Assassination Rogue PvP Rotation and Playstyle (BfA / Patch 8.3)

The Assassination Rogue has two roles in PvP: shutting down casters/healers with relentless mobility and crowd control and having strong sustained damage outside of burst cooldowns. With high damage, high control and great sustained damage, this is one of the top PvP specs for Rogues.

To lock down healers, you will aim to push in and get crowd control on the healer ( Sap, Blind when they do not have trinket, Kidney Shot or Cheap Shot).

The ability to deal sustained damage is what makes Assassination Rogues so deadly. They have the ability to damage an enemy down to below 50% without using a single cooldown. It is at this point that they can stun you and use their burst rotation.

Have a plan for who you will be mainly using your crowd control on. Rogue crowd control is powerful, but dealing any damage to the target and will break and waste it. Also, remember to enter Stealth and apply your Wound Poison and Crippling Poison.

The opener refers to your team's opening crowd control chain and damage done as soon as you get out of the gates. The main goal in the opener is to force your enemies to use their cooldowns. Also make sure that if you are swapping or attacking someone with more than 80% health and using the Breath of the Dying Major essence, you should use that first to get the cooldown reduction on it.

If the enemy healer uses their trinket in the opener, they are in trouble. Blind is one of the most devastating crowd control abilities in the game, with very few ways of getting out of it without having a trinket. Save Blind for when the enemy healer does not have their trinket. You can follow this up with a Vanish to Sap the enemy healer.

If an enemy DPS uses their trinket, you can crowd control the healer and stun the DPS without a trinket. This means they can be burst down in a stun and possibly killed.

When opening, always try to Sap the enemy DPS player who is trying to bring you out of Stealth,then Sap the healer. Then, use your burst rotation. After you are done with your burst rotation, perform your sustained damage rotation until your burst abilities are available again.

This is the rotation you should use on your target at the beginning of the game. This opener stuns your target and applies your bleeds.

1. Use Marked for Death.
2. Use Kidney Shot.
3. Use Garrote.
4. Use Reaping Flames if you are using this Major essence and the enemy is above 80% health.
5. Use Mutilate if you do not have 5 Combo Points.
6. Use Rupture.
7. Use Cheap Shot.
8. Use Mutilate until you have 5 Combo Points.
9. Use Envenom.

After this the rotation is a priority list of things you should be doing. Make sure you are maintaining your Rupture and Garrote on your main target. Use Mutilate to generate Combo Points for these abilities. If your main target has these Bleeds already and they can be stunned, use your Toxic Blade and Kidney Shot your main target. You can then generate Combo Points to use Envenom. Also make sure that if you are swapping or attacking someone with more than 80% health and using the Breath of the Dying Major essence, you should use that first to get the cooldown reduction on it.

When you have the enemy healer in crowd control and you are trying to kill an enemy, you use your burst damage.

1. Use Garrote.
2. Use Mutilate until you have 5 Combo Points.
3. Use Rupture.
4. Use Mutilate until you have 5 Combo Points.
5. Use The Crucible of Flame or Breath of the Dying, whichever Major Essence you might be using.
6. Use Kidney Shot. This will apply Internal Bleeding.
7. Use Vendetta.
8. Use Toxic Blade (if you have taken this talent).
9. Use Mutilate until you have 5 Combo Points.
10. Use Envenom.
11. Use Marked for Death.
12. Use Envenom.
13. Use Garrote.

Important note: If you are using Cheap Shot instead of Kidney Shot while using your burst cooldowns, you can use Marked for Death for a Kidney Shot on the healer for additional crowd control. This is the versatility of Marked for Death. It can be used aggressively on a second Envenom or you can use it for additional crowd control.

Sustained damage is damage you do when your burst cooldowns are not available.

1. Use Mutilate to generate Combo Points.
2. Maintain your Rupture on multiple enemies. If you cannot keep it on multiple enemies, at least keep it on your main target.
3. Maintain your Garrote on multiple enemies. If you cannot keep it on multiple enemies, at least keep it on your main target.
4. Use Envenom at 5+ Combo Points when you do not have to refresh Rupture.
5. Use Toxic Blade right before you put your target in a full Kidney Shot. This will deal a large amount of damage and might make the enemy player panic and use defensive cooldowns.
6. If the enemy team has pets nearby or is stacked, use Fan of Knives to generate Combo Points quickly.
7. Use The Crucible of Flame.
8. Use Poisoned Knife if your target is far away or to apply your poisons to a target that you cannot reach.
9. Use Reaping Flames if you are using this Major essence and the enemy is above 80% health or below 20% health.

Cloak of Shadows is a strong defensive cooldown when playing against casters. Use this when in trouble against caster teams and run to your healer or re-enter Stealth.

Evasion is a strong defensive when playing against melee. This grants you 100% Dodge chance. Use this when the enemy team has melee and is focusing you.

Vanish is a very versatile ability. You can use this offensively, to use Cheap Shots and Garrotes on enemies, or defensively. If you are overextended or need to get away quickly, use Vanish to get away from the enemy team.

Feint (with the Elusiveness talent) grants you a flat 30% damage reduction from everything. This is a buff that should be active on you at all times. A Rogue is very weak against stuns, so having Feint up when stunned greatly increases your chance of surviving heavy damage from the enemy team.

Crimson Vial is the trickiest, but most useful defensive ability a Rogue has. If you feel a hard swap onto you or you are about to be stunned, use Crimson Vial. Using this efficiently can enable you and your teammates to save your other cooldowns.

It is advised to use Macros to use abilities on enemies or allies without having to target them. For this reason, we have a page dedicated to them.