Leveling a Rogue

[GratedWasabi]

Hey guys.

Long story short, I love stealth. Love it. With my Feral no longer being all that fun to play, aka being CC'd 75% or more while in combat, I've been thinking of leveling a Rogue. Plus I just enjoy leveling and I haven't had a max level Rogue since BC!

I hear a lot of debating over the best tree for leveling. I plan on going Subtlety at max and I'm wondering how it fares for leveling. Obviously 1-68 isn't really the concern as anything can slide through those levels like a hot knife through butter, just wondering how it fares in WotlK and Cata. Is it at a big disadvantage in terms of speed?

[Deleted]

Choose any spec. All are viable from 1-85.

If there is a bias, its to do with if you have access to heirloom weapons and what kind. Even this is only relevant to level 78 since that's when much more powerful Cata BoE's are available to wear <-- yeah, you'll want those (!).

For questing, keep up Recuperate and that's it.

[badgertgb]

Subtlety is probably the worst choice but depending on your gear at lower levels works fine. The biggest difference is if you have more than 1-2 mobs things are so slow due to having to hit from the front with pretty bad hemo damage. If you only ever have 1 target - stealth - ambush - evis quickly kills most mobs (premed when available) so that works fairly well.

I would just go mutilate, its very good damage, and more reliable.

[Scapegoat-darkspear]

I leveled as mut, that's because sub is gear dependant and I don't like Combat since they took away ArP.
Mutilate is really fun leveling, especially with mastery.
Just keep recuperate up, and spec into imp. recup if you'd like.

[XAmsterdamX]

I just finished leveling a Subtlety Rogue, and really enjoyed it (though I'm glad I don't need to quest for a while now). Until you reach lv80 Mobs go down in 2-3 hits (ambush-(hermorrhage)-eviscerate). And I really enjoyed mixing it up with stunlocking and shadowdancing. Being able to stealth and vanish sooner is another huge bonus. After lv80 it becomes somewhat harder; I think Cata leveling content is still aimed at people who had some time to gear their char at 80. My tip for this: get a cheap green dagger from the AH when you're 80, and perhaps another at 82 and/or 84.

That said, Combat should also be fine for leveling. Assa is perhaps a bit tough because you'll be energy-starved a lot, but really all 3 specs are doable.

As a Rogue some quests are extremely easy (because of Stealth and Sap), while others are really tough (escorting an NPC that is then attacked by 3 mobs at once). One of the (few) drawbacks of the new lv1-60 content is that you can't really skip quests. But it's still easy enough and fun.

[Dalehan]

I went Sub for 95% of the leveling, maaaaybe used Assassination once in a while, but I find the powerful opening burst of Sub very useful for regular questing.
Mut is... alright. I never felt "omg this is amazing!" when I used it during leveling, since it requires a setup time to get the damage you need. First of all, you need at least a deadly poison proc, or start off with Garrote from stealth to get energy ticks. SnD, mutilate, envenom. Probably can leave out the SnD during leveling, unless specced into Deadly Momentum and having plenty of mobs around that need killing.
But it will still be the better spec, next to Combat, when dealing with multiple mobs. Sub has powerful 1vs1 potential when you get the jump, or even 1vs2 as long as you get the jump. But Mut / Combat will still fare better in multi-target situations.
I enjoyed Sub more, just because it had far less setup time required. Premed (sometimes that ain't even needed), Ambush, Eviscerate. With a lucky crit streak, that could end up in an kill on its own. However, to succesfully chain kill as Sub, Nightstalker is an essential talent, both for the cooldown reduction and movement speed. By the time you killed and looted the mob, your Stealth will be off of cooldown already, so you can move on to the next target. I still use it for dailies in TB etc, just because mobs drop so fast with it.


Feel free to call out on bullshit here I'm just stating my opinion

[curiositykilledthecat]

sub for questing and either mutiliate or assassination for dungeons. Sub in a dungeon where you don't have time to stealth makes you hit for awful numbers and slows down the instance. Use vanish like Billy Mays used cocaine.

[Latin]

Honestly.. I have been playing my rogue for years and have leveled up 4 rogue alts to 80. With the new changes to combat with BF being a toggle and speccing into IMP recup you can plow right throw any quest with out any downtime. I suggest trying out combat to see if it suits your gameplay/style.

my 2 cents.

[Krimson]

All are viable, it's not like trying to quest as a holy priest or something.

Sub - 2 shot things, but reliant on stealth openings and positional requirements to do damage, shadowstep helps alleviate some of the downtime of getting to the next mob in stealth.
Combat - Less single target damage, but best spec for dealing with groups. Can down 3-4 mobs at once rambo style with AR and BF up.
Mut - Chain pulling spec. Deadly Momentum lets you keep SnD and Recup up for as long as you have a next mob to pull. Just keep bashing away with Mutilate.

I personally think Mut is the most well rounded, and most effective levelling spec. It's almost as fast as killing single targets as Sub, and you can deal with multi-pulls much better since mutilate doesn't require your opponents back.