Thanks for the clarification, but I'm still having problems working out my cycle.

The biggest issue I have is this:
I usually shoot for 5s/5r/5e/repeat. I can (barring unlucky lack of procs) consistently complete these cycles and maintain 100% SnD uptime, but I've found that it results in pretty terrible Rupture uptime (something on the order of 60%), simply due to the fact that by the time I get Rupture up, it's already 15 seconds into the fight, and since by this time SnD has been up for 10 seconds, Rupture and SnD expire at the same time. At 35 seconds into the fight, just before I go to refresh SnD, Rupture falls off the target, and I don't usually get it back on until 45-50 seconds into the fight. I'm wondering whether this is okay, or whether I should switch my rotation around to increase Rupture uptime, and if so, how should I go about doing that?

Edited for spellingz

Prioritize rupture and look ahead several seconds. If you see that putting up a 5 pt snd will have rupture falling off as you refresh the snd, you may have to refresh slice and dice with whatever points you currently have, using them as late as possible without capping energy or dropping snd, in order to allow you time to build 5 points for the next rupture as it falls off. You can't really stick to a strict cycle anymore because of the variance in cp generation from SS glyph and talents. As was said previously, rogue cycles are a dated concept and we're much more in the realm of priority cycles.

I would argue that a spreadsheet cannot answer my question currently as I'm not sure they model weapon swapping properly. For instance, all last night I was finding myself with 4-5cp, 3secs left on Envenom, ~5secs left on DP, and 60+ energy. So, if I invoke the GCD by swapping weapons to reapply DP, and then again to swap back to my IP offhand, I've gained at least 20 energy, probably more since I have ~60% crit raid buffed, so I energy cap. Do I mutilate even if I have 4cp, just so I don't energy cap? Do I envenom, weapon swap, and swap back? I feel that gemming AP will probably lessen my energy capping, but is it a dps increase?

This might be a rather newb question, but how many degrees can you move away from strait behind the boss, before it's no longer "behind" and we lose dps? 90degrees?

Just a general question on the latest patch and the changes which took place:

I know, from reading throughout the forums, that Mutilate and Combat specs were relatively close in regards to damage output, with some fights (due to being murderable, etc.) allowing the Assassination spec to pull ahead just due to that fact.

My main question is, with the changes that took place to Master Prisoner, and the armor penetration nerf that took place, is combat still viewed as the highest dps spec out there?

I am asking this, because in all my time playing, I have raided in the assassination spec. And I have been in many raids with other rogues that were highly geared, using the combat spec, and they could not match my level of damage output. But, as always, I am always looking to maximize my abilities, and if there is something out there that is better than what I am using then I would always be willing to try something new (a viewpoint I'm sure is shared with all the talk I see of weapon-swapping). Maybe the other ones that I've been in raids with just don't have the "cycle" right or something. But any help that can be provided is greatly appreciated!

You know if you followed what the simsheet does in this situation, you would probably do better. So before you blame a model, you need to choose proper parameters for it. For instance, in the simsheet I found forcing envenoms to not be executed during an envenom buff in a situation like that to be detrimental to dps. Other than the envenom buff, the situation you described, i.e. 4+ combo, 60+ energy, and 5 sec on DP is perfect for an envenom, which is what the simsheet is doing.

Spreadsheets aside, even if you still have the envenom buff up, you are better off landing an envenom in this situation to avoid wasting energy. After all, as mutilate, you don't want to switch to DP at 5 seconds remaining, 2-3 seconds is all you need.

Btw the situation you just described is pretty out of ordinary. If you have 3 seconds on your envenom buff, you just did an envenom and are ready to do another one already. Let's say your previous envenom was a 5 pointer, it means you got a 6 second envenom buff, so previous envenom happened 3 seconds ago. So in the last 3 seconds, you did an envenom and a crit mutilate which gave you 4 combo points. Let's do the math, even if relentless strikes procced on first envenom, if you were at 60 energy before previous envenom, then spent 60 on mutilate, it means you must have regained 50 energy in the last three seconds to be at 60 energy again. So 20 energy came from focused attacks, of that 6 came from previous envenom and mutilate, and 14 from autoattacks. So 7 autoattacks crit in the last 3 seconds. You are doing around 2.7 autoattacks per second, or about 8 attacks in 3 seconds. So you are describing a situation when your envenom, mutilate, and 7 out of 8 autoattacks crit in the last 3 seconds.

I need to choose between Malice and the new Tempered Vis'kag ilvl245 (and pay for enchanting). So I am trying to estimate how much DPS the proc is worth. Assuming 1ppm and 1800 average damage, I am getting something like 4.3% chance on hit and ~78 damage per hit. That corresponds to 30 "weapon" dps. If I add that 30 to the weapon DPS in the spreadsheet, I get +150dps, 40 more than Malice would be.
This approach is certainly not a proper one, but I have no idea how bad it is: is it completely useless, or maybe only off by some fraction produced by the SS damage increasing talents like Agression?
Is there a better way, e.g. getting the number of MH weapon hits from the spreadsheet?

Second try: In Aldriana spreadsheet, I removed Lethality, Agression, Blade Twisting and Surprise Attacks talents to prevent any SS damage increase. Next I took the full 2200 proc damage, divided by (assumed) 4.3% proc rate and 2.6 weapon speed and added 36dps to weapon base 196,5dps. I used full proc damage as damage reduction by armor is already applied to any weapon damage.
That +36 weapon dps results in +170 total dps, which in my case is 60 above Malice and about equal to Lion's Maw.
The actual result could be even higher, as here the simulated proc damage is reduced by glancing blows which does not happen to the real proc.
Now, I still don't know if these calculations make much sense, but that's the best I can do.

If I cast Tricks of the trade after Rupture, will the damage over time be increased?

ToTT increases your targets damage not yours.

Read Here:
Tricks of the Trade - Spell - World of Warcraft

Title says it all. I'm tired of failing on non-murder targets or encounters with burst phases so I'm considering combat for dual spec. I have 196 daggers or 178 swords and a 178 mainhand fist (could offhand a 196 dagger).

I realize combat daggers is horrible, but is it so bad that the superior weapons are overshadowed by the poor spec?

or

Should I just stay mutilate and continue getting destroyed (~1% total damage) by my guilds hysteria target, a feral, in most of toc.

Use the 178 fist MH, 196 dagger OH (if it's 1.4 or 1.5 speed, consult spreadsheet otherwise). Combat Daggers is dead.

Blizzard has said they do not care about combat daggers and they won't make it a viable spec. Probably the fist mainhand and dagger offhand is your best bet but use a spreadsheet.

You should probably be using deadly poison for offhand already. And what spec are you talking about using double daggers with? Mut? You have to use two daggers as mut. And combat daggers isn't viable.

For FoK damage, it's probably best to use a 2.7 (178~196) MH/2.6 OH as combat and switch back to 1.4 OH when you're single targetting again, with WP/WP for short bursts/low HP adds, and WP/DP if they have large HP bars.

Pardon a newb question.

At the latest patch it seems that Master Poisoner got a bit of a buff by having it not consume deadly poison 33/66/100 percent of the time. I am currently running 2/3 MP and 1/3 Turn the Tables because my spreadsheet said it was best. However I do not see anywhere in new version of my spreadsheet since the patch that MP calculation was changed, so my question is this:

Does the stability of having DP up and ticking constantly on the boss make MP 3/3 better DPS than the mix I am running right now?

Aldriana's beta mutilate spreadsheet and Mavanas's simsheet have both been updated for this

The best way to explain it is that it's not so much that 3.2 3/3MP is (much) better than the 3.1 version of MP, mutilate (and combat) were quite effective at getting DP stacks back up such that the new 3/3MP while it is somewhat of a buff, is only a slight improvement in the scheme of things. However, the new MP no longer provides an increased chance to restack DP, which effectively means that 1/3 & 2/3 MP have been nerfed.

A benefit of 3/3 is that it allows for weapon-swapping; a gain of 400+ DPS (depending on how well you do it, your second OH, and your haste/hit).

Rogue DPS Simulation Spreadsheet (Page 14)

The last few posts have been discussing exactly that.

I would like to extend and redirect this question to Aldriana specifically, as I see he is using an experimental(?) spec, 23/44/4 with FoK glyph, which I assume is to optimize FoK damage.

Link to the spec in question: The World of Warcraft Armory

How is this spec turning out in terms of 5-target damage over the traditional 15/51/5? As the spec includes Blood Spatter, I guess you assume having enough time in between adds to get ruptures going on the boss. If this is the case, is it worth it over just keeping SnD up, or is Blood Spatter only there as a filler?

In terms of poison selection: We have to bear in mind that we need a poison debuff on the target for it to be afflicted by Savage Combat, so it's either Wound or Deadly Poison on atleast one of the weapons. Which combination of poisons is optimal with this spec? As Instant Poison is more damage-efficient than Wound Poison with the improved poisons talents, is Instant Poison MH / Wound Poison OH the best way to go in terms of burst AoE?

Lastly, does this spec involve weapon swaps during the FoK period?

If I cast Tricks of the trade on another Rogue after they have already cast Rupture, will their Ruptures' damage over time be increased?

Sorry for the confusion! I have always assumed dots are "fire and forget" but I find it an interesting question

I'd say no, because the general DoT mechanic is that it only looks at the buffs you had, when you cast it (debuffs on the target should behave differently).
That is also the reason you sometimes can't clip your rupture (not that you'd want to in 99% of cases)

I am seeing rogues gemming for armor pen still even after the latest nerf, are they at fault or is armor pen still a better option than agi in late TOC gear?. I have the spreadsheet but I don't believe it has been updated since the new patch. Also I don't see the point in going eviscerate spec, when you need a minimum armor pen to make it worthwhile, which means that once icecrown hits you will likely be using pieces which have more states, but just not as much armor pen on it.

ArPen is still worth more than Agi for some people, such as if you're hitting the crit cap like me, and especially if you're still stuck using dead-end Fist/Dags. Evis spec is easier to maintain a rotation upon (no rupture VS SnD to juggle) for a very high damage output, and you're less likely to screw up. It also makes juggling cooldowns + weapon swapping less of a hassle.