One thing to bear in mind about the 41/20/0 Mutilate variant is that you can dump Netherblade pieces much sooner than if you were 41/0/20 due to the set bonus being next to worthless when you already have Improved Slice and Dice. In fact this talent alone means you can keep up a 2-3s/4-5r cycle with ease, even throwing in the odd Eviscerate or Envenom when you get a chain of lucky Ruthlessness/SF procs. I definitely found this cycle better than trying to maintain a 5s/4-5r/4-5e cycle, not least because rupture is higher damage per energy than either evisc or envenom, but also because the shorter your cycle the easier it is to maintain.

With 43/0/18 my guess is that you have to run 4-5s/4-5r which takes longer and is more susceptible to being interrupted by chains of bad luck with procs (basically you have quite some slack with 41/20/0 build and its 2-3s/4-5r cycle).

Hey there, i got a some issues gemming my gear for mutilate use.
Right now i got 4agi/4hit gems in all my sockets except the yellow (8hit) and blue one (4agi/6stam) on my Netherblade Chestpiece and the blue one (10ap/6stam) on my Nynjah's Tabi Boots.
I tried a red sockets 8agi / yellow sockets 4agi/4hit setup in the DPS-Spreadsheet but the results kinda suprised my being just a ~5-6dps difference to my old setup. So what do you think would be the best choice for a rogue just entering the t6-layer instances (no bt-gems)? crit/ap? agi? something else?

For Imp. Snd thingy: I don't like to throw in odd Eviscerates or Envenoms due I think they are waste of CP's/energy most of the time (atleast Eviscerate and probably Envenom also even with 5/5 VP). If you run 2-3s/4-5r/4-5evi cycle then your Rupture uptime is lower than my spec (if I didn't think this totally wrong). With 43/0/18 the only working cycle is probably the 4-5s/4-5r like you said, and that is the cycle I want to have also. It maximizes my RS + T6 trinket uptime and allows really high uptimes for trinket and Rupture.

To maintain 4-5s/4-5r cycle without Imp. Snd, yes, it requires quite alot crit to work smoothly, but once you got it there it is awesome (Bok + Lotp in raid situations help alot). I can do 4-5s/4-5r cycle in about 20seconds, meaning I refresh Snd in ~10second then another ~10second to refresh Rupture. This way I can keep FindWeakness + T6 trinket + Rupture up all the time. Only thing that really can mess things up is bad Ruthlessness procs many times in row, I wish I could get it to 100% talent or so :P . There might be better cycles for this build, who knows, maybe some more clever one will find them out sooner or later.

Glad I found this thread, interesting stuff. I've been testing out 41/20 after saving boundless agony from the disenchanter and had some pleasing results. At this point I have no hard stats, only some early observations (from a 4/5mh+4/9bt perspective). We have a fairly melee heavy group, but low on shamans. At teron, I put myself into a tank group that included a feral druid and was surprised that I appeared to remain competitive with combat rogues that had the benefit of windfury.

Interesting observation earlier in this thread that crit is to mutilate as hit is to 41 combat, in that more crit =~ more finishers =~ more returns from relentless strikes. The experience I've had with mutilate is that it "shines" when you get well over 30% crit. The chains of finisher->crit mut->finisher feel great. I wonder how if the math supports this?

The other (possibly dumb) question I had is how armor penetration works for the mutilate attack itself. Does the fact that mutilate is 2 separate attacks change the benefit that it receives from armor pen?

Exactly the thread I was looking for, excellent.

After being Combat swords for while, I feel the need for a different playstyle. Unfortunately all my gear is socketed for Combat, and regemming is out of question at the moment, so I'll probably won't reach the 30% crit threashold, but Fang of Vashj and Tracker's Blade are two excellent weapons that should somewhat overcome this lack.
Thanks for all the great information, keep it up.
I still haven't made my mind up about double Mongoose or Exectutioner/Mongoose for MH/OH. Numbers seem to favour the latter, but do you guys suggest?

Well if you're lacking crit, wouldn't having that extra Mongoose prove more useful?

I know direct comparisons are tough, but by most appearances your WWS and Nishelin's WWS appear to use relatively similar gear and group setups, but his dps is a good bit higher than yours. I don't really get what turns you off from the combat tree, since there doesn't seem to be any difference in playstyle between combat mutilate and sub mutilate. There does however seem to be a decent difference in damage, although I guess it depends on what you're willing to tolerate.

I know I surprised the other rogues in my raid this week when I beat them using a "subpar" spec and remained competitive even when I wasn't top, however, I realize that the math just doesn't work out vs. combat swords, so I'd like to maximize the build within what I can do if I'm going to stick with it. If I'm already taking a ~4% dps hit on the pure sustained fights like Gorefiend, I'd rather not augment that further. By both log evidence, personal observation, and just looking at the spreadsheet (obviously SF model is flawed, but changing combat and sub talents makes for an easy enough comparison) combat mutilate gives at least a 5% damage boost over sub, maybe more, for what as far as I can see is the same playstyle.

As for dagger choice, I would assume Tracker's is superior for either variation. Better poison application/maintenance, similar stat contribution, and for Sub mutilate the OH penalty is larger anyway, lessening the contribution of the increased damage range on the Mutilator. I'd imagine there isn't a huge difference though.

While on the topic of Seal Fate modeling, it has been drastically improved. The overall DPS for Seal Fate is in the correct ballpark now. Just because in some extreme instances, clicking Imp SnD on might give slight negatives to DPS, doesn't mean it's a Seal Fate issue.

The sheet models specific cycles and calculates the dps for each of these and chooses the highest. It's more likely an issue that Imp SnD changes the base cycle length in such a way that your best cycle ends up in-between two modeled cycles, thus making the best cycle it finds lower dps than when your optimum cycle closely matched the modeled cycle.

In short, I wouldn't necessarily call the current SF model obviously flawed. In the past, I've noted a similar phenomenon when enabling the Nightblade 4-piece bonus with a Combat Swords build in some circumstances. The recommended cycle dropped overall buffed dps by 6 just from turning on the bonus. (I had done this without changing gear to assess the value of the 4-piece bonus by itself.)

Ah, I wasn't aware of the change. That's good to know. Is there a way within the sheet to force other cycles than the one it chooses for me, 3-4s/5r? I'm not sure this seems like the best cycle for mutilate especially with Ashtongue.

As of right now there is no way to force a cycle, nor would you really want to from how I understand the calculations work. The cycle DPS (yellow DPS + additional white DPS from SnD) is added directly onto the base white DPS. The extra damage from weapon enchants and extra attacks (sword spec/night blade) is added on top of that given the information from the cycle. Thus if you were to edit the spreadsheet to pull data from a different cycle, you'd lose even more DPS. You might try to see what happens if you disable weapon enchants and anything else that isn't calculated in the cycle and see if that's the source of the lost DPS, but my thought is that the Mutilate cycle module is just a bit inaccurate. The only solution would be to write a better one yourself.

Clearly something is obviously flawed then, since at worst the act of taking the Improved Slice and Dice talent or a set bonus will add zero dps to an otherwise sustainable cycle. The sheet should only change the recommended optimal cycle if it genuinely finds a better one.

Just throwing an idea out there since I don't really understand how the sheet works but is it possible that it is not considering all the cycles when certain talents/bonuses are turned on because it flat out assumes they will be worse than certain other cycles?

Basically, something just doesn't seem right when the suggested cycle changes to one that is clearly worse than the one it was suggesting 2 clicks ago.

I wouldn't call it "obviously flawed". The issue is this...
Let's say for example the spreadsheet is recommending a 3-4s/5r Mutilate cycle. It's doing this by deciding that the average DPS (and energy regen) will give a better DPS for 3-4s/5r than 2-3s/5r or 3-4s/4-5r or whatever combo you are talking about. Now the truth of the matter might be that what you really want to do is run a 3-4s/5r BUT 25% of time if you go 4-5s/5r instead, you will eke out a few more dps.

Now, lets say you add or take away SnD time with Imp SnD. Let's say your 3-4s/5r normally goes 17 sec (just making up a number for illustrative purposes). Now you add a point in Imp SnD and the same cycle now has a duration of 20 sec. The DPS for this same cycle goes down with a point of Imp SnD because in the first example you have a 5-pt Rupture every 17 seconds, but with Imp SnD you have a 5-pt Rupture every 20 secs.

So, the sheet might suggest you drop down to a 2-3s/5r that might go 18 seconds with your Imp SnD. But this cycle only gives a 5-pt Rupture every 18 seconds. Which is less DPS than the other cycle without it. The other option being a 1-2s/5r which is even worse.

In both cases, the spreadsheet is choosing the best possible single cycle one could use with the best possible DPS, but because of variances in how far between the various single cycle options you have, your DPS could actually go down with a skill that at the very least should seem to give the same DPS.

Now, one could simulate the original 3-4s/5r cycle by always cutting the cycle at 17 seconds and getting the same DPS, but that is not how the cycles are determined. The cycles are currently written to either run to the end of your SnD time or to be cut off when you have achieved all the combo points you need. There is no consideration of cycles that are "3-4s/5r cut 1.7 seconds before the end". Now, maybe thats a better cycle, maybe one could model that, but for all intents and purposes, for a measly few DPS difference, it's a lot of extra modeling. And really for what exactly?

So, the short story is that you might experience small DPS discrepancies as the cycles change with a change in talents, but they are explainable. These small DPS changes do not make a cycle be "clearly worse", in fact the spreadsheet thinks that the "clearly worse" cycle is the best for that talent combination. The other thing is that they are not necessarily indicative of an error in the cycles either. But I can tell you one thing, if the sheet is showing a negative change or a very very small DPS gain from Imp SnD, it tells me maybe your talent points are better spent elsewhere.

I'm not saying there might not be other small errors somewhere, but it seems to me, the current DPS estimates seem in-line with current empirical Mutilate results now that the big Seal Fate bug was resolved.

I've started work on a Mutilate-modeling program, and, in order to do so, there's some info I need from you fine people.

What cycle/cycles are most often used/most popular/whatever these days? I haven't played Mutilate in ages, so I'm not sure what the consensus on the optimal cycle (or, at least, decision making process) is these days. Is it still 4+ finishers with priority on keeping SnD/Rupture up? Or is there something else that's taken over?

Personally, I refresh Slice and Dice whenever its down, no matter the available combo points. Rupture with 4+ combo points, waiting for the last one to run out if possible without energy overflowing. Eviscerate/Envenom only with 4+ if there's nothing else to do.

I have yet to calculate whether 'chaining' Find Weakness is worth it over keeping up Slice and Dice and Rupture as much as possible.

On another note, the simulated numbers I posted a few pages back are wrong. Thanks to Latito for pointing out a few mistakes and making useful suggestions. The biggest flaw was in calculating critical damage of white attacks: apparently they did triple damage instead of double. The new baseline dps is 1759. This should be more in line with expected values. I'll post again later when I've reworked the decision making to find more optimal cycles

Most people tend to be using 2-4s/4-5r, although optimal cycle could change drastically just based on having ATL trinket. Buffed crit rate I'm sure plays into optimal cycles, however you can't ever have a real "use this cycle" system for Mut due to its random nature with Seal Fate. Likely you'll just need to put in some rules that make sure SnD is kept up for sure, Rupture as much as possible. If you are running dry on CP, rupture uptime suffers before SnD. If you are getting a really lucky streak, have say 10+ seconds left on SnD, rupture ticking and 4+ CP.. use an Evis or something. It will likely take some tuning and more of a ruleset than a set cycle.

I'm still working on my Sim but its progressing slowly due to not putting tons of hours into it. I'm working on modeling all talents (which relate to dps) and all 4 primary "spam" attacks, using an Event based model and keeping it highly flexible to add in plug'n'play type stuff for other classes. Its turning into more of a "design and build my own large project" than a quick and dirty simulator. Either way, when its done it should provide accurate answers for nearly every spec possible. Still open to help on a GUI - I have an interface now for setting gear, talents, etc. to work with.

If, say, a 3-4s/5r cycle is optimal without Improved Slice and Dice and generates, say, 1000dps then the absolute minimum that the same build but including Improved Slice and Dice is the same 3-4s/5r cycle generating the same 1000dps but with a Slice and Dice cut. It doesn't matter if you can go another 45% of the time without refreshing SnD. If the highest dps you can do is by cutting SnD then the sheet should be recommending that.

The fact that the sheet recommends a clearly sub-optimal cycle when adding Improved Slice and Dice demonstrates that something, somewhere, is not working as it should. It's obvious that there is a flaw - ergo, it is obviously flawed. It may not be dramatically flawed or majorly flawed but it is obvious.

Don't get me wrong - I think the work done on the sheet goes far beyond the call of duty, and I'm extremely greatful for it. But on these forums of all places we need to be completely opbjective about things and there is clearly something wrong with the way the sheet recommends optimum cycles. It may only become apparant when dealing with builds including Seal Fate but it's something that does need addressing since it's possible it affects all proc-reliant cycles (IE Ruthlessness in particular). Hell, this issue may not even be something that can be fixed in a spreadsheet format, as Garak pointed out (and as can be seen by the attempts being made at a separate Mutilate modelling program).

This is the obvious flaw - the sheet should be able to recommend an SnD cut as it does for Combat cycles - and if it doesn't now then it certainly used to because I remember people posting asking what the sheet meant when it told them to cut SnD.

For accuracy. How can I ever trust that the sheet is giving me the optimal cycle if it gives results like this? I know that it generally does but when you sit there and claim that nothing is wrong when something like this happens it starts to feel like blue posts at the Blizzard forums telling us things are working as intended when they're quite clearly broken. I come here to get away from that and for genuine objectivity. We may only be talking about 1-2% dps differences but that can be the difference between a 'viable' build and a 'non-viable' build.

I think you may be right - it's probably not worth taking the time to write something that checks against untalented versions of the same build, but a small note somewhere on the sheet explaining the problem should be enough to at least make people aware of the issue and suggest to them that they adapt their cycles accordingly.

Entering the same gear and buffs into DMM's spreadsheet, Mutilate gives about 1734 dps. That's only 1.4% difference from my simulation (1759). Pretty accurate, I'd say. The spreadsheet is most likely good enough to help with gearing choices.

Edit: Savagery/Infamy combat swords with otherwise the same gear and buffs give 1941 dps according to the spreadsheet.

Any calculations what to do when you end up with 3CP? Mutilate once more to archive 5CP and therefore gain RS+T6 trinket or just finish with 3CP while FindWeakness is still up? I bet if you are going to refresh SnD its better to go for 5CP and waste FW rather than finishing with 3CP, but what about Rupture?

If I remember correctly, the dps gained from using a 3 pt to 5 pt rupture isn't that huge, so if you can get the 3 pt in under FW, I'd say go for it. Ashtongue trinket changes this a little bit, but probably not enough to matter. Obviously if you're refreshing SnD go for 5 pts.

Ah yeah I was wondering about this but was too lazy to do the math (plus I'm not sure exactly how it all works):

Is 3 point Rupture with FW more or less damage than 5 point Rupture without FW?


I've been playing Mutilate from the moment I could get the talent and I'm only now starting to get the hang of a proper cycle.

Since I am at a relatively low gear level compared to most of the posters here, I was really hesitant to post at all. But I've been scumming on this thread for while now, since this topic comes up over and over again in my game play.

First of all I'd like to point out a small tendency to lump both combat daggers and combat swords into the same category and then make the assumption that combat>mutilate based on comparing the numbers between a sword build and a mutilate build.

Since the OP was specifically questioning dagger builds then it seems to me that comparing Mutilate to a sword build is a bit off topic. From the math I've looked at sword builds in general have a distinct advantage and this isn't really something that is being questioned by the OP. Hence the question becomes what is the diff between Mutilate and Combat Daggers.

I've dropped my 41/20 build into the dps spreadsheet, and then a 15/41/5 dagger build. I am simply not seeing the huge difference in numbers that is being spoken of. In fact the Mutilate build is coming out ever so slightly ahead, though the difference is so small its not really worth considering. Of course I pretty much always run with a Feral Druid in party, and that seems to be evening out the Raid dps numbers since I benefit more from the buff in Mutilate than in combat. Perhaps also with upgrades combat will start to out pace Mutilate? I can easily accept this though my quibble with it is that the common assumption is that combat>mutilate at all gear levels.

More importantly though I find that the DPS spreadsheet cannot be a final factor in determining raid build since doesnt it assume uninterrupted dps on a singe target? Now please correct me if I'm wrong but...uninterrupted single target dps boss fights are not the norm. To me the biggest issue with combat daggers is the extremely slow CP generation that leads to what I would call a "delicate" CP cycle that is easily thrown off by difficult complicated fights that require such things as running in and out of melee range, or switching targets and therefore losing combo points.

Let me be clear..I am NOT saying that Mutilate is the better raid build. But I am also not saying that combat daggers is the default best option in all situations. I've played both for significant amounts of time, and it doesn't at all surprise me that the OP is claiming higher dps in Mutilate build. The two builds have very different strengths and will shine in different situations.

Things I have found in the time I have played both builds.
These are simply my observations as someone who has spent a great deal of time playing BOTH specs and isn't just "trying it out for a week or two but really I spec swords". I fully realize that some of it is completely subjective from my experience but I only hope to point out a few things that are often missed when discussing the pro's /cons of the build. I am very curious to see more math/research on the subject, since I am myself terribad at math, but am slightly better at reading it and puzzling through the where's and whats.


1) poison immune bosses = problem. enough has been said about this I don't need to get into it. It is the obvious fly in the soup.


2) In most discussions of Mutilate I see the increased energy gain from Relentless most often ignored. Combat potency is highlighted and many people assume that Relentless Strikes is the same dps gain for both builds. It is not. You will finish more often and therefore gain 25 extra energy more often if you are a Mutilate build. The more seal fate procs the more you can finish. This should be coupled with the fact that VIGOR, the most often ignored talent in the assasination tree, is there to support the use of Find Weakness/Mutilate. In essence it gives you room to breath when timing your Find Weakness buff. For example. You have 5 CP's. You WAIT, until you are at or above 100 energy. You finish. Relentless will take you to a full 110 energy (or 100 + depending on where you were when you finished), allowing you to Mutilate immediatly. You will then drop to 50 energy. 2 seconds later you can Mutilate again dropping you to 10 energy. 6 Seconds later you may mutilate a third time leaving you at 10 energy again. This is 3 Mutilates all on FW in an 8 second period leaving you with 5 CP's and ready to start again. If seal fate or Ruthlessness proc, then you will have 5 CP's after 2 Mutilates, allowing you to use a finisher with find weakness up. (eviscerate if you are in the ideal situation of having time left on both SnD and Rupture,) This cycle is mathematically possible with out VIGOR the first time through, but much harder to maintain as you start to repeat the cycle since things like shiv and the 25/35 energy finishers start to force you to either finish without a full energy bar or wait for a full bar and lose energy on an "uneven tick". Since Vigor is a prerequisite for mutilate you will never need to worry about this, but I do believe its worth understanding WHY you need the talent in order to make the build work.

3) Mutilate out shines other rogue builds in fights that cycle on and off on limited/single targets. for example Prince. The cycle allows for Mutilate to keep a rupture and 5 stack of poison up while running in and out, and maintaining snd whenever in range. I have always done Significantly better damage on that boss in Mutilate build, than I have done in combat daggers. Any fight where combat daggers has to cycle off and on is hard on the build. It's CP cycle is simply too long for it to get much done other than to keep SnD up and on very rare occasion, rupture.

4) Healers will get very excited about the "huge crit heal" they just had. The odds will be high that it was 20 percent bigger than their usual crits and the target was you the Mutilate rogue. Still, even though you die less often no one will ever notice that you are 20% easier to heal, and it will never be discussed as a benefit to any raid. BUT.... adding the passive ability to inflate healer ego's to your spec? ....Priceless.

5) Mutilate SUCKS if you need to switch targets constantly and kill low HP adds (mobs, totems, whatever) . You will be unable to maintain any kind of a cycle and will constantly be struggling to get your SnD back up before the mob dies and you lose the points. In some cases you will barely have time to Mutilate once since the energy cost is so high. And you will be forced to finish before 5 CP's more often then not, making for less energy all around and less energy to use while your FW is up. Of course combat daggers have some of these problems (Backstab costing more than SS) but increased white damage and Cmbt potency will help compensate. For these reasons combat daggers will always have the advantage on the shorter trash pulls and the boss fights where multiple low HP adds are killed. Medium HP adds also favor combat swords and daggers,( for example High King Mulgar, and Moroes) since there is simply less time for the rupture and poisons to tick and its harder to keep FW up with energy bars at max usefulness. Ruthlessness and Relentless will not come into play as often but combat potency will, and you will suffer at that beginning of each new mob, since you will either have to shiv or mutilate with out poisons up.

OK. I've tried to make it as thoughtful as possible. please excuse any mistakes and feel free to point them out. Thank you so much for this thread and this Forum. I was thrilled to find this place where the conversations are in depth and you can actually have a discussion about Raid Mutilate without 500 posts responding "STFU and respec combat you N00B"!!

I did actually get called out on it by a pally "nice to be healing DPS with a built in blessing of light"