Tricks of the trade and specs

[Saoron]

Is tricks no longer viable to use ? The rogue in our raid says it is a dps loss and refuses to use it, unless he is unable to attack at some point, then he will use it. Also, he is exclusively combat, even on single target fights.. How big of a difference is it to switch to mut or sub on single target ? Is it fairly close so that it doesn't matter as much or is there a huge gap and he should get another spec ?

[Verain]

Tricks is a gain in all specs.

Recount records the damage done by the rogue's tricks of the trade as being done by another character, so many rogues incorrectly consider it a personal dps loss to use it.

[Saoron]

yea but according to the tooltip it just says dmg of the 'target' is increased by 15%. Are you saying that it includes the rogue as well ?

[Ashvael]

[...]
Recount records the damage done by the rogue's tricks of the trade as being done by another character, so many rogues incorrectly consider it a personal dps loss to use it.

Well, it is a personal dps loss. It's a raid dps gain.

Combat is very close to assassination, possibly as strong/stronger in the next patch.

[Raugnaut]

Tricks is a raid dps gain, and should be used. Any rogue NOT using it is nub and needs to be corrected/replaced.

---------- Post added 2013-02-12 at 07:33 PM ----------

yea but according to the tooltip it just says dmg of the 'target' is increased by 15%. Are you saying that it includes the rogue as well ?

No, just the target. However, generally, that 15% for 6 seconds tend to be at least 100k extra damage per usage, depending on who you use it on (On a destro warlock bursting, for instance, thats easily 200-300k damage). Consider the fact that Tricks only costs 10 energy, compare it to the fact that Sinister Strike costs 40ish energy and only does about 35% more damage then an auto-attack, and Tricks is the number one damage per energy spell to use.

If you have consistant 1 mil wipes to the hard enrages, blame the rogue for not tricking.

[Verain]

If I tricks my ele shaman during stormlash/ascedance, the tricks damage is like 250k+. Recount records that as shaman damage, because everything she does in those 6 seconds is boosted by 15%. But that damage is really mine- I was the one that pressed the button at the correct time, and if you removed me from the raid that damage would not have happened.

Yea, by recount, your damage is less (you have less energy and "wasted a global"), but there's more damage happening to the boss. But by every standard except RECOUNT, which is the MAP NOT THE TERRITORY, tricks is your personal damage, which you give up if you don't press it.

[MickoLis]

I've noticed no one has really explained how to use it. it should be macro'd to target focus and focus your highest dps player.
/focus said player and that makes tricks a click of a button. easy.
then it can be used on one of two ways. for obvious reasons the tank should be the first to receive.
the after that can be used passively or request for when /focus target is about to burst.
this is a massive increase in raid dps and sure it may make some ones dps go up, the rogues will be barely effected.

when more haste appears on gear, it won't ne noticed.

as for not switching specs, i myself prefer combat. i just like button smashing, its faster plus i have the rotation so down packed im yet to have any complaints. in which case id switch to sub. many rogues still under estimate its single target power. and its fun to play.

[Fellaand]

I am a bad rogue according to this thread, but in my own defense I am a new rogue. What macro are you using for your tricks? I only have a mouse over macro, but i never really use it so if the focus macro is easier then I would rather use that. We haven't wiped to a boss at the 1% mark, but as stated multiple times throughout this thread more raid damage is better then just my damage. Also here is my raid comp, with their approximate dps in order on let's just use Feng Heroic cause he is pretty easy when people aren't stupid. I'm 4/6 heroic, in MSV this is just to me the easiest simplest fight on Heroic, who would you suggest I tricks?

Assass Rogue 90k+
SV hunter 85k+
SPriest 80k+
Afflic Lock 75k+
Frost/Arc Mage 75k+
(Elemental Shaman on 2 heal fights)

Here is the logs from our last kill.
http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/g...?s=5100&e=5531

Also do you suggest I macro ToT in with let's say Envenom? Or a standalone macro?

[Sesshou]

Tricks is on the global last I checked which means you can't macro it with anything else on the global, and that essentially means you can't macro it with anything useful.

[Deleted]

What macro are you using for your tricks?

I literally just logged out so I can't copy my old macro over, but you might want to pick up Clique instead. My main way of using tricks of the Trade was simply clicking on the raid frame of the person who it was most worthwhile to use on at the moment. If I didn't have time for that due to me having to move out of fire and such, pressing my Tricks of the Trade button normally would do whichever of the following things happened first: 1. Tricks the person I have on my focus. 2. Tricks a specific person who I believe was consistently doing the most DPS in our raids (a specific name was used there). 3. Tricks the person the boss is targeting (which is a tank in most cases).

If I remember it I'll grab my macro tomorrow. But really, I swear by Clique. If you put ''Xxdarkarthasdk'' in your macro and said presumably Death Knight stands in fire and dies like the undead bad person he is, you can't use your macro anymore. With Clique you can tricks whoever is still alive and does well at that point or also tricks a tank or a specific person in other cases like when adds spawn.

[Deleted]

#showtooltip
/cast [@focus] Tricks of the Trade

As a rule of thumb you want to use that macro every 30sec on the highest DPS (apart from you!), but of course you can go beyond that. Talk to the person you're using Tricks and figure out which cooldowns it's beneficial to stack it with.

[D3athsting]

Tricks might be useful in a raid but it's just plain stupid to gimp your dmg to boost someone else's one, i myself consider this skill an insult to rogue

[Deleted]

Tricks might be useful in a raid but it's just plain stupid to gimp your dmg to boost someone else's one, i myself consider this skill an insult to rogue

It coincides with the culture of DPS whoring that's prevalent in a lot of PvE environments, but if you're in a guild that can look beyond Recount for performance I find it's a cool way to utilize the team's cooldowns.

Granted, I don't use tricks nearly as much as I should. Note to self.

[Ryve]

Tricks might be useful in a raid but it's just plain stupid to gimp your dmg to boost someone else's one, i myself consider this skill an insult to rogue

So use another 10 energy attack that gains the raid as much damage on the boss instead of it.

[Makarena]

/cast [target=nickname] Tricks of the Trade

[D3athsting]

My suggestion for tricks: 1 min cd, increases both rogue and target's dmg by 10% for 8 sec

[Deleted]

The problem with making Tricks a personal buff is that it counteracts the premises for which it was designed. If it's a DPS increase to tricks, rogues will start to use it on cooldown, thus removing its role as on-demand threat control for you and your allies. They did this with the T14 2P bonus, and they've now done it with Vanish (via Shadow Focus), and every single time our class flexibility suffers.

For the longest time it's seemed like a conscious choice in Blizzard's design philosophy (there are numerous other examples), but it appears they're coming to the same realization as we did: that for the sake of PvE, utility and output has to be strictly separated, and that the challenge lies in making utility otherwise relevant. The 5.2 Smoke Bomb is a great example of that.

[Ryme]

For right or for wrong, it feels very irritating that to maximise raid dps you need to do less dps - this feels even more stupid when you consider that this ideal falls far away from what the rogue is supposed to be, a lone wolf character that cares near exclusively for himself/herself.

Alas, this is the world of warcraft we play, if you're not keeping it on CD, your raid dps is suffering because of it.

[Ryve]

My suggestion for tricks: 1 min cd, increases both rogue and target's dmg by 10% for 8 sec

So, your suggestion is remove the one thing that makes the ability unique, to appease your ego?

[D3athsting]

For right or for wrong, it feels very irritating that to maximise raid dps you need to do less dps

This

@Ryve Seems a bit odd to hear ppl talking about unique abilities when blizz's class homogeneization is aiming to make all classes able to do everything, here's a quote from a post by aldriana: http://elitistjerks.com/blogs/10672-...roblem_tricks/ (it's dated may 15th 2011 but it's still actual since Tot didn't during this time)

When Hunger for Blood was a button that we had to hit every 30 seconds to do 15% more damage, that was stupid; how is Tricks, a button that we hit every 30 seconds to do 2% more damage any less stupid because someone else does the damage for us?