So there’s a current hatred for Shadowstrike amidst Subtlety that is understandable, as it was meant to be a Replacement for Ambush, but fell short.
Shadowstrike is basically Ambush with Less Damage, but a damage buff for use from stealth and a 25 yard teleport to do it. However, the tradeoff is the damage buff/teleport only works for using it from stealth.
Many people want Ambush back because of the obvious difference between these. Ambush was always an Ambush. Mid-combat it didn’t lose potency. It was raw damage with the need for stealth to do it. Note; there is more, but overall. Ambush was Consistent, and Shadowstrike is not.
Ambush didn’t teleport you, however, it also didn’t lose damage after the first hit from stealth.
Shadowstrike could do to have a flat buff to it, ditching the use-from-stealth damage buff for just higher consistent damage. -However that leaves the teleport to reason with-
On one hand, an instant relocating ability can be clutch, but we have that with our 2 charges of Shadowstep. On the other, that much jaunting in combat could get crazy for anyone.
Ultimately, I myself would prefer other means of movement, if possible, as the approach from stealth is literally a rogue’s job and we have enough tools to accomplish that in spades. I feel the consistent nature of Ambush to be better, despite my liking of saving on a Shadowstep to engage a target.
Please watch this video of an obscure WoD cloak and dagger build, which executed on the concept of Shadowstrike far better than Shadowstrike itself ever did: https://youtu.be/v_oU4MtMz0I
From a fantasy standpoint, I think an acceptable compromise is having Ambush baseline, with a talent or glyph that upgrades it to Shadowstrike for those that like it. BUT, once I go down that line of thinking, I think it’s better to just reimplement Cloak and Dagger (see above video) because it’s just flat out better. [If you want, I can elaborate on the many reasons if you feel that they are not obvious]
EDIT: There was a small bug with glyph of stealth which caused it to fail if I immediately restealthed and pressed cheap shot and after downing a mob. Therefore the first few pulls are ever so slightly clunky as I had to learn how to play around the bug. You can see it pretty quickly smooths out once I figured it out. This wasn’t a build I played a lot, I just recorded this video to demonstrate that a better version of the intention of Legion Subtlety already existed if you chose the right talents.
Capitalizing on the same things that they tried to do with Shadowstrike without needing it. That was a fun talent honestly, and I see why Shadowstrike has its roots in it. Honestly, there could just be a talent for faster cooldown for shadowstep if the movement SS provides is that dire, and people could macro. Sub already has a lot of the capable movement it needs. I feel personally that Shadowstep is outdated, as Ambush never truly needed to be replaced for Subtlety Rogue. But Legion turned a lot of things on its ear, honestly.
I may like some of the extra shadow abilities that have come out of the spec, however with Shadowstep being baseline, Ambush should make a return. I feel having 2 charges of Shadowstep makes Shadowstrike unneeded for its extra effects, and nobody has use for a once-per-combat buff of 25% damage vs just having more overall damage.
Glyphs are a honestly an unused system Blizzard could use to satiate the eccentricities of players if that’s still the route they want with it. I won’t even get into that system’s past here, but cosmetic glyphs to make ambush have a different animation, or effect would suit most people who want everything in their toolkit to be Shadow X or Shadow Y.
The reason CnD could be balanced against Step (the talents competed on the same tier) is because Step is more versatile. It doesn’t require Stealth, it doesn’t force you to use CS, Ambush, or Garrote which is important because Step Kicks are super strong, it doesn’t require an enemy target which is important because defensively stepping to a friendly target to get away from danger is very powerful.
So basically, if Step had a shorter cooldown it would be too powerful.
“But Shoegazer, Step now has 2x charges, why isn’t that too powerful?”
The 2nd charge is not nearly as valuable as a shorter CD. Mostly you only get benefit from the 2nd charge at the start of the fight. The only additional benefit would be situations where you don’t use Step immediately when it comes up, allowing a small additional mathematical benefit in the fact that you are not wasting “cooldown regeneration time” as a resource when you are sitting on 1 charge. Still that benefit is small compared to the cooldown shortening you are proposing. Asymptotically, the benefit of the charges is almost negligible – I expect that this roughly cancels out the small increase they made to the Step CD when they added the 2nd charge so asymptotically it really is negligible.
I think trading Preparation (pre-Legion) for 2nd Step charge is a net nerf overall, but it’s one that I’m fine with if people feel strongly about it.
Entirely correct there. I love the current system of Shadowstep for Subtlety, and it’s a massive boost there.
I feel Ambush could come back and we dont currently need a SS ability with where things are going. SS itself is just not enough, and the added CnD effect can be talent-worthy, but i run my mind back asking if that’s too much, just like with a shorter CD for shadowstep. I do not believe i stated my doubt in such a thing as a shorter CD, but it is there, as SS is currently a very intense utility with the Subtlety Spec.
On that, the two charges portion you mentioned was spot on. 2 charges is good, but the shorter CD is what makes it really incredible.
Yup. In a world where Blizzard has unlimited resources there would be no reason not to do this. In this world, we need to convince them that it’s worth the effort.
It matters to me a lot. I’ve played a Rogue exclusively since 2005. This class matters to me so much. But I feel that my connection to my character that has been with me since the beginning, was shattered in Legion. So having the option to play a gritty, violent Subtlety Rogue as it existed before Legion, with only a minor emphasis shadow magic of the tricky sleight of hand variety (step, dance, cloak) is a must-have for me or I won’t play at all.
I feel like they owe it to us to let us play an oldschool Subtlety class fantasy. At the same time I do recognize that some newer players like the Shadow-everything theme. Optional Glyphs to allow them to keep it is really the only approach that can make everyone happy. That’s the only compromise I could accept on the fantasy front.
lol I’m like 90% sure that if Shadowstrike actually dealt damage, and wasn’t just there to build up Eviscerates, then we won’t have nearly as much people pining for Ambush.
Would be nice if Backstab also actually did damage outside of cooldowns… I hate cooldown based play, I like Dance but tying rogues to cooldowns for their only source of burst just feels horrible. The burst should really come from energy pooling and the dance should be there to set it all up. But that’s just my opinion, everyone is gonna be different.
idk why they gave us the gimmicky teleport on shadowstrike when we already have 2 step charges. Id gladly trade some of this mobility for actual damage or control outside of cheapshot
It didn’t happen in that order. Originally they pruned Shadowstep and invented Shadowstrike, we complained, the class designer at the time said “oh, we didn’t realize you like that step is off global, can be combined with kick, and can be used on friendly targets” and to their credit they unpruned Step.
Shadowstrike was still terribly broken and stupid so it received a series of nerfs.
To offset one of those nerfs, they added a 2nd charge to Shadowstep.
I’d like the devs to complete the circle here with deleting Shadowstrike entirely, as it was always a terribly designed ability intended for a design direction that the devs are obviously no longer pursuing.
Also I dislike DFA, not sure if that is still a thing and the shadow clones are stupid too, also not sure if that is still a thing I hear there were many class changes. The rogue class is such a mess, so bad I dont even want to touch it, so bad that I am not even tempted to level it just to see what it is like now, that’s how out of touch it has gotten, its no kidding turned me completely off.
I feel like this was the case with ambush too though. Lol
Sub became less fun when finishers became the source of burst damage. And I could be wrong about this but I feel this has basically been the case post-cataclysm.
Ambush hitting for huge amounts was pretty awesome. Seeing it in Classic hitting from like 30% to 50% of someones HP is crazy. But, yah, I do think Cataclsym was where things changed in that regard. That is when we got mastery, which loaded a bunch of our damage into finishers.
Back in the day people feared getting smashed with Ambush. shadowstep > ambush > eviscerate > laugh. those were good times. I miss the Sub spec of old days so much. full disclosure, I only have this character and a bank that holds my leather so seeing this spec go from being able to 1v2 suckers with mace spec to what it is now is saddening.
Now sub just hits like a wet noodle until you can get all your CD’s to line up during an eclipse, while the frog howls furiously, as Hale-Bopp flies by earth.