I just tried to check this using actual data.

First I took pf's spreadsheet and created two templates, one using the very best gear in the game, and one using only gear that can be obtained with a group of 10 or less players (UBRS and below). The estimated DPS of the very best gear was approximately 50% above the UBRS-blue DPS.

Then I took a regular character planner and did the same with mage gear, once only UBRS blues, once the very best gear in the game, both for a 2/46/3 fire spec tweaked for maximum DPS. With the resulting values for Intelligence, spelldamage, spellhit and spellcrit I calculated the average damage a fireball would do, and the very best gear got approximately 50% more than the UBRS blues in this case as well.

So rogue gear dependency is not worse than caster gear dependency. Which is actually a good thing in my opinion.

First of all though, I was comparing rogue scaleability with gear compared to casters.

And yes, rogues do not scale as well as warriors, but we DO scale better than casters. That was my point.

The rest of my optimism comes not from how I think it will be at 70, but from faith in the fact that if it turns out rogues are a broken class* we will be fixed.

*By broken I mean we ARE a one trick pony. Point us at the beastie and all we do is stab it till it drops. Other classes have buffs, utility and crown control. So we SHOULD be the top DPSers when similarly geared to others.

And all the "omg I'm level 70 and I suck" threads that I saw came from people who just hit 70 and compared themselves to casters in instances. Well of course when you just ding 70 casters will out DPS you. I am just trying to get across that once you start upping your gear, that gap closes, and leave the rest to blizzard to fix and we will be in a comfortable position again.

Its not mindless or unbased optimism. You just CANNOT create a class (rogues) and then make us worse at everything than everyone else, it WILL be balanced.


p.s. i do not mean to imply that someone has insulted me and said I shout cut out the mindless optimism =). I am simply stating that if rogues are poor DPs at 70, we will get buffs. Not even the Devs can REALLY know how rogues will compare to other classes at 70 with raid gear when we are at that stage. A lot is still going to change before the general population is once again raid ready.


*edit*
This is to reply to the guy above =). In PvE its all about sustainability, and as a rogue I can keep my damage constant throughout a fight np, while mages need to stop to regen mana etc. especially if AEing. It is not accurate to look at one attack or one fireball and compare the upped DPS % but instead to look at sustainability in a 5minute or so fight. don't forget fire mages pull aggro a lot as well =) thats more downtime for ya (but maybe the new invisibility will help this.)

Put it this way, when I joined my old guild, I was in blues. My gf also joined and she wa sin blues. My rogues DPS increased dramatically with gear (now T2.5 or so) and while my GFs DPS increased, it no where near increased to the point my rogues did. Even as a SF rogue I held my own well (top5 DPS), as combat I was almost always top of the meter.

I guess I just keep repeating myself =) but I am just sure that in the end a well played rogue specced for PvE DPS will out damage people just as we do now (usually =). Be it fixes in gear, or talents, or whatever.

I just hate to see so many people quitting their rogues because they are convinced they will be more efficient as a DPs shaman or a mage as they bring utility AND DPS.

And one last thing, test the DPs increases (not damage increases =) with specific Tiers of armour, not "the very best in the game". Not sur eif your results would be different, but check the increases for rogues/mages when they use T1 over blues, then T2 then T3. I;d be curious as to the results.

Sorry to nit-pick, but have you actually done Patchwerk (arguably the best sustained DPS Boss level test) since the +skill change? we aren't actually aren't outdps'ing most other competent DPS players currently, and it's not that I'm just bad or anything the sustained DPS thread on these forums show's the trend pretty well. So surely you mean, in the end rogue's may do as much DPS as we once did?

As ever, don't mis-understand I don't want to portray a directly negative imagine of the class, I just don't feel the PvE aspect is as strong as previously, and for me even the "ZOMG BIG NUMBERZ" wasn't really enough to make me really enjoy raiding as a rogue. Personal preference ofcourse.

The sustainability of a mages fireball spam does not get worse as gear improves. If anything it becomes better.

And if a mage is casting fireballs 80% of the time and wanding 20% of the time to regenerate mana, and all of a sudden his fireballs hit 50% harder, his DPS will go up by 50%.

Not to get into the argument but no 50% over 80% is 40% of total not 50%...

0.5 * 0.8
----------- = 0.5
0.8

The 80% are the total, since before the increase the mage was only casting fireballs 80% of the time as well.

So if I understand what you're trying to say 80% of all damage is the total of all damage...

I knew there was a reason I didn't want to get into this.

If you can only sustain fireball spam for 80% of the time (which while using max-consumables isn't true as any mage on these boards will tell you) and have to wand 20% of the time your increase in damage will be 50% more damage over 80% of the time, resulting in an unknown % increase in dps (since your wand damage is an unknown).

Had you said the mage would sit still and do nothing for the remaining 20% of the time you'd be right, my initial response was hasty at any rate.

Regardless a mage who doesn't dps for 20% of the time is no threat to any rogue on any damage meter and the point where this assumption was made the discussion took a nosedive.

I did not do Patchwerk since the +weapon skill hit. So ty for that info =).


Put it this way, bottom line is I believe rogues will be brought up to par once/if it is discovered that at lvl 70 we get out DPS'd on every PvE fight by other classes with more CC ability. To not do so would mean rogues are a totally broken class and a waste of a raid slot.

Therefore I will stick to my rogue, as regardless of how it seems at first, I know we will only be improved and brought up to par with other DPS classes.

So everyone switching to caster alts, I say do it ONLY if you find it more FUN to play, regardless of relative power at the moment.

Oh, and using "max consumables" totally makes a test irrelevant as a Mage gains INSANE extra stats from using Major mana, Runes and mp5 food/oils etc. Check the consumable thread for more info on that. I am refering purely to gear.




*edit*
My main concern is that rogues will become top DPS due to every other DPS class having other jobs to perform. I.E. the hunter drops a bit of DPS as he uses misdirection/traps etc, mages lose some DPS as they babysit a sheep etc. Blizz might point to these fights and say see! rogues are fine! I still think this would be a bit dumb, even for them. So have faith, rogues WILL do their jobs and do it well =)

Hmm for patchwerk I was easely top 1 or 2 in the past 3 patchwerk fights since 2.0 with 11/40/0 4/9 T3 GM sword + iblis, we did not have very geared warlocks(which even though they had at most one or two pieces of T3 and mostly T2 some of them reached top5) since most of our geared members with 6+ T3 went on a break before TBC but a very geared hunter(6-7 pieces of T3) still was under me, though instead of 10-20 was now like top 3 easely. Mages also were high but since they cant ride ignites now they were all around the same dmg area of like rank 3-7

Anyway, I think that with the difference of % dmg reduction from raid mobs armor in TBC being higher, according to another thread it will be around 20% reduction, is another great factor as to why maybe most L70 rogues had a lower damage output compared to other classes. Maybe this will be fixed and blizzard will upp the armor reduction from sunder/FF/CoR in time...

I wouldnt say combat builds are totally nerfed. I spec'd combat daggers for our final Naxx run. Ididnt do too bad.


Rogue - Me, combat dagger fang/bqp 7/9 t3
Fire mage
Fire mage I think the mages were grouped, as Dalien has Atiesh
Fire mage
Combat swords rogue aqr/thundefury
Fire mage
Fire mage
Hunter

On that run, I picked up a kingsfall, and am now back to a 42/2/7 mut build to lvl, with imp sap and imp sin strike. I was happy to see an 800+ dps patch run, and was happy to see myself taking the top dps spot. But, this doesnt totally restore my faith in rogues at 70. I really do think that we will see some fixes for an underwheming lvl 70 skill, and quite underwhelming 41 point talents, aside from Mut. I just am worried its 3-4 months off for said fixes.

I've never really understood where people get this from. I've done the formulas before and the only things that truely outscaled rogues were warriors with Heroic strike/hamstring spam, and the old ignite mechanic. Both of those 2 things have been nerfed. Considering rogues will be given better itemization than they have seen in the past, as well as a gaining a higher % of dmg from every stat in tbc due to new talents, I really dont see it changing.

The simple fact is that most classes damage scale very similarly. The problem with this is that as you scale, the % of damage you do more than the mage next to you shrinks. Assume you do 50 more dps than a mage in ubrs gear. You start out at 550 dps to their 500, then when you get full t3 gear, you do 1000 dps and the mage does 950 dps. You scaled identically, but the % difference in damage is cut in half.

Blizzard tries hard to make all classes scale very similarly. This is where the problem lies, they are afraid to let rogues scale better than other classes. Look at some recent changes, ignite, rage... 40 debuff slots, oh crap, locks/priests are doing to much with dots now, dot nerf.

I'm happy with my rogue because I still hover in the top dps, we do very well in end-game content, and I play with friends.

Skill nerf, not-so-scaling gear, all that jazz aside - I'm very pleased with the rogue class and don't find it "broken." If Blizzard wants to change the class, fine, I won't complain. I will just work with what I have. It is still a game and I enjoy working with the changes Blizz tosses at us rather than keeping the same build. I wasn't having fun being #1 on the charts by a huge margin through every Naxx fight with the same boring build. I like being trounced in DPS because it causes friendly competition to try and beat the top mages now.

All in all, and having played well into 70 in beta, I think things will come out just fine. I had quite a few 70 epics on my rogue and versus equally geared mages, was still coming out on top with a tried-and-true 15/41/5 build.

Wodah's + Natrozim,

http://forums.elitistjerks.com/viewt...p?id=7331&p=57
http://forums.elitistjerks.com/viewt...p?id=7331&p=58

That's the sort of page range for the +skill DPS. I also said a trend, now that mean's a pattern ie. some consistancy. I'll not derail the thread further because it's moving away from the point but the thread's answer your comment's concerning the earlier ones I made quite well.

Not all spells gain 100% of the +dmg so its not quite +1dmg on an item equalling +1 dmg to spells.

Although I've kicked around the idea a bit, I won't be rerolling. Basically it came down to a few points.

First, I actually do enjoy playing my rogue a lot. I completely agree that they need a lot of work to bring them up to par for utility in the new, smaller raids, but I have faith that Blizzard will take care of that eventually. Look at Hunters, Warlocks, Druids, Paladins, & Shamans... they all complained about being one-trick ponies (and mediocre at that one trick too), and Blizzard listened.

Second, I've always loved playing a combat sword/fist spec. Now that it is the definitively best raid DPS spec, I'm in hog heaven.

Third, while doing mostly just SS/SnD/Evis raiding *IS* pretty boring, and combat didn't get any flashy new ability, there are lots of other little things we have to do while raiding. And perhaps more importantly, playing another DPS class certainly is no less boring. A reroll would just produce temporary novelty.

I think this is just one of those low points where we have to tough it out until Blizzard gets the time and feedback to address our serious raiding concerns.

I wasnt saying rogues werent nerfed/messed up/devs confused atm, I was just showing the light in the dark times, shining down on me the other night (haha) after being a bit depressed on the current state of rogues at 60 and 70.

First off: rogues are *not* particularly gear-dependent. Nor are we particularly gear-independent. We scale similarly with gear to other classes; warriors had been the exception to this rule, but that's mostly fixed now it seems.

Second off: gear won't fix us. Part of the reason it did fix us in the past is because caster itemization was initially very poor (stats rather than damage); the shift in caster itemization, the DPS->+damage conversion, everything, has contributed to casters scaling just as well off gear as melee does. The more you look into the way Blizzard's itemization formulas function, the more you realize that those values are *not* random; one ilevel applied to one person's gear will usually produce a similar increase to one ilevel applied to someone else's gear, even between casters and melee.

Third: I don't want to wait to be fixed, only to be slapped down again. Done that once. No thanks. I have faith Blizzard will eventually do something with rogues, but I no longer have the patience to hang my hopes on it, nor any faith it'll be more than a bandaid fix.

I hit 70. I did 5 mans, and you know, they felt pretty decent; I offtanked, I used sap and blind and gouge and stuns and all my skills. I was feeling kind of hopeful.

Then I remembered I used to do all that shit in 5 mans at 60, and none of it carried through into large group content, not significantly.

Correct, as I said "a mechanic". Mostly dots and heavy nuke spells, but it is there. Also, you have talents that increase critical strike bonuses by 100%, etc. I wasn't saying every one of thier skills/talents reflected these mechanics, I was just pointing out that it's there for the taking.

Who knows, maybe someday down the line we'll get some kind of mechanic like that to make up for the lost damage of glancings from weapon skill.. haha, I made a funny.


edit: also, Kalman has once again typed my thoughts so my brain doesn't have to work. Agreed 100%.

Yeah, I did all that shit at 60 too, then I started raiding, learned about optimal DPS cycles, and the boredom began. Then I played a druid for a while, went on 5-mans, used cat form, bear form, offtanked, healed, did some damage. But when I brought my druid to MC on alt-night, I healbotted. My point is, the larger the group, the more everyone is forced to specialize. Not using the majority of your skills in a raid indicates a problem with the content, not your class, especially since the same problem plagues just about every class to some degree.

That's not to say there's no problems with the rogue class. I would like more raid-usable skills, whether they add damage or other utility. I would like to deal competitive damage. I would like the devs to recognize that melee range and positional requirements are much larger disadvantages than they currently seem to think. But wanting large group content to feel like small group content is much wider than just a rogue problem.

Hell, I don't care if it feels like small group content. I know it won't. But there's no way I can raid feeling as completely replaceable as rogues are at this point. Specialization is fine; I'm all for it. But the point of specialization is to be as effective as possible at your role. And if by specializing I'm *still* not effective enough, then what was the point of being there in the first place?

The point was that the things that make us more than "just DPS" in 5 mans don't carry through to larger group content, while the disadvantages are only intensified. The same does not hold true for other classes.

I haven't raided with enough other classes to know whether that's true. But I think the things that make us more than "just DPS" are mostly geared to short fights (non-reapplicable CC, short-duration stuns, damage frontloading via stealth, etc), and that's the biggest problem with the class in raids, where long encounters are prevalent.

I honestly think the devs could go a long way toward perfecting the rogue if they make Stealth usable in combat as long as you haven't taken direct damage or received a single-target debuff in the past N seconds (best approximation I can come up with for the idea that no one is "paying attention to you," allowing a restealth). Stealth is the key to much of our CC effectiveness, so letting it be widely used in raids gives us raid utility as viable CCers. And for some builds, frequent restealthing would be a nice damage boost too. Kill two birds with one stone. Of course that means it'll never happen, right? :)

I absolutely agree. In fact, that was one of my three suggestions on page 114 (although my condition was "if no hostile you are in combat with is currently targetting you" and it had a cooldown of 30-45 sec.) I tried pushing them for a day on the official forums, but it's just depressing trying to support something when you know nobody is reading it. I honestly don't know what to expect out of the rogue community as a whole. They bump 15 troll threads whining about shadow step or cloak of shadows into 8-page monsters while letting serious suggestions about class issues fall off the front page.