Guide to Rogue PvP Strategies

Rogue vs Warrior

Difficulty: Moderate to Hard (Depend on Race)
Poison Choice: Dual Cripple
Spec Favored: Combat

Rogue vs Warrior is finesse vs power, it is a textbook matchup that directly tells me how good a rogue is. For me, in a full cooldown fight, a rogue should win more than it loses in this matchup against most races. You really need to be able to beat the cookie cutter 31/20 warriors at least 50% of the times before you can claim you understand how a rogue plays.

Basic Strategies:

There are three ways to open against a warrior, rupture kite, expose armor, or zero cooldown.

The classic rupture kite, usually done with a hemo spec with improved rupture, is CS->Hemo->Hemo->Rupture. The rogue will sprint, do the opener, and vanish as he sprints out of warrior’s shout range. A 5 point rupture with talent will do 1200 damage (1300+ if the warrior is in zerker stance as they usually are). The rogue comes back in for a CS Hemo CB Evis right as rupture wears off. And he can either blind for a third opener or just turn on evasion and finish the warrior off (white hits + yellow hits + rupture damage will combine for a good 3000 on plate even with mediocre weapons, 3500-4000 if he is in zerker stance and you have top weapons). Be sure to rupture at maximum melee range so as soon as you rupture you are out of the range of a possible rend or hamstring. Try to wait at least 15 seconds after the first CS to avoid diminishing returns. Evasion in the end is extremely beneficial, if he is in zerker stance he has to switch to battle stance and give up a ton of rage.

The expose armor is basically the same idea. CS->BS->Expose or CS->SS->Expose, followed by vanish and reopen, or just AR+Evasion and unload. It is more commonly used with the combat spec, expose armor into AR + Evasion is simply devastating, even AR + Evasion alone can defeat most warriors, expose armor makes it even easier, add a BF and SND and the warrior will feel like he is cloth if he is in zerker stance.

Last but not least is my zero cooldown strategy against warriors. Generally speaking, save for a dodged/parried kidney shot, or the warrior uses his PVP trinket, I really don’t need cooldown to beat most high end warriors those days save for certain racials. It works like this:

1) Open with CS->SS->SS or CS->BS->SS depend on your spec, make sure you are at maximum melee range when you do the final hit so you are out of his range as soon as he is out of stun.

2) Back off, allow your energy to recover, try to stay within the intercept range (8 yard) but outside of his melee range (5 yard). This is difficult to do, just try to stay away as long as you can, shoot him with bow, bait an intercept. A good warrior will always intercept you as fast as he can, but you want to delay it as long as you can to get back as much energy as possible since after the opener your energy is at zero.

3) Kidney shot him after he intercepts you, unload on him, and get out of melee range again. Try to jump through him and turn around for a kidney shot as if you are backstabbing him to avoid dodge/parry. A kidney shot with a nearly full bar of energy is EXTREMELY damaging. You basically get to unload a bar and half’s worth of energy thanks to regen and relentless while he is stunned. Get out of his range again before he is out of kidney shot stun, don’t be greedy and eat an enraged MS crit as you are trying to get out of the way.

4) Cripple poison is a stronger snare than hamstring. As long as you are out of melee range, your energy is filling up, his rage won’t be. It is extremely beneficial. Go for a restealth CS, or wait for your next kidney shot, and you should finish him off on the next stun. The entire strategy relies on hitting him only when your energy is high and he is stunned whenever you get into melee range. Done properly, other than the intercept, he shouldn’t land any real hits on you.

Abilities To Use:

1) Evasion. If ANY rogue tells you evasion is bad vs warriors, he simply has no clue how this matchup works. Overpower has a 6 second cooldown, you will take far less damage with evasion on and avoid MS, white damage, rend, hamstring than without evasion. The perfect time to use it is when he is in zerker stance and has yet to land a hit on you (a very common situation as most warriors start the fight in zerker stance), this forces him to give up most of his rage and switch to battle stance just so he can overpower you. Usually it takes them a second or two before they realize you just turned on evasion, and you take even less damage. Evasion also kills a warrior’s rage generation. He can not get rage from overpower, his white hits all get dodged so the only rage he gets is from your damage. Again, don’t use this when your health is low, use it before he touchs you and you can avoid a lot of damage. Even without evasion the chance of getting overpowered in the fight is very high, why not dodge everything else?

2) Kidney Shot - The warrior killer. Contrary to popular belief, a DPS warrior’s dodge/parry is not very high. We are talking about 20% chance combined at best (10% dodge and 10% parry). For every 25 defense they also get 1% additional dodge/parry, plus 1% higher chance for you to miss. Precision from combat tree and +to hit items are invaluable in this matchup. Never use your kidney shot when you are low on energy (CS->BS->KS is a retarded opener against warriors unless you plan to thistle tea because you basically wasted your KS for no damage especially if relentless doesn’t proc). Try your best to save this for his intercept. Once he uses his intercept, with cripple poison you can stay out of his range for either a restealth or at very least get your energy back.

3) Blind - Once again, extremely valuable, make sure you turn on debuff duration. It is very possible to blind->bandage off a connected gouge or kidney shot as those DOTS run out. With evasion, only DOT he can land on you is deep wound, a very common technique is evasion, gouge when 5 second left on overpower deep wound, blind bandage. He has to be in battle stance to overpower, take advantage of it and gouge->blind.

Abilities To Watch Out For

Berzerker Rage - SpellAlert will tell you when he has this up and when this fades away. Do not gouge him if he hasn’t used this. Gouge is an extremely valuable tool in this matchup especially for a dagger rogue. It buys time for your kidney shot to come back, it buys time for deep wounds and rend to wear off so you can blind->bandage. Only use gouge when you see his berzerker rage fades away OR when he shifts out of zerker stance to overpower you through evasion. When you backstab after a gouge, again, make sure you are at maximum melee distance, so as soon as you backstab, you are out of his range.

PVP Trinket - Some warriors use it on your cheapshot, in that case just kidney shot. The smart warriors will save it for your kidney shot, in that case a vanish CS usually allows you to stun him again and get out of melee range while he is crippled. Or blind him and reset the fight. Or gouge him and back off. Or turn on evasion and tank him with AR. A lot of choices, how you handle his trinket is the key to winning this fight in high level play.

Intimidating Shout - Warrior’s answer to AR + Evasion. They can get a bandage and restart the fight with a charge. Make sure you trinket this. Your PVP trinket stops this cold.

Hamstring - Cripple poison is the stronger snare. And vanish does remove this if you are desperate to get out of his range. If you are on a dagger spec and a warrior hamstrings, SS with dagger to coat him with cripple and get out of the melee range until your KS/Gouge/energy come back.

Piercing Howl - Cripple poison, once again, is the stronger snare. This along with demoralizing shout are warrior’s counters to restealth. You want to “hide” your restealth as much as possible. Don’t run away and restealth. Walk toward him and restealth right before you enter melee range so he doesn’t have time to shout you out of it.

If you are heavy subtlety, go with the rupture kite strategy. It is very easy to do and very hard to counter. I have seen countless full epic warriors brought down to their knees by blue hemo rogues.

If you are heavy combat, consider expose armor into AR + Evasion. Although zero cooldown is extremely strong as well. I usually open with zero cooldown and only use cooldowns if the warrior dodge/parry/trinket my kidney shot.

If you are seal fate dagger, I would always open with zero cooldown and use your cooldowns if the warrior dodge/parry/trinket your kidney shot. As a dagger spec, hamstring makes it extremely difficult to backstab him without stunning, you really have to stay away until either gouge or kidney shot is available. A great way to counter a broken kidney shot is turn on evasion right away, and force him to switch into battle stance, gouge -> backstab and you are out of range again.

Racials:

Human warriors have perception. Be sure to stay far far away for 20 seconds and watch spellalert. Human, night elf, undead and troll warriors are easiest to beat.

Tauren warriors have warstomp, which is evasion killer. They can stomp to stun you and get off a guaranteed MS before you are out of stun. Try to bait a warstomp by moving your feet, or be ready to blow a cooldown.

Dwarf warriors have stoneform. Again, try to bait this with cripple poison and keep away. You will have to use cooldowns. AR + Evasion is the best way to defeat a dwarf warrior. Stoneform removes cripple poison and blind. If you want to bandage in the fight you must bait him to use stone form earlier in the match. Gnome warriors can also remove cripple poison with escape artist in same fashion although they can not be immune to it like Dwarfs can nor break blind.

Orc warriors are hardest. Stun resist is heavily luck dependent. There are fights a Orc warrior feels like a human warrior and eat all of my stuns, there are fights they seem to be immune to my stuns. Again, expose armor followed by AR + Evasion makes it easy, but other strategies are also viable depend on the roll of the dice.

Protection Warriors:

They have stun resist and heavy armor and will fight you in defensive stance, don’t bother with expose armor since at best a 5 point 3/3 expose armor removes his shield. You need the combo points for kidney shot. The in and out approach is amazing against protection warriors because when they do get to hit you, they do relatively very little damage.

Abuse gouge and kidney shot, you should play it like an extended fight with zero cooldown strategy. CS BS SS, back off, kidney shot, BS BS, back off, gouge->backstab, back off etc. Do understand they have high defense, they have stun resist via talents, you will inevitably fail some of your gouges and kidney shots, that is when you may need to use a cooldown or two. Because of last stand, you will usually need to blind bandage, it is a long fight, just wait until rend is about to wear off (use gouge and kidney shot to buy time if you need to), blind and get a full bandage. Don’t toe to toe him, cripple him and run away until either gouge or KS is available.

Rogue vs Mage

Difficulty: Easy To Moderate (Depend on Spec)
Poison Choice: Dual Cripple
Spec favored: 21/8/22

If rogue vs warrior is bread, rogue vs mage is butter. Instead of the controlling, stunlocking style in rogue vs warrior, this is a very fast paced fight, one of the few that requires some actual reflex and fast clicking on both sides. I once said I can tell how good a rogue is just by watching him fight a few warriors and mages, and I still believe in that statement. Rogue vs Mage is the closest thing in this game that can be called skill for both classes.

The opener:

The mage can jump around like an idiot spamming AOEs. You can distract him and some of the amatuer mages blink when you distract them cause their finger is so close to the blink key, quite funny. Anyhow, I always sprint and charge in for my opener, it is the best way to get it off during the universal cooldown between AOEs.

Seal Fate Dagger And 21/8/22 - Ambush if possible, CS if not. Go for a gouge right after.

CB/Prep/Hemo - CS->Gouge

Combat - Improved kick -> SS -> Gouge or just improved kick -> SS -> SS

A gouge right after the opener is ideal. With sprint it isn’t very difficult to land. Many times they will blink but get gouged at same time, so they land in the destination gouged, it is what I would call a perfect start and one that is extremely difficult for the mage to overcome.

Not only it is a free combo point it gives you energy back for a backstab if you are specced for dagger, or a SS and two more white hits, it also positions you perfectly. You will stand right behind him and sprint forward as soon as you hit him out of gouge. Most of the mages will blink as soon as they are out of gouge, and that is where you catch him with a kidney shot or kick.

If the gouge didn’t land, he blinked and you can not find him right away, vanish. You never ever want to allow a sheep at any point during the match. A mage will sheep, bandage, sheep, mana regen, and you wasted your cooldowns and he is at full health near full mana, it is a very bad situation. A sheep in high level play is GG every time. Vanish and sprint to him for a CS, don’t waste time looking for an ambush since he should be spamming AOEs at this point. If you have cold blood, activate it before you CS him and slam an evis in his face as soon as he is CSed, hopefully before he ice blocks.

Against frost nova, blind restealth ambush or blind restealth improved kick is the best opener. You never want to use your vanish on his frost nova because you need it for his blink.

Against Fire and Arcane Mages (POM Sheep):

An easy fight. Make sure you have the PVP trinket equipped. Many fire mages love to POM sheep. Simply trinket it and continue. A mage without ice block is very easy to beat if you manage your cooldowns properly. Go for a Vanish -> Sprint -> CS or Sprint -> KS after he blinks and it is already GG. Blind if he novas. You simply have too many cooldowns to blow here.

Against Ice Block:

Majority of the high end PVP mages are frost and this is why. While a fire mage is hopeless when you get in his face after blink, a frost mage can simply ice block again. Stand behind him and mash backstab or SS, and be ready to blind as soon as he is out of ice block, or be ready to run after him if he blinks forward, most mages come out of ice block with a frost nova.

Against Cold Snap:

You need preparation, a second set of nova and ice block is too much to overcome if the mage plays his card right. Fortunately, a mage can not activate cold snap during blind to break it, so I have defeated many frost mages before they had a chance to cold snap. High level play however you just don’t have enough cooldowns to beat his 10 minute timer without your own.

Against Frostbite:

Treat it like frost nova. Nasty proc when it happens, you pretty much have to use a prep build if a frost mage uses this.

Tips:

1) Always try to blind first when you get novaed. Vanish is too precious in this fight, you need to save it for his blink. You have to be fast because the mage would try to move out of blind range after he novas you.

2) Always try to land a gouge during the initial opener. This allows you to position yourself perfectly to sprint after him when he blinks.

3) Every single second is precious after he blinks. Don’t waste time to position for an ambush. Go in for a CS.

4) Activate cold blood right before you evis. Do activate cold blood while you are stealthed if you plan to CS->CB Evis. Good mages will ice block as soon as they hear the sound of CB and make you waste it. Make sure you hotkey CB.

5) Never ever allow a sheep. A rogue without cooldowns against a full health full mana mage is pure slaughter, that is exactly what it is if you get sheeped. You are a warrior without intercept in that scenario.

6) A combat rogue with improved kick is devastating for mages. You should never CS if kick is available. 2 second silence is as good as 2 second stun except it costs 25 energy and has a 10 second cooldown. Open with kick, SS gouge SS (that is 2 SS and 4 white hits), then sprint to him for another kick or ks. It is easy to do, very hard to stop.

7) This is a battle of cooldowns. Being able to save a vanish is huge. Against a mage without POM, he blinks, you see where he is, you sprint to him, he sheeps you right as you get in his face, you trinket right away and you saved a vanish. The PVP trinket is only useful if you are sheeped next to him, or you can trinket when he bandages himself and get a restealth to boot. You want to use your trinket to save yourself a vanish/blind, but you always want to save your trinket if he has POM.

Salvage a sheep:

You are sheeped and out of cooldowns, what to do? Thankfully the mage should be low on health and mana at this point. If you have trinket left, use the trinket when he bandages and try to get a restealth. You stop his bandage and you still have a chance to win.

Be ready to restealth if sheep breaks early. The second and third sheep especially are on diminishing returns, they tend to break early. Mash stealth if he is casting a big spell. There are many times I am out of the sheep right before the spell leaves his hand and I avoid the damage. In world PVP, a good way is to run the opposite direction and try to get a restealth off. A mage usually try to cast his spell from maximum distance and even with blink he may not be able to catch up with you, especially if he is fire.

Gouge -> Bandage. With high stamina and against mages who are not flawless on their kiting, or when you get lucky resists, it is very possible even with a successful sheep you can come back to win it. Gouge bandage when you get low and you can get lucky crits to squeeze out some wins.

Having said that, getting sheeped by a mage is like getting opened on by a top rogue, you are probably going to lose, it is something you need to avoid at all costs.