Also note that Shadowpanther has the two weapons ranked/rated exactly the same. One of them had to come first when listing the rows, it looks to be alphabetical. This should be expected, considering they have exactly the same stats, the only difference is weapon damage range, however the dps and speed are identical - the smaller damage range on the sword means nothing. This is all completely disregarding the fact that using a completely static rating system for various stats isn't the best way of ranking which item is better for *you*, only a spreadsheet or something with your other ~16 pieces of gear can tell you that.

I have a new convert to combat swords, so I wanted to just get a little advice.
I had been combat daggers and most recently combat mutilate for a very long time, and thus am I'm rather unsure that I am playing swords as it is intended. I've checked over this forum a number of times, but wanted to see if anyone had some advice, either as of my gear selections, or my gemming and enchants.

My rotation is 3-5 Snd / 5-5 R and 3-5 SnD / 5-5 R / 3+ Evis when AD is on. I understand that hit is primary for this spec and feel I may be lacking a bit there as well. Right now I'm raiding SSC TK and just getting to start Hyjal, though I haven't been lucky enough to get anything from these places yet.

Feel free to rip me to shreds, I can take it.

Thank you in advance for the advice.
The World of Warcraft Armory

What do you mean when you say "3-5 Snd / 5-5 R"? In any case, you have 2 piece t4, so the proper rotation for you would be 1s5r. No ifs, ands, or buts. Just get one combo point, hit SnD, then get 5 combo points and hit rupture. Rinse and repeat as necessary.

"3-5s/5-5r", when pulled as a recommendation from the DPS spreadsheet, is referring to a rotation which includes Seal Fate. Seal Fate builds (eg Mutilate) have a variable number of combo points due to the change for SF to proc or not. Thus, what that particular cycle is saying is to used Slice and Dice when you have between 3 and 5 combo points, then use Rupture when you have exactly 5 combo points, then repeat.

The analog as a combat cycle (sans Seal Fate) would be 3s/5r. Combat cycles do not have variable combo point generation, and thus you can say to always finish on a precise number of combo points rather than a range.

Salhik, the best answer for you is to use a spreadsheet to determine your optimal cycle. Aldriana's Gear Spreadsheet is considered the gold standard of accuracy around here, and it supports Combat Swords. Thus I would recommend it. However, if you wish to compare CSwords to Mutilate, or if you are just interested in a ballpark, I would recommend the Rogue DPS Spreadsheet. It is more comprehensive (includes talent builds that the Gear sheet does not), and also supports Armory Import and some other nifty time-saving features for those who have access to Excel.

If you don't wish to use the spreadsheet, then just read and adhere to the recommendations in the first post of this thread.

3-5 Snd -> Slice and Dice when I have between 3 and 5 combo points
5-5 Rupture -> Rupture only with 5 combo points

[e]: Left was faster

My apologies, I don't use Dmm's sheet, so I was unfamiliar with the terminology. Left is correct, of course, in that a spreadsheet is always your best bet for determining your cycle, particularly when you break your t4 set bonus. Enjoy it while it lasts, though. I miss mine.

I have a problem - my SS crit was 10% lower than my normal (white damage) crit on the last VR fight. I have WWS parses that put my SS crit % within 2 or 3% of my normal attack critrate, but this particular fight saw my crit rate hit the floor. Here's the WWS:

Truth - WWS

Should I be worried about this, or should I just ignore it and continue on with life? It's more confusing than anything else.

Random number generator is random.

That's good to know. I was genuinely afraid I was missing something.

Are Rogues and Warlocks always competitive in DPS, or are there gear levels where one out paces the other? In other words, should I resign myself to #4 on the DPS meters because of the trio of locks that will always beat me, or should I try to outdamage them on the fights that I can (non AoE fights, mainly)?

Rogues are more highly dependent on buffs and party makeup for DPS output than pretty much any other class (possibly with the exception of warriors). If I'm missing a fury warrior and enh. shaman, my DPS drops by roughly 30%. Needless to say, that is a lot. Thus, unless you are getting the right group makeup, you'll likely not be on top of the meters.

Also, locks synergize exceptionally well with each other right now, which is why you see destro locks (or even affliction) at the top of a lot of damage meters. (Locks are also not limited by mana in the same way as other casters, as they can just health tap their way back to full mana.)

First, there's no reason to believe that the result was anything you had control over. I can make you feel better by finding out how likely it was though....Statistician to the the rescue? Using a 2-proportion test hypothesizing that the proportions of your non-SS crit rate and SS crit rate should be equal, according to Minitab the SS crit rate is 3.33 standard deviations lower. Assuming it's random and thus should follow a normal distribution, and the probability of such a result falling that far away is around .00043. That's about one in 2326. It's going to happen every now and then.

But as mentioned, there's no reason to believe that you could do anything about it. At very least VR turns on tank switches even if he doesn't on orbs (I haven't done it in a while and I know they've been changed in some manner) your 4 parries for less than 1% indicate you're attacking from behind a vast majority of the time unless you're way past the expertise cap - there are 0 dodges which suggests you are capped.

The effect I describe in post 2784 regarding agility and crit rate applies to dodge as well.

This was mosty likely covered already somewhere in the 100+ pages on this forum....but in a grp of 5 ppl for melee with 2 rogues the best setup is what?

I'm pretty sure it's Rogue / Rogue / DPS Warrior / Enh. Shaman.....but I'm not sure what the 5th should be for optimal dps? Is it feral druid or BM hunter...or maybe ret pally?

Retadin would benefit best from WF. Basically, he'd need to be in the WF group in order to bring DPS enough to justify his spot.

All three are viable options. The highest DPS option will probably be whichever of those three your raid is bringing along for other reasons - is the feral offtanking, is the BM hunter trapping or MDing, is the Ret pally keeping up a whole roster of judgements - or, whichever of the three is putting out the highest personal DPS (in those instances, an extra DPS warrior for a commanding shout or an extra rogue for flat out more damage are both potentially strong choices as well.) - if your raid happens to be bringing along all three of those extras, probably the Ret pally, as the paladin benefits the most from being in the group with the rest of you - Windfury is HUGE for them.

That also confirms the (Agility - 11.8) number I came up with for crit which explains the 0.59% difference. I showed the 11.8 by altering a .lua in an addon to display 6 digits after the decimal to the GetCritChance() UI function so that the exact figure could be determined.

Unless I'm not understanding what you're saying it sounds to me you're both wrong, him to a lesser extent.

All haste stacks. Percentage haste bonuses stack multiplicatively (eg. Slice and Dice and Blade Flurry) and rating-based haste bonuses stack additively (eg. DST procs, haste rating on gear etc.). There is no haste cap, so your friend is wrong about there being diminishing returns. Each point of haste rating increases the number of attacks per second by the same amount regardless of whether you have 0 haste rating or 100 haste rating.

Edit: Unsurprisingly, there is a thread about this very topic on the first page of this forum. A long time reader (hah) should at least know to search before posting.

http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t12882-m...ks_what_means/

This seemed like as good a thread as any to ask my question.

My guild is starting attempts on Vashj (yeah, I know), and there's some disagreement over what the melee should be killing during Phase 2. Some members feel that Rogues should be on the backs of the Coilfang Elites, while others (like myself) think that Rogues should be on the Elementals. What are all of your experiences with Vashj Phase 2 for Rogues and which adds have you had the most success with?

The main question I have is this: Given the nature of the fight, I've been considering going TSH for Vashj nights. The fight doesn't seem to favor melee in general or Combat Rogues in particular. I was thinking that the added cooldown availability, constant target switching, and relatively low armor of Vashj may favor a more mobile spec with better armor penetration and Rupture damage. Have any of you tried Vashj as both Combat and TSH? Or have any comments on one or the other?

I'm open to all suggestions, and any tips would be greatly appreciated. Thanks everyone.

Note: I'm normally Combat Fist + Sword. The spec I have now is just an idea I was toying around with in my head, mostly with the intention of getting 3 Sprints and some other talents I thought may be situationally useful on Vashj. The gear I logged in is my PvE raiding gear, though. I may have the Honor AP trinket equipped, but I run with WSC and SoC in raids.

When we done Vashj we had the rogues on the coilfang elites. Having the melee on the elementals I imagine would work however having us so close to vashj also allowed us to clean up any rogue elementals that got through.

Our guild puts rogues on the Elites and cleanup for any elemental leaks. They don't really have the mobility to do elementals, unless they're SS, which is a bad choice for other reasons.

Why are you considering TSH for Vashj? Combat has cool downs to help burst down Tainted Elementals (if you're put on add duty), SS at least has increased mobility, TSH doesn't seem to me to have any significant advantages on this fight.

In general Vashj isn't a great fight for rogues. You get rooted in goo and you don't have any particularly important jobs (Naga dps is the least important dps factor in P2).

I generally have myself and our other rogue(s) on elites. Combo point mechanics and lack of mobility/emergency self-heals make us pretty mediocre floating elemental DPS compared to warriors, retadins, or enhance shammies.

And yeah, it's not an awesome fight for maximizing performance - but it is fun as hell and a great check of situational awareness, especially if you're the last line of defense against incoming elementals.

1) Less DPS in-time on one target lowers the value of Combat Potency, at least that was my impression.
2) I'd still have BF for adds that got close to the shield.
3) Tainted Elementals spawn every 50s or so right? And you need 4 cores, which should even out to around 4-5mins for Phase 2, so I'd end up with one more of each cooldown.
4) The spreadsheet showed me having a small DPS gain by going TSH (including debuff) over Fist + Sword. My thinking was that in addition to the DPS gain over Combat, even on an endless uninterrupted fight, TSH may be hurt less by the target switching and downtime than Combat, and might gain more from lower armor values when burning Phase 1 + 3.