Combat PvE Rogue Guide 3.3.5a

Contents:

1. Stat caps

2. Early Combat spec and play style

3. Late Combat spec and play style

4. BiS list

5. Enchants

6. FAQ & Tips

7. Bug Section

Abbreviations:

CP - Combo Point

SS - Sinister Strike

FoK - Fan of Knives

SnD - Slice and Dice

Evi - Eviscerate

Rup - Rupture

AR - Adrenaline Rush

BF - Blade Flurry

KS - Killing Spree

TotT - Tricks of the Trade

IP - Instant Poison

DP - Deadly Poison

AoE - Area of Effect

Go# - Glyph of #

1. Stat Caps

Hit Rating. The most important thing about DPSing no matter what you do is getting Hit-capped. No other stat matters at all if you're not Hit-capped. It does not matter if you crit for 10k Sinister Strike if that SS *misses*! Hit rating until the Hit-cap is the biggest DPS increase you will get. So, the Hit-cap for special melee abilities is 8%. You MUST always have it! No Sinister Strike misses, no finisher misses. The Hit-cap for spells (poisons) is 17%. You might want to have this as well, since poisons are a very big & important part of Rogue DPS. The Hit-cap for Dual Wield auto-attacks is 25%. It is NOT worth it reaching this cap.

Q: How do I reach the Hit-cap? - 5% from Precision, 1% from Heroic Presence (Draenei) and you got 2% left, which you will get without even trying. From there on it's about gemming & gear choices.

Q: Should I aim for the spell-cap as Combat? - even though you don't get nearly as much DPS from Poisons as Assassination, they still yield a lot of your DPS. So... you should, but it's not your #1 priority.

Expertise comes second after Hit. When attacking from the front (happens in dynamic fights) it is twice as important as Hit. However, you get a good quantity of +Exp from Weapon Expertise & Racial Weapon Specializations, making the 21 Exp cap easily obtainable just from gear. Furthermore, Exp loses half of its value just by the fact that you're attacking from behind (NPCs cannot Parry from behind, they can still Dodge) and then another big chunk from Surprise Attacks enabling your finishers to ALWAYS land when Hit-capped & attacking from behind.

Armor Penetration - this stat allows you to ignore an enemy's armor. Generally speaking, bosses have around 30% mitigation from armor. ArP is your most important secondary DPS stat as Combat, as almost all of your damage is physical. There are 2 ArP caps - the soft and the hard cap. The hard cap is 1400 - it means you'll (theoretically) ignore all of the target's armor. It is obtainable somewhere between ICC10 and ICC25 gear. Before that point you should be aiming for the ArP soft cap, which is the amount of ArP you need to reach 1400 when your ArP trinket procs.

An ArP trinket is a <must-have> for anyone starting Combat. When it procs, it causes your attacks to almost fully ignore the opponent's armor if you are already ArP-soft-capped. This is a list of the 3 pre-ICC ArP-proc trinkets:

• Mjolnir Runestone (Ulduar, vote);
• Needle-encrusted Scorpion (FoS Hc);
• Grim Toll (Naxx25).

2. Early Combat Spec and Play Style

This is the talent build you should be using as a Combat PvE in early gear levels (see below for more info)

5cp SnD + 5cp Rup is the basic Combat rotation. It will yield most of your DPS and make a mediocre Rogue out of you, but that's not what you're aiming I guess... ;)

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