The problems as I see it:

As a druid it's annoying to see the majority of leather items having agility and attack power instead of strength, since we have talents that work just off of strength, so this gear is subobtimal for us. On the other hand, rogues can't get much use out of items that are strength based, so leather dps gear has to be custom made for each class, and nothing is worse than getting feral loot when you don't have a druid (some would argue that getting feral loot at all is the worst, but I digress).

But what if rogues got 2 attack power per strength? They could then change the items to match this. For example

Nomad's Leggings
Binds when picked up
Unique
Legs Leather
256 Armor
+33 Agility
+49 Stamina
Durability 75 / 75
Requires Level 70
Equip: Increases attack power by 66.

Could easily be changed to:

Nomad's Leggings
Binds when picked up
Unique
Legs Leather
256 Armor
+33 Strength
+33 Agility
+49 Stamina
Durability 75 / 75
Requires Level 70
Requires The Consortium - Revered

If rogues got 2 attack power per point of strength, this item would give them the exact same amount of attack power unbuffed. Feral druids would get 15 more attack power than before, and ~16 more +healing if they pick up the nurturing instinct talent.

In addition, changing rogues to get two attack power per point of strength would mean that the new item gives them 6 more attack power than before if they have blessing of kings, they'd also get another ~80 attack power from a strength of earth totem, and then some more attack power from whatever base strength you have. I'm of the opinion that rogues need a bit more damage so I see this as a good thing.

To me this seems like it would improve things for both classes while preventing item rot.

I can only see a few possible downsides:

The developers want agility to be the primary stat for rogues.

This could be seen as making strength just as good as it. However you could argue that they'd inadvertantly already made "attack power" the primary "stat" for rogues. (Does agility still give more value to a rogue per item budget? Obviously you want items to have both of course).

This would let druids do more damage and they do too much already.

Whether or not druids do too much damage already (I don't think this is the case, but there's not enough data out there to make conclusions. Druids are typically filling a tanking or healing spot due to higher demand for those). However, even if you agree that this would make druids do too much damage, you'd be wrong since druids will get strength itemization eventually for each slot. The current system just makes it take longer to do so, and with worse selection.

I'm a rogue, don't take my damn loot

Your guild could still (and likely should) let rogues get dps leather first. Changing the items to be good for both classes doesn't change this.


Does anyone really see a reason why Blizzard shouldn't just do this?

uh, what? I thought 1 point of str/agi = 2 points of AP = 4 points of ranged AP, not the reverse.

Actually in item budgeting, 1 STR is valued the same as 2 AP. Meaning STR costs more.

People have been asking for this change forever. The argument that was used to counter it before was that "then Rogues will have too much AP and wtfpwn everyone." Well, that doesn't hold water anymore, since Blizzard is now creating lots of items with AP/AGI/STA. I can't see any reason why with the current loot dynamics that Rogues shouldn't get 2 AP per STR, short of laziness by the Devs, or a plan to hold us back while buffing ferals (which I really doubt is the case).

Edit: No Gwai. For Rogues, its 1 STR = 1 AP; 1 AGI = 1 AP = 2 RAP. For Druids, its 1 STR = 2 AP; 1 AGI = 1 AP. That's ignoring the AGI : Crit/Dodge differences too (which also favor Druids).

2 Attack Power = 1 point in either Strength or Agility, under the current item budget.

A lot of loot in TBC is designed around attack power and agility. Lord Beef's point is that if Rogues got 2 attack power per a strength, all that loot could be switched to strength/agility and be more valuable to Druids and be the exact same in value to Rogues.


I can see the argument of changing how attack power works to improve the options for Feral Druids. However, at every armor level each class is divided up in how they want their optimal DPS gear. At the same time, leveling gear is almost always good enough for most classes if it's loaded up on attack power. Druids are the only class that gets tweaked around when they go from strength to attack power. I guess I see the point, but it's a pretty drastic change to how itemization works, and one that isn't all that crucial. Hunters were the only other class that had their stuff changed so dramatically, and I felt that was because their loot needs were so different than other classes that Hunter-rings/amulets/capes were almost useless for anyone else. A feral druid item is still good for a rogue or Enhancement Shaman. A rogue item is still good for a feral druid. A hunter Agility ring was something the other classes looked at as a joke.

1 Strength is valued the same as 2 AP because in a lot of classes it translates to just that. Warriors/pallies/shaman all get 2 AP for every point of strength.

If they wanted to give rogues 2 AP per point of Strength, they would need to take away the 1 AP they get per point of agility. Otherwise we would see rogues running around with retarded amounts of AP.

Rogues have been pushing for such a change on Blizzard's forums for months. Reasons why I think Blizzard might have chosen the route of agi/ap itemization instead:
1) Keep agility as the rogue's primary "base stat." Yes, AP is worth more DPS per item-level, but having strength be more important to a rogue than agility would seem "out of character" to the RP crowd and possibly spark complaints from there.
2) The other class that benefits from agi/ap itemization is hunters, for whom it helps to offset the rap/agi nerf. They may have wanted any itemization change to benefit at least two classes so that people wouldn't cry "Why are you buffing class X?"

Edit:
Putting agi and AP on the same item will result in the same amount of rogue AP as if they'd given us 2 AP per str and kept itemizing str/agi. So obviously Blizzard doesn't think that amount of AP is retarded any more.

It's worth noting that 1 AP per agility and 2 AP per strength is exactly what cat druids get. In fact if you take HotW into account its effectively 2.4 AP per point of strength on your gear, and even a bit more after SotF. It's been this way for a while so simply having that much AP is not enough to break the class balance, though mechanics of druids and rogues are different enough that you can't really say 4000 AP for a druid will be the same as 4000 AP for a rogue.

There is one theory why Blizzard won't do this, at least for a couple months. It is because right now most of the new TBC loot items that are big upgrades for Rogues are big because their old gear is typically Str/Agi/Sta with some Crit & Hit scattered around. Its a lot easier to get people excited about new items (and tolerate swapping out their old epics for blues) if they're seeing huge increases to AP.

I know I'd be holding onto my Deathdealer's a lot longer if I was getting full benefit from all its Strength.

I think that there is no reason to give rogues 2 AP per strength.

a) As noted, item budget-wise 2AP ~= 1str, so on new items, the lack of AP isn't as noticeable anyways.
b) Items with +str, and +AP would now be stronger in terms of AP gain for rogues, disrupting whatever balance they had before. For isntance, you could have +78 AP for the same item budget as +25 str, +50 AP, which would ultimately be 100 AP for a rogue who didn't have this AP potential before.
c) It creates a way to differentiate rogue DPS items from druid DPS items, as druids may often value str higher than rogues do.

They've increased potential AP to a point I assume they are happy with by more efficient allocation of item budget on new items.

If they were to increase it further by allowing str to give 2 ap I would assume that they would no longer be happy with the potential AP in the rogue and they would end up nerfing it some way, either by mucking with item values, or a nerf in skills, which I don't think anyone wants.

If every item in the game a rogue could wear was only AP/Agil, and it was changed to STG/Agil, then yes, all the rogues would have the same AP. That isn't what i'm talking about. I am talking about the HUGE boost to AP rogue would see from items that they are currently wearing that have strength on them.

Take this set for example. http://www.thottbot.com/?s=deathdealer as the guy above me mentioned:

Since your only changing items with AP on them to be items with Stg on them, this set got a whole lot better for rogues. That isn't to say that there is not an equivalent set of items for rogues, that gives the same stats. All i am saying is that simply changing the formula and the items to translate AP--Stg wouldn't be enough, because rogues with strength on their gear now would see a boost to their AP with no negative effects.

It'd be an interesting bit of analysis to take a look at. I don't think it would be dps neutral, most likely it would be an increase for rogues.

A couple observations:
1) Enchantment choices would change. Crusader Enchants become incredibly valuable for rogue's mainhand, str or agi on your offhand might become a push at certain levels of hit/crit/AP.

2) SOE totems, BoK and UR would have some interesting scaling effects on DPS.

3) Probably not as big a deal later, but T2.5 (which was very heavy on str) would see renewed/extended life. I'd have to take a look at the tiered armor analysis again to see if any pieces would become better than t3.0

4) It'd put more emphasis on armor for rogues as opposed to being primarily weapon focused. That will lead to some strange weapon choices, particularly for subtlety rogues. E.g. You may take a lower dps weapon just because it's got a 0.2 second slower swing speed. Today about 50% of my rogue's dps comes from AP, 50% comes from my weapon (unbuffed).

Another issue, while you may or may not want to consider it, is that I think a lot of warriors would start using [even more] leather for DPS gear.

while that isn't a route I particularly care for, it could cause problems in some places.

I didn't follow Druid DPS itemization much apart from the Tier sets so is there actually lots of Druid gear that has Str, Agi and NO increase in armor value? With the threat nerf and just looking at our tanking gear, the theme of itemization seems to be Bear/Cat hybrid items and if that is still the case then Rogues might not like the idea of homogenizing Druid and Rogue leather. Because what use is the increased AC value for a Rogue that wants to maximum DPS?
If there is dedicated Druid DPS leather ignore this. ;)

Eh, that got changed? EDIT Nvm me, I just realized I was comparing the AGI:Dodge ratio of Rogues with the AGI:Crit ratio of Druids in my mind which is obviously not smart. /EDIT


Btw, remember the Silithus bugs (the elite ones)? Those had a debuff that reduced your Str by 50%. I always wondered why we didn't see more of those debuffs in raid environments because stuff like that could be tweaked to let Rogues do more damage than other melee classes in relation. Hey, there has to be an advantage to the drawback of only getting 1 AP per Str, right? :)

It's not a bad thing. It's a very, very good thing. If rogues and druids get the same benefits from the same stats, there is no method to relatively equalize them apart from mucking around with talent returns. If down the road devs find that rogues are scaling 10% faster than druids, they've removed every tool they have to fix that scaling to wherever they want it to be. If, however, they can make equipment that's always going to be preferred by one class or the other because it plays more to their stat point multipliers, it's possible to buff one set of gear relative to the other without making it attractive to the other class.

Take a hypothetical Tier 7 piece of armor. Due to talent synergies, weapon scaling and the like, Rogues are 25% ahead of druids in Tier 7. (While being only 15% ahead of them in Tier 6, which is the desired amount.) They can't simply muck around with talents, because things are balanced in Tier 6. They have two choices: Nerf the rogue gear, or buff the druid gear. Whichever is appropriate depends on where the benefits are coming in. But if both classes use the same gear, there's no place to insert small tweaks to fix up the differential as desired.

In general, it will always be a lot easier to fix power differentials through incremental itemization change than through incremental talent changes. Talent changes hit all level ranges; item changes can be specifically tailored to noted level/progression ranges which may have problems.

If Rogues got 2 AP per point of strength you can bet your ass every single warrior and melee shaman would be up in arms about not getting 1 AP per agility point.

An item with 10 strength and 10 agi drops. Who gets the most benefit from the item? Basically, nobody:
- Paladin: 2 AP
- Druid: 2 AP
- Rogue: 2 AP
- Warrior: 2 AP
- Shaman: 2 AP
- Hunter: 1 RAP, 1 AP

This same problem you describe about conflicting stats is very abundant on mail armor as well. Take a count of how many items you see with Str, Sta, Int vs Agi, Sta, Int (or worse yet, Agi Int AP) while you're on your way to 70. Mail itemization is still heavily slanted towards hunters.

I don't think the silver bullet answer is the way to go, because it leads to extreme amounts of gear homogenization. Plate is the unfortunate example of this: every item that is good for a melee DPS paladin is also good for a melee DPS warrior, and there is little to no item diversity at all which leads to a lot of frustration when those items aren't very common. Diversity is good, and as long as they continue to make items that are "ok" for one class and "very good" for another as that cloak in the first post is, I think we'll be all right. The big problem is when to go overboard and make items that are basically class items without the class restriction tag, like Malfurion's Blessed Bulwark.

Not to derail much, but I think that was Blizzard's intention. Feral gear was scarce pre-AQ and consequently the performance of Ferals (especially DPS) was nowhere where it could have been. Imagine this scenario and then Malfurion's Blessed Bulwark drops. Which class would it go to if it was not heavily skewed in the Druid's favor? Definitely not to the Druid. But alas, this is a thing of the past. Ferals got extremely well PR (exaggerated as well obviously) so issues of not considering letting a Feral roll on gear that benefits not only him but "real DPS" classes should be a thing of the past - and with that drops a la Malfurion's Blessed Bulwark.

I can't say, I haven't been in raids in the burning crusade, so I don't have a solid idea of rogue damage compared to other classes in raids with top end gear. Nor do I have a solid idea of the utility of rogues in high end raids.

If there's a high amount of highly magic resistant monsters then rogues may very well come out on top.

Do I think that other classes with a physical DPS role and different "utility" should be able to approach rogue DPS such as cat druids, fury warriors and enchancement shaman? Yes.

Though, if raids continue in the same vein as they were in vanilla WoW where most rogue utility is wasted, then I think there is a problem. Rogues have a lot of tools at their disposal, the big issue isn't that other classes can equal them doing damage, the problem was most of rogues abilities in the past, would scroll up IMMUNE.

Why bother changing strength then. Strength's only benefit to a rogue is 1AP, to boost it to 2AP would make it exactly equivalent in item budget to AP. If you're never stacking the two together on leather, then why make the change at all?

To other classes, strength has a higher benefit, on a warrior, paladin or shaman it gives 2AP and increased block value. To a druid it gives 2AP in bear, caster and moonkin, and 1AP in cat. It is only a secondary stat for rogues, and I don't see why this is a problem. For a rogue, hunter and cat druids the primary composite stat is agility.

I suppose it comes down to the next point.

I don't see the differentiation as a bad thing. We already have armor classes to differentiate items a bit. But consider a strength/stamina ring drops, you will have bear druids, prot warriors, possibly paladins who want it. Adding another class to the mix doesn't help matters much. Other classes/specs like enh shaman, cat druids, fury warriors might want it but wont get as much benefit as the primary 3.

Assume an agility/ap item drops, then you'll have rogues, hunters, cat druids who want it. Other classes like enh shaman, ret pallies, fury warriors might want it but don't get as much benefit as the primary 3.

Assume a agi/str item drops, you'd have feral druids, enh shamans, ret pallies, fury warriors all after it. But for a rogue, it would be better for him to get the agi/ap one. In fact, a cat druid wanting to maximize DPS would want the agility/AP one as well.

There's not a massive amount of leather strength gear going to waste at the moment. Sure, they didn't maximize stat allocation for rogues on deathdealers. Yes, you could have had more AP if they had given you AP instead of Str.


Here's my point I suppose:

Could it be possible that Blizzard doesn't want you to have that much AP? Because if they did, they could have given it to you. To me it seems they kind of gamed the item values of the set a bit by adding strength to the set instead of attack power.

They have done this a lot before in other sets, adding stats that don't directly help you. I mean, your shadowcraft gloves have +10 spirit on them. Why would you put that on the items unless it was just to lower other stats.

They've gamed other items pretty much the same way. Dungeon 2 armor for instance takes a massive drop in item level, though you don't see it through the standard interface since they were rewarded as a quest, just so that they can make some of the items purple without having to give the stat allocation of a purple item.

I believe that the fact that strength is on your items is not because they screwed up, but because they wanted to give you half as much AP using the same item budget.

I believe if tomorrow magically rogues got 2 AP from strength, that blizzard would want to fix items by doing something stupid like adding spirit to them in order to lower your AP gain from the newly overpowered str/agi hybrid armor sets.

When has changing itemization ever been a solution used to address balance issues? I can't think of a situation where they've ever buffed or nerfed gear due to scaling issues. The only situation where there's been anything like this is hunters and that's due to a core mechanics change. They certainly didn't add more spell damage to warlock gear when they were terrible DPS in naxx, even though warlocks did pretty well in MC back in that gear.

If for example, the gap between rogues and druids grows from 15% to 25% in a tier of gear, that simply means that the druid isn't getting as much from the increased stats as they need to be and it's a class mechanics/talents issue.

Blizzard would still have flexibility to fix these issues even if there was a growing gap. If for example shred from a druid was fine at tier 5, but underpowered at tier 6 they could just reduce the bonus damage on shred and increase the multiplier.

This argument was viable in 1.0, where there were a tiny, tiny handful of items with AGI and AP on them, and, because this double-dips the itemization formula where AP is concerned, these items were ridiculously good for rogues for their item level.

Now, though, Blizzard seems to have abandoned that concern, and tons of items have AGI and AP, and the itemization consequences are exactly the same as though they were itemized for STR and rogues got 2 AP per STR.

I agree with the general notion that all of the classes should want something a little bit different to clear up loot disputes. That said, rogues are so generic right now that there is no specific rogue loot?

For mail items Agi/str or RAP/Spell damage will divide the hunters and the shaman.
For plate items int/+healing etc will separate warriors and pallies.
For leather there is no distinction for the rogues. The best rogue loot is also great druid loot and in many cases good hunter loot, shaman loot etc etc.

It would be nice for the rogues to have something to focus on but they have painted themselves into a corner in some ways.

Perhaps they could make rogues focus on some of the other nice but underused bonuses, like Haste Rating. If, for example, they gave rogues a passive 50% boost to any haste rating items then it could be made a viable avenue of gear selection for them.

Agility would still give more dps for a buffed rogue, not to mention, the armor/dodge bonus from agi you still get. It would however give a nice little boost to unbuffed/pvp rogues due to base strength.

If Blizzard is going to give +agi/ap/crit/hit loot in TBC, there is no reason why they should not make this change. The reason it was there to start with was because they did not want rogues scaling past everyone, but if they give them the same thing through +ap itemization, it defeats the purpose. Also, making this change will not in anyway make rogues scale faster than other classes, but it will give them a bump up in their base-line dps.

Reasons not to would be: DPS warrior/feral jewelery would be more hotly contested with rogues. Not as much incentive to create +ap jewelery for hunters and hunters will feel itemization shortcomings for a while. A change like this would cause extra programming.

I'm a bigger fan of letting people work out loot disputes to a certain extent and have most every drop be good for at least two classes to prevent item rot.

Pre TBC, if a hunter piece dropped you could give it to a hunter, or have it be used poorly by a shaman or warrior due to it being overly agility heavy. Post TBC the agi/ap split is actually very beneficial as now enhancement shamans can make very good use of "hunter" gear and warriors are better off as well.

If you want to make an item specific for just one class it's best to have it drop as a token. Tokens are items that are hotly contested and can be used by a variety of classes very well, and these are generally seen as a good thing.