I have a confession to make in case it wasn’t obvious: the whole point of building a Combat set was to bring back the glory days of WotLK. I’m referring to being able to run both as Combat and Assassination. I just liked having that choice back then. Now that I actually have a decent Combat set, things aren’t working out as I intended.

This explains why:

Q: What’s the top DPS spec?

A: Assassination and Combat are both reasonable options. Combat should be a bit ahead above 35% and a bit behind below 35%, but its hard to say which is going to be higher on average. In practice, I think they’re going to be pretty close on single-target, and primarily distinguished by how they perform in non-single-target situations. That is: Assassination has vastly better AoE and more broadly applicable utility talents, while Combat will be the king of DPSing two targets (via Blade Flurry) and has better burst via cooldowns; for any given fight, this distinction is likely more relevant than the theoretical single-target difference between the specs. [via EJ]

Combat used to be the spec of choice when it came to AoE situations, making it better for 5-man dungeons. Now that Assassination is the superior spec for both single and multi-target fights, the only reason to run Combat is when I’m cleaving. I don’t know about you but I find that option severely limiting.

Don’t get me wrong. Combat DPS is amazing when it’s used properly. With my current gear I usually get 6-7k DPS on single-target and 11k when I can use Blade Flurry. 11k is good damage, obviously. My only problem with it is that it seems so situational.

Think about it.  With Assassination all you need to do after the pull is to cast Tricks then go crazy with Fan of Knives. That’s it. With Combat, I have to decide whether hitting two targets only justifies not touching the others. I also have to worry about the eventual threat issue when Tricks goes down. Bottom line, I need to do more runs as Combat and see what I can learn. I also have to convince myself to stick with Combat even when I start seeing my numbers go down (cleaving nothing, KS on cooldown, etc.)

How about you guys? Any similar experiences? Have you tried running both? Is it better to just stick to one spec?

So the patch is out. I went ahead and assembled a second set for Combat to try it out. In case you’re wondering why a second set is necessary, it’s because of stat weights; Assassination and Combat have different priorities. For example, Spell Hit is critical to Assassination due to its reliance on poison damage. Special attacks play a more vital role for Combat, making Expertise a priority over Spell Hit. You can look up my previous post on stat weights for more information.

I tried out my Combat set earlier today and here’s what I can tell you.

• This is an early impression, but soloing and questing were more convenient to do in Combat because my special attacks were hitting harder. Downsides? Recuperate was healing less and I was running slower. Why? Because they were both untalented.

• Blade Flurry did wonders for my DPS during trash pulls on heroic dungeons. It was fun cleaving everything. However, it also messed up my threat big time. I was using Vanish then Evasion + Cloak of Shadows when it was on cooldown more often than necessary. And yes, even when I was casting Tricks I was still having problems. I’m going to try to include Feint in my rotation and see how it goes. It’s better than turning off Blade Flurry altogether.

• How’s Combat’s single-target DPS compared to Assassination? Forget it, it’s not even close. Go switch specs and use your daggers when you’re fighting only one mob.

I hit 85 a couple of days ago and I’m in the process of gearing Sin for raiding. Well, possibly anyway. There are a couple of things we need to sort out guild-wise before we get there but that’s a different story. Anyway, here are a couple of things you might want to know in case you’re also considering getting your rogue geared.

The item level of regular dungeon drops is 333. Gear that can be acquired by Justice Points is 346. Regular dungeon drops have a heroic equivalent when you run heroic dungeons. The level of these items is also 346 and says “Heroic” under the name.

You need an item level of 329 in your character sheet to qualify for heroic dungeons.

Assassination provides the most DPS out of all three specs. Combat is supposed to be close. That isn’t the case in my experience though.

In case you haven’t seen it yet, everything you need to know about Cata raiding (stats, specs, etc.) can be found here. An in-depth Assassination guide is also here. Specs, stat weights, gems, etc. are all there.

Here’s a gear list of sorts that you might find useful, sorted by slot. Note that I only queried armor so trinkets, rings, cloaks and weapons aren’t included.

That’s it for now. Hope you find the information useful.

“Sayang” is a Tagalog word (that’s my native language, by the way) that expresses dismay, usually over something that is a waste or was wasted. When you find yourself saying “too bad” or “what a waste”, whatever situation you used it for would be within the appropriate context of the word. Boherrac and I were chatting in-game and he asked how my DK was, to which I answered that he was stagnating and that I was too lazy to do anything with him. He dropped the word then: “sayang”.

It was enough to send me thinking.

It was sort of a wake up call. Nothing groundbreaking, mind you, but it did make me want to gear my DK again, which I did earlier by giving him a couple of gems. Well, it was more than a couple, but I realized yesterday that I haven’t even bothered to put a meta on him for his DPS set. Seriously, WTF. I also switched to Blood DPS for the heck of it. I’m already dual-wielding with Sin so I figured that using a two-handed weapon would be a good change. It’s too early to tell if I’ll actually stick to it.

Note that this was written with new rogues in mind. I recently ran a fail group on my DK and it was tough to see a fellow rogue just suck at DPS. I was tanking Anub’Arak in AN and things were going well until he burrowed and the adds came. Recount told me that I was number two in DPS, behind the mage but above the rogue. You know that a group is fail when the tank is doing more damage than the rest of the group.

So, here’s a little something to raise your DPS in heroic 5-mans:

• Go Combat. Equip your best weapons, then spec into it.
• Set the tank as your focus target (click on the tank, type “/focus”).
• Make this macro and map it to a button:
• /cast [target=focus] Tricks of the Trade
• Doing the above will cast TotT on the tank.
• Everytime your tank pulls, hit the macro, then spam Fan of Knives.
• Profit!
• For big pulls, cast Blade Flurry, TotT, FoK. Whenever BF is up, remember to stand close to two adds or more since you’re cleaving.
• For big, prolonged pulls, cast Adrenaline Rush, Blade Flurry, TotT, FoK.
• More profit!

It’s an oversimplification and sort of a repeat post, but hopefully it should get things started on the road to better DPS. Seriously. What I just saw was painful to watch.

I’ve been holding off on purchasing emblem gear because I want a tier piece to drop from VoA first. My goal is to get the tier 10 4-piece bonus going and see my DPS increase. I want to be able to nail one finisher after another. After two weeks of doing VoA, I’ve yet to see rogue leather drop so I haven’t had the chance to even roll on it yet. That’s been the story of gear for me for the past couple of weeks, even in ICC. Melee DPS leather simply does not drop in our runs.

Yesterday Festergut dropped Plague-Soaked Leather Leggings. I put it on my spreadsheet and saw a DPS increase. Just for fun I decided to put the tier 10 legs and hands just to check what my DPS would be if I bought those instead.

I was floored to see a DPS decrease.

I checked and re-checked but the numbers were consistent. If they were both at ilvl 251, getting the tier 10 legs and hands to complete the 4-piece bonus was going to lower my damage output. I was in denial at first, thinking for so long that the 4-piece bonus was really, really good. Well, screw that. The discovery then led to me checking out what pieces I should buy. I finally settled on the waist and trinket, with those being the biggest DPS upgrades according to the spreadsheet. I’ve yet to run ICC to see how my DPS turns out though. I’ll find out this week.

I got asked about Tricks of the Trade twice this week and it wasn’t by fellow rogues. The questions came from two tanks that I regularly run with. For the purpose of this post, I’m going to name them Tanks, Cow and Mandy. If they ever read this post, they’ll appreciate the subtlety behind the naming. And yes, I realize that I said two tanks yet named three. We’ll get to that in a bit.

During a 5-man run:

Cow: Do you have to cast Tricks every time I pull? Am I having aggro issues? Do you do the same with Tanks?

Me: Yes. No. Yes.

During a different 5-man run:

Mandy: Do you hold back when I pull? Like, wait for me to get aggro before you attack? Do you do the same with Tanks?

Me: No. No. No.

For the tanks out there, let me say this: we’re not casting Tricks on you because we have issues with your tanking. It’s not because we think you don’t have enough aggro. Tricks is there to ensure that aggro does not become a problem for the entire group, not just us rogues. It also allows us to unleash our DPS without worrying about threat (for 6 seconds, at least). Overall, it benefits everyone. Tricks + Fan of Knives does wonders for group AoE. Tricks + Blade Flurry + Adrenaline Rush + Fan of Knives spam makes rogues smile. So please, don’t worry about getting the buff from us. We like killing things. Tricks is there to ensure that those things don’t kill us back.