Assassination Rogue Guide (Raid)

[Deleted]

Hey guys, my bad if there is a similar post on these forums already (I don’t check forums very often), but when I check them I always see a lot of assassination questions coming by. About gemming and what not. So I thought, i’ll make a guide for those who might find it helpful

Things you’ll find in this guide:
- Talents
- Glyphs
- Stats
- Gemming
- Reforging
- Enchants
- Weapons and Poisons
- Rotation
- Useful Macro

Talents
31/2/8
This is the spec to go with when you’re going to raid.
There are 2 points that can be used in a different way though. 1 talent point in Opportunity can be switched to Precision if you lack hit.

Amount of hit you need for spell hit cap:
3/3 Precision: 1127
2/3 Precision: 1332

The 2nd talent point is a filler point. You can put it wherever you want that you think is useful. Most people pick either Deadly Brew or Deadened Nerves. I personally prefer Deadly Brew as it can be very useful on boss fights with adds (like Omnotron).

Glyphs
Prime
The prime glyphs an Assass rogue needs are pretty basic, Since there are only about 4 Prime glyphs that are somewhat usefull. The way to go is:

Glyph of Backstab
Glyph of Rupture
Glyph of Mutilate
Another glyph a lot of people consider is Glyph of Vendetta instead of Glyph of Backstab. But Glyph of Backstab shows a higher DPS increase then Glyph of Vendetta does, so go with Glyph of Backstab. The 6 extra seconds on Vendetta are really not worth it. As soon a boss hits 35% health you switch to Backstab instead of Mutilate, which makes the glyph so awesome. Less energy cost -> more Backstabs.

Same reason for Glyph of Mutilate. Mutilate is your main skill from 100% to 35% health. So less energy cost -> more Mutilates.

Why Glyph of Rupture? Rupture is a very important skill in your rotation. You should always keep Rupture up on the boss. The 4 extra seconds the glyph gives just makes it easier to keep up the rotation and be able to maybe do an extra Envenom in between.

Major
There are a few different glyphs you can pick as Major Glyphs. The glyphs I use myself are:
Glyph of Feint
Glyph of Cloak of Shadows
Glyph of Sprint

Why these glyphs? I picked Glyph of Feint as the energy reduction from it can be extremely useful in some of the fights. Cause there are several fights where Feint can be very useful. Conclave of Wind, Maloriak, Chimearon, Nefarian, Al’akir etc. enough bosses where it can be useful to use. So the energy reduction on it is very nice.

Glyph of Cloak of Shadows is just personal choice. It also more useful on raid trash then it is on bosses though.

I picked Glyph of Sprint cause the 30% extra speed can be extremely useful on a lot of fights. A very nice example for this is Atramedes. When you get targeted by his breath in the air phase it can be very useful to have the extra speed as you’re able to kite his breath a bit longer.

2 other glyphs that can be useful:
Glyph of Tricks of the Trade
Glyph of Kick

Glyph of Tricks of the Trade makes your TotT cost no energy, but reduces the damage bonus with 5%. This is a slight DPS boost for yourself as you can spend that 15 energy on something else. Reason I don’t have this glyph myself is because I raid 25mans and we usually have 2-4 rogues in the raid, so we TotT each other for the bonus damage (which gets reduced with the glyph).

Reason I don’t have Glyph of Kick is because we always have several people assigned to interrupting in our raid so it’s not really needed for me personally.

Minor
Most useful Minor Glyph is the Safe Fall one. Beside that it’s totally up to what you prefer yourself =) Glyphs I use myself:
Glyph of Safe Fall
Glyph of Poisons
Glyph of Blurred Speed

Stats
EP Values

Agi 2.6
Yellow Hit 1.75
Spell Hit 1.4
Mastery 1.3
Haste 1.2
Expertise 1.1
Crit 0.9
White Hit 0.75

As you can see, the first 5 have the highest EP values. These are also the most important stats for an Assassination Rogue. Although Yellow and Spell hit are below Agi, Hit cap is the first thing you need to go for. Yellow hit cap is for your skills (like Mutilate), Spell hit cap is for your poisons.

Beside the hit cap your priority will be:
Agility -> Mastery -> Haste

Agility:
Gives Attack Power, and increases the damage done from all your damage dealing skills.

Mastery:
Increases the damage done by your poisons.

Haste:
Increases your Energy Regeneration and makes you auto attack faster.

A lot of people still wonder why Expertise is not important for Assassination atm. The reason for that is because Finishing moves that fail no longer take the full energy cost. If Envenom fails it only costs about 7 energy, instead of 35. 7 energy is such a small amount that it won’t screw up your rotation so easily.

Gemming
Red Sockets: Delicate Inferno Ruby
Yellow Sockets: Adept Ember Topaz
Blue Sockets: Glinting Demonseye

Gemming on socket color, assuming the socket bonus is nice…if not.. just gem Agi

Meta Socket: Agile Shadowspirit Diamond or Fleet Shadowspirit Diamond

The Agile meta is the best ofcourse. But the recipe for this meta gem is very rare so the gems can be very expensive on the AH (depends per server). So if you cant afford it, go for the Fleet meta.

Reforging
Crit and Expertise are the 2 stats you need to get rid of as much as you can.

Crit Expertise -> Reforge -> Master/Haste/Hit (if under capped)

Enchants
A list of enchants for all the gear pieces. (The list does not include Enchants from proffesions like the Ring enchants)

Head: Arcanum of the Ramkahen (Revered with Ramkahen - Uldum)
Shoulders: Greater Inscription of Shattered Crystal (Exalted with Therazane - Deepholm)
Cloak: Enchant Cloak - Critical Strike
Chest: Enchant Chest - Mighty Stats
Bracers: Enchant Bracer - Speed

Gloves: Enchant Gloves - Mastery
Legs: Dragonscale Leg Armor (Created with Leatherworking or can be bought on AH)
Feet: Enchant Boots - Major Agility

Weapons: Enchant Weapon - Hurricane
Or Enchant Weapon - Landslide if you can afford it. Don’t pick Landslide until you have an epic weapon though.


There are a few improvements for these enchants. Like for Chest, Cloak ,Bracers and Gloves. But just like Landslide these enchants require Maelstrom Crystals which are very expensive and hard to get. I wouldn’t bother with upgrading these gear pieces. The Landslide Enchant is the only expensive Enchant atm that is a lot better then the weaker version (Hurricane).

Weapons and Poisons
As an Assass Rogue you should go for a slow Main Hand and fast Off Hand dagger. The fast dagger is for more Poison procs. The slow dagger is for the higher Backstab damage.

Slow MH -> Instant Poison
Fast OH -> Deadly Poison

Rotation
Opener: Garrote
Main Skill: Mutilate 100%-35% and Backstab 35%-0%
Finisher: Envenom and Rupture
Buffs: Slice and Dice and Envenom buff
Cooldowns: Vendetta and Cold Blood

The rotation will be like this:

Garrote -> Mutilate -> Slice and Dice -> Mutilate till about 4-5 CPs. -> Rupture -> Mutilate till about 4-5 CPs -> Envenom.

Envenom will refresh the duration on Slice and Dice. And beside that it will also give you a buff:
Deadly Poison application chance increased by 15%.
Instant Poison application frequency increased by 75%.
The duration on this buff is short, but you should try to keep it up as much as you can.

Most important thing in your rotation: Never let Slice and Dice and Rupture drop. Both are very important to keep up.
Once your Rupture and Envenom buff are up (so also a fresh Slice and Dice) it’s time to pop your Vendetta. When this one is active you should also use your Cold Blood.

The rotation continues like that. Only change is at 35% where you swap Mutilate with Backstab.

When you’re on a boss encounter that requires target switching (like Theralion and Valiona) try to push in a few Combo Points on the current target. Once this switch happens you can Redirect those combo points to the new target and start of with a fresh Rupture.

If you see that ..for example..your Slice and Dice is going to drop, Envenom at the amount of combo points you have. Even if its just 1 combo point, Envenom. You will lose more DPS if you let Slice and Dice drop and need to “activate” it after again.

Useful Macro
I only use 1 macro in Dungeons/Raids but i find it extremely useful.
The TotT macro.

/cast [target=Awesumsauce] Tricks of the Trade
/w TotT on you!!!

The macro lets you TotT the person you name in the macro without losing target on the boss. So you can either put the tank in the macro or another Rogue for example.



If i missed something, feel free to reply. But i hope this guide was useful for some of you

[Brett Skullcrack]

Or you could just read the more comprehensive EJ mutilate guide linked from the sticky.

[Deleted]

Or you could just read the more comprehensive EJ mutilate guide linked from the sticky.

And still alot of ppl come with questions here. so why not

[sabrelime]

That is a very good point,however, those same people are more likely to make a post about it then read anything themselves. The moderators are already in process of making guides for every spec anyway, though.

[Brett Skullcrack]

And still alot of ppl come with questions here. so why not

Because if they're not going to read the stickies they're not going to read this either.

[Deleted]

Nice guide for the people that don't hang around EJ. You have missed vanish as an offensive cooldown though.

[Bighead]

Glyph of TotT is a raid DPS boost, under most circumstances, regardless of how many rogues you have in your raid. Aldriana calculated that in order for unglyphed tricks to be a net gain over glyphed tricks, your target would have to be doing around 43k dps.

[ezek]

[QUOTE=Zephyra;10482666]

The rotation will be like this:

Garrote -> Mutilate -> Slice and Dice -> Mutilate till about 4-5 CPs. -> Rupture -> Mutilate till about 4-5 CPs -> Envenom.

okay, the bolded above is incorrect, rupture is so minimal on dmg you no longer need to cp to 4+, its actually a dps increase to dump whatever CP you have at the time into a new rupture. reason for this is, simply put, rupture provides Venomous wounds which give you 15 energy per tick. this debuff is on whenever rupture or garrote is on. so you dont need the increased dmg.

[Meijnrr]

I know many people are far too lazy to read stickies and then go to EJ so this should be nice for them. Also it is not a DPS increase to use low-point Ruptures, if you read through all the pages of Assassination Guide (which I know is long) there is a post where Aldriana states the damage lost for using Rupture with each amount of combo points down from 5, and the damage lost for not having it up for 1 second.

[Krid]

Glad to see someone can copy+paste.

[sabrelime]

I know many people are far too lazy to read stickies and then go to EJ so this should be nice for them. Also it is not a DPS increase to use low-point Ruptures, if you read through all the pages of Assassination Guide (which I know is long) there is a post where Aldriana states the damage lost for using Rupture with each amount of combo points down from 5, and the damage lost for not having it up for 1 second.

And Aldriana has a new post stating that you should always just re-reupture whenever possible. So you are incorrect sir.

http://elitistjerks.com/f78/t110328-...m_edition/p23/

[Lineli]

Also if you can't obtain an Agile Shadowspirit gem, you should be using the Chaotic Shadowspirit. Yes it has crit on it, but the 3% critical damage increase is worth it. Especially since as Assassination you already have a run speed bonus.

[Phantazm]

i'd say your rotation description is a little clunky, concerning the opener. you wait a good bit before throwing up rupture. if you wanna get all your abilities rolling quickly and then slip into a more cyclical rotation, you could try opening with garrote(if possible, if not, mutilate, of course)=>SnD=>mutilate=>rupture=>mutilate(twice, if you have the time on your SnD for it)=>envenom then just do the whole prioritize SnD>Rupture>Envenom deal.

[Meijnrr]

And Aldriana has a new post stating that you should always just re-reupture whenever possible. So you are incorrect sir.

http://elitistjerks.com/f78/t110328-...m_edition/p23/

No, I never said it was better to have Rupture downtime and use 4/5 point Ruptures, I said it is not a DPS increase to use low-point Ruptures when you could of had high-point ones without causing downtime.

[sabrelime]

I know many people are far too lazy to read stickies and then go to EJ so this should be nice for them. Also it is not a DPS increase to use low-point Ruptures, if you read through all the pages of Assassination Guide (which I know is long) there is a post where Aldriana states the damage lost for using Rupture with each amount of combo points down from 5, and the damage lost for not having it up for 1 second.

well the original post never said it was a dps boost to use low points it said use it to keep it up.

[coldrae]

well the original post never said it was a dps boost to use low points it said use it to keep it up.

Correct, but I believe he is refering to

The rotation will be like this:

Garrote -> Mutilate -> Slice and Dice -> Mutilate till about 4-5 CPs. -> Rupture -> Mutilate till about 4-5 CPs -> Envenom.

okay, the bolded above is incorrect, rupture is so minimal on dmg you no longer need to cp to 4+, its actually a dps increase to dump whatever CP you have at the time into a new rupture. reason for this is, simply put, rupture provides Venomous wounds which give you 15 energy per tick. this debuff is on whenever rupture or garrote is on. so you dont need the increased dmg.

Which is quite incorrect, as a 5 point rupture is longer than a 4 point and so forth.

[Meijnrr]

well the original post never said it was a dps boost to use low points it said use it to keep it up.

Yeah I was referring to ezek's post (which I dumbly did not quote).

[Deleted]

Soo. I have a lot of mastery. 65% more damage to poisons and only about 5% haste. Should i reforge some master to haste? i had everything under control with assassination before i went to combat. I had about 10.8k dps on the dummy (with assassination). now im struggling to get to the same amount with better gear. Im really frustrated, and i don't think they nerfed assassination in the patch (4.0.6, went combat on release) and with combat i was over 11k

[Atreides]

Assassination wants Mastery over Haste at your gear level. You need an astronomical amount of mastery for haste to catch it EP wise. I don't really understand your post though, were you Combat from 4.0 then went Assassination at 4.0.6? Assassination actually got buffed with the meta gem change, albeit slightly.

Combat beats Assassination very slightly on 1 and 2 target fights where it doesn't have to switch more often than Redirect is up, but only while the enemy is above 35%. Once Assassination can begin its Execute phase with Backstab spam, Combat isn't even close to the damage being pumped out by Assassination.

Since a dummy is always above 35% health, Assassination doesn't look as good as it should on them. The damage sub 35% is that great. Its the opposite problem of MM hunters, where they do more damage at targets above 80% health, inflating dummy DPS.

[Deleted]

Assassination wants Mastery over Haste at your gear level. You need an astronomical amount of mastery for haste to catch it EP wise. I don't really understand your post though, were you Combat from 4.0 then went Assassination at 4.0.6? Assassination actually got buffed with the meta gem change, albeit slightly.

Combat beats Assassination very slightly on 1 and 2 target fights where it doesn't have to switch more often than Redirect is up, but only while the enemy is above 35%. Once Assassination can begin its Execute phase with Backstab spam, Combat isn't even close to the damage being pumped out by Assassination.

Since a dummy is always above 35% health, Assassination doesn't look as good as it should on them. The damage sub 35% is that great. Its the opposite problem of MM hunters, where they do more damage at targets above 80% health, inflating dummy DPS.

I went combat on 4.0.6 release. switched back now because combat rotation is so spammy.
Anyway, my problem is that my dps seem to have dropped on the dummy even with better gear with assassin spec.
But what i really wanted to know was that if i have too much mastery and not enough haste (65% more damage to poisons and 5% haste)