Dirty Deeds: A Rogue Story

We are slowing dying of suspense! 
Akrios from RogueRogue will be releasing his 10th non-arena video.  I for one can not wait!  I enjoy his videos and, have learned a good amount just from watching them.

And speaking of videos and soon, I have started to work on my guide to watching rogue PvP videos.  I have hopes that it will help out anyone that does not understand why these types of movies are so popular and how to get the most from watching them.

Yes, it was a short post but, it is 3:30am and I think it's time to call it.  Just wanted to update everyone and, to point out that another great movie is coming out soon.

After a half day of Athiri Basin and Alterac Valley play I have come to really appreciate playing defense in these battlegrounds.

In Alterac Valley I am really enjoying running around with a small group of people and helping to cap back towers or retake graveyards. It may not seem like it is accomplishing much and your honor kills will be lower than if you were on the offensive or defending the actual keep but, you will be slowing the opposing team's progress by several minutes which in the modern AV is more than enough time to give your team a chance to start on the boss sooner.  This is especially important for Horde players considering how imbalanced the map is in favor of the alliance team.  (The bridge, the route from the starting cave and, the design of the towers all add up to an alliance advantage)

Arathi Basin is by far my favorite place to play defense.  Specifically, at the Blacksmith.  If you can get a job as a Blacksmith guard you will get the buff for defending a flag which will increase your honor gain from all honor kills and, you will get credit for the vast majority of kills made on the map.  Only the extreme ends are out of range.  Just by spending your game at BS you will (if your faction controls it and you can avoid dying) end the match with the most honor kills and the most honor for your faction.  Besides the obvious personal gain for defending BS it is also the most strategic point on the map in my opinion.  The BS grave yard allows quick access to any of the other four nodes.  In addition, it will form a point of the triangle of friendly nodes that your team is trying achieve.  BS, Farm, LM is a lot easier to defend than Farm, LM, Stables.  Take a look at the map and you'll see why.

Warsong Gulch is another map where I enjoy the defense.  As a rogue I enjoy sitting outside of my tunnel and waiting for the Alliance flag carrier to come out. (be watchful of both the ramp and the graveyard fall) You may not be able to get the flag carrier down if they have some friends with them but, you did slow them down allowing your team more time to get their flag across or kill the opposing flag carrier.

There is another reason why I enjoy the defensive style of play in battlegrounds.  Practice.  I don't enjoy being in the 'zerg' I enjoy the smaller scale battles. Being on defensive with 1-4 other people is more than enough to slow or stop a 10+ man rush and your choices and play matter more. Defending the central towers and graveyard with one other person.  Running into a tower held by four alliance and, taking it back feels better and, a lot more fun than running with 32 people up the map and standing around and waiting for towers to cap.

"Will of the Forsaken now shares a 45-second cooldown with similar effects, including the Medallion of the Horde, Titan-Forged runes, Insignia of the Horde, etc."

Seeing how I just changed my rogue from a Blood Elf to an Undead this change is somewhat upsetting at first.  But, then I got to thinking about it.  Being able to break a fear, charm or, sleep affect and still being able to trinket immediately afterward was a bit unfair to fear classes.  And this will not go into effect until 3.3 anyway if it makes it out of the PTR.  I tend to believe that it will.

Now a 45 seconds cool down really isn't that bad.  I haven't run into too many occasions yet, where you need to go back to back with WotF and trinket.  I would still prefer WotF over any other racial for a rogue for the simple fact that it is now a second trinket for most situations on a 45 second cooldown and a 2 minute wait before you can use it again.  I know that sounds odd but, you know what I mean.

I'm sure you'll read a lot about this change both people praising it and condemning it but, in the never ending pursuit of 'balance' it is a change that had to be made.  And remember that with Cataclysm most racials are going to be changing anyway.

In case you haven't seen the Tier 10 Rogue models.

• Rogue T10 2 Piece - Gives your melee finishing moves a 13% chance to add 3 combo points to your target.
• Rogue T10 4 Piece - Your Tricks of the Trade ability now grants you 15 energy instead of costing energy.

 The 2 Piece is amazing and will make Assassination that much more of a combo point game.  Being able to do two Envenom back to back occasionally will be great. Just try not to overlap the Envenom buff too much to maximize the chance of extra Instant Poison procs.
The 4 Piece is just as nice as Tricks of the Trade is an ability we use every cooldown, or at the very least during any 'burn' phase.  Getting energy back instead of spending energy for this ability will be very nice and, a much bigger DPS boost than it may appear at first.

(Update: it appears as though MMO or Blizzard had the set bonuses reversed. What I have listed as 2 piece is 4 Piece and vise versa)

To Dirty Deeds: A Rogue Story.
I hope to fill this blog with stories and thoughts from both of my rogues. One is a raiding rogue on a PvE server and I just recently started another rogue on a large PvP server.

This is my first ever blog so expect to see a lot of growth in the blog as time passes. So be sure to let me know what you like and don't like!