This Week in Rogueball: May 10-16, 2013

Time for a new experiment!

Here’s a quick roundup of stuff relevant to WoW rogues that happened, or was said, in the past week:

In the Live Game

• It looks like sometime on May 16 they implemented a hotfix that inadvertently nerfed the crap out of the legendary meta gem for melee DPS. It was quickly reverted, but if you’ve got that gem equipped and your DPS weirdly dropped yesterday, now you know why.

Patch 5.3

• PvP chief Brian Holinka reaffirmed that, despite the nerfs in store, he thinks rogues will still be better in Patch 5.3 than they were in 5.1.
• Patch 5.3 PTR: Death knights (particularly Unholy) got a damage nerf — via a targeted nerf to *our* Tricks of the Trade spell. It doesn’t affect our DPS at all, but let’s be annoyed about it anyway.
• We still have no launch date for Patch 5.3, by the way. It’s looking pretty likely that shit’ll go down next Tuesday (5/21) or the Tuesday after. Also, I think “shit’ll” just became my new favorite word. [Updated] Patch 5.3 is likely launching next Tuesday (5/21), by the way, as announced by Blizzard a few hours after I initially posted this. “Shit’ll” is still my new favorite word, though, and I’m sorry I struck through it. Forgive me, shit’ll!

Blizzfolk Interactions + Random Tidbits

• We learned that you can’t use a Potion of Luck on a Vine-Cracked Junkbox in hopes of getting extra loot from it.
• Holinka appeared to disagree with players who felt that Marked for Death was overpowered in PvP.

From the World Wide Ninjaweb

• Encrypted Text this week provided a rundown of five particularly helpful rogue macros.
• A few of us had a pretty cool conversation in the WoW rogue forum, for a couple of pages starting here, about how much rogues have changed (or haven’t changed) since Cataclysm.
• Similarly, a forum thread on how people would redesign our three specs has been impressively cordial and constructive (for the most part), and is now five pages long.
• I started a comprehensive collection of rogue-related Blizzfolk tweets that you all should visit every single day and share meals with it and hug it and tell it it’s very pretty.

And that’s this week in rogueball (TWIRB).

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R-Cubed Site Update: You Can Haz All the Warcraft Rogue Tweets

Yep, it’s a blog post about a post on this blog. That feeling you just had? It’s your BRAIN BECOMING ESPLODED.

Since I started this little roguey home on the Web half a year ago, WoW designers’ and community managers’ use of Twitter to communicate with players has shot up into the stratosphere. For people like me, who use Twitter for Warcrafty chatting way more often than is healthy, I have never felt more directly engaged and tuned-in to what the brains behind the game are thinking about and working on. It’s pretty freaking cool.

The blessing, for all of you who read this blog and other rogueish fansites, is that we have more to tell you than ever about what designers and CMs have been saying about the class. The curse, for those of us who manage to somehow fool you into thinking our words are worth reading, is that there’s more info than ever to try to keep track of and summarize.

For a while, I was creating a new bloggy post on here every time a new Twitter conversation took place that was relevant to our class. Earlier in the spring, though, shit just got too real: When folks like Ghostcrawler and Brian Holinka are flinging dozens of tweets per day into the ether, it’s a serious challenge finding the time to do anything more than scan them with my eyeballs and quickly save links to the roguely ones.

Enter the Roguetwitpendium. Formerly the Home for Wayward Rogue Tweets (a place where I dumped tweets that I hoped to write up in a future blog post), it’s now a mostly-in-date-order, mostly-sort-of-kind-of-grouped-by-topic listing of every single rogue-related tweetversation I’ve seen that involved a WoW designer or community manager. It’s meant to be a single page that I — or you, I guess, if you’re into that kind of thing — can turn to browse through a full timeline of rogue-related Twitter conversations with the folks behind the game. Which is hopefully kind of handy.

I’ll still write up individual blog posts for tweets and other developments I think are worth me using my own words to bore you about. But for those of you who want an easy way to stay up to date on the entire Blizzard rogue Twitterverse (read: masochists), now you’ve got it.

At the moment, I only have May’s tweets all set up the way I want; March/April will follow shortly, and after that I’ll push further back in time as my future time allows (and assume I don’t breach the space-time continuum in the process). But I’ll do my best to update the page at least once a day with new rogueBlizztweets as they flit through the ether.

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Patch 5.3 Note Update: Tricks No Longer Buffs Some Death Knight Diseases

We got a hint last week, from a series of Brian Holinka and Ghostcrawler tweets, that our Tricks of the Trade spell was likely to get a poke to reduce its synergy with some death knight diseases — particularly the so-called “festerblight” rotation, which gives Unholy DKs some pretty amazing damage potential in a way that wasn’t entirely intended. (Think what would happen if we found a way to extend Shadow Blades indefinitely. Kinda like that.)

Last week, a patch note update included some direct nerfs to festerblight that surprised and frustrated many Unholy players who felt the change was coming out of left field. The devs took a closer look and decided that it wasn’t festerblight itself that was causing the biggest issue — it was how festerblight was being enhanced by the 15% damage boost granted by a friendly nearby rogue casting Tricks of the Trade at the proper moment(s).

Which led to those DK nerfs from last week being reverted in today’s official patch note update, and replaced with this:

• Blood Plague no longer benefits from the damage increase granted by Tricks of the Trade.
• Frost Fever no longer benefits from the damage increase granted by Tricks of the Trade.

This concludes the part of the post where I continue to have any clue what I’m talking about. (Actually, that part may have concluded about halfway through the first sentence.) But because I want to find some closure to the post, I’m going to try to stretch this into some kind of meaningful statement about how this provides a nice reminder that rogue changes aren’t always about balancing rogues in particular; they’re about trying to keep rogue abilities and rogue strengths/weaknesses in balance with the other classes in the game, and trying to ensure that no single grouping of classes becomes clearly superior to others in situations like progression raiding or 3v3 arena (where, for instance, rogue/hunter/priest has proven extremely strong in 5.2, and is seeing hits across that team as a result).

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On Twitter: How Rogues Made Death Knights OP

Ask not what your rogue can do for you; ask what it can do for your entire raid team.

Here’s an exchange that PvP cap’n Brian Holinka had with players on Twitter earlier today around some planned DPS nerfs to Death Knights. I’ve got no deep/useful analysis to provide here, except maybe to note the glimpse this gives us into just how complex class-change decisions can be, no matter how small they seem. It’s also an important reminder of how, sometimes, a change that we may think is a slam-dunk ends up having entirely unexpected consequences in PvE and PvP situations.

@holinka Reason behind Unholy Might nerf? Dks only receive nerfs in 5.3 (NS, Unholy Might, Sudden Doom), probably back to 5.1 state now—
Another (@skanot) May 08, 2013

@skanot We're looking at it still. We think it has more to do with Tricks of the Trade than diseases.—
Holinka (@holinka) May 08, 2013

@Aulper7 @skanot Rogues can give you 15% more damage with tricks of the trade. It allows DK's in PvE to get a lot of high spread damage.—
Holinka (@holinka) May 08, 2013

 

[UPDATE 5/9:] Ghostcrawler added these responses a bit later on.

@Fromnowear The PI problem was it was a talent, so it felt too mandatory because you could use it on someone else.—
Greg Street (@Ghostcrawler) May 09, 2013

@VerainOfUrsin @holinka ToT is fine overall. We just didn't want it to push all DKs into Festerblight rotation.—
Greg Street (@Ghostcrawler) May 09, 2013

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Patch 5.3 PTR Note Update: Stuff We Already Knew About Becomes Super-Official

WoW Community Manager Rygarius is back from his vacation, and that means an update to the official Patch 5.3 PTR notes. On the rogue front, the update certifies three changes we already caught wind of last week, either via developer tweet or datamining:

• The sharp right turn on the Cloak and Dagger change is now in the notes. Instead of having the range nerfed, it will only be usable in stealth (which doesn’t include Shadow Dance).
• The Find Weakness PvP nerf/PvE buff mentioned by Brian Holinka is now in the notes.
• The Revealing Strike duration buff that was datamined last week, but otherwise wasn’t publicly discussed by anybody official, is now in the notes.

For a full rundown of rogue changes coming up in Patch 5.3, you know where to look!

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On Twitter: Patch 5.3 Rogue PvP Changes Are Likely Done, Holinka Suggests

And with this, PvP rogues may finally have a chance to exhale. Or to take a breath between howls over the planned class nerfs.

@fate47 happy with rogue/hunter changes. Still talking about affliction, holy pally and mage.

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 07, 2013

Obviously, this shouldn’t be taken to mean that the door is finally closed on the rogue adjustments for Patch 5.3; the developers may well change their minds, and there’s always a chance that they decided on additional changes last week and we just haven’t seen them yet. But this strongly suggests that the end of rogue PvP nerfs is in sight.

It also strongly suggests, of course, that any PvP buffs folks may have been hoping for to offset the nerfs probably won’t be happening for Patch 5.3 either.

Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing: The reactions I’ve seen in forums from rogue PvP players run the gamut from “these are minor and expected changes that won’t gut me” to “this is so catastrophic for rogues that I’m cancelling my subscription and burning my house down,” and everything in between. That wide range of opinions leads me to suspect that, in competitive arena, we may well see rogues dip a bit in terms of their presence within top rankings. But we’re probably not looking at anything resembling the barren pre-Patch 5.2 landscape, particularly not given the adjustments being made to other classes — or the adjustments that may yet be made to other classes, as Holinka suggests in the tweet above.

It’ll be interesting to see the effect that all of these changes — to rogues, to other classes (especially hunters) and to PvP Power — have on popular arena comps. It can be hard to predict which classes/specs really synergize well with one another until arena players have really had a chance to dive in and check out all the changes, which tends not to happen until the patch actually goes live. (The devs have noted previously that players tend to spend very little time on the PTR testing PvP changes in arena, so the changes they make to their initial patch plans are based more on theory and feedback than on actual play data.)

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On Twitter: PvP Chief Compares Shadowstep to Other Classes’ Baseline Mobility

BlizzBlues typically avoid, in plaguelike fashion, any direct class-vs.-class comparison of a single tool in the toolkit. They’re fond of saying — and rightly so — that classes aren’t created to be hard counters with one another, and that if they all had the same tools, they’d all basically be the same class (which might be very nicely balanced, but would also be the most boring thing in the history of ever).

That made it a little surprising that WoW PvP honcho Brian Holinka engaged in some back-and-forth last night over Shadowstep, and how the ability — which is currently a level-60 talent option — stacks up against the baseline mobility-aiding spells that other classes get. It’s a bit of an odd comparison, and as you’ll see Holinka doesn’t just talk about the ability in a bubble (since its synergy with other abilities, such as Cloak of Shadows, can add to its strength). But it’s one of those cool little glimpses into the way the mind of a senior PvP designer works and how he regards the strengths and weaknesses of rogues compared to other classes.

@objectirl Low cooldown and instantly on target. Comparing to Ret, Enhance, Death Knight and even Warrior it's very good. Monk may be better

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 06, 2013

@objectirl not to mention automatically applied snare and shiv'd 70% snare.

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 06, 2013

@Bludzeu @objectirl DK mobility = grip?

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 06, 2013

@Bludzeu @objectirl cloak and ams are a wash, chilblains is a talent (unlike crippling), potentially many cc breaks but not mobility

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 06, 2013

@Bludzeu @objectirl but I agree warrior is a stretch

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 06, 2013

@Bludzeu @objectirl to be fair I forgot ferals which are also very mobile

—
Holinka (@holinka) May 06, 2013

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On Twitter/Patch 5.3 PTR: Cloak and Dagger Nerf Clarified (It’s All About the Stealthjamins)

Amidst the hue and cry over our latest rogue PvP nerf revelation (in Patch 5.3, Cloak and Dagger likely won’t work when Subtlety rogues try to use it during Shadow Dance), WoW PvP honcho Brian Holinka dropped this little nugget:

@JRoosy CnD's range is back to 30 yards, but no longer usable unless stealthed—
Holinka (@holinka) May 03, 2013

Holinka and Ghostcrawler have been tweeting like CRAZY over the rogue changes since word of this CnD adjustment got out; read my previous post for a (mostly) complete listing.

Between Twitter, datamining and official patch note updates, the Patch 5.3 rogue change revelations have been pretty rapid-fire lately, so just to recap where we think we’re at right now:

• Cloak and Dagger will still be usable at 30 yards; the nerf to 20 yards will be reverted. However, rogues will only be able to use CnD while stealthed — this is why it can’t be used during Shadow Dance, because you’re technically not stealthed when ShD is active. (I’m assuming we will also be able to use CnD during Vanish or, for those of us who play a night elf, while Shadowmelded, but I haven’t seen any solid info on this yet.)
• All the Shuriken Toss changes are still happening. (Energy cost doubles, damage doubles, damage bonus at range removed.)
• The crowd control glyph nerfs (to Cheap Shot’s stun and Garrote’s silence) are probably still happening. (Aeriwen notes in the class forum that the Glyph of Cheap Shot tooltip hasn’t been updated with the nerf, but it’s still in the official patch notes.)
• The Find Weakness PvP nerf/PvE buff is still happening.
• We still haven’t heard a thing from anyone official about the datamined Revealing Strike buff.
• The Recuperate PvP buff is still happening (though that’s not a rogue-only change; it’s part of the broader PvP Power adjustments the devs are implementing for 5.3).

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On Twitter: New Subtlety PvP Nerf; Devs Respond to Flood of Patch 5.3 Rogue Tears — Updated 5/8

[UPDATE 5/4-5/8: Since I first posted this, Holinka clarified the new CnD change and noted that the previous range nerf is being reverted. I've also added a whole mess of additional, related tweets from Holinka and Ghostcrawler at the end of the post.]

Since the most recent Patch 5.3 PTR build yesterday, a number of Subtlety rogue players on the PTR have reported that Cloak and Dagger no longer works while they’re in Shadow Dance. The synergy between these two abilities has been one of the bread-and-butter rogue combos during Patch 5.2, and has helped propel rogues — specifically Subtlety rogues — to the top of the arena heap.

When added to the other changes already in store for Patch 5.3, what we’re seeing is a very clear attempt to 1) tone down rogue burst and CC abilities in general, and 2) try to make Assassination and Combat feel like they’re worth trying in PvP as well (mainly by making Sub less attractive).

PvP chief Brian Holinka and Ghostcrawler let forth a flurry of tweets (many featuring his refreshingly unapologetic tongue-in-cheek humor) in response to the frustration many rogues have expressed with this steady flow of rogue PvP nerfs for Patch 5.3. I shall unleash them on you below the cut; I’m too lazy to set up anchored links so you’ll have to scroll through them, but they’re split roughly into these minicategories:

• Tweets Clearing Up the CnD Change
• Offsetting the 5.1 Changes
• What About Subterfuge?
• Has Rogue PvP Been Ruined for 5.3?
• Re-Examining the Mobility Talent Tier (Part I)
• Re-Examining the Mobility Talent Tier (Part II)
• Ignorance About Being Ignored
• What About Patch 5.4?

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Patch 5.3 Datamining: Rogue DPS Tuning Begins

MMO-Champion and Wowhead have picked up a new Patch 5.3 PTR build, which includes two rogue changes:

• The Subtlety-only Find Weakness PvP nerf/PvE buff that Brian Holinka tweeted about earlier today is in place, though it’s not yet in the official patch notes. (Instead of 70% armor reduction, it’s now 50% reduction against players and 100% reduction against PvE targets.)
• Unexpectedly, Combat rogues appear to be getting a fresh DPS bump (and possibly a PvP boost?) in the form of a buff to the duration of Revealing Strike. Everything else about RvS stays the same, but when you use it the buff will last for 24 seconds instead of 18 (a 33% increase). This change hasn’t been confirmed (or even mentioned) by anyone at Blizzard yet, so we may not be seeing the full story yet.

While we won’t fully see the PvP implications of these changes until the new season begins, the PvE implications can be calculated to within an inch of their lives, as the Rogue Code dictates must be so. A couple of players have tinkered with our best simulation tools to see what sort of impact these changes will have on our DPS.

For Subtlety, Dansu posted on the WoW rogue forum that, in SimCraft, the Find Weakness PvE buff amounts to a little more than a 5% DPS increase for the spec — which, in theory at least, puts it basically on the same level as Assassination at very high gear levels (i.e., heroic raid gear with both set bonuses). Fierydemise, one of the brains behind our beloved ShadowCraft rogue-optimizing tool, came to a similar conclusion after modeling the change in that engine.

For Combat, as Fierydemise also noted in the post I just linked, we’re looking at a super-tiny DPS impact if it’s truly going to be implemented solely as it was datamined. The change basically would mean that, in the course of a six-minute raid fight in which you’re on the boss the whole time, you’ll be using RvS instead of Sinister Strike five fewer times than you otherwise would. That’s… barely any effect. RvS deals slightly less damage than SS and has no chance to proc an extra combo point when used, so being able to use SS a few more times is cool, but certainly not a major spec-balance fix — provided you’re already very good at juggling Slice and Dice, Rupture and RvS. If you’re not, then this change potentially becomes a much bigger deal, because it makes that juggling act a little bit easier.

Part of me wonders if, assuming this RvS change really is entirely what was datamined, it isn’t intended mainly to be some sort of PvP buff. Considering Combat is widely panned for competitive PvP at the moment and I haven’t tried it in ages, I have no concept of what impact this change would have in that area. Maybe make kiting have less of an impact?

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