Cataclysm Classic Combat Rogue Talent Builds

Combat Rogue has a relatively straight forward talent build that focuses on maximizing our damage by utilizing the full array of talents from Bandit's Guile to Killing Spree.

This spec goes is focused on maximizing your ability to deal damage, there is some very slight variance depending on what you view as more important, this build opts for two points into Ruthlessness which you can easily shift one of these points back into Lethality.

In this section we will go over some of the key talents you will use when you are playing a Combat Rogue. Be sure to understand your most important talents as they are vital to play the build to its fullest strength.

• Improved Sinister Strike — increases the damage done and reduces the Energy cost of your Sinister Strike ability. Sinister Strike is our primary Combo Point generator and the ability we will be casting most often so the more damage it deals and the less Energy it costs the more impactful each cast will be.

• Aggression — increases the damage dealt by your Sinister Strike and Eviscerate abilities which will act as both our primary Combo Point generator and spender so the added benefit to both is a great, entirely passive DPS increase.

• Revealing Strike — causes your next offensive finish move to deal 35% more damage. While not a replacement for Sinister Strike this ability should ideally be used when you have four Combo Pointsactive on the target and plan to cast Eviscerate as your next Combo Point spending ability.

• Improved Gouge — increases the duration of your Gouge ability and reduces its Energy cost by 30. While not traditionally a DPS ability we will be utilizing Gouge regularly in our rotation as a nearly free way to generate Combo Points thanks to Glyph of Gouge.

• Combat Potency — causes your off-hand melee attacks to have a 20% chance to generate 15 Energy.

• Adrenaline Rush — increases your Energy regeneration rate by 100% and your Attack Speed by 20% for 15 seconds. The increased Energy regeneration allows us to cast a considerable amount more abilities while it is active but you risk Energy capping so always make sure you are in a position to be able to consistently spend the Energy before casting Adrenaline Rush.

• Savage Combat — increases your total Attack Power by 6% and causes all targets afflicted by your poisons to take 4% more Physical damage from all sources.

• Bandit's Guile — causes your Sinister Strike and Revealing Strike to grant you an evolving insight, increasing your damage up to 30% against the target. As long as you continue to cast Sinister Strike Revealing Strikes you will progress from Shallow Insight to Moderate Insight to finally Deep Insight.

• Killing Spree — instantly teleport to the target and deal damage over the course of 2.5 seconds. This ability can hit the same target multiple times and your damage done is increased by 20% while Killing Spree-ing.

Prime glyphs are new to Cataclysm, giving you a third "row" of glyphs you can use on your character. While there are a couple of different options to choose from, there are some very clear front runners for each specialization.

• Glyph of Adrenaline Rush — increases the duration of your Adrenaline Rush ability by 5 seconds greatly increasing the amount of Energy regenerated and thus allowing you to cast considerably more abilities in this window.
• Glyph of Sinister Strike — causes your Sinister Strike ability to have a 20% chance to generate an additional Combo Point.
• Glyph of Slice and Dice — increases the duration of your Slice and Dice by 6 seconds, as Combat keeping your Slice and Dice buff active as often as possible is crucial so adding duration to the buff will make this much easier and allow you to spend more Combo Points on Eviscerates.

Major glyphs typically offer utility-based options and can be highly situational. For Combat there are a wide variety of Glyphs, but we have highlighted what are typically the most useful.

• Glyph of Feint — reduces Energy cost of your Feint ability by 20.
• Glyph of Gouge — removes the positional requirement of our Gouge ability.
• Glyph of Blade Flurry — reduces the Energy generation penalty of Blade Flurry by 50%.

Minor glyphs typically provide very minor benefits. Your choices will typically depend on what quality of life increase is the most meaningful for you.

• Glyph of Poisons — causes your poison application to be 50% faster.
• Glyph of Safe Fall — greatly reduces your fall damage taken.
• Glyph of Blurred Speed — allows you to walk on water with Sprint active.