Assassination Rogue PvP Guide (The War Within Pre-Patch)

Assassination Rogues have consistent sustained damage thanks to their Bleeds and Poisons and are very good at cleaving down several enemies with their damage over time effects. Their healing reduction effect, Wound Poison, can be applied to multiple enemies, making it difficult for enemy healers to heal their entire team. Their access to a silence effect with Garrote has made them known to be great at killing healers. An Assassination Rogue left unchecked will quickly close a PvP match!

The most important feature of The War Within are Heroic Talents. However, since these Heroic Talents will not be available during the prepatch, they will be added and discussed near the beginning of the expansion. That being said, there are a few important talent changes that are worth being highlighted:

• Shadow Dance has been removed from the class tree and replaced by Without a Trace, granting all Rogues an extra charge of Vanish. This is a slight nerf to the Assassination offensive arsenal, as the specialization had become really reliant on Shadow Dance to land kills, but it is a solid defensive buff.
• Subterfuge now lasts 6s (up from 3). This is a good buff in itself, and together with Without a Trace, it helps compensate for the loss of Shadow Dance. Vanish can be used as a pseudo Dance whenever it is not needed to survive.
• Acrobatic Strikes now provides extra attack speed rather than extra range. This is another significant nerf because Assassination was really dependent on cleave damage to win games. With less range, it will be harder to cleave multiple enemies unless they stay close together.
• Cut to the Chase has been granted as a baseline passive and no longer requires a talent point.
• Serrated Bone Spikes is now a passive and triggers upon using Rupture. This is a welcome change because it means Rupture will deal more damage on cast and also refund Combo Points.

Strengths

• Excellent sustained damage.
• Decent burst.
• Great control.
• Excellent utility.

Weaknesses

• Very prone to dying in stuns.
• Significant cooldown on defensive abilities.
• Often reliant on teammates to stay alive.
• Very predictable burst damage.