Post by Sabriela on Jun 19, 2010 17:50:43 GMT -5
Note: The information below is not my own work. I have a Rogue but she is level 6. =D This is pretty much a copy and paste of information found on the Rogue class forum on Worldofwarcraft.com. This and all posts made by me are copy and pastes, just to make it easier on the Rogues to find information on their class without having to scour the internet. =)
The following information has been edited by Lokilok (meaning I can't find the author) and a direct link can be found here forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=19110156216&sid=1
Ok, first of all, I did not write this guide. I noticed there are no stickied PvP guides yet and i found this one to be particularly useful and sticky-worthy. Secondly, the original post was created on January 26, 2009 so it is somewhat outdated. To make this still useful, i have slightly edited a few things to keep it up to date with the current patch, 3.2.0. The original post can be found here - thekingdomofernor.com/serendipit ... heory.html
If anyone finds a typo, outdated ability, changed ability, anything like that, please post here and i will fix it. Enjoy:
First, a brief background on my WoW PvP experience:
I've been playing WoW since December 2004. I've been playing my Rogue since Spring of 2006. It took me ages to reach 60, because I spent so much time PvPing. Once I hit 60, I grinded to High Warlord against some very steep competition.
Once TBC came out, I started making some silly PvP videos, and reached top 10 of the battlegroup (and subsequently Gladiator) in 3v3 (as Druid/SP/Rogue) and 2v2 (SP/Rogue), Season 1, as 41/0/20 Sub Mutilate.
Season 2, Mutilate's mind numbingly simple playstyle nearly drove me to quit the game, until I went combat, and then AR/Prep. I made top 10 Season 2, with a Shadow Priest and Balance Druid (Lewt) in 3v3 and 2v2, as AR/Prep.
In Season 3, the competition really died down. I got my shoulders first week, but by the end of the season, no one really cared. I made Gladiator as Rogue/Warlock, specced Shadow Step.
Season 4, the competition was even worse, and so I only played the first week to get my weapons, and then quit until the 2nd to last week of the season. We only played one session, for one day, and I got Gladiator S4 as Double Rogue Priest, with Mahiko and Adamman.
Other than that, I've made 25 videos on WCM, most well known being "Lewt carries Buddhist in 2v2", "Mahiko and Buddhist 2v2", "Dancing with Shadows", and "Buddhist Enlightenment". Enough about me, though. I'm not trying to brag, I'm just putting down my own experience, so you can put my advice into perspective. I'm not infallible, I mean, if I were, I wouldn't have any fun playing WoW anymore. The fun in WoW comes from self improvement.
Rogues, the class where the cap of skill is nearly beyond human reach.
I've been playing for so long, I get asked every day how I can keep going, how I still find the game fun. It's simple: Rogues are DIFFICULT TO MASTER. They really, really are.
There's a difference between being successful as a Rogue, and being good at a Rogue. Some Rogues reach Gladiator, and yet suck terribly. It's not because our class is over powered, it's because our class is effective, even when handled by a novice. It's just like that for Hunters. Hunters don't have to be skilled in PvP to succeed, and when they are, they're insanely effective.
What makes Rogues so interactive and difficult to master?
Good question. Several things:
Energy: Energy is like mana, except you go OOM every few seconds. Yes, it comes back just as quickly, but how often does a Mage say, "Damn, I can't counterspell because I don't have enough mana."? Not very often, because matches usually don't last long enough for that kind of situation to appear. Sure casters go OOM pretty often, but by that time, their enemy team is likely going OOM as well. Point is, we have to manage our energy very precisely, otherwise we're screwed from the start of the game.
Interrupts, stuns, silences, and incapacitates: Rogues have to keep track of the cool downs of Gouge, Kick, Kidney shot, Vanish, and Shadow Dance(when it applies), to keep an effective Interrupt Rotation spinning.
"Keeping track of CDs? That's not very tough with a little practice."
Sure, but we also have to decide between using an ability to stop a cast, or as a CC. A good Rogue often has to choose between using Gouge to stop enemy DPS, or to cancel enemy heals.
Also, kick is much more effective when used at the end of a cast, and not as the very beginning, for a couple reasons:
A) That is how to avoid being juked (a fake cast intended to waste your kick)
B) They waste their time casting the spell, only to be interrupted at the last moment.
Sap. It's one of our best CCs, and yet it's probably the most difficult CC to use in the entire game. It must be used while in stealth, while the target is out of combat. This poses a number of problems:
A) Landing a sap before an arena match has "begun" can be difficult with the number of AOEs in the game at this point.
B) Vanish is very very unreliable. You may see that healer sitting in a full fear, and you have it planned out to Vanish sap, but 50% of the time, Vanish simply fails to put you in to stealth to use the ability.
Combo points:
Combo points are just another thing that makes playing a Rogue like defensive driving. You have to maintain a proper rotation of interrupts, and you have to maintain a proper rotation of finishers. It's simple in concept, but in practice it takes time to learn which finisher is most effective for which situation.
What will give me the biggest DPS boost on this target? Expose armor? Rupture? Slice and Dice? Kidney Shot? Eviscerate? Each one of those answers is correct, given the proper situation. Learning that situation takes time and experience.
A big thing about combo points is the common need for Kidney shot. Kidney shot is perhaps our most key ability in arena. When an opponent is stunned, he's helpless. He can't dodge, parry, block, or use [almost] any defensive ability. You need to know when you need to kidney shot, so that you have the combo points to use the ability.
Poisons:
Poisons have become very easy to use in WOTLK, especially with deadly brew. In the past, we had to maintain a constant stack of 5 wound poison, which could require using SnD over another finisher, and a weapon swap. Now, it's fairly simple. However, as Shadow Dance, for example, applying Mind Numbing requires a weapon swap, which is fairly difficult to do effectively mid match.
Positioning:
Rogues have, perhaps, the most difficult job of positioning in the game. Why?
-To be effective, we must remain behind our enemy, in melee range.
-We have no ability which sends us to our team mates, like intervene.
-Without Shadow Step, staying in melee range almost certainly will require one or more Sprints before the target is dead. If your target gets out of melee range for an instant, he may be able to lose crippling poison and kite you.
Why is this so hard? Because, at higher ends of arena, LoSing your healer for a moment will mean your death, where at the same time, staying in LoS of your healer may require leaving melee range of your enemy, allowing him to kite you until you lose the game. Deciding what to do takes practice.
Situational Awareness:
Every class needs to be aware, so why is this subject relevant to Rogues specifically?
Because, when you are spending so much time staring at your UI (how many CPs you have, how much health you and your enemy have, how much energy you have, what cool downs are up, if you still have your poisons up, if you still have EA/Rupture/SnD running), it's really tough to not tunnel vision, for a Rogue.
Watch for healers that try to stop and drink. One little trick that works quite well when fighting healers when they are drinking is to use distract to make them stop. That extra 2-5 seconds it takes to get there could be the difference between a win and loss.
Also, being a melee class with very limited mobility (sprint on a high CD, must be used to chase down the target you intend to kill, usually), there are few things we can do to someone we don't intend on killing, so it's hard to get used to watching other people. Not to mention, in the past, switching targets would make you lose your CPs, which built an instinct into many Rogues to never switch targets.
However, to be a good Rogue, one must pay attention to the positioning of his partners, enemies, the health of his partners and enemies, what everyone is casting (to vanish or CloS incoming CC, or to interrupt the heals of someone you aren't targetting) and what CDs/Trinket everyone has used.
Why spend so much time reading all of that?
Because once you realize how much there is to learn, you can open your mind to new possibilities, and focus on what you're missing.
Now that you know the intricate details to Rogueing, I'll give the less important in-game situational guides:
Basics:
DPS:
Pooling Energy: If you don't pool energy, you aren't going to kill any good player if he's got a healer or heals himself. Using all of your energy at once to damage is much more effective than doing it slowly, because it gives healers less time to react.
-Don't use your damaging ability until you're about 10 energy from full.
-Never leave yourself under 15 energy, otherwise you can't kick (25 energy w/o the pvp gloves).
Finishers: Using the proper finisher for every situation takes a lot of experience, but here are some good guidelines. This is assuming your comp isn't super gimmicky and bursts things down instantly.
-Slice and Dice: This is a very powerful finisher, and can be used on any enemy that you don't plan on killing in the next 10 seconds. It will up your DPS substantially, but also apply your poisons 40% faster (excluding certain procs-per-minute poisons).
-Rupture: With Blood spatter and Serrated blades, rupture can do a ton of damage. It's most effective when used against targets with high armor, because it ignores armor.
-Eviscerate: In WOTLK, eviscerate became much stronger than it was in TBC. Eviscerate is great when you plan on actually killing someone.
-Kidney Shot: Perhaps our best finisher, Kidney shot makes the enemy unable to dodge, parry, block, or use [almost] any defensive ability.
Openers:
-Ambush can be used on mages, if you actually plan on forcing an iceblock.
-Cheap shot is great for anything that can't break it, but can screw you up while silenced. For example, as a Rogue, being cheap shotted is your worst nightmare.
-Garrote is great for a healer you plan on killing. It puts a dot on them, so you can't use blind or sheep after garroting, but Garrote has no DR, meaning you can garrote multiple times and apply multiple 4 second silences.
CC:
-I already covered sap pretty well in section one. Essentially, getting a sap from the start is important, but if it means you can't get an opener (cheap shot) on your target, then you might want to forget it.
-Blind is our main arena CC. It should be used in a chain with other CCs, when your target is getting low, to force a trinket, or to kill your target.
-Dismantle is great for any melee class or hunter. It totally disables all of them except for DKs, for the duration. It's a very defensive ability, and great with preparation glyph.
-Gouge is awesome, I use it every arena to stop the casts of people I'm not trying to kill. For example, if I'm killing a warrior, I'll gouge his Paladin's Holy Light.
Arena:
In arena, the Rogue's job is to (in order of importance)
A) Lock down
B) Reduce Healing received
C) Deal Damage
D) Interrupt Casts
E) Crowd Control
You don't bring a Rogue to arena primarily to deal MASSIVE DAMAGES!, you bring him because he can make an enemy helpless. A Rogue can turn another Rogue into a dead man. Rogues also reduce the healing taken by their target by 50%, which is crucial to most teams.
How to be effective:
I) Don't die
II) Don't let your partners die
III) Don't let your enemy get away
IV) Burst when your target can't get healed
V) Sustain damage when you know you can't burst him to death
I) To avoid dying:
Learn when to use your defensive cool downs. Examples:
-Don't use CloS when you're facing a Rogue+Mage team in arena, until they're actually planning to kill you (or unless you're CloSing a sheep cast, and your target is about to die).
-Don't use evasion unless the warrior is actually trying to kill you, not when he's just intercepting you off his healer
-Don't use evasion if he's already dismantled or in a full stun, until the duration ends.
Learn to LoS your healer, and your enemy:
-Are you about to die, and the person you're trying to kill is no where close? Don't run out of LoS of your healer, just get heals and then go back at him.
-If you and your target were both to die, would your team win?
-If you and your target are next to the edge of a wall, and someone is casting on you, go behind the wall. That's obvious, but pretty much just stay situationally aware.
Learn to kite:
I have survived and won countless games because I've simply ran from a melee dps, or a caster (going out of LoS), until my healer got a chance to heal me.
II) Don't let your partners die:
-Is there a warrior and a dk killing your priest? Shiv and Gouge the DK, dismantle the warrior, then get back on your target.
-Is your hunter about to get blown up by that mage? Blind/kick/gouge him before his cast finishes.
-You've got Gouge, Blind, Dismantle, Kick, Crippling poison, Mind numbing, use them!
III) Don't let your enemy get away:
-Always keep crippling up
-Is that warrior running towards you? Vanish his intercept.
IV) Burst when your target can't receive heals
-Is your target fully hotted and at 90% HP? Don't bother bursting, it won't work.
-Use Cold Blood and offensive vanishes when their healer is about to get caught in an unbreakable CC (his trinket is blown).
-Do the same if your target is out of LoS of his healer, and can't get into LoS before he'd die (you have him stunned there).
V) Sustain DPS when you know burst won't work
-Warlock Druid, for example. Keep EA and SnD up on that lock, and just keep DPSing. If you're pooling energy effectively, you should be scaring their healer into blowing trinket and NS. Once those are down, generate a CC chain and burst the lock.
1v1s in Arena:
-If your target has no DoTs to put on you, you'll typically want to be near a pillar. You want to kite your enemy around, and get as many restealths as possible. For a example, against a Warrior, you want to use crippling poison and avoid him as much as possible until you're really ready to take him down. Rupture him while you avoid his melee swings.
-Using nameplates is very useful for that task.
-Some pillars are thin enough for Taurens and Gnomes to hit through, so make sure you're back a little bit on the pillar.
-Against casters like Warlocks, it's pretty much a DPS race. All you can do is try and kill him before he kills you.
-Don't lose your cool, be sure to kick any casts. Don't forget expose armor.
So I've pretty much already explained everything except how to kill specific classes in 1v1 situations. I'm going to write this from the stand point of a Mut/Prep Rogue, since that's easy and most people are specced it. It won't be hard to imagine how to do this as any other spec. This is all based on the current game. Later, things will change drastically. For example, atm, Priests are very easy to kill, but I guarantee you in a few months, they will be moderate or hard to beat. When I used classes, I pretty much went with their most common or best specs. For example, Shaman is Resto, not Enhance, because Enhance would be a joke to beat.
Difficulty is based on how difficult it is to win most of the time, assuming you're a good player, against someone of equal skill and gear. So if it says "Easy", then it means it's "easy to win most of the time".
Remember, there really is no set rotation on what to do in pvp. Sometimes you must do what the situation calls for. This will just give you a general idea of the fights.
Warrior:
Difficulty: Easy
Warriors are very easy to beat in the current state of the game, primarily due to dismantle.
1) Open with Cheap Shot
2) Mutilate and apply a 4-5 point EA
3) Dismantle
4) Mutilate until you've reached 4 or 5 CPs
5) Save energy until dismantle has 1 second left on its duration
6) Kidney Shot from behind. If it is avoided some how, gouge, sprint, and try to go for a restealth
7) Use your burst, Cold Blood mutilate, mutilate again.
8) Stun him whenever possible
9) Get out of melee range immediately after -- this should be a fluid motion
10) 5-8 Kite him, don't let him intercept you, but don't get melee swung either if it's possible.
11) With near full energy again, go for a vanish cheap shot
12) Mutilate twice again, and if possible, kidney shot
13) At this point, you should be able to finish him off.
As you can see, it's not very exact, lots of things can happen. Make sure you use feint when he bladestorms. It's just a general strategy, to give you a general idea of what I'd do if I came across a Warrior.
Warlock:
Difficulty: Easy
1) Cheap shot
2) Cold blood Mutilate, Evisc, be ready to trinket a death coil
3) Sprint back to him, make sure to Kick any fear attempts
4) Once you have near full energy, kidney shot
5) Cloak of Shadows immediately after the KS (He'll probably trinket your KS, and this will leave him helpless)
6) Mutilate twice, ending with an eviscerate
7) As CloS is about to go down, vanish and back away from him quickly, avoid getting aoe feared or taking a dot
8) Sit around for a few seconds to gather energy, reopen, and finish him off.
Priest
Difficulty: Easy to Moderate
1) Garrote
2) Mutilate and EA
3) Be ready to trinket if he fears right after the CS. I'd say use CloS to resist it, but good Priests don't usually use it so predictably.
4) Mutilate twice more, he will have feared by now.
5) With full energy, kidney shot and CB Mutilate, mutilate again, eviscerate
6a) If he trinkets, CloS and Blind him, restealth and bandage while he's Sapped.
6b) If he doesn't trinket, CloS, Vanish
7) Reopen with cheap shot
8) Get in front of him, and blind, start bandaging
9) He'll surely trinket this blind, otherwise you can restealth, sap, and reopen to finish him off
10) You know he's going to trinket, so gouge him just as he does, try and don't let him get a cast off
11) He shouldn't have fear back up at this point, but he might. If you are experienced with the timer on his fear, there are ways to avoid the cast when your gouge ends.
12) Pool some energy during this gouge, mutilate to 4-5 CPs, and evisc
13) If you need to, you can prep vanish and reopen with another garrote
14) Either way, get back to 4-5 CPs, and KS again... he should be dead by this point
Hunter
Difficulty: Moderate
I'm assuming the Hunter isn't BM. If he is, all you can do is zerg him down and through a dismantle in there.
1) Open with cheap shot
2) Cold blood mutilate
3) Dismantle
4) Evasion
5) Sprint
6) Mutilate again and KS
7) Kinda just... zerg him down... lol
Make sure you have at least 1 defensive cooldown up at all times, dismantle/evasion/sprint/ even cloak of shadows if you have the glyph. Stun whenever you can. Be ready to trinket an ice block trap thingie.
Druid
Difficulty: Easy to Hard
Resto:
Moderate to Hard
Do something similar to killing a priest. The only real difference is that you can more focus on DPS. Just chain stuns and silences. Burst him down.
Doomkin:
Easy
1) Open with Cheap Shot
2) Mutilate
3) Eviscerate
4) Vanish if you got rooted from the proc, do it before he gets out of the stun
5) Reopen with garrote
6) Sprint
7) Mutilate
8) Kidney Shot... It's really sort of situational, you might get the feeling he's about to try and pop out of owl form and heal, which is right when you want to kidney shot.
9) If you get war stomped, let him cast the cyclone, then just trinket it and attack, he'll pop into caster when the cyclone cast finishes, and you'll get a chance to do some big damage for a global or two.
It's hard to describe this fight, but it's very systematic, it just takes real practice.
Feral:
Moderate to Hard
Sadly, this is another very stupid fight. Pretty much he's going to sit in bear and spam mangle you, while you 5-8 kite him on crippling poison and Rupture.
Shaman
Difficulty: Easy to Moderate
This is pretty much like fighting a priest, again, except you don't have to worry about CC. You do, however, have to worry about him tanking you and outhealing your damage. There are two ways to beat a resto shaman: Burst with heavy stuns and silence chains, or outlast.
To burst him down:
1) Cheap shot
2) Mutilate, KS
3) Cold blood mutilate, mutilate, evi
4a) If he trinketed KS, Blind, hit his fire totem if it's up immediately, and restealth to sap, bandage, reopen.
4b) Vanish, Garrote
5) Mutilate, Evi
6) Be ready to kick any casts.
To outlast, you'll want
1) Open with Garrote
2) Mutilate, SnD
3) Hit any fire totem, and poison cleansing
LET HIM HEAL, with wound up, you want him to heal, and go OOM as fast as possible.
4) Mutilate, Mutilate, Rupture
5) Keep SnD and Rupture up at all times, and keep hitting those totems.
6) When he drops mana tide, hit it immediately
7) CloS on his Shock CDs, to avoid the damage
8) Use herbalism heal, self heal trinket, or any self heal ability available on every CD
9) When he's as OOM as he's about as OOM as he's going to get, pool energy, kick a heal, and burst him down.
Paladin
Difficulty: Easy to Moderate
If he's Ret,
1) Cheap shot, use cloak when it's over as 95% of the time a pally will stun you right away
2) Cold blood mutilate, eviscerate
3) Dismantle
4) Mutilate one or two more times, he'll be forced to bubble
5) When he bubbles, sprint away, and restealth (vanish if you must)
6) Once bubble is down, reopen and repeat.
If he's Holy (or that Prot healing spec)
1) Garrote
2) Cold Blood Mutilate, eviscerate
3) Vanish, Cheap Shot
4) By the end of the Cheap shot duration, you can Mutilate again, and he'll likely be scared into bubbling
6) If he doesn't bubble, he'll blow some instants, just kidney shot him here
7) Mutilate to 4-5 points, and he'll surely bubble by now
8) Again, sprint, clos, vanish
9) Once bubble is down, reopen and repeat.
If he's prot, god help you. All i can really say is chain together your abilities, kick any heals, gouge and restealth often, use ALL abilities as often as possible and good luck.
Mage
Difficulty: Moderate (Shadow Dance) Difficult (Mutilate)
Mages and Rogues are pretty much the only opponents in which it's a LOT harder to kill as one spec or the other. The problem with Mutilate and Mages is the lack of mobility, that if you get a little unlucky or make a mistake, you're kited and dead.
1) Ambush
2) Continue to walk forward, through him, and Cold Blood Mutilate
3) Eviscerate
4) Now, if he's Arcane, he might have Ice blocked on your CB Mutilate, and negated it. If so, get in front an watch the Iceblock buff on his buff bar, the instant it disappears, gouge. You'll be able to gouge before he blinks 95% of the time.
5) With him gouged, mutilate.
6) He'll blink, you sprint and vanish. You want to run to the side, not at him, otherwise he'll blizzard you out.
7) Reopen with a garrote, eviscerate, and he'll practically be dead.
8) If he's frost, he may be higher in HP, and you'll have to go with what you've got, continue to burst him down while avoiding his damage.
Death Knight
Difficulty: Moderate to Difficult
Death knights are pretty much like Warriors that have pets that can stun you, and spells to hit you through dismantle. They also have dots, and all sorts of snares and stuff.
1) Cheap Shot
2) Cold Blood Mutilate, Rupture
3) Dismantle
4) Mutilate twice more and evisc
4) Sprint, CloS if needed, Vanish as dismantle ends
5) He probably popped ice bound fortitude already, expecting a KS earlier on, if so, wait it out before you open
6) Reopen with a cheap shot, kidneyshot if he isn't on icebound fortitude, and try to burst him down
Vanishing to avoid damage while you're out of energy is very important against a DK.
Rogue
Difficulty: Very Difficult
This is "very difficult" because it's based upon winning most of the time against someone equally geared and skilled as yourself. Rogue vs Rogue encounters are the fastest in the game, and to win requires great reaction time.
If you've got the opener:
1) Cheap Shot
2) Be ready for him to trinket, don't use Mutilate yet, or it'll put you on GCD
3) If he trinkets, blind, and, if he blinded you, you've won. If he vanished your blind, his stealth will drop, and you can simply vanish yourself and reopen. You've won, if he doesn't Fan of Knives you out of stealth.
4) Either way, dismantle him then use evasion after your dismantle runs its course.
5) After evasion is a good time to use gouge --> vanish --> immediately use CS which will then allow you to use KS (sometimes if you're lucky and/or fast enough you can even do this while you have rupture on you). He should be about dead after that. If not try it again after using prep.
If he's got the opener:
If he cheap shots and uses an instant, then trinket and blind him. Watch very closely, if he trinkets, vanish. He's just used blind, and you're both out of stealth. This puts you both on even ground. The first thing you want to do is dismantle him. If he's good, he'll do the same. Just after that, evasion. Hope is, you're faster than him, so you've dismantled him and put yourself on evasion before he could do the same. He may vanish, to which you FoK him out.
I find Rogue vs. Rogue duels incredibly hard, because things never seem to work. For example, it seems that in duels, if I spam blind for a second straight (while not on GCD), it just won't use the ability half the time. I'd think it's just me being bad, but this type of thing never happens for me in arena, so I don't know. I hate duels, for this reason, it seems like nothing works.
Another reason RvsR duels are incredibly hard is, you have no healer. What I mean is, if you are opened on, trinket a stun, and vanish, say he vanishes too. He got the opener, so you're down health, and now you're both in stealth. It doesn't help you at all. In an arena situation, getting yourself into stealth like that would save you, give you the chance to be healed, and perhaps win the game.
Anyway, there you have it. My Comprehensive PvP Guide to the Rogue class.
The following information has been edited by Lokilok (meaning I can't find the author) and a direct link can be found here forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=19110156216&sid=1
Ok, first of all, I did not write this guide. I noticed there are no stickied PvP guides yet and i found this one to be particularly useful and sticky-worthy. Secondly, the original post was created on January 26, 2009 so it is somewhat outdated. To make this still useful, i have slightly edited a few things to keep it up to date with the current patch, 3.2.0. The original post can be found here - thekingdomofernor.com/serendipit ... heory.html
If anyone finds a typo, outdated ability, changed ability, anything like that, please post here and i will fix it. Enjoy:
First, a brief background on my WoW PvP experience:
I've been playing WoW since December 2004. I've been playing my Rogue since Spring of 2006. It took me ages to reach 60, because I spent so much time PvPing. Once I hit 60, I grinded to High Warlord against some very steep competition.
Once TBC came out, I started making some silly PvP videos, and reached top 10 of the battlegroup (and subsequently Gladiator) in 3v3 (as Druid/SP/Rogue) and 2v2 (SP/Rogue), Season 1, as 41/0/20 Sub Mutilate.
Season 2, Mutilate's mind numbingly simple playstyle nearly drove me to quit the game, until I went combat, and then AR/Prep. I made top 10 Season 2, with a Shadow Priest and Balance Druid (Lewt) in 3v3 and 2v2, as AR/Prep.
In Season 3, the competition really died down. I got my shoulders first week, but by the end of the season, no one really cared. I made Gladiator as Rogue/Warlock, specced Shadow Step.
Season 4, the competition was even worse, and so I only played the first week to get my weapons, and then quit until the 2nd to last week of the season. We only played one session, for one day, and I got Gladiator S4 as Double Rogue Priest, with Mahiko and Adamman.
Other than that, I've made 25 videos on WCM, most well known being "Lewt carries Buddhist in 2v2", "Mahiko and Buddhist 2v2", "Dancing with Shadows", and "Buddhist Enlightenment". Enough about me, though. I'm not trying to brag, I'm just putting down my own experience, so you can put my advice into perspective. I'm not infallible, I mean, if I were, I wouldn't have any fun playing WoW anymore. The fun in WoW comes from self improvement.
Rogues, the class where the cap of skill is nearly beyond human reach.
I've been playing for so long, I get asked every day how I can keep going, how I still find the game fun. It's simple: Rogues are DIFFICULT TO MASTER. They really, really are.
There's a difference between being successful as a Rogue, and being good at a Rogue. Some Rogues reach Gladiator, and yet suck terribly. It's not because our class is over powered, it's because our class is effective, even when handled by a novice. It's just like that for Hunters. Hunters don't have to be skilled in PvP to succeed, and when they are, they're insanely effective.
What makes Rogues so interactive and difficult to master?
Good question. Several things:
Energy: Energy is like mana, except you go OOM every few seconds. Yes, it comes back just as quickly, but how often does a Mage say, "Damn, I can't counterspell because I don't have enough mana."? Not very often, because matches usually don't last long enough for that kind of situation to appear. Sure casters go OOM pretty often, but by that time, their enemy team is likely going OOM as well. Point is, we have to manage our energy very precisely, otherwise we're screwed from the start of the game.
Interrupts, stuns, silences, and incapacitates: Rogues have to keep track of the cool downs of Gouge, Kick, Kidney shot, Vanish, and Shadow Dance(when it applies), to keep an effective Interrupt Rotation spinning.
"Keeping track of CDs? That's not very tough with a little practice."
Sure, but we also have to decide between using an ability to stop a cast, or as a CC. A good Rogue often has to choose between using Gouge to stop enemy DPS, or to cancel enemy heals.
Also, kick is much more effective when used at the end of a cast, and not as the very beginning, for a couple reasons:
A) That is how to avoid being juked (a fake cast intended to waste your kick)
B) They waste their time casting the spell, only to be interrupted at the last moment.
Sap. It's one of our best CCs, and yet it's probably the most difficult CC to use in the entire game. It must be used while in stealth, while the target is out of combat. This poses a number of problems:
A) Landing a sap before an arena match has "begun" can be difficult with the number of AOEs in the game at this point.
B) Vanish is very very unreliable. You may see that healer sitting in a full fear, and you have it planned out to Vanish sap, but 50% of the time, Vanish simply fails to put you in to stealth to use the ability.
Combo points:
Combo points are just another thing that makes playing a Rogue like defensive driving. You have to maintain a proper rotation of interrupts, and you have to maintain a proper rotation of finishers. It's simple in concept, but in practice it takes time to learn which finisher is most effective for which situation.
What will give me the biggest DPS boost on this target? Expose armor? Rupture? Slice and Dice? Kidney Shot? Eviscerate? Each one of those answers is correct, given the proper situation. Learning that situation takes time and experience.
A big thing about combo points is the common need for Kidney shot. Kidney shot is perhaps our most key ability in arena. When an opponent is stunned, he's helpless. He can't dodge, parry, block, or use [almost] any defensive ability. You need to know when you need to kidney shot, so that you have the combo points to use the ability.
Poisons:
Poisons have become very easy to use in WOTLK, especially with deadly brew. In the past, we had to maintain a constant stack of 5 wound poison, which could require using SnD over another finisher, and a weapon swap. Now, it's fairly simple. However, as Shadow Dance, for example, applying Mind Numbing requires a weapon swap, which is fairly difficult to do effectively mid match.
Positioning:
Rogues have, perhaps, the most difficult job of positioning in the game. Why?
-To be effective, we must remain behind our enemy, in melee range.
-We have no ability which sends us to our team mates, like intervene.
-Without Shadow Step, staying in melee range almost certainly will require one or more Sprints before the target is dead. If your target gets out of melee range for an instant, he may be able to lose crippling poison and kite you.
Why is this so hard? Because, at higher ends of arena, LoSing your healer for a moment will mean your death, where at the same time, staying in LoS of your healer may require leaving melee range of your enemy, allowing him to kite you until you lose the game. Deciding what to do takes practice.
Situational Awareness:
Every class needs to be aware, so why is this subject relevant to Rogues specifically?
Because, when you are spending so much time staring at your UI (how many CPs you have, how much health you and your enemy have, how much energy you have, what cool downs are up, if you still have your poisons up, if you still have EA/Rupture/SnD running), it's really tough to not tunnel vision, for a Rogue.
Watch for healers that try to stop and drink. One little trick that works quite well when fighting healers when they are drinking is to use distract to make them stop. That extra 2-5 seconds it takes to get there could be the difference between a win and loss.
Also, being a melee class with very limited mobility (sprint on a high CD, must be used to chase down the target you intend to kill, usually), there are few things we can do to someone we don't intend on killing, so it's hard to get used to watching other people. Not to mention, in the past, switching targets would make you lose your CPs, which built an instinct into many Rogues to never switch targets.
However, to be a good Rogue, one must pay attention to the positioning of his partners, enemies, the health of his partners and enemies, what everyone is casting (to vanish or CloS incoming CC, or to interrupt the heals of someone you aren't targetting) and what CDs/Trinket everyone has used.
Why spend so much time reading all of that?
Because once you realize how much there is to learn, you can open your mind to new possibilities, and focus on what you're missing.
Now that you know the intricate details to Rogueing, I'll give the less important in-game situational guides:
Basics:
DPS:
Pooling Energy: If you don't pool energy, you aren't going to kill any good player if he's got a healer or heals himself. Using all of your energy at once to damage is much more effective than doing it slowly, because it gives healers less time to react.
-Don't use your damaging ability until you're about 10 energy from full.
-Never leave yourself under 15 energy, otherwise you can't kick (25 energy w/o the pvp gloves).
Finishers: Using the proper finisher for every situation takes a lot of experience, but here are some good guidelines. This is assuming your comp isn't super gimmicky and bursts things down instantly.
-Slice and Dice: This is a very powerful finisher, and can be used on any enemy that you don't plan on killing in the next 10 seconds. It will up your DPS substantially, but also apply your poisons 40% faster (excluding certain procs-per-minute poisons).
-Rupture: With Blood spatter and Serrated blades, rupture can do a ton of damage. It's most effective when used against targets with high armor, because it ignores armor.
-Eviscerate: In WOTLK, eviscerate became much stronger than it was in TBC. Eviscerate is great when you plan on actually killing someone.
-Kidney Shot: Perhaps our best finisher, Kidney shot makes the enemy unable to dodge, parry, block, or use [almost] any defensive ability.
Openers:
-Ambush can be used on mages, if you actually plan on forcing an iceblock.
-Cheap shot is great for anything that can't break it, but can screw you up while silenced. For example, as a Rogue, being cheap shotted is your worst nightmare.
-Garrote is great for a healer you plan on killing. It puts a dot on them, so you can't use blind or sheep after garroting, but Garrote has no DR, meaning you can garrote multiple times and apply multiple 4 second silences.
CC:
-I already covered sap pretty well in section one. Essentially, getting a sap from the start is important, but if it means you can't get an opener (cheap shot) on your target, then you might want to forget it.
-Blind is our main arena CC. It should be used in a chain with other CCs, when your target is getting low, to force a trinket, or to kill your target.
-Dismantle is great for any melee class or hunter. It totally disables all of them except for DKs, for the duration. It's a very defensive ability, and great with preparation glyph.
-Gouge is awesome, I use it every arena to stop the casts of people I'm not trying to kill. For example, if I'm killing a warrior, I'll gouge his Paladin's Holy Light.
Arena:
In arena, the Rogue's job is to (in order of importance)
A) Lock down
B) Reduce Healing received
C) Deal Damage
D) Interrupt Casts
E) Crowd Control
You don't bring a Rogue to arena primarily to deal MASSIVE DAMAGES!, you bring him because he can make an enemy helpless. A Rogue can turn another Rogue into a dead man. Rogues also reduce the healing taken by their target by 50%, which is crucial to most teams.
How to be effective:
I) Don't die
II) Don't let your partners die
III) Don't let your enemy get away
IV) Burst when your target can't get healed
V) Sustain damage when you know you can't burst him to death
I) To avoid dying:
Learn when to use your defensive cool downs. Examples:
-Don't use CloS when you're facing a Rogue+Mage team in arena, until they're actually planning to kill you (or unless you're CloSing a sheep cast, and your target is about to die).
-Don't use evasion unless the warrior is actually trying to kill you, not when he's just intercepting you off his healer
-Don't use evasion if he's already dismantled or in a full stun, until the duration ends.
Learn to LoS your healer, and your enemy:
-Are you about to die, and the person you're trying to kill is no where close? Don't run out of LoS of your healer, just get heals and then go back at him.
-If you and your target were both to die, would your team win?
-If you and your target are next to the edge of a wall, and someone is casting on you, go behind the wall. That's obvious, but pretty much just stay situationally aware.
Learn to kite:
I have survived and won countless games because I've simply ran from a melee dps, or a caster (going out of LoS), until my healer got a chance to heal me.
II) Don't let your partners die:
-Is there a warrior and a dk killing your priest? Shiv and Gouge the DK, dismantle the warrior, then get back on your target.
-Is your hunter about to get blown up by that mage? Blind/kick/gouge him before his cast finishes.
-You've got Gouge, Blind, Dismantle, Kick, Crippling poison, Mind numbing, use them!
III) Don't let your enemy get away:
-Always keep crippling up
-Is that warrior running towards you? Vanish his intercept.
IV) Burst when your target can't receive heals
-Is your target fully hotted and at 90% HP? Don't bother bursting, it won't work.
-Use Cold Blood and offensive vanishes when their healer is about to get caught in an unbreakable CC (his trinket is blown).
-Do the same if your target is out of LoS of his healer, and can't get into LoS before he'd die (you have him stunned there).
V) Sustain DPS when you know burst won't work
-Warlock Druid, for example. Keep EA and SnD up on that lock, and just keep DPSing. If you're pooling energy effectively, you should be scaring their healer into blowing trinket and NS. Once those are down, generate a CC chain and burst the lock.
1v1s in Arena:
-If your target has no DoTs to put on you, you'll typically want to be near a pillar. You want to kite your enemy around, and get as many restealths as possible. For a example, against a Warrior, you want to use crippling poison and avoid him as much as possible until you're really ready to take him down. Rupture him while you avoid his melee swings.
-Using nameplates is very useful for that task.
-Some pillars are thin enough for Taurens and Gnomes to hit through, so make sure you're back a little bit on the pillar.
-Against casters like Warlocks, it's pretty much a DPS race. All you can do is try and kill him before he kills you.
-Don't lose your cool, be sure to kick any casts. Don't forget expose armor.
So I've pretty much already explained everything except how to kill specific classes in 1v1 situations. I'm going to write this from the stand point of a Mut/Prep Rogue, since that's easy and most people are specced it. It won't be hard to imagine how to do this as any other spec. This is all based on the current game. Later, things will change drastically. For example, atm, Priests are very easy to kill, but I guarantee you in a few months, they will be moderate or hard to beat. When I used classes, I pretty much went with their most common or best specs. For example, Shaman is Resto, not Enhance, because Enhance would be a joke to beat.
Difficulty is based on how difficult it is to win most of the time, assuming you're a good player, against someone of equal skill and gear. So if it says "Easy", then it means it's "easy to win most of the time".
Remember, there really is no set rotation on what to do in pvp. Sometimes you must do what the situation calls for. This will just give you a general idea of the fights.
Warrior:
Difficulty: Easy
Warriors are very easy to beat in the current state of the game, primarily due to dismantle.
1) Open with Cheap Shot
2) Mutilate and apply a 4-5 point EA
3) Dismantle
4) Mutilate until you've reached 4 or 5 CPs
5) Save energy until dismantle has 1 second left on its duration
6) Kidney Shot from behind. If it is avoided some how, gouge, sprint, and try to go for a restealth
7) Use your burst, Cold Blood mutilate, mutilate again.
8) Stun him whenever possible
9) Get out of melee range immediately after -- this should be a fluid motion
10) 5-8 Kite him, don't let him intercept you, but don't get melee swung either if it's possible.
11) With near full energy again, go for a vanish cheap shot
12) Mutilate twice again, and if possible, kidney shot
13) At this point, you should be able to finish him off.
As you can see, it's not very exact, lots of things can happen. Make sure you use feint when he bladestorms. It's just a general strategy, to give you a general idea of what I'd do if I came across a Warrior.
Warlock:
Difficulty: Easy
1) Cheap shot
2) Cold blood Mutilate, Evisc, be ready to trinket a death coil
3) Sprint back to him, make sure to Kick any fear attempts
4) Once you have near full energy, kidney shot
5) Cloak of Shadows immediately after the KS (He'll probably trinket your KS, and this will leave him helpless)
6) Mutilate twice, ending with an eviscerate
7) As CloS is about to go down, vanish and back away from him quickly, avoid getting aoe feared or taking a dot
8) Sit around for a few seconds to gather energy, reopen, and finish him off.
Priest
Difficulty: Easy to Moderate
1) Garrote
2) Mutilate and EA
3) Be ready to trinket if he fears right after the CS. I'd say use CloS to resist it, but good Priests don't usually use it so predictably.
4) Mutilate twice more, he will have feared by now.
5) With full energy, kidney shot and CB Mutilate, mutilate again, eviscerate
6a) If he trinkets, CloS and Blind him, restealth and bandage while he's Sapped.
6b) If he doesn't trinket, CloS, Vanish
7) Reopen with cheap shot
8) Get in front of him, and blind, start bandaging
9) He'll surely trinket this blind, otherwise you can restealth, sap, and reopen to finish him off
10) You know he's going to trinket, so gouge him just as he does, try and don't let him get a cast off
11) He shouldn't have fear back up at this point, but he might. If you are experienced with the timer on his fear, there are ways to avoid the cast when your gouge ends.
12) Pool some energy during this gouge, mutilate to 4-5 CPs, and evisc
13) If you need to, you can prep vanish and reopen with another garrote
14) Either way, get back to 4-5 CPs, and KS again... he should be dead by this point
Hunter
Difficulty: Moderate
I'm assuming the Hunter isn't BM. If he is, all you can do is zerg him down and through a dismantle in there.
1) Open with cheap shot
2) Cold blood mutilate
3) Dismantle
4) Evasion
5) Sprint
6) Mutilate again and KS
7) Kinda just... zerg him down... lol
Make sure you have at least 1 defensive cooldown up at all times, dismantle/evasion/sprint/ even cloak of shadows if you have the glyph. Stun whenever you can. Be ready to trinket an ice block trap thingie.
Druid
Difficulty: Easy to Hard
Resto:
Moderate to Hard
Do something similar to killing a priest. The only real difference is that you can more focus on DPS. Just chain stuns and silences. Burst him down.
Doomkin:
Easy
1) Open with Cheap Shot
2) Mutilate
3) Eviscerate
4) Vanish if you got rooted from the proc, do it before he gets out of the stun
5) Reopen with garrote
6) Sprint
7) Mutilate
8) Kidney Shot... It's really sort of situational, you might get the feeling he's about to try and pop out of owl form and heal, which is right when you want to kidney shot.
9) If you get war stomped, let him cast the cyclone, then just trinket it and attack, he'll pop into caster when the cyclone cast finishes, and you'll get a chance to do some big damage for a global or two.
It's hard to describe this fight, but it's very systematic, it just takes real practice.
Feral:
Moderate to Hard
Sadly, this is another very stupid fight. Pretty much he's going to sit in bear and spam mangle you, while you 5-8 kite him on crippling poison and Rupture.
Shaman
Difficulty: Easy to Moderate
This is pretty much like fighting a priest, again, except you don't have to worry about CC. You do, however, have to worry about him tanking you and outhealing your damage. There are two ways to beat a resto shaman: Burst with heavy stuns and silence chains, or outlast.
To burst him down:
1) Cheap shot
2) Mutilate, KS
3) Cold blood mutilate, mutilate, evi
4a) If he trinketed KS, Blind, hit his fire totem if it's up immediately, and restealth to sap, bandage, reopen.
4b) Vanish, Garrote
5) Mutilate, Evi
6) Be ready to kick any casts.
To outlast, you'll want
1) Open with Garrote
2) Mutilate, SnD
3) Hit any fire totem, and poison cleansing
LET HIM HEAL, with wound up, you want him to heal, and go OOM as fast as possible.
4) Mutilate, Mutilate, Rupture
5) Keep SnD and Rupture up at all times, and keep hitting those totems.
6) When he drops mana tide, hit it immediately
7) CloS on his Shock CDs, to avoid the damage
8) Use herbalism heal, self heal trinket, or any self heal ability available on every CD
9) When he's as OOM as he's about as OOM as he's going to get, pool energy, kick a heal, and burst him down.
Paladin
Difficulty: Easy to Moderate
If he's Ret,
1) Cheap shot, use cloak when it's over as 95% of the time a pally will stun you right away
2) Cold blood mutilate, eviscerate
3) Dismantle
4) Mutilate one or two more times, he'll be forced to bubble
5) When he bubbles, sprint away, and restealth (vanish if you must)
6) Once bubble is down, reopen and repeat.
If he's Holy (or that Prot healing spec)
1) Garrote
2) Cold Blood Mutilate, eviscerate
3) Vanish, Cheap Shot
4) By the end of the Cheap shot duration, you can Mutilate again, and he'll likely be scared into bubbling
6) If he doesn't bubble, he'll blow some instants, just kidney shot him here
7) Mutilate to 4-5 points, and he'll surely bubble by now
8) Again, sprint, clos, vanish
9) Once bubble is down, reopen and repeat.
If he's prot, god help you. All i can really say is chain together your abilities, kick any heals, gouge and restealth often, use ALL abilities as often as possible and good luck.
Mage
Difficulty: Moderate (Shadow Dance) Difficult (Mutilate)
Mages and Rogues are pretty much the only opponents in which it's a LOT harder to kill as one spec or the other. The problem with Mutilate and Mages is the lack of mobility, that if you get a little unlucky or make a mistake, you're kited and dead.
1) Ambush
2) Continue to walk forward, through him, and Cold Blood Mutilate
3) Eviscerate
4) Now, if he's Arcane, he might have Ice blocked on your CB Mutilate, and negated it. If so, get in front an watch the Iceblock buff on his buff bar, the instant it disappears, gouge. You'll be able to gouge before he blinks 95% of the time.
5) With him gouged, mutilate.
6) He'll blink, you sprint and vanish. You want to run to the side, not at him, otherwise he'll blizzard you out.
7) Reopen with a garrote, eviscerate, and he'll practically be dead.
8) If he's frost, he may be higher in HP, and you'll have to go with what you've got, continue to burst him down while avoiding his damage.
Death Knight
Difficulty: Moderate to Difficult
Death knights are pretty much like Warriors that have pets that can stun you, and spells to hit you through dismantle. They also have dots, and all sorts of snares and stuff.
1) Cheap Shot
2) Cold Blood Mutilate, Rupture
3) Dismantle
4) Mutilate twice more and evisc
4) Sprint, CloS if needed, Vanish as dismantle ends
5) He probably popped ice bound fortitude already, expecting a KS earlier on, if so, wait it out before you open
6) Reopen with a cheap shot, kidneyshot if he isn't on icebound fortitude, and try to burst him down
Vanishing to avoid damage while you're out of energy is very important against a DK.
Rogue
Difficulty: Very Difficult
This is "very difficult" because it's based upon winning most of the time against someone equally geared and skilled as yourself. Rogue vs Rogue encounters are the fastest in the game, and to win requires great reaction time.
If you've got the opener:
1) Cheap Shot
2) Be ready for him to trinket, don't use Mutilate yet, or it'll put you on GCD
3) If he trinkets, blind, and, if he blinded you, you've won. If he vanished your blind, his stealth will drop, and you can simply vanish yourself and reopen. You've won, if he doesn't Fan of Knives you out of stealth.
4) Either way, dismantle him then use evasion after your dismantle runs its course.
5) After evasion is a good time to use gouge --> vanish --> immediately use CS which will then allow you to use KS (sometimes if you're lucky and/or fast enough you can even do this while you have rupture on you). He should be about dead after that. If not try it again after using prep.
If he's got the opener:
If he cheap shots and uses an instant, then trinket and blind him. Watch very closely, if he trinkets, vanish. He's just used blind, and you're both out of stealth. This puts you both on even ground. The first thing you want to do is dismantle him. If he's good, he'll do the same. Just after that, evasion. Hope is, you're faster than him, so you've dismantled him and put yourself on evasion before he could do the same. He may vanish, to which you FoK him out.
I find Rogue vs. Rogue duels incredibly hard, because things never seem to work. For example, it seems that in duels, if I spam blind for a second straight (while not on GCD), it just won't use the ability half the time. I'd think it's just me being bad, but this type of thing never happens for me in arena, so I don't know. I hate duels, for this reason, it seems like nothing works.
Another reason RvsR duels are incredibly hard is, you have no healer. What I mean is, if you are opened on, trinket a stun, and vanish, say he vanishes too. He got the opener, so you're down health, and now you're both in stealth. It doesn't help you at all. In an arena situation, getting yourself into stealth like that would save you, give you the chance to be healed, and perhaps win the game.
Anyway, there you have it. My Comprehensive PvP Guide to the Rogue class.
