[Pulsing Amethyst].

Basically best til Hyjal/BT gems, well just a bit. [Shifting Shadowsong Amethyst], same agility, 1 more stam.

Really? +10 AP > +5 agi?

Yup it is...barely...thanks

No it isn't, see [Shifting Shadowsong Amethyst]

Yea Shifting Shadowsong Amethyst is superior to Brutal Tanzanite/Pulsing Amethyst...what I'm saying is that Brutal Tanzanite/Pulsing Amethyst is superior to Shifting Tanzanite post 2.4. Right?

Depends on buffs. Basically looking at 5 agil vs 10 AP. On the unbuffed end, 10 AP. On the buffed end esp with kings, 5 agil.

First: I would recommend that you not sign your posts, as the powers that be look unfavorably on such things.

Second: At the risk of sounding unhelpful and tautological: they're better because, well, they're better. The spreadsheet makes an estimate as to how much DPS you get from each stat, so when an item scores more highly, that means it's better.

So, for instance, for helms: Deathmantle has an extra 8 agility, 24 attack power, and 5 crit rating in exchange for 12 hit and 84 armor pen. When one scores the damage contribution for these, one finds that it is fairly close (depending on exactly what gear and buffs you have, either can score higher). Thus, if you score the items on Offensive, I suspect you will find that they are very very close.

However, Vengeful has a lot more defensive stats, so if you score them on Weighted Total, Vengeful wins. And even if you subscribe to the school of thought that defense is more or less irrelevant and that offensive stats are all that matters, it should be clear that if two items have equal DPS, the one with more defensive stats is better.

Just briefly, don't sign your posts

I really am feeling nice today or else I'd tell you to do your own work (end random tangent).

Anyways, the reason why Vengeful pieces are probably showing up as better than Deathmantle is the sheet being on "Weighted" Total, factoring in stamina and dodge from agility to item rating. If you were to put it on Offensive you'd probably see T5 as superior in at least some of the cases, buffs being the determining factor (although you may want to factor in those defensive bonuses, it's personal preferance since they certainly DO help). Another reason for the Vengeful pieces with Armor Pen showing as superior could be the boss armor: is the sheet set to 6200 or 7700 armor bosses? As you correctly point out, if it's the former Armor Penetration would be worth more. It's probably worth evaluating pieces under both settings, especially as you move to T6. Anyways, let's take a look at the pieces you mention.

With default gear and buff set, all gear socketed optimally for DPS, and set to Offensive:

[Vengeful Gladiator's Leather Helm] is probably the best piece of the set, an 0.68 EP upgrade over the [Deathmantle Helm].
[Vengeful Gladiator's Leather Spaulders] are a 1.86 EP upgrade from [Deathmantle Shoulderpads], but are worse than [Shoulderpads of the Stranger] by 12.81 EP.
[Vengeful Gladiator's Leather Tunic] is 16.06 EP worse than [Bloodsea Brigand's Vest], but 12.78 EP better than [Deathmantle Chestguard] and 28.24 EP better than the next best chest, [Shadowtooth Trollskin Cuirass].

One final note, watch the set bonuses. 4pc T5 is pretty damn good, so once you have that there'll pretty much be no attainable gear set which is better for those 4/5 slots until 2t6.

Thank you very much for your assistance! =)

A few remarks on the 0.9.5 version I am using atm :
- Sunrage shoulderpads do not exist any more in game, but are still in the spreadsheet
- Tunic of the Dark Hour is classified as a BT drop, whereas it is a new badges item
- There is still no blood frenzy among the buffs available ^^

Apart from that, amazing work ^^ I'm just so sad that as an alt rogue who does not have access to T5/T6/T7, I'll have to farm badges to get an ugly fists combo (2.5 speed, meh >.<) to replace my awesome ZA swords

@ Aldriana

I saw you remarking that Shard of Contempt isnt interesting for raiding, however if you couple it with Slayer's Boots and WEx you get 107.x expertise rating which should cap you against 73 bosses, no?

Doesnt this make it worth picking up for raiding until you get a Blackened Naaru Sliver (which presumably drops from M'uru and hence wont be immediately available)?

A cap isn't something you usually shoot for, but rather something to be avoided. Assuming a 6.5% dodge rate on bosses, the cap would be at 102.5 Expertise rating. Any point above that is entirely wasted.

Now let's have a quick look at the Shard of Contempt. It provides 44 expertise rating, but we can only use 39 because of the cap, if we're wearing the Slayer's Boots and specced WEx. Using the AEP values from the Roguecraft 101 thread, this equals 39 * 2.56 = 100 AEP. The proc is a bit harder to evaluate as we don't know the proc rate and, well, it's a proc. According to the Wowhead comments, it has a 45s internal CD, so for simplicities sake, I am going to assume a generous 20s per 60s uptime resulting in roughly 77 AEP.
So in total, it's at 177 AEP which puts it clearly behind DST, WSC, Ashtongue and probably even Madness of the Betrayer.

Just as a sidenote, who forces you to spec into WEx ? if you get to/over the cap by gear, spec out of WEx. Shadowpriests do the same with Spell Hit in late T6.

Wowhead's spell data shows the proc rate to be 10%.

The problem is, with a 20/41 build there really isn't anything else to take that will help your dps with that extra talent point if you do go 1/2 WE instead of 2/2. It's probably better to just go 2/2 and equip gear with different stats.

I'm trying to figure out which trinket to go with until Blackened Naaru Sliver. Its either WSC, Madness or Shard of Contempt. The difference between WSC and Madness at my gear level seems negligible at best. The Shard of Contempt however is interesting coupled with Slayer's Boots considering it could be as much as 4 weeks to even open Rohendor and possibly longer to kill M'uru (if he even drops Blackened Naaru Sliver). I'm already at the hit cap so its AP vs ArP vs Expertise.

I dont have the math skills to model them against each other, which is why I was hoping for some insight from Aldriana.

Ah, thanks. It seems I'm completely blind.

A lack of other valuable dps talents does - you end up spending same points on filler talents like riposte / antifear-stun / imp.kick etc... The only possible way is to pick dual weapon spec, however there is hardly any good non-sword mainhand and each talent will only benefit one hand (or atleast that was last common belief, can't find any data)

So with a 60 sec CD it would be around 178ish, and we now have reports that the CD is most likely 45 sec, doesnt that make it better than everything except BSL & DST?

i will never understand why so many rogues are hesitant in speccing into anti-fear/stun. It's a great chance to continue dps and a useful filler.

Speaking of useful fillers... Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft or even zero WEx and 1 imp kick is better then going above the cap and wasting talent points...

The estimates I made assuming a 45 second cooldown and 10% proc rate indicate that it is slightly below DST (so long as you're getting full value from the expertise on the thing). We currently have no idea how the Blackened Naaru Sliver will actually perform, we just assume that it'll blow everything else out of the water.

I guess with the fear changes (boss sticks to highest threat), it wouldnt hurt having Nerves of Steel if you could afford it.

However, you would lose 1.268% if you drop down to 1/2 WEx, so you would be down to 5.5% making the whole effort of getting the Shard of Contempt pretty meaningless.

You're only going to be 0.3% above the supposed 6.5% cap anyway.

Edit: Thanks Vulajin, I think I'm going to put Shard of Contempt on my to do list for 2.4