|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 8:01 am
Following suit with Tseta Im going to keep track of all my findings with the new rogue talents here to figure out which specs are more viable. In addition Ill leave notes for other rogues who may be curious. Talent Specs: Following that players will only have 61 talent points I see the biggest three specs being the following for the trees AssassinationCombatSubtletyWill following with a post in depths explaining how those trees work with current mechanics. Keep in mind most of this is going to be PvP related since that's my bag and having a real PvE experience on the PTR isn't very likely. Each post below will be reserved for those three specs and how they play out.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 8:06 am
Assassination
This spec looks to be the strongest for PvP. Unfortunately it lacks the mobility of subtlety or the energy regen of combat giving it two very very big weaknesses. However at current Mutilate does the most damage. By far. Killing Spree (51 point combat talent) puts out mediocre damage at best. Focused Attacks definitely helps the energy regen however only giving 3 energy every critical is 'meh'. But when your only good offensive move costs 60 you'll take what you can get.
Making Vile Poisons a 3 point talent was most definitely the right thing to do. Unfortunately removing relentless strikes from its old position and making it 5 points in Sub kinda hinders your options. I would love for them to make it it trainable or put it back and remove Vigor so at 80 one could attain dual wield specialization, opportunity AND dagger specialization (renamed Close Quarters Combat). Hunger for Blood has the potential to be really good, it burns 90 energy just to pump it up to 3 stacks for a 9% increase. I think I liked the idea better for 15% damage increase. Hell, warriors Enrage is 25% and thats not even a 51 point talent. The downside is a recent patch changed the wording on it. It used to remove all physical debuff, bleeds, hamstring, mortal strike, etc etc and refund its energy cost (making it free and spammable) first they cut the energy return in half. It cost 30 energy to pop Hunger for Blood and now it only returns 15 if it kicks off a physical effect. However, in the very next patch it no longer removes hamstrings and mortal strikes or anything of that sort and ONLY removes bleeds. For a 15 energy return. Can you say nerfed into near uselessness? Yes. Yes you can. As far as Cut to the Chase goes, I'm pretty sure that's going to be a PvE only talent as I only use slice and dice in certain situations in PvP (warriors, warlocks and druids mostly) and only when I have the points and energy to spare in between trying to live.
Overall rating: 3 out 5
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 8:07 am
Combat
The weakest of the trees for PvP. While some of the deeper talents definitely make a push for PvP they just don't cut it. Killing Spree's damage is sub optimal in every situation you can think of. Even on average level 70 targets I was getting at most 500-600 CRITICALS. Meaning for a 51 point talent something is very very wrong here. Sure it hits 5 times and that adds up to being 2500-3000 damage if EVERY HIT crits but the likely hood of this happening in such a fat chance in hell that we should just ignore it. The energy regen of this tree is I'm going to say it, ********. The change the Vitality to increase energy regen by 10% instead of +4% stam/+2% agility is absolutely the best thing in this tree. Adrenaline Rush still retains its insanity even with the energy regen change of 1 every 1/10th of a second (still equating to 20 every 2 like it is now). However the deeper talents just don't solve any issues for PvP with this tree. Poisoned Blood is fantastic allowing 4% more Attack Power and doing 2% additional damage to targets you've poisoned and Prey on the Weak LOOKS great, 25% more critical damage on targets that have less health than you as a % of total health. BUT, in PvP those numbers are still severely lacking. My conclusion is this, while I was hoping this tree would shine a little in pre-expansion PvP I'm sadly disappointed and unfortunately with the numbers I've been seeing and the math in my head I'm almost 100% certain that PvE specced Mutilate will outdo this tree in DPS for instancing as well because of its lack luster 51 point talent.
Overall rating: 2 out of 5
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2008 9:31 am
Subtlety
This tree is tricky. Unfortunately (and maybe its just the PTR) my Hemorrhages have been REALLY low in the triple digits and only popping up 1k+ on really rare criticals. Since the math on Hemo was NOT one of the changes made to the tree I'm pretty sure this is broken or some kind of damage formula is broke somewhere on the test realm. The rest of this post will assume that on live realms Hemorrhage's damage will be about the same as it is now making it the key attack for this particular spec of Sub.
Now then, this tree has amazing mobility (that was slightly nerfed by not allowing you to Shadowstep while rooted) and the available option of having all your cooldowns on insanely low timers. The premeditation change was a much needed change and pretty much guarantees adding 2 more combo points every time you need to Vanish off because if its newly shortened 20 second cooldown. First off just let me add the Slaughter From the Shadows is a sigh of relief for the tree and I'm actually convinced its infinitely better than the 51 point talent Shadow Dance. Having Hemo only cost 30 energy instead of 35 doesn't sound like much but in practice is absolutely amazing. I'm sure cutting 15 energy from Ambush and Backstab would make Shadowstep daggers a pretty sick spec too but I haven't tested that no comment yet. Let me just add this, having Vanish, Spring and Evasion on 3 minute cooldowns is kind of insane already BUT having Prep being able to be talented down to 5 minutes via Filthy Tricks IS insane. I can see this being pretty busted in longer arena games which Asikk and I have been known to fall into (we were in 4 10 minute + games just last night actually) so this is going to be key in keeping those cooldowns up and using them at every available opportunity. So in short, what do I think is this tree's strong point? Survival. Unfortunately the new talents aren't as exciting as I'd hoped and Shadow Dance is basically un-usable. So what you can cheap shot and garrote out of stealth? They all get a 2 second cooldown and cheap shot has a wicked DR list with things it shares coupled with the fact that Shadow Dance only lasts 10 seconds meaning you could get 5 moves off during the time it's up IF you had all the energy you needed. And 3 cheap shots (4 would be immunity due to DR) and one garrote then refreshing garrote isn't as appealing as it sounds. So while this tree is kind of boring to play now because its basically the same method of play as it is now (shadowstep -> cheap shot -> hemo -> kidney -> hemo until dead) that doesnt mean its necessarily bad. It just needs some work.
Overall rating: 2 out of 5
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2008 9:34 am
Non-talent based changes
Dismantle - Unfortunately this skill is broken and only removing the main hand like a disarm. It's supposed to remove the main hand slot, the off hand slot and the ranged slot. If it worked I'm guessing it'd be pretty good.
Eviscerate and Rupture - Finally Blizzard does something right for this class. The formula's that calculate these two finisher's damage have been changed and modify with attack power but with a larger coefficient. I haven't had an Eviscerate critical for LESS than 2k. I've seen 5 point Evisc. crit for less than 1000 on live servers which always disappointed me for a big finishing move that takes 5 combo points to maximize. In addition my best Rupture (that is specced into Serrated Blades for 30% more damage) bleeds 1300 damage at max combo points. The new rupture formula has 1700something listed as the 5 point damage BEFORE applying Serrated Blades. I thank the gods that blizzard fixed these two abilities.
Vanish - All I can is jesus christ about damn time. Not requiring flash powder frees up SO MUCH bag space.
Poisons - I sort of and sort of don't like. The poisons skill is removed and in its place you're able to purchase poisons from the vendor completed. They require certain levels and of course, are only available to rogues. Increasing the proc rate on Crippling and Wound to 50% seems kind of broken to me. In addition Wound poison no longer has to stack and one application is a 50% reduction in healing. Crippling doesn't have 2 ranks and the first rank is a 70% movement speed reduction. Instant and Deadly now scale with attack power getting some impressive criticals from instant and some rather nice DoT ticks from Deadly. Overall I think I'm going to like it more even if the lore whore in me dislikes the removal of the craftable skill.
And finally the most important thing of all.
Energy - Absolutely, the best thing about 3.0 for rogues is the energy return mechanics. I zero'd out my energy bar with Hunger for Blood just to see it climb from 0 back to 120 (10 from pvp gear and 10 from vigor for the curious) and watching it climb back rapidly one number at a time made me smile. It FEELS faster even though its the same time and for those times when you have 30 energy and the boss is near dead and you need to Evisc. to help kill him (35 energy) no more waiting 2 seconds. Now you only need to wait .5 (less if you're combat and have Vitality). All in all I thank Blizzard for this much needed change and I dare say it's the best quality of life improvement for rogues in 3.0 and the expansion.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Oct 18, 2008 11:29 pm
All this s**t is irrelevant. The best spec for PvP is 42/5/14. The best spec for PvE is 50/5/6. I opted OUT of Hunger for Blood for 1 point in Opportunity and it worked out nicely. I think HfB would've increased overall DPS and damage done in the end by a significant amount however, having to keep it up constantly rebuffing every 30 seconds is a b***h of a pain in the a** and I'm lazy. That being said, Combat's DPS is sub-par still. Subtlety hasn't been passed over and the mobility of Shadowstep has been nerfed into uselessness. For 3.0.2. Assassination is King. Hail Mutilate.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Reply
