Did you take misery into the calculation and the 3% extra crit damage from the meta socket ? The numbers had 4/5 and not 5/5 Vile Poisons and Find Weakness may not be up the whole rupture duration. Also the 2-Tier5 bonus plays in nicely. I think with the Ashtongue exalted trinket the magic number of 45% crit can be obtained and would make Envenom a tiny bit stronger.

Again, my math skills are pure awful so I'm sure someone can and probably already has done the math to show why ruthlessness is so greatly required for rogues dps output. But in playing around with the talent trees, I just don't see any ability in the top half of the subtletly tree that makes up for the 60% chance of obtaining an additional CP, particularly since ruthlessness proccs with the use of a finisher, and additional CPs that result from it proccing then help you do more dmg by being able to use higher CP finishers more often. This skill basically helps perpetuate itself.

If you go down the subtlety tree looking for additional CP, you have initiative and setup. In most raid situations, you might use either garrotte or ambush as an opener, which might provide that additional combo point, but that would be as an opener.. so that would be a 75% chance of one additional combo point during a boss fight, (maybe 2 if you vanish midfight and open again) at a cost of 3 talent points versus ruthlessness 60% chance of a CP EVERY time you use a finishing move during a boss fight. I don't know the math, but it is still clear from my experience that ruthlessness provides more than 1-2 CP during a typical boss fight.

For setup- it works when you dodge an attack or fully resist a spell, meaning that the mob has you targeted. On trash pulls, you might see this procc fairly often, but I have to say that if you are dodging a boss, then you are doing something wrong most of the time and are probably closer to being dead than increasing your dps output.

And additional combo points are what enable you to run the SnD/rupture cycle so smoothly, none of the other talents in the ass or sub trees provide for these. And yes, Seal of Fate does provide it, but you should already be putting 5pts in Seal of Fate if you are going Mut specc, so that is left out of the argument.

And this still doesn't take care of the white dmg that duel wield and precision provide that work so well with having a prolonged SnD cycle. I am not a fan of combat as a specc due to its simplicity and it being more boring and less "roguey" to me. But it is the tree that provides the sustained dps needed on long boss fights. It is nice to see though, that changes are being made to our talent tree to provide another option for pve than just the one combat tree we have had to use for the past year. As much as I would like some of the sub talents early on like increased stealth speed and stealth, I think those 20points are still best used in the combat tree for boss fights. And perhaps I have this wrong, but the rogues dps on trash mobs in raids, while important, is not where we are expected to shine... especialy in highly mobile fights where BM hunters and mages are going to find it much easier to equal or top our dps. It is the long boss fights where we need high sustained dps. And until they put a talent fairly high up in sub that assists sustained dps, not just burst, then I don't see that tree being useful for high end raiding except in the rare case where one rogue in the group perhaps speccs hemo swords at t4 and t5 gear levels.

The new mutilate buff is only a slight increase of about ~5% on overall dmg in pve but it's a great buff for pvp.
The challenge, as someone stated earlier; how to improve mutilate to bring it on par with pve swords without overpowering it in pvp.

Some much needed changes:

1) A boost on Deadened nerves
2) Rethink Anesthetic poison

Perhaps a synergy of theses 2 could be whats missing in pve? Somekind of big boost to poisons dmg by remaking deadened nerves. Because most mut rogues in pve will use wound instead of DP, it wouldnt be overpowered in pvp.

It would allow sword rogues to be slightly superior in tank and spank fights where melee sticks on the target while making mutilate strong in hit and run encounters.

I think you got it totally wrong here. My point was that 4x/0/x Mutilate is dependant of Ruthlessness, which afterall, is just 60% chance effect. Without Ruthlessness proc you aren't able to run 5s/5r cycle without one dropping. If there would be chance to put 5/5 in Ruthlessness and gain 100% chance for CP, it would be possible to get near 100% SnD Rupture uptime without Imp. SnD talent considering 45-50% base crit + PW.

By going Subtlety instead of Combat, no one would consider Setup or Initiative as "good" talents for PvE, Serrated Blades is the thing that you are after in Subtlety. When you take in account ~9second cycles (5s/5r) Serrated Blades really start to shine because high Rupture uptimes. This is of course, if Ruthlessness would be 100% chance somehow to allow 1 Mutilate -> Finisher cycles all the time. At this moment it's not possible because your cycles will drop with 60% Ruth. + no Imp. SnD.

Ok, sorry I misread your first statement then and took it to mean you wanted to find a specc without ruthlesness, not that you wish they would change ruthlessness to mean 100% instead of 60%. Obviously, if they changed ruthlessness somehow to give 100% procc of a CP, then with seal fate and the increased mut crit % chance with the proposed puncturing wounds change, Mut rogues might be able to keep SnD running more often with the likelihood of extra CPs. I still think if we assumed 100% ruthlessness procc and that SnD/rupture cycles wouldn't drop, that the dmg increase by serrated blades and rupture wouldn't outdo duel wield and precision white dmg.. but the limited math estimates I'm thinking are not by any means accurate. Someone with better math would have to work that one out.

And, without knowing the answer for certain here, even if 4x/0/x specc came closer to the dps that 41/20/0 did, it might still not be worth it at this point given that Mut specc is still noticeably enough behind combat at this time. Though puncturing wounds might bring that a little closer? Of course, I haven't heard even rumors that they are planning on changing the %chance procc to ruthlessness...

If I remember correctly they +10% damage applies to the whole rupture duration. So the only thing that matters is using rupture while FW is up, you don't have to keep it 16 sec.

Just because I hadn't seen it elsewhere: Would Eviscerate make more sense than Rupture on RoS during deaden in that case then?

I'd imagine you would need to pop a rupture less than halfway through a deaden in order for it to compare to the damage a doubled Evisc can bring.

First of all, I apologize if this was mentioned somewhere before, in this post or elsewhere, I'm cirrently at Uni and can't really read through everything and I need to know fast.

Due to PTR buff to Mutilate I'm interested if anyone has any theorycraft on new Muti dmg, or should I say will it overcome or be on par with combat swords. Simply asking cause I still have time (I think) to swap my newly acquired vengeful swords with daggers by GM, but that's not such a big issue as is my curiosity about significance of this buff to Mutilate damage.

If anyone has any info on this it would be greatly appriciated, because I love playing Mutilate, but damage comes first in raiding

p.s.

soon i will have access to ashtongue talisman of lethality, if that makes any difference gear wise on new Mutilate.

That trinket is one of the best (the best?) for Muti far as I recall, it's a huge solid crit boost.

I have been drooling over the new 2.4 badge daggers, considering saving my badges for the MH but being in a new to T6 guild I doubt I will due to access to stuff like Boundless Agony or Shard of Azzinoth eventually...it just looks purdy!

Is Hourglass still viable for someone who didn't get the Tsunami for Muti?

Hi there!
I've been reading this forum for a long time now, but never really wrote anything yet.

As there are changes upcoming to the assassination tree, i was wondering a bit about what could be the new talents there in the 2nd expansion, as there are no info about that.
We'll get 10 new talents points to spend, paying with the DPS spreadsheet i put those points into opp and dagger spec and i gained 134dps, which is about +10% in my gear now. I don't think the assa tree could get a new instant attack, so some very strong passive talents should come to be worth points spendig there. What do you think?

The value of Serrated Blades is, of course, dependent on boss armor, boss debuffs, and how much armor penetration you have on your gear. It gets better and better as you move towards zero armor, at least until you cap out.

Basically, the differences between Sub Mutilate and Combat Mutilate are:
Serrated Blades + Opportunity vs. Dual Wield Spec (for yellow damage)
Serrated Blades vs. Dual Wield Spec + Precision (for white damage)

(Improved SnD is in the mix too, but it mostly just provides for easier finisher rotations. It should be possible, with Imp. SnD, to run a 5s/5r/4-5e or similar rotation without SnD dropping, or to run a 3s/5r. However, it's possible to pull off a decent rotation without it as well so it isn't strictly necessary.)

So, let's look at the differences. Opportunity is slightly superior to DW Spec in terms of just Mutilate damage (1.8 vs. 1.75, assuming equal damage weapons). Serrated Blades is 8*70 = 560 armor penn. For a typical boss mob, this is a ~5% boost to damage that is mitigated by armor (but the value can vary widely depending on gearing, etc, as stated above). DW Spec, in terms of white damage, gives a (1.75-1.5)/1.5 = 16.67% white damage increase, again assuming equal range weapons in both hands.

Most Mutilate parses I've seen have something like 85-90% of their damage being Mutilate and white damage; the Mutilate portion being ~25% or so. So

Combat
+16.67% increase to 85% of your damage (white and Mutilate)
+5% hit (call it a ~+5% increase to 60% of your damage)
0.1667*0.85 + 0.05*0.60 = ~17% increase overall

Subtlety
+~5% increase to 85% of your damage (white and Mutilate)
+20% increase to 25% of your damage (Mutilate)
+30% increase to 10% of your damage (Rupture, being generous)
0.05*0.85 + 0.20*0.25 + 0.30*0.10 = ~12% increase overall

The math is rough, but the difference is large enough to favor combat by a good bit. Which is a pity, as I really like the concept of the Serrated Blades talent. But DW Spec is still just too good to pass up.

Not really on topic; there are better threads out there for speculation like this.

From everything I have been reading here and in Roguecraft 101, I would say that the puncturing wounds change will bring Mutilate to a roughly equivalant spot with Combat Daggers, but only against poisonable mobs. It will not out-dps combat swords still. Currently, combat swords still is the top dps specc for rogues at equivalant gear levels. However, combat daggers is only marginally behind that (i believe the numbers posted are about -3% dps) and if the addition of puncturing wounds and change to certain mobs being now affected by bleed effects or poisons works out as predicted, it will bring mutilate specc more closely in line with combat daggers.

For pvp, I think these changes will certainly make Mut speccs even more deadly with the puncturing wounds talent and daggers would be something you would want to seriously consider. For pve- if your goal is to remain at the maximum damage output you can as a rogue, then you will want to keep your swords. I believe most of us here discussing this are interested in adding a more fun, "roguey", and/or challenging playstyle to the class with the understanding we are giving up a little dps for that. Though this change to the tree makes me optimistic that after a year of rogues asking for options for pve speccs, perhaps Blizzard is starting to listen and we might see more changes that will make a Mut specc on par with combat swords in future patches. Hopefully this answers your question on whether to keep your swords or change to daggers.

Mutilate also gains edge if the fight is mobile/interrupted enough. I would also give some points for QR, even thought it doesn't exactly increase DPS output, but if the difference is small enough between two specs I'd prefer lower DPS and gain QR+FF. I don't have any idea what type fights there are in Sunwell so this remains questioned.

Most of the time my damage spreading was 35-40% Mutilate damage, 45-50% white damage with 43/0/18 spec if anyone wants to know.

While we're here, what are these 2 extra points everyone puts in Assassination to go 43/0/18 instead of 41/0/20? Are they just arbitrary fillers, or is there something vital that I'm missing?

For PvE few more poison talents which probably increases damage more than Elusiveness. No big deal thought. For PvP it's up to personal preference between Imp. EA, Elusiveness, Master Poisoner or Imp. KS and so on.

My example I would probably go with this type, it feels and looks "complete". You could always divide 5/5 VP to 3/5 and 2/5 VP IP. One would say that second point in Master Poisoner is waste but I don't like looking 1/2 talents if you know the point + poison resistance is always nice utility.

Probably more optimal one

I'm not seeing anything past Serrated Blades in Subtlety that adds to damage and allows for Mutilate, so that's only 18 there. Meanwhile, with 41 in Assassination you're still missing some points of damage (typically Instant Poisons, which isn't much but it's still there), not to mention a few pieces of utility that you may have skipped.

Yea that's what I figured. Like Ekval, I just like having talents filled out rather than 1/2 here, 3/5 there, and 4/5 over there, so I was always more inclined to just fill out 5/5 Camo than to put the rest into Assassination.

Thanks guys!

It is true that MoD is mainly for PvP. As I see it, it is better to just Mutilate from stealth rather than Ambush, so Imp. Ambush goes totally waste. I never Feint either so SoH isn't that useful and same goes for Initiate which utterly crap in both PvP and PvE for 3 talent points (for Mutilate that is). After all the decision doesn't change your DPS at all whatever Subtlety filler you pick, I just prefer MoD over anything else outside raids.

On top of all that, you already have an improved opener from Opportunity (Garrote). If you insist on using Stealth in a raid, that's your opener of choice.

Thanks for reply and tbh i expected an answer somewhere in those lines

Atm, I will stay combat simply to stay at top, but I will probably switch to muti when my guild gets whole BT on farm (currently only 3 bosses left ^^) simply cause I too see it as a much more fun specc ,and seriously hoping it might become even main pve specc in wotlk (a rogue can dream, right)

So does Rogue Talents sound like a good spec for trying out 2.4 mutilate based on Left's calculations?

I think the real argument is how much gear you're willing to sacrifice to gather that +5 percent hit rating that is native to combat spec adversed to serrated blades. Plus, opportunity could be wasted largely due to a moving boss (Sadly, I can't think of any raid bosses where this would cause a huge problem save for Vashj and maybe Essence of Souls).

I think it's well worthwhile to pick up quick recovery instead of 2/5 Imp Poisons, but yes, that's essentially what the 2.4 41/20/0 Mut build looks like.