Well, I think the key point is this: there will always be a "best" setup at any given gear level - a combination of weapons, armor, and spec that will outDPS any other option. That's inevitable, and that's fine. However, one can't always achieve the ideal gear, so the relevant piece of information is how viable the alternatives are.

For instance, the problem with the current state of balance is that using swords is basically always better than using daggers - even if the daggers are two full tiers of quality higher. In the ideal world, while swords might still be better, if you have a choice between daggers from tier n or swords from tier n-1, you should be better off with the higher-tier weapons.

Now, getting balance right down to this level is of course challenging, and it remains to be seen how well they can pull it off; but I think saying that the ultimate goal is to have the specs be close in overall quality is a fair statement.

I see the question of 2 (or more) viable raid specs differently.

Yes, if our only function is dps, then there will only ever be one best spec. Trying to balance 2 different ways to play the class and result in nearly identical dps for each gear plateau would be a daunting task.

But look at how hunters are talented. If you want to put out the most dps, BM is likely your best bet. If you want to put out good dps, while having nice group buffs that are desirable, then Survival is right for you. 2 specs, both raid viable.

That's what rogues need if they're going to have a choice of competitive specs. Otherwise, your choice is best dps, or a sacrifice for style.

In this game, in its current form, there's always going to be a spec better than the other for PvE DPS as a rogue, period. They'd have to either change weapon specializations or give one of our other trees a highly desirable raid buff, such as Survival for hunters, otherwise scaling will always be the deciding factor.

Other than bad RNG numbers, all those factors are already in my calculations. If you do get a bad string of RNGs and end up without enough energy to continue the cycle, then pool energy, use SnD instead of evis if SnD is lose or just CB the evis and refresh to a 5 stack SnD, and then return with a new pool of energy. You lose FW on at most 1 finisher, which might be SnD anyway, so it doesn't matter, and still should be able to keep your cycle.

If the Armour Penetration Rating system would be set up as a percentage value, would that be what you had in mind? Using simple numbers, having each point of ArP lower a target's "Reduces Physical Damage taken by" .05% would eliminate the increasing returns, and would also help to balance it in pvp between using it on a plate wearing target versus a cloth wearing one.



The 4s5r rotation applies throughout the fight. However, you generally want to get the Slice and Dice buff on yourself as soon as you can in that fight, so dropping a quick one or two point SnD immediately is better than building to your four point SnD first.

Because of the way Eviscerate damage is calculated (x + CP*y + CP*AP*z) the damage loss from using a 3 CP Evis and a 2 CP Evis compared to a 5 CP Evis is less than if you were using Rupture, although it is still a damage loss. However, with more finishers, comes more Ruthlessness procs and you don't have lost CP that you can get with double mutilates, so it is more like comparing two 3 CP Evis's to a 5 CP Evis, or a 3 CP and a 4 CP to a 5 CP at higher crit rates. Plus, FW will be up at least 95% of the time on your Eviscerates compared to less than that (not sure how many exactly) for a 2 mutilate cycle.

It isn't something that can be compared accurately until we get spreadsheets, but it COULD be viable, which means it shouldn't be dismissed just because it doesn't work with the current mechanics. I think that with CttC, TtT, and FA, single mutilate finishers could result in better DPS than double mutilate finishers.

Current SnD/Rupture cycles for mutilate have all mutilates and rupture benefit from FW and keep SnD up at all times. Trying to expand that cycle to work with CttC starts running into problems due to issues with energy pooling. Therefore moving to a single mutilate cycle costs a bit more energy due to finishers, but also allows everything to be done under FW.

The real issue comes when adding in HfB, as that definitely hurts the cycle due to energy issues. When I did my calculations several pages back, HfB barely resulted in more DPS. However, it would be better DPS if you weren't spending as much energy to keep it up, due to debuffs you could clear.

My initial point was that HfB could be used fine without the debuffs up to make it good. Whether that is better than not using it with the same cycle or whether the cycle itself is worthless is entirely another question, which can't be determined until spreadsheets come out.

Also, I should point out that theoretical energy math and actual energy math are going to be different since refreshing HfB exactly every 10 seconds is impossible, so the cycle would go to 9.5 or 9 seconds, which would be a pretty big loss in damage, probably making it worthless.

First, the AP coefficient is 6% per combo point spent on Rupture in Wrath, so there is no special difference between downranking below a certain CP threshold for either finisher. Even in the current implementation the damage of Rupture only especially drops off below 3 CP, but even 3 CP Ruptures are very nearly as good as 5 CP Ruptures while 3 CP Eviscerates are hardly ever worth using.

Also, be accurate: you are not comparing two 2-4 CP Eviscerates against one 4-5 CP Eviscerate because you cannot perform both using the same amount of energy. It is conclusively established (via spreadsheets) that consistently high-CP finisher cycles are superior, even with Mutliate and the chance to finish more often, even if Find Weakness doesn't necessarily always apply to the finishers.

Might I add that I have a spreadsheet that models all of this stuff other than Cut to the Chase, which isn't currently a useful talent, so I'm hardly just guessing here.

The problem is CttC won't allow you to skip Slice indefinitely no matter how you use it. In its current form, you can get up to ~2 chances to Eviscerate or Envenom during a 5-CP Slice duration, then if you didn't proc CttC you have to refresh Slice or it'll drop. Repeatedly performing 2-4 CP Eviscerate components only gains you one extra chance to proc CttC per cycle, which is great, but really not worth the wasted energy which could otherwise be spent on Mutilate. The optimal cycle is something like 4+s/4+e…, where the ellipsis indicates that you repeat the 4+e component until CttC doesn't proc, then refresh Slice. In this cycle, Hunger for Blood isn't sustainable.

The funny thing is, the more energy you throw away on finishers, the less energy you'll really be able to afford to spend on Hunger for Blood. I've covered a lot of these concerns in my feedback post on the beta rogue forums, which I'm sure you've seen linked and possibly read.

Hey all long time reader first time poster, Just wanted to see what your opinions were on a talent build. From looking at all the new 51 point talents none of them seem outstanding. I just started messing with talent builds last night and one of the combat builds for pve i've came up with is this WorldofWarcraft.com -> Info -> Classes -> Rogue -> Talent Calculator I think that could be a good talent build, Any critique?

As a "long time reader", I would assume you've seen the discussion of the last few pages stating that it's really hard to evaluate any WotLK talent builds right now since we don't have a firm grasp of the mechanics? There is, however, some speculation on Prey on the Weak several pages back. I won't repeat it here.

What I will say is that I doubt that any build which goes 21 points into Subtlety but skips Hemo is going to be competitive.

I'm not feeling really feeling any excitement of the new tier 9/10/11 talents, they all seem pretty lackluster. While I know it's early, and like many Rogues looking the explore Mutilate again which seems like it's becoming the new top-end spec, has anyone taken a more in-depth look at the tri-spec Hemo/Sword builds? Something along the lines of 16/31/24? I've tried messing with the spreadsheet, and I do see a pretty big boost setting these talents up, but since I can't setup a possible Mutilate spec with the new expansion it's hard to put it against any frame of reference.