Thinking about leveling a rogue

[Gralmor-ragnaros (Gralmor)]

So after struggling hard as a fury warrior to get into any +9 key groups and above because everyone seems to be “LF Rouge, DH”, i decided that i want to level up a rogue to have as a strong alt. I’ve mained rogue in past expacs like cata and mop on a different server, but now i want to level it again on my main server.

There’s something that’s bugging me though, and that’s more m+ oriented:
Despite their importance in m+, I’ve realized that rogues aren’t such a “Jack of all trades” class, meaning that you either top the meters on AOE and fall very far behind on ST (Outlaw) or you fall behind on AOE like on reaping ads but you’ll probs come first in ST (Assassination). That idea annoys me a little because if you look at Demon Hunters, they seem to be topping both AOE and ST most of the time, and hell even as a fury warrior, sure my damage isnt comparable to top geared rogues but i can dish out some mean AOE on reaping groups (70k+) and still come out first, if not second, on ST fights.

Is there a workaround for this as a rogue ? What has worked for you ? I’ve heard that the echoing blades trait for assass can make the spec very strong in AOE while still retaining its power in ST.

Let me know your thoughts and discoveries. Thank you.

[Nill-kazzak]

Outlaw’s not really that lackluster in ST if you take blade rush instead of dancing steel. What will probably mean the most is how long you take to roll a decent buff on any given boss, which isn’t something everybody can stomach, tho it’s still pretty easy to top overall meters. And those 5 buffs are Hella sweet

As for assassination, yeah echoing blades are pretty much mandatory for any content where you can expect to aoe, as is keep your wits about you as outlaw. From my personal experience, mostly in season one, the specc performs well in both cases but pulls ahead in ST as you’ve said so specc a bit further into aoe with crimson tempest to help out on that.

Mostly to sum it up, yes you’ll perform a bit better on one front but not like being top on ST and bottom on aoe or vice versa.

Tho I have to say if you’re only rolling a rogue to get into m+ my advice is don’t do it. It’s not a golden ticket. Yeah there are some groups that always want one and you’re pretty much needed for some skips, but without some experience and with so many out there as well you won’t be getting insta invites. My advice would be to push your own keys on your warrior and make some friends along the way if you don’t have guildies or friends to push with you. Found that out the hard way since I got into the expac pretty late.

[Omár-draenor]

I am coming from the same place you are: Fury war main that couldn’t get into m+.
As an Orc I couldn’t roll an elf dh (hell no) so I rolled the next best thing a rogue and have found out the same thing you did. We have to suck at something either Aoe or st and it was extremely frustrating.
Dh is op in this situation where they can have both and even us Fury Warriors had this ability ( st and aoe )

But I found a nice niche for us and it is fantastic, it is 2-3 or 4 target add “cleave”.
Stack up the Azerite Double dose, when you have 2 or 3 of these do not use FoK, instead keep apply your dots and tab untill you main target and just use your st rotation.
The idea here is supplementing your monster ST with the damage coming from the bleeds\poison of other mobs and NOT going full aoe mode with FoK.

As a side note I have been testing master assassin and the opener ( garrote, mutilate, rupture ) seems to have a high chance of dropping poison bomb due to the extra crits generating more combo points for a 5 combo point rupture and it has been helping me a lot on aoe instead of lost time with applying rupture.

Hope this info helps you out.

[Gralmor-ragnaros (Gralmor)]

Very solid advice. And honestly i just needed a very small excuse to keep on playing my Warrior due to how much i love the class haha, so yeah i’ll give my keys another go and will keep a close tab on assass.

@Omár
Glad someone else saw that. And honestly i was torn between maghar orc and undead for rogue but seeing as my main is an Orc i thought i might go with an undead rogue, always imagined rogue as undead before the newer races ^^
Though im interested in that build, how high do you pull with it on reaping adds? Do you still get passed by other Dhs or Outlaw rogues ?

Edit: For some reason this stupid new website update wont let me do 2 replies in a row… So i did them in the same post.