deadly Throw
/cast [mod:shift,@focus]Deadly Throw
/cast [nomod,@target]Deadly Throw
/cast Combat ReadinessOther Macros
There are a few more macros that I find handy for rogues.
Click below to see them:
Code:
#showtooltip
/cancelaura Horde Flag
/cancelaura Alliance Flag
/cast VanishVideo example:
Code:
#showtooltip Stealth
/cancelaura Horde Flag
/cancelaura Alliance Flag
/cast !Stealth
Code:
/targetenemy
/cast Sap
Code:
#show sap
/cast !stealth
/cast [@arena1]Sap
Code:
#show sap
/cast !stealth
/cast [@arena2]Sap
Code:
#show sap
/cast !stealth
/cast [@arena3]Sap
Code:
/cancelaura Stealth
Code:
/cancelaura Hand of Protection
Code:
/cast [@mouseover]Throw
/cast [@target]ThrowGameplay tips - Openers
I will just cover subtlety openers because of experience with the other specs is limited. Furthermore, subtlety is a spec based around openers, where as the others are not.
The number 1 thing new rogues always ask. How do I open? I hate it when I get that question because there is no simple explanation. It depends on things like the class you're opening on, whether or not it's a 1v1, how many combo points you had before you opened, how much energy you had, what glyphs and talents you are playing, etc.
There is no way I can explain every possible scenario in detail, so I'll just go over the main ones and explain how you might adjust the opener in different situations. I will also provide short video clips for demonstrations.
Optimizing your energy
This is not much of a trick, but for the sake of this guide I will call it "the energy trick" for easy reference.
In every opener (unless you already have combo points) you always start with Premeditation → Slice and Dice before you open. This is because Slice and Dice is your energy regen source and is really important to have up at all times. The trick involves waiting for full energy, and then open just before Slice and Dice is about to give you an energy tick (happens every 2 seconds). If you time it right, you will gain the +8 energy the same second you open, which is optimal. If you mistime it, the +8 energy will go into your energy cap and won't do anything, which means there's a full 2 seconds until your next energy tick.
It's easy to learn the 2 second timer in your head after a little bit of practice.
Click below for a video demonstration:
Basic melee opener
This opener applies to warriors, rets, rogues, ench shamans, ferals and all monk specs.
Premeditation → Slice and Dice → the energy trick → Cheap Shot → Rupture → Ambush → Backstab → Kidney Shot
Click below for a video demonstration:
Premeditation → Slice and Dice → the energy trick → Cheap Shot → Rupture → Ambush → Backstab until 5 cp → Eviscerate
Click below for a video demonstration:
Death Knight/Mage opener
This opener applies to death knights and frost mages, or any mages that are specced ice ward. The reason for this Garrote → Cheap Shot-style opener is to prevent Death Knights from IBF'ing your cheap shot, and to prevent mages from either blinking your cheap shot or pet nova'ing/ice warding your garrote and simply running out of range.
There are slight variations of the base opener that are optimal for each class. Here is the base opener:
Premeditation → Slice and Dice → the energy trick → Garrote → Cheap Shot → Ambush → wait for Cheap Shot to almost expire → Kidney Shot
When opening on a DK, you want to pop evasion same global as garrote, and then try to turn your character to face the ghoul as it jumps behind you to stun you. If done correctly you will dodge the ghoul stun.
When opening on a mage, you want to make sure you stand as close to the mage as possible when you garrote, this is to make sure that your cheap shot lands before he gets out of your melee range. You also want to end the opener on Eviscerate or Rupture instead of Kidney Shot (unless they blink your cheap shot late, in which case you can step kidney).
Click below for a video demonstration:
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