Subtlety Rogue DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities (WoW MoP 5.2)
In this article, we list your Subtlety Rogue (WoW MoP 5.2) core abilities and how they should be used together (rotation). We also explain when to use your various cooldowns. Then, we go deeper and present all the subtleties that playing a Subtlety Rogue will face you with.
The other articles of our Subtlety Rogue guide can be accessed from the table of contents on the right.
This guide has been reviewed and approved by Dryaan, one of the best Rogues in the world, who raids in Envy.
1. Single Target Rotation↑top
- Combo Point builders (by order of priority)
- Use
Ambush when you are in Stealth. - Use
Hemorrhage to apply and maintain the bleed effect it causes on your target. - Use
Backstab as your default Combo Point builder. - When you cannot attack your target from behind, then you cannot use
Backstab, so
Hemorrhage becomes your primary Combo Point
builder.
- Use
- Finishing Moves (by order of priority)
- Apply and maintain
Slice and Dice, with 5 Combo Points preferably:- always refresh Slice and Dice when there are between 0 and 2 seconds remaining.
- Apply and maintain
Rupture with 5 Combo Points. - Use
Eviscerate with 5 Combo Points.
- Apply and maintain
For more information about the optimal opening sequence, refer to our dedicated section.
2. Multiple Target Rotation↑top
When there are 4, 5, or 6 enemies around you, you should sometimes replace
Eviscerate with
Crimson Tempest in your rotation. The idea is to
keep the 12-second bleed effect, from Crimson Tempest, applied on the enemies.
When there are 7 or more enemies around you, you should abandon your single-target
rotation and spam
Fan of Knives instead. When you reach 5 Combo Points on your target,
use
Crimson Tempest to spend them.
If your main target will die in less than 1 minute and you have chosen
Marked for Death as your Tier 6 talent, then use it on cooldown.
3. Poisons↑top
Your Lethal Poison should always be
Deadly Poison.
Your Non-Lethal Poison should be
Leeching Poison. If you chose
a different Tier 3 talent, then use
Mind-numbing Poison.
Refer to our Poisons section for detailed explanations about poisons.
4. Cooldowns↑top
You have four main DPS cooldowns.
Shadow Dance enables you to cast your Stealth-only abilities for 8 seconds.
While active, this ability also reduces the Energy cost of
Ambush by 20.
This ability only has a 1-minute cooldown, so you should use it whenever it is available.
Shadow Blades increases your Combo Point regeneration for 12 seconds, on a
3-minute cooldown. Use this ability whenever you can.
Vanish makes you enter Stealth. Use this ability on cooldown, immediately followed
by 1 or 2 casts of
Ambush (depending on whether
Subterfuge is your tier 1 talent).
Also, you can use
Preparation to reset the cooldown of Vanish.
Premeditation adds two Combo Points on the target, but it can only be used
while in Stealth, which means that you will have to use it at the pull, when you
use
Vanish and whenever you use
Shadow Dance.
In addition, you can use
Redirect in fights where you have to fight different enemies
is a DPS gain. See our Redirect section for more details.
Also,
Sprint can give you more uptime on the boss, which translates
into a direct DPS increase. So, you can use Sprint as a DPS cooldown in some
fights (in addition to its obvious survival role).
Finally, you have a number of survival cooldown, such as
Feint,
Cloak of Shadows,
Preparation,
Evasion, etc. Do not
hesitate to make regular use of them.
5. Optional Read: Mastering Your Subtlety Rogue↑top
The Subtlety specialisation is not very hard to play, and even though the information given above will yield good results, there is much more you need to understand before you can play your Subtlety Rogue to its full potential.
5.1. Combo Points and Energy
As a rogue, most of your abilities need Energy to be used. Your Energy bar has a capacity of 100 Energy and refills at a rate of 10 Energy per second. Your energy regeneration is increased by:
- your melee haste (Haste Rating + haste-enhancing buffs);
- your
Relentless Strikes passive ability, which grants your Finishing Moves a
20% chance per Combo Point to restore 25 Energy; - your
Slice and Dice ability, which restores 8 Energy every 2 seconds (thanks
to
Energetic Recovery, one of your passive abilities).
The faster you regenerate Energy, the more casts of
Eviscerate you can fit
in your rotation.
Some abilities add one or several Combo Points on your target, up to a maximum
of 5 Combo Points (10 with
Anticipation). Other abilities, called Finishing
Moves, consume up to 5 Combo Points
on your target. The more Combo Points a Finishing Move consumes, the more powerful
its effect is. Your Combo Point generation is increased by
Honor Among Thieves,
a passive ability that grants you 1 Combo Point every time you or an ally scores a critical
hit (with a limit of 1 Combo Point every 2 seconds).
5.2. Poisons
As a Rogue, you have Poison spells that you can use to give your weapon strikes a chance to deal more damage and/or apply a debuff/effect. This chance is fixed, which means that slower weapons will have a smaller chance of applying your Poison effects than faster weapons.
Poisons are either Lethal or Non-Lethal. Lethal Poisons are your damaging Poisons while Non-Lethal Poisons provide crowd control and utility. You can have one Lethal Poison and one Non-Lethal Poison active at the same time.
Deadly Poison and
Wound Poison are your Lethal Poisons.
Deadly Poison will be your Poison of choice. Wound Poison will only be used
when you need the healing reduction that it provides.
Your Non-Lethal Poisons are listed below. Using
Shiv will
apply on your target a concentrated version (i.e., a more potent effect)
of your Non-Lethal Poison.
Crippling Poison reduces your enemy's movement speed.
Mind-numbing Poison reduces your enemy's casting speed.
Leeching Poison (Tier 3 talent) heals you for 10% of the damage dealt.
Paralytic Poison (Tier 5 talent) stuns your enemy.
Note that
Fan of Knives has a chance to apply your poisons on every
target that it hits.
5.2.1. Honor Among Thieves
The most important aspect of your resource management is to learn how to rely
on procs from
Honor Among Thieves. This passive ability grants you a Combo Point every
time a party or raid member critically hits or heals (with a limit of 1 Combo Point
every 2 seconds). This effect is only active while you are in combat.
Use these guidelines to properly take Honor Among Thieves into account
in your resource management:
- If you have 3 Combo Points and are very low on Energy, you should
wait for
Honor Among Thieves to grant you the remaining two Combo Points.
This way, you will have Energy to spend on a Finishing Move. - Similarly, whenever you reach 4 Combo Points, you should save your
Energy and wait for
Honor Among Thieves to give you the last Combo Point. - If you have 4 Combo Points and your Energy bar is almost full,
then you should quickly build up another Combo Point with
Backstab (or
Hemorrhage if you cannot attack from behind) and immediately use a Finishing Move.
The idea is that risking to waste a Combo Point from
Honor Among Thieves is
not as bad as wasting Energy.
5.3. Find Weakness and Master of Subtlety
Find Weakness is an important mechanics when playing a Subtlety Rogue.
This temporary damage increase is only available after using
Ambush,
Garrote, or
Cheap Shot. These abilities require Stealth to be
cast so you will have
Find Weakness uptime at the pull, every time you
use
Shadow Dance and every time you use
Vanish (the cooldown
of which you can reset with
Preparation).
Master of Subtlety is a passive ability that you get from choosing the Subtlety
specialisation. It grants you 10% increased damage after you break out of Stealth
or after dealing damage in Stealth (typically while using
Ambush). Note
that Master of Subtlety will not proc during
Shadow Dance.
As
Find Weakness and
Master of Subtlety are often up at the same
time, we chose to detail them together.
You should always time your
Shadow Dance and
Vanish cooldowns
in such a way that you do not have to refresh
Slice and Dice or
Rupture (which does not benefit from
Find Weakness) while
these cooldowns are active.
This way, you will be able to maximise the damage
you will do with melee attacks,
Backstab,
Hemorrhage, and
Eviscerate, while
Find Weakness and
Master of Subtlety
are active.
For increased effect, you should also try to have
Find Weakness
and
Master of Subtlety up when raid DPS cooldowns are being used
(for example,
Bloodlust,
Heroism, or
Time Warp), when
you use your Potion of the Tol'vir and on-use trinkets, and
when the boss takes increased damage.
5.4. Rupture and Sanguinary Vein
Sanguinary Vein is a passive ability that increases the damage
of your
Rupture ability by 50% and that causes you to deal 16% increased
damage to enemies afflicted by
Rupture,
Garrote, or
Crimson Tempest (your AoE Finishing Move).
The most obvious implication of having this passive ability is that
Rupture should always be on the target, so that you
always deal 20% increased damage.
Another, less obvious implication is that you can use
Garrote
for breaking out of Stealth at the opening. This will instantly
grant you a 18-second duration on
Sanguinary Vein.
5.5. Find Weakness and Shadow Blades
As a general rule, avoid using
Shadow Blades when
Find Weakness
is up. The reason for that is that the auto-attacks done during Shadow
Blades already bypass the enemy's armor, so part of the damage bonus from
Find Weakness is wasted during Shadow Blades.
An exception to this rule is when casting Shadow Blades during Find Weakness would enable you cast Shadow Blades more times during the encounter.
5.6. Building Combo Points during Shadow Dance
When using
Shadow Dance,
Ambush takes the place of
Backstab as your Combo Point builder. This is very beneficial as
Ambush deals more damage and generates more Combo Points than Backstab.
5.7. Using Redirect
Redirect is a very convenient ability for Rogues, especially for
Subtlety Rogues because Combo Point management is very important.
This ability transfers your existing Combo Points to your current target. Note that
when you kill an enemy, your unused Combo Points remain on it, which means that they
can be transferred through
Redirect. Moreover, your Combo Points on a dead enemy
are removed when another enemy dies with unused Combo Points.
Redirect is very useful in two situations:
- when you switch target and want to start on your new target with the Combo Points you had on your previous target;
- when you engage a boss and you want to start with as many Combo Points as possible (by transferring the Combo Points of the last trash mob that died).
5.8. Opening Sequence
In this section, we assume that you took
Subterfuge as your
Tier 1 talent.
- Enter Stealth — if you are pre-potting, it will get you out of Stealth, so pre-pot before entering Stealth.
- Use
Tricks of the Trade on your Tricks of the Trade target (see next section). - open with
Premeditation+
Slice and Dice (you get increased Energy generation from
Energetic Recovery); - cast
Shadowstep (if
Cloak and Dagger is not talented) and
Garrote (for
Sanguinary Vein); - cast
Ambush as many times as possible (usually twice)- should be possible thanks to Energetic Recovery and
Subterfuge; - extra Combo Points will be stored, thanks to
Anticipation;
- should be possible thanks to Energetic Recovery and
- continue with your normal rotation, with the following tweaks:
- do not refresh
Rupture until
Garrote fades; - use
Shadow Dance right before
Find Weakness runs out (so the
first
Ambush during Shadow Dance benefit from Find Weakness). - use
Vanish right before
Find Weakness runs out again.
- do not refresh
5.9. Tricks of the Trade
Tricks of the Trade was originally designed to be cast on tanks in order to help
them keep aggro. With the changes that threat generation has undergone in WOTLK and Cataclysm,
it is now more beneficial to your raid if you use Tricks of the Trade on one of the best
DPS players in order to increase their damage done.
Note that you can (and most often should) cast
Tricks of the Trade on the tank at
the pull, before switching to a different target when refreshing it.
Tricks of the Trade costs you a global cooldown to cast and costs
15 Energy. The damage bonus that it grants to your target is so
beneficial, that it is well worth the sacrifice of a global cooldown and
15 Energy.
Please refer to our Macros and
Addons page for a
Tricks of the Trade macro.
5.10. Bosses That Cannot Be Attacked From Behind
Certain bosses cannot be attacked from behind, for example
Ultraxion in
Dragon Soul. This means that you need to use
Hemorrhage, instead of
Backstab, to build Combo Points.
On such bosses, you will gain
Find Weakness uptime by using
Garrote to break out of Stealth. This ability, unlike
Backstab has
no positioning requirement.
Finally, you can boost your DPS by equipping a 2.6-speed weapon in your
Main-hand slot. Since you are unable to use
Backstab,
there is no reason to stick with a Main-hand dagger.
6. Changelog↑top
- 19 Mar. 2013: Added a section on the interaction between
Shadow Blades and
Find Weakness. - 19 Mar. 2013: Improved opening sequence and removed sub-optimal variations.
- 11 Mar. 2013: Patch 5.2 update.
- Updated mention of
Preparation being a Tier 4 talent (it is now baseline). - Added a mention of
Marked for Death in the multiple-target rotation section. - Updated damage increase provided by
Sanguinary Vein (it is now 16%, was 20%).
- Updated mention of
