Subtlety

  1. Index:
    • Introduction
    • Talents
    • Glyphs
    • Gear
    • Gems & Enchants
    • Poisons
    • Tips for spells & abilities
    • Some Tips and Tricks
    • Diminishing Returns
    • Arena Combs
    • Basic Macros
    • Advanced Macros and Bindings
    • Professions
    • Final Words
    INTRODUCTIONKeep in mind that Subtlety Rogue is not just about Shadow Dance and the huge burst in it. It is mostly about control, especially in the arena. This guide is from my point of view on Subtlety Rogues, so please keep it in mind. Some of my arguments may not be correct so feel free to correct me.TALENTSBasic Spec
    I’ll begin with this „Basic“ spec that I’m using mostly, It’s spec for everything (arena, battlegrounds, duels). I prefer using [Ruthlessness] instead of [Blood Spatter]. Better using Eviscerate instead of bleeds because you never know, when you will need to get away your enemy with gouge, blind or so. Link (open wow talent calculator)Combo Point Building Spec
    This is spec focused mostly on combo point building, with [Ruthlessness], [Initiative] and [Honor Among Thieves] you won’t have any problem with combo points, It’s like you have always 5 combo points on your target. There is just little difference between „basic“ and thins spec. Link (open wow talent calculator)Bleed Spec
    This spec is focus on bleed damage, so It’s better to roll it with attack power stacking. If you prefer killing your enemies with bleeds, you should use this spec, Its also pretty usefull against warriors and other plates. Learn to kite your enemies and you can pretty nice beat everyone by putting bleeds on your target and kitting. (shiving for cripling poison and running, keeping neutral distance away from warrior??s melee range and charge range etc.). And also doing some more damage with Eviscerate. Like when you get some combo points from bleeds while kitting.Link (open wow talent calculator)Info about talents:[Ruthlessness] is very usefull talent that will give you lot of bonus combo points. In my option, Its much better to put 3 talents points there instead of [Malice][Cheat Death] ÔÇô Very useful talent, try to track the 1 minute cooldown, you never know when it can save you. I won a lot of arenas and duels because of this talent. It’s a must.[Honor Among Thieves] ÔÇô Why only 1/3 ? ÔÇô It’s because this talents is bugged at the moment. That means 1/3 is working the SAME like 3/3. I have been testing it, and I’m pretty sure of that. There is also bug tracker link : [BUG TRACKER LINK] – Honor Among Thieves (Talent) (check this link to bug tracker to see status of this bug.)[Heightened Senses] ÔÇô This talent is working now, stealth mechanics are fixed. It’s pretty useful, I see lot of casters missing on me because of it. Most of the casters have 4% hit rating so with this talent, they have only 2% against you which means, they aren’t capped.[BUG TRACKER LINK] – Stealth Mechanics Why no [Lethality] ? ÔÇô I did some tests, like I changed Lethality to [Master of Subtlety], and I feel better with MoS. Also, there are much better options than Lethality.If you prefer to „spam“ more hemorrhage, and you are not „fan“ of backstab, you can make little changes like [Puncturing Wounds] to [Ruthlessness], [Setup] or something else. Again it depends on your play style.GLYPHSShadow Dance tunneling / Backstab specsShadow Dance tunneling means, that you usually pool full energy (130 with vigor glyph) before dancing and you will get little bit better burst than without glyph of vigor. I prefer this option.Major Glyphs:
    • Preparation or Sprint (Sprint is very useful, I prefer sprint. Usually I have some more glyphs in the bags and I’m switching between them especially against warriors where is glyph of preparation pretty usefully (2x dismantle))
    • Shadow Dance
    • Vigor
    DuelingMajor Glyphs:
    • Preparation or Sprint (Sprint is very useful, I prefer sprint. Usually I have some more glyphs in the bags and I’m switching between them especially against warriors where is glyph of preparation pretty usefully (2x dismantle))
    • Shadow Dance
    • Gouge
    Hemorrhage specMajor Glyphs:
    • Preparation or Sprint (Sprint is very useful, I prefer sprint. Usually I have some more glyphs in the bags and I’m switching between them especially against warriors where is glyph of preparation pretty usefully (2x dismantle))
    • Shadow Dance
    • Hemorrhage
    Minor Glyphs for all specs:
    Minor Glyphs:
    GEARHere are some important things that I recommend:
    • Very important thing is HIT CAP for PvP. That is 5% (about 164 hit rating). I’m usually having 178 hit rating which is 5.43%

    • Keep atleast 950 resilience. Better to have 1000+. Actually I’m sometimes using about 1100 ressilience in 3v3 but also in 2v2 if I play double DPS comb.

    • About weapons: Best option is to use 1.8 speed main hand (dagger, of course), and 1.4 speed dagger as off-hand. Well, you can also use 1.5 speed axe, first weapon, or sword, but best is probably 1.4 speed dagger. (See below why.)

    • AP, ARP or AGI ? ÔÇô This is very highly debated issue. As a subtlety rogue you should have 2 sets for PvP. One with attack power stack and another with ARP stack. Of course, ARP is more useful against platers and attack power more useful against cloth enemies. With your ARP stacking , It’s important that you have atleast 40% arp. Best is 50%. I know 50% is kidna hard to get without pve items and keep resilience up to 950. But It’s not imbpossible. You can do some pve. Actually, there is a lot of PvE items for ARP, and they are good, but there are difficulties that arise with resilience and arp. So, my tip is, you don’t need to stack only ARP in your sockets. You can use few others like 20 resilience. Anyway, you have to think and speculate about your gear and try to balance it. Also if you roll AP stacking, best option is to have some arp pve parts with full attack power stack.

      I also tried AGI stacking. Don’t do that. It’s good for crit and dodge, so you can be little bit more defensive against other melee classes and also have some more critical hits but nothing else. Probably choose between AP or ARP. Or both with 2 sets.
    Weapon Speed -1.8 + 1.4 or 1.8 + 1.5 ?[Crippling Poison] doesn’t scale with the weapon speed, it’s a set Proc Rate, so 1.4 off-hand weapon (dagger) is better than 1.5 because its faster so I’ts have a greater chance to proc [Crippling Poison] . But if you prefer shiving your enemies, use 1.5 weapon. (See „POISONS“ below for more information about poisons)Replacing PVP items with PVE.When you going to change your pvp (wrathful, relentless etc.) parts with pve, you should try replace firstly items, that doesn’t give you any agility like pvp neck, back, finger and weapons with trhown. It’s much more useful then replacing items, that already gives you agility like belt, feets but of course if you really lack on arp, you can change them too but try to focus mainly on those parts that I already wrote.GEMS & ENCHANTS:Meta: Relentless Earthsiege Diamond (+21 Agi/3% Crit Dmg)Yellow, Red and Blue: 20 arp stack, but in your legs, use the blue slot ÔÇô 10 all stats for bonus from meta socket. You can also change some to balance your stats like, hit rating (+20 hit rating gem) or so.Enchants:You should know which enchants to use. I’ll tell you one important think :
    You can also use different enchant on your weapon swap (off-hand) like 2nd berserking or something else. Its up to you.POISONS
    (usable in subtlety)„Poisons is an ability that enables Rogues to coat their Main Hand or Off Hand weapon with poisons. When a poisoned weapon strikes an enemy it has a chance of applying a debuff that damages, slows, or otherwise hinders the enemy, depending on the poison applied. Learned at level 10, Poisons are a core part of the Rogue class and their use is required to maximize effectiveness.“[Wound Poison VII] – The proc chance of Wound Poison scales with weapon speed and it deals a small amount of damage. It’s good against melees and casters, because it does some damage and reduces the effects of all healing abilities by 50%. [Wound Poison] proc chance based on weapon speed:1.3 Speed – 46.43%1.4 Speed – 50.00%1.5 Speed – 53.57%1.6 Speed – 57.14%1.7 Speed – 60.71%1.8 Speed – 64.29%2.6 Speed – 92.86%2.8 Speed – 100.00%Remember to use it against targets that can heal.[Crippling Poison] – Like i already said, It doesn’t scale with the weapon speed, it’s a set Proc Rate, so put this on a fast weaponIt’s a must-have in Subtlety. Best that you can have is 1.4 dagger.[Mind-numbing Poison] – It doesn’t scale with the weapon speed, it’s a set Proc Rate. It’s great against casters, but useless against melees. Usually im using this poison on my „swap“ weapon in bag, so i can anytime weapon swap and put mind-numbing on my target and then i can swap back to crippling poison.[Anesthetic Poison II] – There are several buffs you can dispel with anesthetic poison, with the most important being the following: [Savage Roar]A 30% damage buff is pretty impressive, and being able to dispel it is a nice way of wasting a feral druidÔÇÖs combo points. You wonÔÇÖt be able to put out much pressure using wound+anesthetic, but it can be a nice way of helping out your partner to survive a feral druids initial OTT burst. As well as reducing their damage youÔÇÖre also keeping them free of dots to allow a defensive gouge. Switch back to wound+deadly when youÔÇÖre back on-top of the situation. [Berserker Rage]Dispelling their Berserker Rage isnÔÇÖt too devastating to a warrior, but removing it stops some of their rage generation and leaves them vulnerable to gouge, fears and even saps. It will also dispel their enrage buff, though that is likely to be reapplied immediately. [Hunger for Blood]YouÔÇÖll probably never see a HfB rogue at all nowadays (unless they forget to respec before a BG or arena match). You may want to switch to wound+anesthetic for the comedy value ÔÇô watching them energy-starve themselves as they spam HfB is kind of cute.Anesthetic Poison source : lastrogueTIPS FOR SPELLS & ABILITIES[Hemorrhage]: Hemo is one of the spells that doesn’t require you to be behind your enemy, so it’s useful when you can’t get behind your enemy, and you have to fight in front. So, USE it if you will be in situation like that. It’s also useful before using [Eviscerate] and also don’t forget to put it on your target before dancing.[Feint]: Many Rogues ignore this spell, but it’s very helpful in trouble like when you get a miss, dodge, or parry when you disamantle on bladestorm. USE it ! Reduces AoE damage taken by 50%[Distract]: Usually usable before sapping, but it’s also helpful in arena because you can interrupt drinking ![Gouge]: Very useful spec for CC or resteathing with [Improved Gouge] talent.[Kick]: Very important spell. Try to use it wisely. Also watch for ÔÇ£fake castsÔÇØ, even though many people don’t know what that is.[Preparation]: It’s good to use after your all main spells are on cooldown.[Tricks of the Trade]: It’s a useful spell for your arena partners. Its gives +15% damage. Don’t forget to use that every 30 seconds.[Cloak of Shadows]: Probably one of the most important spells. I think that all of you know how to use it.[Vanish]: Next most important spell. Don’t forget that if you vanish when a spell like death coil, frost bolt etc. is flying at you, you can prevent being hit by it. (Sometimes it’s bugged for some spells here on Molten-WoW. You have to try and keep in mind which spells those are.)[Dismantle]: Try keeping this spell vs classes like Warrior for Bladestorm. You can easily stop it! It’s also very useful vs Hunters and all melee classes![Blind]: Keep in mind that most people saving their trinket for it. Be ready![Rupture]: Use it mostly on rogues and feral druids to counter their steath! Of course use it also for additional damage.[Deadly Throw]: Very helpful spell for running enemies that you need to catch or slow them for something else.[Fan of Knives]: It’s good to use, like when you see rogue in steath for only second, and you are too slow to sap. Try to follow his path and maybe you will be lucky to discover him with FoK.[Slice and Dice] : Usually, I use it before opening on target, so I use [Premeditation] – > [Slice and Dice], or sometimes when im going to resteath / [Vanish], and my target still has some combo points, use it again before opening. Sometimes when I’m fighting „face to face“ like vs warrior, I have popped [Evasion] and waiting for some cooldowns, or pooling energy, I use [Slice and Dice] there, too. Mostly when I have [Rapture] / [Garrote] also on my target, because [Honor Among Thieves] gives a lot of combo points that I can spend on [Slice and Dice] / [Expose Armor].[Shadowstep] : Originally Posted by Rav?¡ous(ArenaJunkies) shadowstep kick
    shadowstep charge/intercept
    shadowstep future neilyo style
    shadowstep baddies and run away while theyre going WTF?!?
    shadowstep through certin walls and explioting with it,
    shadowstep stupid things like eles and balanced druid when they skill you down from the bridge:/,
    Shadowstep back up to lumbermill when people chasing you, then see them die 😀
    Shadowstep ambush mage with 15k hp on mounts in wg, then dying:(
    Shadowstep kidney blink just to have your kidney immuned 😦
    shadowstep cannons in sota with bombs and kill the last gate before you team is ever up there.

    shadowstep ❤ SOME TIPS AND TRICKS ( Im still working on this)
    • One of the most common mistakes that Rogues usually do is spaming abilities as soon as there is enough enery to use them. Try to keep some energy. DonÔÇÖt use everything as soon as you can. It is a very important thing, like before when I was spamming everything. For example; A caster starts to cast a spell, and I donÔÇÖt have enough energy to kick him. So, it’s very IMPORTANT to keep your energy. It’s known as ÔÇ£pooling energyÔÇØ.

    • When you are about to attack your enemy from steath, use your [Premeditation] spell to add 2 combo points and you can use [Slice and Dice] before opening. Or if you want to open with bleed, you can do like I do sometimes. [Premeditation] -> [Garrote] -> [Rupture] so you will get longer [Rupture].
    Diminishing ReturnsDiminishing returns, abbreviated DR, means that certain spells and abilities are less effective against player characters if they are used frequently within a short period of time.DR Categories (Rogue) :
    Spell conbinations that share DR as Rogue:[Blind] – Fear, Howl of Terror, Intimidating Shout, Psychic Scream, Scare Beast, Seduction, Turn Evil [Cheap Shot] – Pounce [Kidney Shot] – Bash, Concussion Blow, Deep Freeze, Demon Charge, Gnaw, Holy Wrath, Inferno Effect , Hammer of Justice, Intercept, Intimidation, Maim, Ravage, Shadowfury, Shockwave, Sonic Blast, War Stomp[Sap], [Gouge] – Freezing Arrow, Freezing Trap, Hex, Hibernate, Hungering Cold, Polymorph, Repentance, Wyvern Sting[Garrote] – Arcane Torrent, Gag Order, Improved Counterspell, Nether Shock, Silencing Shot, Improved Kick, Shield of the Templar, Silence, Spell Lock, Strangulate[Dismantle] – Chimera Shot – Scorpid, Disarm, Psychic Horror (Disarm effect), Snatch ARENA COMBOS2v2Shadow priest – Probably one of the best 2v2 comb that you can play as sub. It can do pretty nice burst in short time and also priest can help little bit with healing and you can survive much more. Priest have best survivability for sure. Also you can do pretty nice CC but keep in mind that fear share DR with Blind and also Psychic Horror (Disarm effect) share DR with Dismantle.Frost mage– Another really great comb. Really strong and also can survive a lot. Dont forget to use mage’s food when it is nececary, sometimes I just keep my vanish/cos for times when i need to hide and go eat. You can play also with Arcane mage, they have little bit better burst but frost mage have usually better control and can survive much more. Its up to you. Dont forget that polymorh share DR with sap.Resto Druid – Nice combo, good support, some of the druids have talent that sometimes regen your energy, I think its pretty useful. Just try to be more offensive, dont spam all abilities when you have enought energy, just pool energy and do burst when is right time for it. Dont forget about cyclones and I prefer to do many switches between oponents, and always try keep one in cyclone and also you can try resap after first cyclone. I really like this combo for learning and training pooling energy, checking DR timer and so on.Resto Shaman – Really good combo as well, totems are pretty useful, dispel, good support. Keep in mind that Hex share DR with sap and gouge. [B]Retribution Paladin/B] – Combo with massive burst and damage. It’s probably one of those better combs. 3v3RMP(Rogue, Mage, Priest) – Probably best 3v3 combo ever of the game, You can see this comb on the tom like every expansion. RLS (Rogue, Warlock, Shaman) – Really good comb too, This is my favourite one since there are not many good disco priests and good frost mages to do really nice RMP :). You can try it also with resto druid instead of shaman but shaman is much way better. I played it with resto druid and we had problems with TSG (warrior, pala, death knight).BASIC MACROSI made topic about rogue macros, please follow THIS LINK !ADVANCED MACROS AND BINDINGSÔÇ×Macro is used to eliminate necessary steps or combine multiple stepsÔÇ£ (Neilyo)Mostly in Subtlety, you have to do many steps in a short time. So, macros are the way which increase your speed. Very important is to make your bindings ÔÇô macros best and most comfortable. I’m still not done with my macros and bindings. I change them like every 2 days. Of course, only little changes. I’m also trying lot of different setups for my bindings, and I always choose that which is the best for me.You can make it easier to play by binding more spells to one key-binding. Take a look on my bars here, if you want:As you can see, I manage my bars so that I dont need to use both right action bars. ( Its neilyo’s style)Lets take my macro ÔÇô binding on ÔÇ£2ÔÇØ. My macro on this bind is :#showtooltip Hemorrhage
    /startattack
    /cast [nomodifier,target=target] Hemorrhage;
    /cast [modifier=shift,target=target] Slice and Dice So if I use this macro (pushing 2), I’ll start auto-attacking and using Hemorrhage on my target. If I use shift+2, I’ll use my Slice and Dice. So, I saved 2 slots on my bars. But well, not only did I save slots, but I also made my character easier and faster to play, because I don’t need to run across the keyboard to push a different key for my different ability / spell.Backstab / Ambush and Shadow Dance bar:As you know, every time when you use your Shadow Dance, your bar changes to ÔÇ£shadow danceÔÇØ bar. For this, I’m using following macro (unstealth / sdance bar):/startattack
    /cast Premeditation
    /cast [stance:3] Ambush
    /cast [stance:0] Backstab *[stance:3]- shadow dance bar
    *[stance:0]- out stealth barThis macro helps me to avoid spamming backstab in Shadow Dance, because when im ÔÇ£spamingÔÇØ this macro, and I use sdance, there very little time until the bar turns.(Warning: Do not use this macro in stealth! Only in sdance and outside of stealth.)Medallion & Every Man for Himself (Racial)#showtooltip
    /cast Every Man for Himself(Racial) – (or Medallion of the Alliance / Medallion of the Horde)
    /cast !stealth Macro for your „trinket“ or racial that will cast Stealth after „trinketing“. Sometimes happend situations like you have to use your trinket out of combat so with this macro you’ll get quickly in to the stealth.Quick Shadow Dance Macro in one macro#showtooltip Shadow Dance
    /cast Shadow Dance
    /cast [nomodifier,target=target] Ambush;
    /cast [modifier:shift,target=target] Cheap Shot;
    /cast [modifier:alt,target=target] Garrote Macro which you’ll be able faster use shadow dance and thereupon ambush, cheap shot (shift + yourbind) or garrote (alt + yourbind). Of course you can change or modify „modifiers“ to your own like „ctrl“.I don’t know what else to say to this for now, but it’s up to you on how you will manage your macros and bindings. If I get any new ideas, I’ll add it here. I hope that you undestand and that I advise you in this.PROFESSIONSProbably one of the best professions for Rogue is [Engineering]. I also recommend it.Keep in mind that if you are using [Nitro Boosts], it is a good idea to also use [Flexweave Underlay], because sometimes there is a chance to get blow up into the air. The parachute could save your life.For arena, it is better to use [Tuskarr’s Vitality] or [Greater Assault] on boots. It’s up to you.Also, possibly use [Hand-Mounted Pyro Rocket]. In arena, it’s very useful because you can cancel opponents‘ drinking and also catch vanishing Rogues!As 2nd proffesion there are 3 most used professions:
    Use what best suits you. I’m using Enchanting at the moment, but I think that JC is the best.ADDONS[Gladius] – Very useful addon in arena. You can track enemy trinkets and also enable DR tracking.[Natur Enemy Castbar] – Great addon fro tracking DR and also for tracking enemy cooldowns. Its good in world pvp, bgs, duels because gladius works only in arena.[OmniCC] – OmniCC is an addon that adds text to items, spell and abilities that are on cooldown to indicate when they will be ready to use. In other words: it turns all the standard analogue cooldowns into digital ones.[Quartz] – Quartz is a modular approach to a casting bar addon. An overview of (hopefully most of) the modules: Player, Target/Focus, Buffs, Flight, Global Cooldown, Interrupt, Latency, Mirror, Range, Swing, Timer, Tradeskill Merge.FAQDoes weapon swap trigger GCD (global cooldown)?Yes, Swapping weapons does trigger the GCD, so make sure you donÔÇÖt swap with full energy ÔÇô use it as a way of pooling energy instead.