I’ve recently made the decision to change mains heading into 9.2. to rogue! So far it is fun and rewarding. Coming from maining a DH since Legion, and an enhancement shaman before that, it only seemed natural to pick another melee dps spec/class.
That being said, however, I am feeling a bit overwhelmed at times during dungeons. I expected a bit of a learning curve as the amount of buttons, macros, and key binds I have are double that of a Havoc DH - but more help is always good.
So I’m looking for things you Outlaw rogue mains know now that you wish you knew back then, when you first started. I’ve scoured the internet for guides and have read and watched most but I want to know if there are things like certain macros or Weak Auras you can not live without or some general tips that might slip through the cracks of most guides.
Sorry for this lengthy post but thank you in advance to any who might respond!
macro for casting tricks on your focus target when you cast stealth or vanish (makes it convenient when going from pack to pack in a dungeon)
macro that combines blade rush + killing spree into a single button so you don’t have to worry about swapping them every time you switch
weakaura to show you when you don’t have any poisons (or other consumables)
weakaura to show you when to roll/reroll the bones (some rolls are bad enough to risk the reroll)
use adrenaline rush as much as possible, the cooldown is 3min but once you get used to the rotation it turns into a 1-2min cooldown and you can basically use it once, or more, per pull
vanish should be part of your regular rotation, use it to cast ambush as much as possible due to the chance of getting a rtb buff (EDIT: this is a benefit granted by a conduit, but it’s the bis conduit)
vanish also has other uses:
emergency distract/sap for incoming pats that will wipe your group
emergency stun if you need to delay an enemy’s cast for a few more seconds
break roots/stuns
drop aggro if tank dies/you pull off of them
gouge, gouge, gouge… one of the best utilities you can bring to a group; great for delaying spells if no one has an interrupt or if the cast can’t be interrupted and the mob can be incapped
feint is a great way to help your healer out during - so many - encounters, pair it with crimson vial (both on the gcd but still worth it) for an added bonus
you can pair feint with other damage mitigation abilities to create a half baked immune (ex: i regularly pair fleshcraft and feint on the dealer xy’exa fight in DoS to mostly mitigate the explosive contrivance ability and give my party members an extra puddle to jump on)
don’t save cloak of shadows out of fomo, it’s a great way to walk through fire; you can use it on some trash pulls and still have it back up in time for a boss
if you have the broadside buff (the one that gives you an extra combo point), use your spenders if you’re at 4/5 or 5/6. your damage is heavily influenced by spending as many combo points as possible. when you have broadside up and you use a generator while at 4/5 (or 5/6) points, you will lose a point due to overflow, this a net dps loss as far as I understand it
blade rush/killing spree are both parts of your single target rotation
do not ever use blade rush/killing spree in a multi target situation without blade flurry active
EDIT: this should generally adhered to for optimal dps, but there are some niche cases where you may not want to pair them for the sake of survivability (e.g. bursting, bolstering, preventing splash from breaking CC, etc.)
sprint is a defensive cooldown - helps you get out of fire/frontals faster - damage avoided is healing saved; i suggest using this as much as possible… i don’t remember if it’s on the gcd but it is still worth using
there’s a wall of text for you, i’m sure there are other tips/tricks out there too
EDIT: oh, also, you can use RtB, slice and dice, and some other abilities while stealthed, giving you a great way to prep for your opener before a fight starts
Do not play outlaw is my best advice. We are still aoe capped, hard to play, rely on rng on top of rng on top of rng equipped with an rng domination set. If you want to play rogue just look into sin or sub (sub right now, sin maybe on patch). Or if you just want a fast-paced brawler then play a WW monk or fury warrior. Both great right now, offer vastly more utility than rogues, and are hybrids to allow for quick queue times or just a welcomed change of pace when you get bored.
Outlaw has a very high APM and can be super sweaty, but is very rewarding. It scales more with gear and can be underwhelming when initially gearing up - sub is more dmg for lower effort while gearing, if you want to go that route.
Use AR on cool down and get a few weakauras - combo tracker, roll the bones, and slice and dice tracker. Helps visualize it for me.
The RNG can be minimalized but sometimes it’s there…a lot less than you would think. Just keep spending points and reroll/vanish if the buffs aren’t what you want.
Cheap tricks makes gouge free. Super useful pseudo interrupt!
Mark for death sniping can be tricky to learn but it’s a lot of fun when you get it down. Would use on CD just like AR.
Just to be clear unlike what somebody said above, you do not need to be in stealth to use distract. 99% of the time you’re going using Vanish to proc CTO conduit.
Another thing that nobody is mentioning is that you pretty much need to put all your utility abilities on mouseover macros because if you switch off the target that you put Ghostly Strike and Between The Eyes on you’re losing like 30% of your damage. So ideally your kick / kidney / gouge / marked for death (literally required) / Bonespike if you’re Necro (Also required).
Necro is better in M+ because it gives you 100% uptime on BF but Kyrian is easier and the go to if you don’t know how to play Necro.
But honestly, the best answer I can give you to your question is to simply not waste your time. Our tier set is mediocre, we remain one of the few classes that’s still punished by Blizzard and having a 5 target cap, and next patch Sub will take over in raid and every single dungeon.
Outlaw’s single target is on par with others and its 2 target cleave is garbage. I mean yeah it’s better than subs but sub notoriously has the worst 2 target in the game so like duh. If you are constantly pulling 2-3 target packs in M+ you are doing something very wrong. As of right now sub absolutely dominates the other rogue specs and is the clear #1 dps on warcraftlogs for m+. Out of all the dungeons there is exactly 1 outlaw rogue ranked above the other specs and that is in ToP where the outlaw got over 30 external buffs. Every other dungeon and unbuffed rogues in ToP outlaw lags behind…sometimes FAR behind.
Not sure why you are REEEEing at me. I never said outlaw wasn’t viable. I said it is a weaker choice that takes more work to accomplish less, which is 100% accurate. If you want to argue past that then talk to someone else, I no longer have the drive to argue on the wow forums.
dude…take a chill pill. You’re so offended holy crap. And all I said that OL is superior to sub in 1-3 cleave scenario. Which is true…because I am outlaw as we;;/, and it looks like I have A LOT more experience in keys than you do to begin with.
So yes, I can come out anywhere between 10-11.5k per run as Outlaw, which is on par with the vast majority of 20’s dps. Do MDI sub do much better? Yeah…Even Feral MDI player will do better than 11k.
It is taking me a long time to get my outlaw rogue to be on par with demon hunters, monks, and warriors 15-20 item levels below me in damage. I’m currently sitting at 242 item level and struggling to get 5-6k overall which is terrible compared to my warrior of similar item level. I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong, sims say 2k less as well so there’s that…
Right. Since you aren’t posting on a DK low level alt in a rogue forum, I can’t even look at your character.
Let’s get a few things out of the way.
Are you using the right talents? You can look at mine to compare. https://raider.io/characters/us/kelthuzad/Peexee
Are you built Versa/Haste/Critical? Because you can go ahead and delete all mastery pieces and replace them with 230 blue BoE for versa/haste. Mastery is a dead weight stat. Thought I am not some crazy know-it-all, but 252 Mastery piece is FAR WORSE than 230 versa piece. (Someone can come and disagree with me here). But that’s 100% True for Rings/Neck. Delete mastery jewelry.
Are you keeping up with your Blade Flurry when on 2+ targets? (It’s the AoE ability)
Are you using Roll The Bones effectively? Got a tracker to make sure you don’t override good rolls?
Are you using Vanish+Ambush to generate extra RtB rolls? Ambush can grant rolls.
Are you using proper conduits? Conduit that increases % of getting better roll & conduit to generate RtB procs via Dispatch?
Are you using Blade Rush off cooldown? Or trying to aim it at larger sized packs AND use it when low on Energy?
What are you even going on about. I just corrected a couple things you said and noted that you didn’t need to tag me and you are getting very bent out of shape. God these snowflakes now adays.
Thanks for the advice, this is my rogue. I understand crit/verse/haste stat priorities, as well as roll the bones conduits simming better (currently using weaponmaster/triple slash because of fun). The one thing I"m not doing is using vanish as effectively. Regardless of that, the overall dps isn’t going to be 3-4k because of all your suggestions IMO. All my 249+ ilvl characters don’t have to use 4 globals in order to buff their damage…
https://raider.io/characters/us/illidan/Øverkill
Don’t use Overkill on row 1. It’s the worst talent. Pistol Shot works with Blade Flurry. So you’re missing out on A LOT OF damage in both AoE and ST situations. And you need to use Pistol Shot proc all the time.
Don’t use 6 CB talent either. In both raiding & M+, MFD is better. In 9.2, however, 6CB will be better. Per every M+ run, you’re probably missing out on like 50+ free Dispatches.
Have Mark for Death keybinded. And always try to use it in combat, especially if you can pop it on a low health target that’s about to die. Every AoE pull in M+, I get 2-3 MFD go off. That’s x3 free dispatches. That’s 20k+ single target damage + 12k in AoE. So that’s free 32k easily. Now do that every pull. You will get 300+ easily. That’s your another 1k dps.
