“The fundamental flaw(s) of the rogue class starts right at the beginning”.
There you go, I said it.
Lets go back a while. November 2004, for America a month that would chance history, for Europe the start of 3 months crying until february 2005. I think I can say that the whole world was waiting for WoW to be released since the announcement in 2001.
Now before WoW I already was quite addicted to video games including RPG’s. I love the building of your character and the exploration you had to do. Most of the time I played warriors so I was destined to play a warrior when WoW came out. And so I did. By the time I was lvl 60 I had gear with intellect, agility and strenght all together. Ofcourse later I knew this was not how I should be gearing up. I also learned about the rogue class. A pure DPS class with fast wielding daggers/swords/axes. Now, normally I start my 1st characther to learn the game and getting to know the layout of the land and then start again with the knowledge I have. Since I wanted to play a 100% pure DPS class it had to be a rogue. And so I started my 2nd journey as night elf rogue, because as elf I would come to Ashenvale in which the music was really nice. ( I love it ) Later I changed to gnome, till today.
Now everybody knows in classic you had to level up every weapon seperately and that took quite some time. Those moments you finally got a new kickass weapon but forget you had to level it up 1st 
I loved everthing about the rogue and the game all the way to lvl 60. From this point on we all knew you had to be in a guild to continue further. Remembering the 40 man Molten Core runs. This was also the time you really had to start studying your class to get the most dps out of it with the best rotation and slowly the addons starting to come out. Where recount was the most popular (I think). With this addon you could finally see if your class study paid off. Who was at the top of the dps meter. That time the rogue really stood up for what its class was suppose to be, pure dps. Many times rogues stood at the top.
Then the 1st expansion came and I remember the start was quite tough. Lots of running in very open areas with lots of mobs. (luckily I had sprint had stealth). After some quests you got the quest to go into the new dungeons. So, as usual, you started to ask for help to get a group. I came to notice almost no group wanted a rogue because of the dungeon mob groups who were way more suitable for range players so all groups consisted of only range dps. This was the 1st time I started to think wether the rogue was, the to go class. Further into the game I realised it was better to make my own group. It was like this till lvl 70, but still loving my rogue as a main character.
During the time until WoTLK release I also started to try out the other classes because I wanted to see and feel how they played. So playing my rogue through WoTLK, again really struggeling at some areas, I also leveled up a shaman. Lots of areas were really crowded (scarlet crusade) and with my rogue I died many times. Playing my shaman I was worried I would die as many times. Only to know I literally blew everone away as much as 6 mobs at a time. How was this even possible ? How unbalanced is this ? Was the shaman overpowered ? Was my rogue THAT bad ? I started to see the many differences between the classes all together. I noticed other classes were more fun to play, like the shaman, but also warlock and I had good fun with shadowpriest. Even now, my rogue was everything, so much time spent on this class, so much studies, there is no way I let my rogue die, but I saw the cracks slowly coming.
I dont have to say to anybody how the game went after WoTLK. As for the rogue class, the big “NO” came for me to see the -combat rogue- being changed into -outlaw rogue-. You got to be serious ? This was it, the whole idea of a fast wielding weapon dps class who no mob can withstand was instantly gone. We were going to be pirates. Still melee but with pistols, how does this even work ? No way, “this cannot be”, but it was and so I cried many tears.
The coming of shadowlands and dragonflight, for me personally, still leveling my rogue 1st, was the final straw for me. The maw ? worst area ever created, Unplayable, especially for rogues. Dragonflight ? being constantly at the bottom 10 at dps meters in the raid as a rogue, I decided to leave WoW with some pain after 18 years. The rogue class was dead. I had no reason to play WoW further.
So after a year, getting bored with other games I am back again. Hearing about the 3 part saga for next expansions got me warmed up. Thus setting myself a goal, just getting ready for this, meaning making sure leveling every character to max.
Now I already have all classes on alliance with one horde, I decided I want the same with horde including the allied races. I know, I am nuts and crazy.
So, I started with leveling. Chose chromie time wisely to level as fast as possible and had, fun enough. I come to the point where the rogue, monk and evoker are left. Evoker start at high level so I safe this for later. Here goes, I picked orc rogue (for racial bonus) and started … lvl 1. (still have this in my head that this class is dead, why I chose this for last)
For all characters I chose the exile reach to start. Nice tutorial area, nothing wrong with it. There even is a quest to nuke an elite bear. So when i chose my rogue to go, I already had played 9 other classes through that area without problems. (there shouldnt even be problems !!!)
When you come to the quest to kill that elite bear you are lvl 9 with about 10 spells given to you by Blizzard, but still in base build. Also with some upgraded gear from the quests including your class quest. For rogues, the instant poison talent.
The 1st thing you need to do when you start the game is kill a dummy with the 1 talent you have. And here is where I am going to say already:
“the rogue is by far the worst class to play”
You can literally see this by just this 1st quest to kill that dummy. The talent you start with is -sinister strike-. This need to be used to increase combo points. The fact that this cost 45 energy instantly kills our class. So, I hit it once and then I HAVE to WAIT for energy to refill and rely on autoattack until I can use Sinister strike again.
Killing that dummy took way longer than any other class which basically means our most important spell is also instantly our achilles heel, how ironic. But the dummy “dies” after 1 min and I go on. Mr. Lee would probably also have said the rogue class sucks since wooden boards don’t hit back. True fact.
Jumping to that quest to nuke the bear. I am gonna summon the spells you have with info and how they are NOT working.
sinister strike - costs 45 energy, 7 damage. Can barely use it, thanks to the waiting time for energy refill, death within 20 secs. USELESS and NEED to change. energycost need to be removed (like all other classes who can use their base attack all the time)
eviserate - finisher, so need CP’s. ONLY used it once at 3 CP, before death.
slice an dice - increase attack speed. rogues suppose to start with it at 3 CP. true but at this time already lost 1/4 health. Also really doesnt do anything, at least nothing that you can visualize. It really doesnt show I stab that bear 10x faster. WHICH IT SHOULD DO !
Ambush - Ofcourse you start with stealth and ambush, but can use it only once. logic, but useless. Dont need to chance, but doesnt really help with killing the bear.
instant poison - read this, … 30% chance to poison enemy. It is our class talent and it should help us bigtime. It doesnt do sh*t. I sip my dagger with poison, so everytime I stick my dagger in this bear it ALMOST does damage ? WHAT ? It NEEDS to be 100% otherwise it doesn’t make sense at all. As if my poison falls of my dagger just before I hit him !!!
Or use it as a damage over time spell, 100% hit and then x amount of damage over 6 seconds. And also … ONLY 2 nature damage, seriously !!
For now, poison is 100% useless and I want color numbers in FCT to see it actually DOES poison damage. (without an addon)
crimson vial - Gotta be THE most USELESS healing spell of the game. Absolutely crap, doesnt help you any bit at all. Needs to be a spell to INSTANT HEAL you for 40 or so, not 20% of maxhealth over 4 secs. Otherwise completely useless.
(monk has a fast heal that fills him up 50%, this HELPS)
More then these above spells you dont have. ROGUE is the ONLY class that cannot kill this bear. Its the freaking tutorial and already this class SUCKS. Thank you Blizzard. The talents we have at level 9 are the worst ever and these should be our base attacks. All other classes nuke this bear within 20 secs, for rogues its the other way around.
I tried this 10 times with different approaches, IMPOSSIBLE.
Why does my monk, who has leather gear as well, but way better healing and 3 different talents to use instantly has no problem at all to kill this bear ???
(For the record, I dont use heirlooms cause I find this cheating, the other classes had no problems at all to kill the bear without heirlooms)
So, conclusion, ROGUES need to be rebuild from the ground up and for the LOVE OF GOD …
NUKE THE PIRATE THEME !!! Its UNPLAYABLE !
Our base attacks are literally NOT working. Together with leather armor, well …
We need to go back to the combat rogue style with fast attacks and also showing this visually in the game like -fists of fury- for the monk. superfast visuals.
The fact that i cant even do the tutorial 100% while rest of classes has no problem, makes me decide to chance my main character and not continue with my orc rogue, unless this class is going to chance drastically. Even in dragon flight other classes are way more fun to play than rogues.
If nothing happens this class will die out. Blizzard should be ashamed to have let it come this far. I seriously hope for the next expansion we see a complete overhaul of the rogue class, just to save them. Or in some future patches already before the expansion.
After getting nuked by that bear so fast I had to urge to write this, I am angry and super disappointed at the same time. If you made it this far, respect, I just hope if we act like a group, something might actually chance.
Rogues probably wont get killed, but they also should NOT be placed silently in a corner rotting away.