I’ve never understood how to play one.
Can someone dumb it down for me? 
I’m confused when you should use certain abilities, even backstab.
Shadow Dance? Should that primarily be for Shadowstrike?
It’s a little bit tricky, but no rocket science here.
I really encourage you to check YouTube, Wowhead and/or Icy Veins portals guides - knowledge would be transfering much smoother then here 
The basic PvP/PvE dmg of Sub rotate over Shadowdances = Shadowstrikes as you right mentionned it.
Generally Shadow Dance must be mashed with Symbols of Death when possible. You add Shadow Blades, Covenant Ability (and Cold Blood, Marked for Death in PvP) if you wanna do burst dmg.
Much of your effectivness and playstyle depends of your talent choosing.
For the beginner I would recommend:
- PvE M+: Premed, Shadow Focus, Deeper Strat, Prey, Enveloping Shad, Master of Shadows/Secret Technique (second focus harder on AoE dmg).
- PvE Raids: Weaponmaster, Shadow Focus, Deeper, Cheat/Elusiv, Prey, Envelop, Master of Shadows.
- PvP: Premed, Nightstalker, Marked, Soothing/Cheat/Elusiv (depends of your playstyle), Prey, Dark Shadow/Envelop (first more risky, more burst build, I recommend Envelop on start), Master of Shadows.
Obviously two daggers, unless you have better 1h weapon, then use it in offhand but only in PvP.
In PvP you try to melt enemy’s HP with Shadowstrikes and Evis keeping him/her in stun with Cheap Shots and Kidney Shots.
In PvE when you use all Shadowdances, you Backstab unless getting SD again (optimally Backstab is best behind the target). Keep Slice and Dice and Rupture on your target at all times.
And basically that would be it.
Get the MA legendary while its still good
Macro all offensive CDs + Ferocity badge together into a giant “F you” button
Pre Cold Blood > Cheap Shot out of stealth > F You button > Covenant ability > Eviscerate > Marked for Death > Eviscerate > Run for restealth
???
Profit
I’ll try to summarize it the best I can.
The spec revolves around Shadow Dance and Find Weakness to deal damage. Shadow Dance gives you access to Shadow Strike, which deals good damage and applies Find Weakness for a long time. Shadow Techniques will also periodically apply a free combo point.
During Shadow Dance, you are just pumping out Shadow Strikes and Eviscerates (at least in PvE) on a single target. On 3+ targets, use Shuriken Storm and Black Powder instead.
Everything outside of Shadow Dance is essentially spent buying time and “setting up” for your Shadow Dance charge. During this time, you are primarily using Backstab to generate Combo Points. DO NOT spam Backstab. Space it out to reasonably conserve your energy and let Shadow Techniques do the rest. This is also the time to be using Combo Points to apply/reapply Slice and Dice and Rupture (you can use these during Shadow Dance, but try to only apply them outside of Dance or you lose some DPS). Use Eviscerate if you have Slice and Dice and Rupture up with no Shadow Dance charges. Use Shuriken Storm and Black Powder on 2+ targets outside of Dance.
A BIG mistake I see people make is using Shadow Dance every moment they have a charge. Do NOT do this. Generally speaking, you want to only want to be using Shadow Dance when 1) You have pooled your Energy (let it fill to 100), 2) Slice and Dice is up and 3) Rupture is up on your target (except in multi-target scenarios). 4) You are reasonably sure you will have 100% Melee uptime on your target.
Patience is a big thing with Subtlety. Mashing your keys like a dingus will result in a DPS loss. One thing you want to get into the habit of doing is waiting for Shadow Techniques to give you your free combo point, then popping Shadow Dance right at that moment. This way you can do a clean Shadow Strike > Shadow Strike > Eviscerate 3 times with no issue due to the timing on Shadow Techniques (if you pooled your energy correctly). Once you start getting the hang of it, your timing on waiting for Shadow Techniques will go off right at the same time you pooled your energy.
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Nice guide Exitus.
Rylence, you may want also read the guide:
It contains Exitus’s info and more.
I want to thank you for those tips, i never thought of it like that. I will definitely be practicing that. Thank you so much