I just had to write a post today just to get this out of my system. Actually it is already out of my system, as many issues seem to fall off of me like water rolling off a duck's back. and i am writing this when i should be following up on a couple of closings and working on several reports actually say something--its not rolling off my back as it should. You guessed it, rant/story incoming!
Well me and my gf were out there gear-leveling our alts, me on my rogue and her on her DK. I barely had enough ilevel to enter heroics, 329 to be exact, as does she and we qued for our second or third heroic on those toons last night (the first we ever did on the rogue/dk set was throne of the tides with no other that i can recall of. so i am thinking this is our second heroic).
We sit for 30 minutes in queue, waiting, patiently. Actually i was trying to put together a computer fan, a box from ikea, a used USB cable, and make it into a cooling solution for my xbox. We were all a little occupied doing various things. Anyway, the queue pops and we get Deadmines. Back in the days we used to abbreviate it VC, for Van Cleef. but i am not sure if we're still using that term. Maybe DM, or Dire Maul fell off the face of the earth and no one mentions that as DM. DM. Anyway, lots of tangents today. sorry.
We zoned in and i checked out the three puggees. They were all from Sisters of Elune, tank had mainly tanking gear with some dps pieces (no no right there), healer had good gear but nothing fancy. spec looked OK but with no pain suppression? whaaa? oh and fury warrior was speced... fury, of course.
In we go, after the first readycheck (omg really?) we pulled the first ogre and his kobold. After the first pull i can tell we werent doing too well. Me and my gf were at 7k dps. pretty decent for entry level heroics, i thought. then i saw the warrior's dps at 3.2k. oh noes. But maybe he wasnt ready. plus, no one died. so off to the next pull and i jumped into the cannon. I shot everything up so the second pull, which included a whole bunch of kolbolds and an ogre was a farce. the cannon did all the work and the dps could have just stood there. that's fine. the next pull were the two ogres before the first boss. i couldnt sap so we pulled them together. take fell to about 15% health twice but recovered. healer went OOM. warrior did 3.4k dps! an increase, yay!
Then our first boss fight occured. again, me and my gf were doing about 6-7k dps while running around in circles, avoiding the fire wall and the electro-zones. actually i got caught in electro bomb zones several times because there was really no where else to go. I had to help the tank pick up adds with Tricks/FoK, which really really helped centralize damage. After about 20 seconds of fire wall, the warrior dies. then the healer. then the tank and everyone else. the tank asks what went wrong. no one replied. actually it was pretty obvious. healer died so we all died. duh, right? the 3.2k dps warrior could have just been dead since the start and it wouldnt have mattered.
Second attempt went better. Me and my gf both got the [Ready for Raiding] acheivement. i think a chestpiece dropped for me, which i was pretty happy about since it replaced a level 312 chest. we move on to trash. death happened when we pulled the two casters which i expected was bound to happen. but we rebounded because the second attempt had less mobs! on one pull, the healer died to a monkey. the tank died to the monkey too. then i realized what was happening and i clicked on the ball and chain to make the monkey turn friendly. after that, the tank made it an effort to make all the remaining monkeys friendly.
We get to the lumber room with the oaf/goblin and, of course, took two attempts. the first attempt was a little dull. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. we would have survived if the oaf didnt pick the healer to slam into the wall. besides that, the only real complaint i had was that no one picked up the goblin to attack. i guess it doesnt matter either way. but after the first wipe on him, the tank said hmmmm. and i replied with, "healer died in that attempt, if oaf picked someone else to ram into the wall, we would have been okay." the healer replied with "so blame the healer for everything". well, i call it like i see it. its nothing personal. anyway, i replied with basically instructions on how to do this well. "avoid the bombs, dps down the boss, switch to goblin when he jumps off, and if you're below 70% health when you get slammed in the wall, you die." the tank replies with "so you know everything about this fight". i took that as a snarky remark and said, "totally". no reply.
we went ahead and killed him this time. again, me and my gf were tops in dps. brand new heroic rats doing about 7k dps. and again, warrior was at 3.2k dps. tank was doing abotu 5k. healer was OOM.
We went on to wipe again. On trash. Once we got to the forge, it was it for me. we were there for a little over an hour and anything bullshit that anyone gave me will have me reply with less than pleasant words. We were at four wipes already, maybe more bc i could have lost count. but at least four. twice on boss and at least twice on trash.
We proceeded down the circular ramp towards the first reaver. The tank asked who wants to use the robot. i asked if anyone knows how (much better question, dont you think?). there was no reply. i asked my gf not to jump on the reaver, even though she has an idea of how to use it. i knew how to use it too, but i wanted the warrior, who was doing crap ass dps to get on the reaver. at least we'll maximize our potential that way. after a couple of minutes of just standing around, the warrior got the hint and jumped on the reaver. after we killed the enemy reaver, i would hop on to it to help out the fight before it self destructs. what i found out was amazing. the warrior stood with the tank, thereby receiving the cleave damage. by the time we got to the third reaver, the warrior's reaver bot died and he had to dps on foot. he also used steam jets or whatever that ability was to knock me back several times. i countered with a charge that stunned the enemy reaver. easy enough. after the last reaver died, the warrior got into his robot and the tank pulled Reaper.
Now things were going quite smoothly for the first 30 seconds of the fight. yes, it was bliss for that long. stay out of harvest, stay out of overdrive. easy. we did that. most of the fight was us running away with intervals of dps. this is how the fight should be. then from behind i get a slag attacking me, then i died. upon hitting my face with the keyboard, i saw several more slags moving up the ramp. good job warrior. We wipe, of course.
As i was zoning into the instance again, for the sixth time, the tank posts the dps meters. then says, i dont think we have enough dps for this fight. i was in disbelief that this guy could actually say that after we topped meters the entire fight. and his warrior buddy was on a reaver, so his dps didnt quite count. also, this is a heavy movement fight and dps is secondary to survival (a misnomer, since dps should ALWAYS be secondary to survival, but this fight exemplifies it). in any case, i replied with, "this is a two-dps fight". the tank replies with, "i know that but i dont think our dps is good enough". no shit. the dps cant dps with slags flowing in. in any case, i replied with something like this, "you're right, i do think you guys need to learn to play better before you queue for heroics again. peace out. "
then i left. my gf saw the rest of them leave so she left too. no one replied to me. no one could say much i guess.
in any case, why is this a problem? and why is my blog post title about another game? It is because the tank completely disregarded the fail of his teammates. as if, it was completely forgotten. of course, him and his friends could do no wrong and every little piece of failure that his team produced was lost to oblivion.
i dont know what planet these guys were from, but from the "dont blame me" attitude of the healer, to the snarky comments from the tank, to the utter disregard of incompetence from these three people or the ridiculously low dps from the fury dps warrior (you know the class that usually tops meters with their whirlwind?), i could not imagine the only response from the tank was that maybe the dps wasnt good enough for this fight.
No, the dps did suck. but it didnt suck because the rogue or the dk was doing bad dps, or that our total combined 15k dps (5k split between three people). the dps sucked because the warrior sucked donkey nuts. total was about 15k for all three dps. but the tank was doing 3k. we were doing 6k each. im sorry, but we can only carry so much fail. after a while it becomes a matter of, Gevlon told you so. and yes, im sitting there watching how M&S cannot figure out that maybe they are the problem and not the good players. It's people like these that make us wish we could play with our guildies more. at that time, it was 10pm PDT, or 1am EDT, so most of our guildies were sleeping.
Not once did i see a penance from the disc priest. not once did i see a prayer of mending fly around. very little will i see a PW:Shield come flying my way. I never saw a power word barrier, never saw hymn of hope, never saw inner focus, never saw a renew. the healer's major heals were greater heal and power word shield. no archangel either, tho he was specc'd into it.
The warrior was doing mainly auto-attacks (40% of damage) heroic strike and colossus smash. yep, that's it. maybe rend every once in a while and a thunder clap. but that's it.
The tank, on single bosses, hammer of the righteous (crusaderstrike, no?), little judgments, and very few shield of the righteous. add to that no inquisition. i cannot comment on whether he did use divine protection or ardent defender.
but how can a bunch of fail players get together and pretend like they're good without seeing that other people are doing amazingly better than them. yes, amazingly better compared to how they play. i mean if somoene was doing twice my damage, sometimes 3x my damage, wouldnt i want to know how he does it? maybe i can reproduce what he did next time around. that's how i see it. and how can i play a class and not take criticism? i mean the healer's response was basically, "yea blame the healer for everything." What's even more striking was that the tank would often say, "thats my fault" when it really wasnt his fault. it was the healer. i could come up with my own theories of why that is, but let me keep my theories to myself for now.
now i dont care if someone is bad as long as he is willing to listen to reason and learn from those who are doing better than him. five wipes before we get halfway into the instance is NOT good. and thinking that maybe its everyone else except for me is not "reason" or reasonable. perhaps it is you especially if the dps arent being stupid. maybe its you. or maybe its one of you. stop defending your failed friends. protecting them will not make them better. pretending that they are great players will only make them great players in their own world. but in a world where people are playing with each other, there is a matter of truth that must be accepted by all. you cant relegate all oberservations that's critical to you or your friends to oblivion. thus, i will not relegate your actions to mere disregard. i will regard your actions, your playstyle, your abilities and your replies to me. i will not pretend you guys dont suck. and i didnt. please do the same to your friends. you're only fooling yourselves and eventually, it will cause headaches for those unfortunate to party with you. i should have put you on ignore when i had the chance. too late now as i forgot all of their names. i only know them as the idiots from Sisters of Elune.
to you, poor souls, i pity you.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Learning the Combat portion of a Rogue
With the last post out of the way, i can finally get into the little nitty gritty on playing my rogue. This is not a guide, nor is it a primer of any sort on helping anyone learn the rogue class. this is just my experience so please, if you think im doing this wrong, please say something. =D
My initial experiences with rogues are that they are sneaky, elusive, and most of all, annoying. Ever level through Ashenvale, running from questgiver to objectives, only to be interrupted by a rogue who's bored? Ever read local defense and see that Cross Roads is under attack? its usually a rogue. Ever run around tarren mill, turning in quests and finding out that a rogue is having a great time sapping people? Ever enter a cave full of ogres and fighting through the ogres just to get to that one Khorium deposit but having it ninja'd by a rogue as you fight the mob guarding the node? Not too many good experiences with rogues i tell you.
But as i leveled my rogue, i find that they offer a pretty niche type of gameplay. The energy and combo point system makes playing a rogue a lot more complex while questing and significantly while in dungeons. The combo point system allows me to save up combo points for stronger finishers. The mob's health, their numbers, even their spell selections will determine which finishers i will have to use. Not only that, but the energy system is the only system in the game where timing is absolutely necessary. Spamming attacks isnt the rogue way. And rightly so, it shouldnt be since the whole character of being a rogue involves planning, timing and finesse. Button smashing might not be the best form of play. That is, unless you're playing shinobi.
Everyone knows the basics of a rogue. or at least i believe everyone does.
Energy: Rogues use energy to attack. Energy is used up when performing attacks. Energy replenishes at a certain rate. Missed attacks can refund a % of energy back.
Combo points: Rogues have two basic categories of attacks. One to produce combo points and the other to spend combo points. Both use up energy. Missed attacks can refund a % of energy back. Ideally, rogues will want to maximize their combo points (being 5) before using a finisher. Each finisher has its own effect (some do instant damage, others do damge over time, others make the target more vulnerable to melee damage, and still others cause your own attacks to speed up.
The basic combo point maker for Combat: Sinister Strike (SS) and Revealing Strike (RvS).
Sinister strike is your bread and butter attack. I use this attack more than any other attack. Revealing strikes are tossed in between, at least once per 5 point stack prior to an Eviscerate or Rupture. Revealing strikes will not do anything for Slice and Dice so using it before slice and dice is not essential. Although, if you use it as your 5th combo point move before slice and dice, revealing strikes will still be up since it has a 15 second duration. It basically buffs your finisher by 30%, so use once before you Evis or Rupt. Using it twice will do nothing but add another combo point (which SS can do) and reset the cooldown for Revealing Strike buff to 15 seconds. The 30% incraesed bonus to finishing moves does not change.
The basic finishers for Combat: Slice and Dice (SnD), Rupture and Eviscerate.
Slice and dice cases you to attack faster. use this first and always try to keep it active. some rogues start off with a 1-point SnD, which gives them a good 30 seconds or so. 5 points will give you 40 seconds of SnD. go with 1 point SnD. it ends up pretty easy to maintain.
Rupture causes a bleed on the target for a certain amount of time. the time is fixed, but the damage is different based on the number of combo points. with revealing strikes buff, it also ticks for more. Use this on bosses, or on long lasting mobs. there is no other benefit for this spell besides that you can keep doing damage while you're running around avoiding fires.
Eviscerate is often preferred over Rupture. The point is that many fights will have phases that take the boss out of the fight (basically immune) while we take care of adds, fires, dance, whatevers. in these instances, just Evis instead of Rupt. Getting all the damage at once may be more beneficial than going for a DoT that may not be allowed to last its whole duration.
The special finishers for Combat: Expose Armor, Recuperate, Kidney shot.
Expose armor is one of these spells that many other classes can do better. Plus, its only useful for physical damaging dps that having one magic dps in the mix will make this ability pretty much useless. you'll get more benefit if you just evis. Other classes can do it better because they dont have to waste too much of their resources to place this debuff on. Overall, this ability is very situational and almost never used.
Recuperate helps a lot when in high damage fights. Although you'll miss out on a finisher, it does make it easier for your healers to heal you. Finally, Kidney shot is one of those spells which i love to use on casters, especially the healing type casters. Open with cheapshot. When they come to and cast a heal, i kick. Then they cast another heal, i can blind. then i can kidney shot and basically finish them off. its not a stun "lock", as it was before, but it does keep the mob incapacitated long enough so that dps can kill him off.
Cooldowns for Combat: The two major offensive cooldowns for combat are Killing Spree (KS) and Adrenaline Rush (AR).
These two abilities are my two favorite reasons to go combat. It took me several levels of practicing and playing around to really figure out how these buffs work. but when i finally got them to work well, they became the "candy" to this whole fighting system.
Killing Spree causes me to jump from one mob to another (if one mob, then it just jumps five times to the same mob) doing pretty good damage. It seems to last about 3 seconds, but in those 3 seconds, it is amazing. added bonus to this is that the auto-attacks are still going. True, you might only get 3 auto-attacks off, even with slice and dice on, it doesnt change the outcome--dps boost. Of course, being that auto-attacks still goes off while KS is up, it makes it doubly fun to time it just right (ie. during slice and dice, while my energy is zero. Also, KS also works with Blade Flurry, so if there are two or more mobs in the fight, KS will also hit adjacent mobs, as well as the sped up auto attacks. So like i said, its candy.
As for adrenaline rush, this spell speeds up my energy regen, thus allowing for more SS, RvS, Evis, etc. during its duration. Much like Killing Spree, time it after SnD and when your energy is low (you dont want to be energy capped). You can use these two cooldowns back-to-back. It might not be as effective together, as KS will not produce combo points and the time you're jumping around through the shadows, you may end up being energy capped.
Utilities for Combat: Other utilities are Tricks of the Trade, Shiv, Feint, blind, Evasion, Cloak of Shadows and Vanish.
I suppose Recuperate can be utility but do keep in mind that it does require combo points.
Tricks of the Trade, or Tricks, or TotT is used prior or during a pull to redirect threat to someone else, usually the tank. Not only does it redirect threat, it also gives the target an increase in dps. this can be utilized several ways, but the most important way is to Tricks the tank. Upon tricksing the tank, the rogue will basically pull for the tank, or pull a stray mob to the tank. This is almost identical to the Hunter's Misdirect, where they use misdirect to pull for the tank. The second area where this is useful is during fights where you want to buff the main dps. Sure putting tricks on the tank will buff his 5k dps. but tricksing the hunter who's doing 10k dps will ultimately produce twice the damage from Tricks than the tank. Finally, two rogues can simply Tricks each other to give each other a damage buff. since the tricks is on each other, the threat transfer is almost transparent.
Shiv removes enrage. Shiv also adds poisons instantly and cannot be dodged. Although this ability does add combo points, i did not include this as a combo point ability. We use this ability more for the two reasons stated above--the combo point is an added bonus. One more thing to add about instantly applying poisons, this ability costs less the faster your offhand dagger is. so in a pinch, if you're seeing 5 stacks of your poisons about to expire, this ability may be preferred over waiting and gambling on your next offhand attack (or Main Gauche) to hit.
Feint is awesome. Say it with me, Feint is awesome! It reduces a lot of the AoE damage, 50% to be exact, that can cause a lot of fail and healer stress. This ability not only reduces your threat it increases your healer's love towards you. Please use it often to avoid those nasty AoEs, especially on boss fights where tanks dont know how to move mobs out of dark fissures, etc.
Blind is basically a stun for 10 seconds. Also interrupts casting. Kick is on CD? blind. Mobs is running for the healer and your Tricks is on CD? blind. Similar to a hunter's scattershot. We have a lot of similarities, dontchaknow?
Evasion, cloak of shadows, vanish.... they all have their uses. Evasion is useful when you grab aggro, or have to grab aggro for a while. Cloak of shadows will remove harmful debuffs (slows, poisons, dots) and Vanish will allow you to stealth immediately, even in combat. When you do have some kind of debuff on you, like say, a disease or faerie fire, use cloak of shadows first, then vanish. the disease ticks will break your stealth if you dont remove it first (you can tell i want to end this post already since this section is so short!!).
Blade Flurry: An ability that allows you to hit two targets instead of one but in return your energy regeneration slows. the ability can be glyphed so that energy regen doesnt take as big a hit, which is often a must if you're doing dungeons. for raids where much of the damage is to a single boss at a time, blade flurry may be useless. in any event, it is up to the player to decide whether blade flurry should be used, assuming more dps is always better, even on trash, or left out altogether. if you use blade flurry often, do consider glyphing. Blade flurry also works with Killing Spree. The reason this ability is set aside and mentioned on its own is because this is spell does not fall into any of the above categories. It's just an ability any rogue can turn on or off and any time really. in dungeons, i have this on after my first slice and dice. then i turn it off when there is only one mob remaining, or when there are two mobs who are not standing right next to each other. in these situations, the cleave effect will be wasted. (Cleave effect = hitting two or more players at once with a single hit or cleave or swipe). Overall, this is a very handy ability. Remember to tricks often, as the cleave can cause unwanted aggro.
Other tricks, tips, or corrections? please comment so i can improve. I've only played combat for the past 10 levels, but during those 10 levels i've actually figured several things already mentioned above. To summarize, i cant spam attacks. there is a basic category of spells but what makes rogues particulary fun to play are the utility spells, timing of cooldowns and weaving of differnt combinations and abilities. This is the major reason why i enjoy the rogue. my favorite classes are usually melee classes with the occasional healer (of course, druid healing preferred), so finding another fun melee class to play is motivational indeed. the only other melee class i think i still havent played is the enhancement shaman. one day i hope to write about it as well!
Note: not all spells and abilities are mentioned. either i havent found a reason to use them or they do not apply. If there are other abilities that i should also consider, or if the abilities i've mentioned can be expanded on, please comment. thanks!
My initial experiences with rogues are that they are sneaky, elusive, and most of all, annoying. Ever level through Ashenvale, running from questgiver to objectives, only to be interrupted by a rogue who's bored? Ever read local defense and see that Cross Roads is under attack? its usually a rogue. Ever run around tarren mill, turning in quests and finding out that a rogue is having a great time sapping people? Ever enter a cave full of ogres and fighting through the ogres just to get to that one Khorium deposit but having it ninja'd by a rogue as you fight the mob guarding the node? Not too many good experiences with rogues i tell you.
But as i leveled my rogue, i find that they offer a pretty niche type of gameplay. The energy and combo point system makes playing a rogue a lot more complex while questing and significantly while in dungeons. The combo point system allows me to save up combo points for stronger finishers. The mob's health, their numbers, even their spell selections will determine which finishers i will have to use. Not only that, but the energy system is the only system in the game where timing is absolutely necessary. Spamming attacks isnt the rogue way. And rightly so, it shouldnt be since the whole character of being a rogue involves planning, timing and finesse. Button smashing might not be the best form of play. That is, unless you're playing shinobi.
Everyone knows the basics of a rogue. or at least i believe everyone does.
Energy: Rogues use energy to attack. Energy is used up when performing attacks. Energy replenishes at a certain rate. Missed attacks can refund a % of energy back.
Combo points: Rogues have two basic categories of attacks. One to produce combo points and the other to spend combo points. Both use up energy. Missed attacks can refund a % of energy back. Ideally, rogues will want to maximize their combo points (being 5) before using a finisher. Each finisher has its own effect (some do instant damage, others do damge over time, others make the target more vulnerable to melee damage, and still others cause your own attacks to speed up.
The basic combo point maker for Combat: Sinister Strike (SS) and Revealing Strike (RvS).
Sinister strike is your bread and butter attack. I use this attack more than any other attack. Revealing strikes are tossed in between, at least once per 5 point stack prior to an Eviscerate or Rupture. Revealing strikes will not do anything for Slice and Dice so using it before slice and dice is not essential. Although, if you use it as your 5th combo point move before slice and dice, revealing strikes will still be up since it has a 15 second duration. It basically buffs your finisher by 30%, so use once before you Evis or Rupt. Using it twice will do nothing but add another combo point (which SS can do) and reset the cooldown for Revealing Strike buff to 15 seconds. The 30% incraesed bonus to finishing moves does not change.
The basic finishers for Combat: Slice and Dice (SnD), Rupture and Eviscerate.
Slice and dice cases you to attack faster. use this first and always try to keep it active. some rogues start off with a 1-point SnD, which gives them a good 30 seconds or so. 5 points will give you 40 seconds of SnD. go with 1 point SnD. it ends up pretty easy to maintain.
Rupture causes a bleed on the target for a certain amount of time. the time is fixed, but the damage is different based on the number of combo points. with revealing strikes buff, it also ticks for more. Use this on bosses, or on long lasting mobs. there is no other benefit for this spell besides that you can keep doing damage while you're running around avoiding fires.
Eviscerate is often preferred over Rupture. The point is that many fights will have phases that take the boss out of the fight (basically immune) while we take care of adds, fires, dance, whatevers. in these instances, just Evis instead of Rupt. Getting all the damage at once may be more beneficial than going for a DoT that may not be allowed to last its whole duration.
The special finishers for Combat: Expose Armor, Recuperate, Kidney shot.
Expose armor is one of these spells that many other classes can do better. Plus, its only useful for physical damaging dps that having one magic dps in the mix will make this ability pretty much useless. you'll get more benefit if you just evis. Other classes can do it better because they dont have to waste too much of their resources to place this debuff on. Overall, this ability is very situational and almost never used.
Recuperate helps a lot when in high damage fights. Although you'll miss out on a finisher, it does make it easier for your healers to heal you. Finally, Kidney shot is one of those spells which i love to use on casters, especially the healing type casters. Open with cheapshot. When they come to and cast a heal, i kick. Then they cast another heal, i can blind. then i can kidney shot and basically finish them off. its not a stun "lock", as it was before, but it does keep the mob incapacitated long enough so that dps can kill him off.
Cooldowns for Combat: The two major offensive cooldowns for combat are Killing Spree (KS) and Adrenaline Rush (AR).
These two abilities are my two favorite reasons to go combat. It took me several levels of practicing and playing around to really figure out how these buffs work. but when i finally got them to work well, they became the "candy" to this whole fighting system.
Killing Spree causes me to jump from one mob to another (if one mob, then it just jumps five times to the same mob) doing pretty good damage. It seems to last about 3 seconds, but in those 3 seconds, it is amazing. added bonus to this is that the auto-attacks are still going. True, you might only get 3 auto-attacks off, even with slice and dice on, it doesnt change the outcome--dps boost. Of course, being that auto-attacks still goes off while KS is up, it makes it doubly fun to time it just right (ie. during slice and dice, while my energy is zero. Also, KS also works with Blade Flurry, so if there are two or more mobs in the fight, KS will also hit adjacent mobs, as well as the sped up auto attacks. So like i said, its candy.
As for adrenaline rush, this spell speeds up my energy regen, thus allowing for more SS, RvS, Evis, etc. during its duration. Much like Killing Spree, time it after SnD and when your energy is low (you dont want to be energy capped). You can use these two cooldowns back-to-back. It might not be as effective together, as KS will not produce combo points and the time you're jumping around through the shadows, you may end up being energy capped.
Utilities for Combat: Other utilities are Tricks of the Trade, Shiv, Feint, blind, Evasion, Cloak of Shadows and Vanish.
I suppose Recuperate can be utility but do keep in mind that it does require combo points.
Tricks of the Trade, or Tricks, or TotT is used prior or during a pull to redirect threat to someone else, usually the tank. Not only does it redirect threat, it also gives the target an increase in dps. this can be utilized several ways, but the most important way is to Tricks the tank. Upon tricksing the tank, the rogue will basically pull for the tank, or pull a stray mob to the tank. This is almost identical to the Hunter's Misdirect, where they use misdirect to pull for the tank. The second area where this is useful is during fights where you want to buff the main dps. Sure putting tricks on the tank will buff his 5k dps. but tricksing the hunter who's doing 10k dps will ultimately produce twice the damage from Tricks than the tank. Finally, two rogues can simply Tricks each other to give each other a damage buff. since the tricks is on each other, the threat transfer is almost transparent.
Shiv removes enrage. Shiv also adds poisons instantly and cannot be dodged. Although this ability does add combo points, i did not include this as a combo point ability. We use this ability more for the two reasons stated above--the combo point is an added bonus. One more thing to add about instantly applying poisons, this ability costs less the faster your offhand dagger is. so in a pinch, if you're seeing 5 stacks of your poisons about to expire, this ability may be preferred over waiting and gambling on your next offhand attack (or Main Gauche) to hit.
Feint is awesome. Say it with me, Feint is awesome! It reduces a lot of the AoE damage, 50% to be exact, that can cause a lot of fail and healer stress. This ability not only reduces your threat it increases your healer's love towards you. Please use it often to avoid those nasty AoEs, especially on boss fights where tanks dont know how to move mobs out of dark fissures, etc.
Blind is basically a stun for 10 seconds. Also interrupts casting. Kick is on CD? blind. Mobs is running for the healer and your Tricks is on CD? blind. Similar to a hunter's scattershot. We have a lot of similarities, dontchaknow?
Evasion, cloak of shadows, vanish.... they all have their uses. Evasion is useful when you grab aggro, or have to grab aggro for a while. Cloak of shadows will remove harmful debuffs (slows, poisons, dots) and Vanish will allow you to stealth immediately, even in combat. When you do have some kind of debuff on you, like say, a disease or faerie fire, use cloak of shadows first, then vanish. the disease ticks will break your stealth if you dont remove it first (you can tell i want to end this post already since this section is so short!!).
Blade Flurry: An ability that allows you to hit two targets instead of one but in return your energy regeneration slows. the ability can be glyphed so that energy regen doesnt take as big a hit, which is often a must if you're doing dungeons. for raids where much of the damage is to a single boss at a time, blade flurry may be useless. in any event, it is up to the player to decide whether blade flurry should be used, assuming more dps is always better, even on trash, or left out altogether. if you use blade flurry often, do consider glyphing. Blade flurry also works with Killing Spree. The reason this ability is set aside and mentioned on its own is because this is spell does not fall into any of the above categories. It's just an ability any rogue can turn on or off and any time really. in dungeons, i have this on after my first slice and dice. then i turn it off when there is only one mob remaining, or when there are two mobs who are not standing right next to each other. in these situations, the cleave effect will be wasted. (Cleave effect = hitting two or more players at once with a single hit or cleave or swipe). Overall, this is a very handy ability. Remember to tricks often, as the cleave can cause unwanted aggro.
Other tricks, tips, or corrections? please comment so i can improve. I've only played combat for the past 10 levels, but during those 10 levels i've actually figured several things already mentioned above. To summarize, i cant spam attacks. there is a basic category of spells but what makes rogues particulary fun to play are the utility spells, timing of cooldowns and weaving of differnt combinations and abilities. This is the major reason why i enjoy the rogue. my favorite classes are usually melee classes with the occasional healer (of course, druid healing preferred), so finding another fun melee class to play is motivational indeed. the only other melee class i think i still havent played is the enhancement shaman. one day i hope to write about it as well!
Note: not all spells and abilities are mentioned. either i havent found a reason to use them or they do not apply. If there are other abilities that i should also consider, or if the abilities i've mentioned can be expanded on, please comment. thanks!
The Rogue Experiment
I have a rogue. His name is Bruno (post character re-customization). He's been leveling on and off for the past several years. Although i've never really taken any sustained interest in playing a rogue, i find that since i've leveled up through Northrend and now in Cata stages, i've begun to actually like my rogue more and more.
Perhaps the problem, in the beginning, is that i had a druid who leveled as Feral and about 80% of the rogue's major attacks and fight mechanics are copied directly on to the feral druid "cat" form style of play. From openers to finishing moves, to even combo point makers, they all seem so very similar. For example, Hemmorage = mangle, backstab = ravage, sinister strike = claw, maim = kidney shot, etc. After levels and levels of playing a rogue, it felt almost the same as leveling a feral druid. And i've told myself many times that i would probably never want to level a feral druid again.
Maybe the problem wasnt just the similarities these two classes/specs have, but also the differences make playing a rogue seem a little limiting to me. For one, as a druid i can simply switch into bear form and tank should a pull go bad. As a rogue, my only option is really to blind one, then switch back. When the blind wears off, its time to evasion aura. If things go really bad, i can vanish and start over. Now after the fight, my druid will heal, stealth and move on to the next mob almost seamlessly. With the rogue, i'll sit there eating or waiting for my health to replenish. Simple differences like that does make a difference when deciding what's more "fun" to play. Back then, i was unhappy with the way rogues cannot heal themselves apart from bandages and how they always have to remember to coat their daggers with poisons. Also the complexity of weapon choices with different specs also turned me off a little regarding this class. With a feral druid, pretty much any weapon is good, with the added bonus that you will never have to learn that weapon skill. of course, weapon skill is now built into your level and makes it easier to switch between swords, maces and daggers for rogues.
Now i dont want to make this post about Feral Druid Cats vs. Rogues of all Specs, but a background needs to be included somewhere. When Wrath of the Lich King hit, i went from feral dps to feral bear tank and never looked back at feral dps. in fact, i tried dpsing once or twice again and never enjoyed it. So there you have it. For the longest time, i have always felt that i am playing the rogue class with some limitations and would be better off playing feral dps. then, since i've already played feral dps, i never really cared to level up a melee dps class that relied on energy again. Well now im sitting here writing about energy-bassed rogue dps.
Actual Rogue-related Stuff
In any case, it has been an experience trying to get used to the rogue class. I leveled several months ago from 60-70 and found that Subtlety was quite simple and boring. I had to attack from behind constantly and realized that 50% of my damage comes from the first 5 seconds of play. The remaining damage just trickles resulting in a DPS in the first 5 seconds of 5k, then after a 15-20 second fight, it goes down to less than 1k. Sad huh? that's what i thought. I was a little dismayed but i figued i could work this to my own advantage. In outland dungeon fights where im stacked with delicate bloodstones, fights last 10 seconds max. and even boss fights dont last too long either. I was satisfied with 1k dps at level 65 anyway since most dps classes barely get to break the 1k
Enter northrend and things changed a little. Mobs have more health so fights last a little longer. Thats good and bad. Although it does favor the rogue in terms of dps in longer fights, it doesnt favor a subtlety rogue, who's usually great at opening damage but fails at sustained damage in the long run. So after several dungeons between 69 and 72, i was resigned to doing lowest dps in all dungeon fights. This did lead to days of non-play on my rogue and eventually, loss of play completely.
Then one day, my gf decides to level up a death knight and i leveled with her when she hit 70. The experience was relatively the same so i decided to switch specs and grab different weapons. Although i knew that Sub wasnt ideal for dungeon play, i really liked the idea of shadowstep. Keeping hemmorage up to buff rupture was simply familiar to me when i was playing a feral druid. Playing combat simplified things a little. one, i had no "buff" to maintain besides slice and dice, and two, i never really had to stealth. =D
As a combat rogue, my main concern was to activate slice and dice, rupture if the fight will be long, otherwise, eviscerate. my combo maker is sinister strike, which can be used from any direction (further simplification). Now there are a few items that are tossed into this spec that acually makes it different from Sub. I have two cooldowns to play with and one toggle-able ability that allows me to cleave. And those are the difference. But those differences make leveling a rogue so awesome this time around.
Bruno is now level 82 and working on leveling through vashjir. He basically sat in LFD queue for the first level and a half since hitting level 80.
Perhaps the problem, in the beginning, is that i had a druid who leveled as Feral and about 80% of the rogue's major attacks and fight mechanics are copied directly on to the feral druid "cat" form style of play. From openers to finishing moves, to even combo point makers, they all seem so very similar. For example, Hemmorage = mangle, backstab = ravage, sinister strike = claw, maim = kidney shot, etc. After levels and levels of playing a rogue, it felt almost the same as leveling a feral druid. And i've told myself many times that i would probably never want to level a feral druid again.
Maybe the problem wasnt just the similarities these two classes/specs have, but also the differences make playing a rogue seem a little limiting to me. For one, as a druid i can simply switch into bear form and tank should a pull go bad. As a rogue, my only option is really to blind one, then switch back. When the blind wears off, its time to evasion aura. If things go really bad, i can vanish and start over. Now after the fight, my druid will heal, stealth and move on to the next mob almost seamlessly. With the rogue, i'll sit there eating or waiting for my health to replenish. Simple differences like that does make a difference when deciding what's more "fun" to play. Back then, i was unhappy with the way rogues cannot heal themselves apart from bandages and how they always have to remember to coat their daggers with poisons. Also the complexity of weapon choices with different specs also turned me off a little regarding this class. With a feral druid, pretty much any weapon is good, with the added bonus that you will never have to learn that weapon skill. of course, weapon skill is now built into your level and makes it easier to switch between swords, maces and daggers for rogues.
Now i dont want to make this post about Feral Druid Cats vs. Rogues of all Specs, but a background needs to be included somewhere. When Wrath of the Lich King hit, i went from feral dps to feral bear tank and never looked back at feral dps. in fact, i tried dpsing once or twice again and never enjoyed it. So there you have it. For the longest time, i have always felt that i am playing the rogue class with some limitations and would be better off playing feral dps. then, since i've already played feral dps, i never really cared to level up a melee dps class that relied on energy again. Well now im sitting here writing about energy-bassed rogue dps.
Actual Rogue-related Stuff
In any case, it has been an experience trying to get used to the rogue class. I leveled several months ago from 60-70 and found that Subtlety was quite simple and boring. I had to attack from behind constantly and realized that 50% of my damage comes from the first 5 seconds of play. The remaining damage just trickles resulting in a DPS in the first 5 seconds of 5k, then after a 15-20 second fight, it goes down to less than 1k. Sad huh? that's what i thought. I was a little dismayed but i figued i could work this to my own advantage. In outland dungeon fights where im stacked with delicate bloodstones, fights last 10 seconds max. and even boss fights dont last too long either. I was satisfied with 1k dps at level 65 anyway since most dps classes barely get to break the 1k
Enter northrend and things changed a little. Mobs have more health so fights last a little longer. Thats good and bad. Although it does favor the rogue in terms of dps in longer fights, it doesnt favor a subtlety rogue, who's usually great at opening damage but fails at sustained damage in the long run. So after several dungeons between 69 and 72, i was resigned to doing lowest dps in all dungeon fights. This did lead to days of non-play on my rogue and eventually, loss of play completely.
Then one day, my gf decides to level up a death knight and i leveled with her when she hit 70. The experience was relatively the same so i decided to switch specs and grab different weapons. Although i knew that Sub wasnt ideal for dungeon play, i really liked the idea of shadowstep. Keeping hemmorage up to buff rupture was simply familiar to me when i was playing a feral druid. Playing combat simplified things a little. one, i had no "buff" to maintain besides slice and dice, and two, i never really had to stealth. =D
As a combat rogue, my main concern was to activate slice and dice, rupture if the fight will be long, otherwise, eviscerate. my combo maker is sinister strike, which can be used from any direction (further simplification). Now there are a few items that are tossed into this spec that acually makes it different from Sub. I have two cooldowns to play with and one toggle-able ability that allows me to cleave. And those are the difference. But those differences make leveling a rogue so awesome this time around.
Bruno is now level 82 and working on leveling through vashjir. He basically sat in LFD queue for the first level and a half since hitting level 80.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Still Here
First I'd like to apologize for my absence. I've actually been really unmotivated to write lately. I've also been working a lot more at work than usual. And when i do have the few minutes to write, nothing comes to mind. Call it what you will, bloggers' block, dryspell, dissatisfaction with the current state of coffee (starbucks wants to buy peet's, wtfno!), the weather, high gas prices, or dysentery, i havent really had any solid thoughts that i'd like to share with anyone. heck, when i play wow i dont even think of how online social behavior shape the community's perception of harder heroics (though basically everyone think they suck, but heroics are supposed to be hard, correct?). anyway. just saying. wow bores me. im in auto mode right now. what am i doing?
1. Half-heartedly doing dailies. yes, dailies for the fourth year in a row. dailies to get some cool gear and some enchants. of course, i'll get a different enchant depending on faction. but stealing food from dwarves get boring after the 5th day. and i dont even get to eat any of it.
2. Half-heartedly doing dailies. what? yea, the cooking, fishing, jewelcrafting... even the daily transmutes and research/discoveries. i missed a few researches on my scribe last week. i missed a JC daily or two last week (and i have two JCers). i missed a few xmutes, and when i do them, i dont even visit uldum or hyjal anymore, i just do them in orgrimmar and get a random element.
3. Automatically relisting gems twice daily. Most of my gold is made from JC, or from disenchanting the JC stuff and making enchants. well my enchants arent selling so i have a bunch of unenchanted rings and neclaces sitting in the mailbox. my "green" gems are sitting in my xmute character waiting to be changed to "blue" gems and metas. im always out of red gems and have way too many green gems. i've given up selling green gems for now, as no one seem to want sensei's, vivid, etc dream emeralds anymore.
4. I'm leveling a rogue. yes, another melee dps. i do miss having the instant attacks with very little cooldowns, providing me double the dps of my rogue usually. im doing half of what most people do, until i use my cooldowns. it sucks leveling as a rogue. i mean i get to a mob, get enough combo points to cast slice and dice, then try to build more combo points and lose it because the mob just died. now im out of energy and have to start over on another, almost dead mob. after the first finisher, i could never build enough combo points to actually do anything else. i cant even get enough energy up to do a 2-point finisher. nerfed content sucks i tell you. Then the boss fight comes and i shine because that's the only time the fight last long enough (okay, not always. some fights are stupid short) for Adrenaline Rush to last its whole duration, and then, i top the meters and actually feel useful. haha. tanks dont even care that i tricks them to pull a stray mob to them, which ends up in a messy pull.
5. My rogue is a skinner/leatherer. yea, typical. but that means i am running around killing countless kodos, wolves, dragonkins and yetis to actually make enough garbage items to get through to something useful. seriously, a rogue takes a ridiculous amount of time killing and skinning, even if the kill takes 1-shot. i cant "train" or aggro more than four mobs at a time unless i want to risk losing the first two mobs. i gather three or four at once, dismount, kill, loot, skin, mount, repeat. boring as hell. but hey, at least its not archeology.
6. Speaking of Archeology, gonna spend the next few mindless weeks leveling that up too.
So in conclusion, cata heroics are hard. rogue leveling is stupid. Jc makes lots of gold. and wow is pretty boring.
1. Half-heartedly doing dailies. yes, dailies for the fourth year in a row. dailies to get some cool gear and some enchants. of course, i'll get a different enchant depending on faction. but stealing food from dwarves get boring after the 5th day. and i dont even get to eat any of it.
2. Half-heartedly doing dailies. what? yea, the cooking, fishing, jewelcrafting... even the daily transmutes and research/discoveries. i missed a few researches on my scribe last week. i missed a JC daily or two last week (and i have two JCers). i missed a few xmutes, and when i do them, i dont even visit uldum or hyjal anymore, i just do them in orgrimmar and get a random element.
3. Automatically relisting gems twice daily. Most of my gold is made from JC, or from disenchanting the JC stuff and making enchants. well my enchants arent selling so i have a bunch of unenchanted rings and neclaces sitting in the mailbox. my "green" gems are sitting in my xmute character waiting to be changed to "blue" gems and metas. im always out of red gems and have way too many green gems. i've given up selling green gems for now, as no one seem to want sensei's, vivid, etc dream emeralds anymore.
4. I'm leveling a rogue. yes, another melee dps. i do miss having the instant attacks with very little cooldowns, providing me double the dps of my rogue usually. im doing half of what most people do, until i use my cooldowns. it sucks leveling as a rogue. i mean i get to a mob, get enough combo points to cast slice and dice, then try to build more combo points and lose it because the mob just died. now im out of energy and have to start over on another, almost dead mob. after the first finisher, i could never build enough combo points to actually do anything else. i cant even get enough energy up to do a 2-point finisher. nerfed content sucks i tell you. Then the boss fight comes and i shine because that's the only time the fight last long enough (okay, not always. some fights are stupid short) for Adrenaline Rush to last its whole duration, and then, i top the meters and actually feel useful. haha. tanks dont even care that i tricks them to pull a stray mob to them, which ends up in a messy pull.
5. My rogue is a skinner/leatherer. yea, typical. but that means i am running around killing countless kodos, wolves, dragonkins and yetis to actually make enough garbage items to get through to something useful. seriously, a rogue takes a ridiculous amount of time killing and skinning, even if the kill takes 1-shot. i cant "train" or aggro more than four mobs at a time unless i want to risk losing the first two mobs. i gather three or four at once, dismount, kill, loot, skin, mount, repeat. boring as hell. but hey, at least its not archeology.
6. Speaking of Archeology, gonna spend the next few mindless weeks leveling that up too.
So in conclusion, cata heroics are hard. rogue leveling is stupid. Jc makes lots of gold. and wow is pretty boring.
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