Outlaw Rogue Guide for The War Within

Welcome to our War Within expansion guide for Outlaw Rogue. Prior to the expansion's launch, this page will detail everything you need to know about Outlaw Rogue in the upcoming The War Within expansion, including class and spec changes, Hero Talent Trees, and some very light predictions on the state of the spec.

This page is a constantly evolving work in progress, as there will likely be regular changes to parts of the spec's kit, talents and abilities throughout the TWW Beta process. This is not meant to be a launch guide for Outlaw Rogue. The purpose of this page is to serves as a resource for you to keep up to date with how the spec is evolving on Beta, and what you can expect from its playstyle and feel on launch.

Outlaw Rogue has received a number of changes to it's talent trees, which includes the shuffling of some talents, as well as changes to a handful of talents and abilities throughout. The most impactful ones in the class tree are:

• Acrobatic Strikes no longer grants increased melee attack range. It was reworked to now grant additional auto-attack damage, and movement speed.
• Cut to the Chase is now baseline for all Rogue specs.
• Subterfuge now lasts 6 seconds, and is a 2-point talent right before the right-most capstone in the class tree.
• Shadow Dance was moved into the Subtlety spec tree, and replaced with a new capstone that grants an additional charge of Vanish instead.
• Nightstalker was removed.

There have also been many changes in the spec tree. The most notable ones include:

• Adrenaline Rush no longer grants a reduced GCD by itself, but instead reduces your GCD based on your Haste value. This finally makes Haste a valuable stat for Outlaw.
• Count the Odds now provides the same benefits inside and outside of stealth.
• Underhanded Upper Hand no longer affects Slice and Dice, which now auto-extends via Cut to the Chase already, and no longer grants Subterfuge.
• Sepsis was removed.

Outlaw's reliance on stealth-based benefits was lessened slightly, but with Crackshot still being as strong as it is, the removal of Shadow Dance had no bearing on the choices in the class tree. Gaining a second charge of Vanish makes the spec slightly less punishing to play, and adding Haste as a valuable stat for the spec gives a little more variety in gearing choices.

The War Within has major implications for all specs thanks to the Hero Talent Tree system, new tier sets, and the natural reduction in secondary stats when entering a new expansion.

Outlaw Rogue gets to choose between the Trickster and Fatebound Hero Talent Trees. In the sections below, we will take a small dive into the design and benefits of these Hero Talent Trees for the spec, and offer some thoughts on their potential performance and gameplay implications.

The Fatebound Hero Tree Talents are largely centered around the idea of flipping coins through Hand of Fate, offering either a percentage-based damage increase or a cosmic damage proc. Everytime you spend 5+ Combo Points on a finishing move, you either add a stack to the already existing buff, or have it swap over to the opposite one instead. Monitoring and managing the buffs will be key to optimizing the benefits of the Fatebound Hero Talents.

Gameplay-wise, Fatebound is very much a passive kit that offers only very few skill expression opportunities. This is not a bad thing at all, as it allows for a very predictable damage increase to the Outlaw damage profile. While the entire concept is very much centered on RNG, many talents offer additional control over the outcome of these Hand of Fate rolls, which will help you build higher stacks on either of the buffs throughout the fight. Due to how many finishers we end up casting during a 5+ minute encounter, the RNG will even out fairly reliably, so there is no need to worry about this Hero Talent tree adding a lot of DPS variance.

Power-wise, Fatebound needs some major adjustments to be competitive with the DPS gain other classes get right now, which is an easy task once class tuning goes into full motion in the TWW Beta. There are a few bugs that still need ironing out as well, but Fatebound looks to be in a very comfortable position right now with many of the talents offering small DPS increases or making the rotation slightly more fluid, like Deal Fate. While it is not the most interesting, flashy or exciting Hero Talent theme, it is a solid choice for anyone who wants to focus on learning the ins and outs of their chosen spec first without the choice of Hero Talents overcomplicating things.

Defensively, Fatebound adds further bonuses to the already strong toolkit we have. Death's Arrival will allow us to cast Shadowstep a second time within quick succession, which could be used to stick to the boss just a little longer before having to run away from it for a mechanic, as you could just step to a friendly player who is already in a save position, and then immediately jump back to the boss a second or two later. It also offers some minor defensive benefits, with Chosen's Revelry giving you some additional Leech, while Tempted Fate has a chance to make you take less damage. Neither of these choices are incredible, but with how strong our mobility and survivability already are, they don't have to be.

The Trickster Hero Tree Talents are centered around Unseen Blade, a proc that applies after using Sinister Strike and Ambush. Initially, this only applies a damage increase to your target in the form of a debuff, with many talents further improving these benefits or granting different ones entirely. You also gain more control over proccing Unseen blades as you allocate more talent points in this tree.

Gameplay-wise, Trickster is a very passive tree, with the capstone putting you into an animation lock that heavily disrupts gameplay flow. As a result, this hero talent tree is a bit awkward to play, and the Unseen Blades debuff further locks you onto a singular target -- something we just moved away from by having Between the Eyes grant you crit-chance globally, and not just against a single target.

Power-wise, Trickster seems to perform slightly better in low-cleave environments but it is currently trailing behind Fatebound on pure-single-target or larger AoE fights. The difference is very minor, however, so feel free to play around and enjoy the Trickster theme. It bears mentioning, that any of the current predictions are based on the idea that the animation lock of Coup de Grace will be removed. If it does not, Trickster will become noticeably worse than Fatebound.

Defensively, Trickster is very potent, giving a damage reduction against enemies affected by your Unseen Blade, or improving the efficacy of Feint. It also offers some great utility, with a permanent Tricks of the Trade or a reduced cooldown for Blind which will be very useful in Mythic+.

Below are the Tier Set Bonuses for Outlaw Rogue in The War Within.

• Rogue Outlaw Season 1 2pc — Your Sinister Strike, Pistol Shot, and Ambush have a 20% chance to Ethereal Rampage, dealing 15% increased damage as Shadow.
• Rogue Outlaw Season 1 4pc — Ethereal Rampage additionally increases the damage of your next Between the Eyes by 6%, stacking up to 3 times.

Both set bonuses are completely passive and are not expected to have any gameplay impact. We expect some numerical changes to the tier set, but in its current form, the bonus seems to provide roughly the same amount of DPS as other classes.

Strengths

• Further cements the spec as one of the strongest sustained DPS specs in the game.
• Low reliance on cooldowns (this can be a downside as well).
• Both Hidden Opportunity and Keep It Rolling are performing similarly well.
• Better gearing opportunities as Haste is no longer a bad stat.

Weaknesses

• Trickster has some issues, locking you to a single-target in AoE, while also animation locking you with its capstone, disrupting gameflow.
• Still reliant on stealth effects as Crackshot is too strong a capstone to skip out on.