Slice and Dice = just another weakaura on your screen.

[ymirsson]

Is this the purpose of every ability in the spellbook, the sole standard that each ability has to meet to justify its place in the kit?

What else can there be? Do you actually use abilities that are not fit for the situation at hand, to get ahead? Should be a basic PvP concept.

[shoegazing]

What else can there be? Do you actually use abilities that are not fit for the situation at hand, to get ahead? Should be a basic PvP concept.

So EVERY ABILITY IN THE SPELLBOOK must be able to differentiate a mythic raider from a heroic raider, or a gladiator from a duelist or rival?

Should we prune Eyes of the Beast because it doesn't provide such a skill element? Should Detection be removed from Rogues because it doesn't provide it? Should Pick Pocket be removed from Rogue because it doesn't provide enough opportunity for a Mythic raider to demonstrate their superiority?

Is a Gladiator's use of Backstab significantly different from the way a Duelist uses the ability? As a PvPer who has finished many seasons in the top 2%-0.5% of the rated ladder, I can say confidently it's not the case. The difference between Duelist and Gladiator is game knowledge of other classes, knowledge of "the meta", how they communicate with their teammates, the work they put in to prepare strategies against every composition and execute them seamlessly, the fact that they know how their teammate is going to respond to a certain situation before anything is said over voice comms.

The argument that SnD being brought back is bad because it doesn't provide enough opportunity for the best players in the world to separate themselves from the top 10% is obviously a terrible argument. I think you can recognize and agree with me on that fact.

[Coldkil]

The argument that SnD being brought back is bad because it doesn't provide enough opportunity for the best players in the world to separate themselves from the top 10% is obviously a terrible argument. I think you can recognize and agree with me on that fact.

Fully agree with this. I still say SnD is a "boring" ability but it's not a stupid one. I'd like to see a better implementation of it but i'm no game designer so i don't have any idea that sounds actually better and not another iteration of "passive dps increase" or "use on cooldown".

Maybe something else entirely - leave SnD as it is and have other skills to actually interact with it. Something like Exsanguinate that makes your bleed run faster and actually has an impact on rotation. Maybe a choice between extending its duration (better for prolonged fights and sustained dmg) and reduce duration for an increased attack speed (better for burst/short fights).

[Kaver]

Is this the purpose of every ability in the spellbook, the sole standard that each ability has to meet to justify its place in the kit?

You're right. But the difference is that they are adding SnD.

My point is that there is no reason to add more "filler" abilities when we already have plenty of "filler" abilities. None of them are making our gameplay more engaging and we don't really need more. AR for Outlaw Rogues is not an exciting CD either, but this is already in the game. We have a lot of bland boring abilities already so when they are adding "new" stuff, they should rather focus on utility or mechanics which you can actually min-max.

I would love to have smoke bomb as a raid utility for example because this would allow us to make a big difference for the raid team.

(My focus is mainly raid oriented)

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The argument that SnD being brought back is bad because it doesn't provide enough opportunity for the best players in the world to separate themselves from the top 10% is obviously a terrible argument. I think you can recognize and agree with me on that fact.

My argument is that we don't need anymore abilities unless they add a significant impact to our gameplay. We got plenty of boring lackluster abilities already, so we don't need SnD to be another one. Give us something exciting instead. We need that. I don't understand why every Rogue ability needs to be so boring. The only exciting thing about Rogue right now is the utility we got in M+. Having Gouge, Sap, Cheapshot and Blind is fun utility in M+ because it gives us a lot of crowd control, but other than that Rogue is really boring. SnD is just yet another boring ability. In raids Rogue is super boring because the rotation is bland and we don't have any group utility which is relevant in raids. Give us some fun mechanics. That's all I want.

[ymirsson]

So EVERY ABILITY IN THE SPELLBOOK must be able to differentiate a mythic raider from a heroic raider, or a gladiator from a duelist or rival?

Should we prune Eyes of the Beast because it doesn't provide such a skill element? Should Detection be removed from Rogues because it doesn't provide it? Should Pick Pocket be removed from Rogue because it doesn't provide enough opportunity for a Mythic raider to demonstrate their superiority?

Is a Gladiator's use of Backstab significantly different from the way a Duelist uses the ability? As a PvPer who has finished many seasons in the top 2%-0.5% of the rated ladder, I can say confidently it's not the case. The difference between Duelist and Gladiator is game knowledge of other classes, knowledge of "the meta", how they communicate with their teammates, the work they put in to prepare strategies against every composition and execute them seamlessly, the fact that they know how their teammate is going to respond to a certain situation before anything is said over voice comms.

The argument that SnD being brought back is bad because it doesn't provide enough opportunity for the best players in the world to separate themselves from the top 10% is obviously a terrible argument. I think you can recognize and agree with me on that fact.

So you say when, how and where a good player and a bad one uses an ability is in no way different? Because that's what i was saying.
Why would you for example refresh SnD when the enemy is nearly dead, or not attackable?

[shoegazing]

You're right. But the difference is that they are adding SnD.

My point is that there is no reason to add more "filler" abilities when we already have plenty of "filler" abilities. None of them are making our gameplay more engaging and we don't really need more. AR for Outlaw Rogues is not an exciting CD either, but this is already in the game. We have a lot of bland boring abilities already so when they are adding "new" stuff, they should rather focus on utility or mechanics which you can actually min-max.

I would love to have smoke bomb as a raid utility for example because this would allow us to make a big difference for the raid team.

(My focus is mainly raid oriented)

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My argument is that we don't need anymore abilities unless they add a significant impact to our gameplay. We got plenty of boring lackluster abilities already, so we don't need SnD to be another one. Give us something exciting instead. We need that. I don't understand why every Rogue ability needs to be so boring. The only exciting thing about Rogue right now is the utility we got in M+. Having Gouge, Sap, Cheapshot and Blind is fun utility in M+ because it gives us a lot of crowd control, but other than that Rogue is really boring. SnD is just yet another boring ability. In raids Rogue is super boring because the rotation is bland and we don't have any group utility which is relevant in raids. Give us some fun mechanics. That's all I want.

SnD isn't a "new" ability they are adding out of nowhere, it's a classic and iconic Rogue ability that existed for well over a decade and should never have been pruned in the first place. When it was pruned, players like myself complained to Blizzard "my Rogue no longer feels like my Rogue" so they are correcting their mistake and brinigng it back.

I agree with you that other new/returning abilities should be added as well. I want to see Smokebomb baseline. I want to see Gouge back for my Subtlety Rogue -- I've had that ability since I dinged level 6 back in 2005 and it's been my "4" keybind ever since. Now I just have a gaping hole in my action bars where Gouge should be and it feels TERRIBLE.

I do not agree however that unpruning Slice and Dice has anything to do with the fact that we so far aren't getting other abilities unpruned. No developer has said, "we can't give you Gouge because we already gave you SnD" and it would be ridiculous if they did say something so foolish. The unpruning needs to go much further. Other classes like Warrior are getting 3x as many buttons back.

"I want Gouge back" (which again, I agree with, and I can guarantee I want Gouge much more than you do since I've been tweeting the devs about it on a nearly daily basis for years) does not lead to the conclusion "SnD should not come back". They are separate abilities, both are essential and fundamental to the feeling of playing a Rogue, and we should have both.

If you want Gouge back, make a thread about Gouge and I promise you I will be 100% supportive. Same goes for Smokebomb, Garrote, Premeditation.... abilities that had no business being removed in the first place.

[Coldkil]

-snip-

In the end, it's always the old tune of "PvE VS PvP". It's not derogatory, it's just that the differences between the two things are not just how many skills you have and/or skill, it's literally two different games.

PvE is the optimization/efficiency game. The focus is perfect rotation, avoiding all errors and optimizing damage in a given timeframe, counting the mechanics you have to face. The pruning of abilites is basically baked into PvE - you test all the skills and analyze what they do and use the only ones that net you the best results and they're the optimal ones.

PvP is the split second decision/adaptation game. The focus is to be able to deal with a plethora of different situations without any warning barren the small info you have at the beginning of the match. So it's just natural that you will need a vast toolkit of abilities to counter/fight all these kinds of situations. While it's not like everyone should have everything to fight everyone else, you still have/need to manage a lot of different strategies and be able to change it on the fly.

Generally, it's good they're bringing back stuff that used to define our class. But as back when it was in game, some things have always had blatant shortcomings like SnD. I'm happy it's back, but i've never been fond of it as many other rogues, because it doesn't feel impactful at all as it didn't long time ago. And as i said before, it's not even the ability itself but the lack of interaction with out toolkit imho.

[Kaver]

SnD isn't a "new" ability they are adding out of nowhere, it's a classic and iconic Rogue ability that existed for well over a decade and should never have been pruned in the first place. When it was pruned, players like myself complained to Blizzard "my Rogue no longer feels like my Rogue" so they are correcting their mistake and brinigng it back.

I agree with you that other new/returning abilities should be added as well. I want to see Smokebomb baseline. I want to see Gouge back for my Subtlety Rogue -- I've had that ability since I dinged level 6 back in 2005 and it's been my "4" keybind ever since. Now I just have a gaping hole in my action bars where Gouge should be and it feels TERRIBLE.

I do not agree however that unpruning Slice and Dice has anything to do with the fact that we so far aren't getting other abilities unpruned. No developer has said, "we can't give you Gouge because we already gave you SnD" and it would be ridiculous if they did say something so foolish. The unpruning needs to go much further. Other classes like Warrior are getting 3x as many buttons back.

"I want Gouge back" (which again, I agree with, and I can guarantee I want Gouge much more than you do since I've been tweeting the devs about it on a nearly daily basis for years) does not lead to the conclusion "SnD should not come back". They are separate abilities, both are essential and fundamental to the feeling of playing a Rogue, and we should have both.

If you want Gouge back, make a thread about Gouge and I promise you I will be 100% supportive. Same goes for Smokebomb, Garrote, Premeditation.... abilities that had no business being removed in the first place.

I know SnD isn’t new. That’s why I used “”. But it’s still something they are adding to the game now. And my issue with SnD is based on a pragmatic POV. I do raiding and M+ so I look at how SnD will impact my gameplay in that content. And personally I don’t see any positives. A pull sequences (for outlaw) on a trash pack is going to look something like:

1) Rtb
2) AR
3) BF
4) Build 5 cps
5) SnD
6) ... now your damage rotation can start

I think this is going to be really bad. It’s way to many GCDs you need to go through before you can damage a trash pack in M+.

We need to look at how SnD will impact gameplay now and not how it used to do in the past. And the situation is that based on the current design of the Rogue specs, SnD is not going to add anything positive to the gameplay in my opinion. Personally I think gameplay should be more important than Blizzard wanting to add iconic abilities back. Otherwise they really need to design the Rogue around it which they haven’t. They just randomly added it without ensuring that it actually make sense in relation to the current gameplay.

I completely agree that SnD shouldn’t have been pruned in the first place. But sadly it was. And following Blizzard have designed the specs around not having SnD. So if they add it back into the game they need to redesign the specs. Otherwise we are spending way to much time using buffs instead of doing damage. I don’t want to activate 4 buffs (Rtb, AR, BF and SnD) before I can do damage. That’s way to much.

Just to clarify, I never said that SnD has anything to do with Gouge or Smoke bomb not being added to the game. If I implied it, then it was unintentional. I just don’t what SnD based on the pragmatic gameplay reasons I mentioned above. And Gouge + Smoke bomb are just examples of abilities which in my opinion improves gameplay. But I know it’s not an “either or” situation.

[shoegazing]

1) Rtb
2) AR
3) BF
4) Build 5 cps
5) SnD
6) ... now your damage rotation can start

I think this is going to be really bad. It’s way to many GCDs you need to go through before you can damage a trash pack in M+.

Your "rotation" started on step 1, which can happen before you are even in melee range if I am not mistaken, and the damage starts as soon as you right click.

Adrenaline Rush is a 3min cooldown and won't be used on every trash pull, let alone at the beginning of the pull.

I highly doubt you will be building to 5cp before pressing SnD.

I completely agree that SnD shouldn’t have been pruned in the first place. But sadly it was. And following Blizzard have designed the specs around not having SnD. So if they add it back into the game they need to redesign the specs.

That is exactly what I want. I look forward to seeing every last trace of Legion/BFA nu-Rogue filth deleted. I get the warm fuzzies just thinking about it.

[Kaver]

Your "rotation" started on step 1, which can happen before you are even in melee range if I am not mistaken, and the damage starts as soon as you right click.

Adrenaline Rush is a 3min cooldown and won't be used on every trash pull, let alone at the beginning of the pull.

I highly doubt you will be building to 5cp before pressing SnD.

Technically yes, my rotation do start a 1). But my point was more that popping 3 CDs + 1 non-damaging CP spender in a row which are all on the GCD feels bad.

Adrenaline rush is a 3 min CD yes, but we have CD reduction on it so the overall uptime is pretty high.

And we will build 5 CPs before using SnD. We also do this with Rtb right now. As I mentioned in earlier post, the current modern Rogue generates A LOT of CPs so building 5 CPs is no big deal.

My main concern is based on gameplay in practice. As you mention, damage starts when you press right click, yes, but having to activate 4 different buffs before you can use any damaging CP spenders is not going to feel good and it’s no going to improve our game experience.

[blankfaced]

SnD is one of those abilities that can be turned into a short duration short cooldown. Like 45s cooldown with 15s uptime. Something you hit in times you need a bit of burst. Something I would actually like to see on all classes more often.

[OFiveNine]

roll the bones was a mistake bring back snd

[Blezius]

roll the bones was a mistake bring back snd

Outlaw was a mistake

[bloodmoth13]

I have always hated slice and dice. Its one of the most boring abilities in the game, when im building up combo points i want some pay off, not some long term buff that i need 100% uptime on.
Id enjoy it more if it had a cooldown and was like triple the power, then you would get to feel the distinction between with and without it.

[shoegazing]

I have always hated slice and dice. Its one of the most boring abilities in the game, when im building up combo points i want some pay off, not some long term buff that i need 100% uptime on.
Id enjoy it more if it had a cooldown and was like triple the power, then you would get to feel the distinction between with and without it.

That would be a terrible mistake for two reasons:

1. We don't need more CDs and abilities that don't interact with our core resources of energy and combo points. Rogue shouldn't be another whack-a-mole class that is just push button on CD, resource management has always been a strong element of our gameplay, so much so that it became a model for every other class.

2. Combo Points become boring when Eviscerate is the only spender. Rogue class used to have many different finishers for different strategic and situational applications. SnD brings back a small and sorely needed piece of that by giving us an additional spender that allows us to do more sustain damage, delayed to later, vs. doing more burst damage right now. This strategic choice is very important in lots of scenarios.

[Critical92]

You guys all seem to forgot that in the past autoattack dmg was a big part of the overall dmg of a rogue. SnD was a huge buff and needed near 100% uptime in pve.
The first thing people looked over if a new rogue complained about his/her dmg was snd (and rupture) uptime.
It was needed in pvp for different kinds of reasons over the years.
Subs energyreg was tied to it, Assa had it passive after first use, but all in all it was just an autoattackspeed modifier. The things that proc with autohits will play a huge role with SnD together, but SnD alone is weak with the current dmg distribution of spells.
In SL it will be there but it is nolonger "that" button of the past. Currently sub gains the most of snd because shadow technique scales with autoattackspeed. Faster hits = more procs in a given time. Assa gains only an annoying maintenance button and outlow is outlol.

[bloodmoth13]

That would be a terrible mistake for two reasons:

1. We don't need more CDs and abilities that don't interact with our core resources of energy and combo points. Rogue shouldn't be another whack-a-mole class that is just push button on CD, resource management has always been a strong element of our gameplay, so much so that it became a model for every other class.

2. Combo Points become boring when Eviscerate is the only spender. Rogue class used to have many different finishers for different strategic and situational applications. SnD brings back a small and sorely needed piece of that by giving us an additional spender that allows us to do more sustain damage, delayed to later, vs. doing more burst damage right now. This strategic choice is very important in lots of scenarios.

its still an incredibly boring ability that i have never missed and i think that almost any other ability would be more interesting. It just needs some immediate flourish to feel good to push rather than being a boring buff. It could be redesigned very slightly to feel more interesting, but a minute long buff that you dont feel isnt interesting in the slightest.

[Beet]

Some of us actually like abilities that take skill to manage such as SnD. So don’t speak for everyone OP. Just yourself.

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That would be a terrible mistake for two reasons:

1. We don't need more CDs and abilities that don't interact with our core resources of energy and combo points. Rogue shouldn't be another whack-a-mole class that is just push button on CD, resource management has always been a strong element of our gameplay, so much so that it became a model for every other class.

2. Combo Points become boring when Eviscerate is the only spender. Rogue class used to have many different finishers for different strategic and situational applications. SnD brings back a small and sorely needed piece of that by giving us an additional spender that allows us to do more sustain damage, delayed to later, vs. doing more burst damage right now. This strategic choice is very important in lots of scenarios.

Now I agree with this one hundred percent. I liked when we had multiple options for our finisher. I mean it’s kind of pathetic when we have one finisher only. At that point it’s like why even have it? Just make it go off automatically when you hit five combo points.

[shoegazing]

its still an incredibly boring ability that i have never missed and i think that almost any other ability would be more interesting. It just needs some immediate flourish to feel good to push rather than being a boring buff. It could be redesigned very slightly to feel more interesting, but a minute long buff that you dont feel isnt interesting in the slightest.

It's a false dilemma to think that Slice and Dice is coming back "in place of" some other ability that could be unpruned.

Do I want Gouge back more than anything else? Yes. I learned it after dinging level 6 in early 2005, it had been my "4" keybind ever since, and my Rogue has never felt the same without it.

But SnD isn't preventing us from getting Gouge. I still want SnD back as well for the reasons I already elaborated. Our gameplay has become terribly one dimensional, dumbed down, and stupid with the pruning of so many finishers.

[Valdhammer]

Slice and Dice was a definitive combat ability for a very, very long time, and as a talent in it's current form it literally makes you do less DPS than if you selected no talent in that line at all.

I welcome it back, maintenance buffs are a very common theme in this game and a big thing that sets apart the casuals from the big boys.

What separates casuals from the “big boys” is the amount of free time they have to sink into a video game.