Mists of Pandaria Classic Assassination Rogue Leveling

Assassination Rogue remains one of the best leveling specializations in the game. As a Rogue any of the three specializations are great choices but Assassination benefits massively from our primary Combo Point generating ability not having a positioning requirement, so regardless of if you are solo leveling or find yourself inside a group you will be doing similar damage. The single biggest increase to quality of life while leveling your Rogue in Mists of Pandaria is Glyph of Deadly Momentum that causes your Slice and Dice and Recuperate to be refreshed to their original duration any time you land a killing blow that yields experience. This will massively increase your uptime and allow you to spend more Combo Points on Envenom.

Below also includes a breakdown of each of your options talent wise while leveling. In Mists of Pandaria you will unlock a new row of talent selections every 15 levels, starting at level 15. The goal of our talents recommended is to maximize your up time and damage so you can quickly progress through each zone.

This tier of talents is focuses on maximizing the benefit of your Stealth ability and augments some of your abilities while Stealthed.

• Shadow Focus reduces the Energycost of all of your abilities by 75% while Stealthed. While leveling this should be your default choice. Your largest limiting factor while dealing damage while leveling will be the availability of Energy so any chance to make your abilities cheaper should be taken.
• Subterfuge causes your Stealth to break 3 seconds after dealing or taking damage as opposed to breaking instantly. As mentioned above the largest limiting factor while leveling your Rogue will be energy, while it would be great to be able to Cheap Shot your target and then quickly Ambush them this will end up slowing us down in the long run.
• Nightstalker increases your movement speed by 20% while Stealthed and increases your damage done by 50% while Stealthed. The increased movement speed while stealthed is incredible and the bonus damage can help you quickly dispatch your enemies but again the availability of Energy is key while leveling and the majority of our damage done while leveling will be outside of Stealth.

This tier of talents focuses on ways to mitigate incoming damage in very different ways.

• Nerve Strike causes the target of your Cheap Shot and Kidney Shot to deal 50% less damage for 6 seconds after the stun fades. While leveling this is an incredible talent that will greatly reduce your damage taken. You will often be using Kidney Shot when fighting against an Elite or any monster dealing more damage than you are comfortable dealing with so the added damage reduction for the 6 seconds following this can help keep you alive until your next stun is available.
• Combat Readiness reduces incoming damage by 10% each time you are hit stacking up to 5 times. While this is a great talent especially when fighting groups of multiple enemies its rare that we will ever gain the full benefit of this, giving Nerve Strike the slight edge. It also synergizes poorly with Evasion which we will be aiming to use often while leveling.
• Deadly Throw consumes Combo Point to deal damage, slow and interrupt the target. This can be a great tool to slow or kill a fleeing enemy while leveling but its uses are far too niche to consider while leveling unless you are constantly finding yourself in PvP scenarios or are leveling via battlegrounds, and even in those situations Nerve Strike will likely be a stronger choice.

This tier offers a few different ways to increase personal survivability.

• Cheat Death causes an otherwise fatal attack to reduce you to 10% of your maximum health and reduces damage taken by 85% for 3 seconds. The majority of your deaths while leveling will come at a surprise, this allows for a buffer that can let you quickly Vanish or even Sprint away from your enemy.
• Leeching Poison can be used as a non-lethal poison causing your attacks to have a 50% chance to heal you for 10% of the damage dealt to the target. The healing received from Leeching is definitely a bonus while leveling but due to the nature of leveling it is rare we will be able to benefit much from this healing as mobs will often die after just a few hits. Assuming Recuperate is active this can also lead to some unnecessary overhealing.
• Elusiveness causes your Feint ability to reduce all incoming damage by 30% while it is active. This is a great choice in a situation where you find yourself constantly fighting enemies dealing a considerable amount of damage but most of your time leveling will be spent dealing with low health enemies where your Energy and global cooldowns are better spent dealing damage.

This tier of talents is centered around mobility and maximizing our uptime on the target through a few different options.

• Burst of Speed increases your movement speed by 70% for 4 seconds and removes any slowing effects. While leveling this should be your default option, the ability to move quickly between groups of enemies is often times your largest limiting factor as a Rogue and if you can burst from group to group instead of having to mount up this can quickly shave time off your levels. This is also incredibly strong when paired with Shadow Focus which makes it nearly free.
• Shadowstep instantly teleports you behind your target and increases your movement speed by 70% for 2 seconds. This is a great ability to maximize your uptime on a target but while leveling it is rare that we will need to be hitting the same target for more than a few seconds so maximizing our uptime is not a major concern.
• Cloak and Dagger causes your Ambush, Garrote, and Cheap Shot to teleport you behind your target. We will be entering and exiting Stealth countless times throughout the leveling process but similarly to Shadowstep the ability to gain a 70% movement speed increase for a small amount of Energy is just too good to pass up.

This tier of talents increases the effectiveness of your crowd controlling abilities and allows you an entirely new way to stun your enemies with Paralytic Poison.

• Prey on the Weak causes the target of your Kidney Shot, Cheap Shot, Gouge, Blind, or Sap to take 10% more damage for the duration of the effect. This acts as an essentially free increase to our damage against targets we will be stunning. While leveling the easiest way to mitigate incoming damage is a well timed Kidney Shot so the ability to deal even more damage to this target can help killing the target before they are able to resume attacking you.
• Paralytic Poison is a utility poison that causes you to stun your target upon reaching 4 stacks. The added stun here can be helpful when fighting against Elite mobs but you will rarely be fighting a mob long enough to receive the benefit of this, and the randomness of it makes it difficult to interrupt enemy spell casting.
• Dirty Tricks causes your Gouge and Blind to now be free and no longer break from your periodic damage dealt by bleeds like Rupture or your poisons like Deadly Poison. This is a great way to immediately crowd control an enemy you are actively engaged with, but it is rare that this will be of any use as often times Blind will be used on an off target and Gouge is usually just an impromptu interrupt.

Glyphs in Mists of Pandaria are still a major part of the leveling process but not quite as much as previous expansions. In Mists of Pandaria Prime Glyphs have been entirely removed, Major Glyphs are often situational benefits in combat and Minor Glyphs are exclusively cosmetic or quality of life benefits, but understanding how each of these works can help your leveling process tremendously.

As any Rogue specialization there are two Glyphs you should pretty much always be running Glyph of Deadly Momentum and Glyph of Recuperate. Deadly Momentum refreshes our Recuperate and Slice and Dice back to their original duration any time you kill an enemy yielding experience. This is an incredible way to maintain these two buffs while leveling as you should constantly be in combat killing mobs that yield experience while leveling. Glyph of Recuperate increases the potency of the heal-over-time effect. The single largest way to increase your leveling speed is by constantly being gaining experience and any time spent out of combat healing will slow this down. Listed below are some other options to consider while leveling.

• Glyph of Cloak of Shadows causes your Cloak of Shadows ability to reduce incoming physical damage by 40% while Cloak is active. While leveling you will constantly be dealing with both types of damage so this can help us mitigate Physical damage in a situation where you are not encountering much incoming Magic damage.
• Glyph of Expose Armor causes your Expose Armor ability to instantly apply all 3 stacks to the target granting you the full effect of Weakened Armor. It is rare we will be using Expose while leveling but this greatly increases the potency of it per cast.
• Glyph of Feint increases the duration of your Feint ability by 2 seconds. In any situation where you are constantly using Feint this is a great option.
• Glyph of Sharpened Knives causes your Fan of Knives to apply 1 stack of Weakened Armor to any target hit. If you find yourself leveling in dungeons or grouping up consistently with other Physical damage dealers this is a great way to increase their damage.
• Glyph of Evasion increases the duration of our Evasion by 5 seconds. Evasion is one of our best tools when dealing with multiple enemies or just one heavy hitting physical damage dealer, so the added duration makes us even tankier.

Minor Glyphs as mentioned above will only offer you quality of life or cosmetic benefits in Mists of Pandaria. While their in combat effects can be limited these Glyphs can make it considerably easier to traverse the map and get to your next quest even quicker.

• Glyph of Blurred Speed causes your Sprint ability to let you walk on water while it is active.
• Glyph of Safe Fall greatly increases the effectiveness of Safe Fall.
• Glyph of Poisons increases the speed you apply Poisons to your weapons by 50%.

Your leveling rotation as an Assassination Rogue is very similar to your max level rotation but with a few small changes, mostly aimed at keeping yourself alive and mitigating incoming damage so you can spend as much time as possible in combat. The Poisons you will use while leveling are Deadly Poison and Crippling Poison. Deadly will consistently be our highest damage output and Crippling will slow the targets making it much easier to maximize your uptime and making it harder for them to flee at low health. Your non-lethal poison can be changed though at your own discretion.

Highlighted below is a rough priority order of things to consider while you are leveling and how to optimally deal damage.

The priority order is as follows:

1. Keep Deadly Poison active;
2. When exiting from Stealth open with Cheap Shot;
3. Maintain Slice and Dice and Recuperate, these will be refreshed by Glyph of Deadly Momentum but if you find yourself without one or the other make sure to reapply it as quickly as possible;
4. If you find yourself taking more damage than you are comfortable consider casting Kidney Shot to stun your enemy and allow Recuperate to heal you up;
5. Remember you can always use Vanish to exit combat if you find yourself at risk of dying;
6. While the mob is above 35% Use Mutilate to generate Combo Points unless you get a Blindside proc, then use Dispatch instead;
7. While the mob is below 35% Use Dispatch to generate Combo Points;
8. With 4-5 Combo Points cast Envenom if Recuperate and Slice and Dice are already active.
9. If you are fighting 3 or more enemies use Fan of Knives to generate Combo Points in place of Mutilate/ Dispatch.
10. If you are fighting 7+ enemies spend your Combo Points on Crimson Tempest instead of Envenom Assuming Recuperate and Slice and Dice are active.