Assassination Rogue PvP Talents and Builds (Season 4)

There is one viable talent build as Assassination, but two points can be moved around to exchange burst damage and additional sustained damage. The build focuses heavily on AoE cleave damage with bleeds, the current strength of Assassination, but still has a few tools to burst a target down quickly.

The talents Thrown Precision and Flying Daggers combined with Seal Fate make Fan of Knives your preferred Combo Point builder if you can hit several targets, and allow you to deal a lot of AoE damage. The talents Tiny Toxic Blade and Arterial Precision also greatly contribute to your cleave pressure. And last but not least the talent Indiscriminate Carnage allows your Rupture and Garrote to hit 3 enemies for 10s after your opener, after your Vanish, and during your Shadow Dance. With this you will be able to have your bleeds up on many enemies at all times, making it very difficult for the enemy healer to keep his team safe.

Shadow Dance is one of your key abilities. It allows you to have a great uptime on your Improved Garrote, which is the highest damage source for Assassination Rogues. It also allows access to Cheap Shot that you can use to stun multiple enemies, greatly enabling your team and preventing the enemy team from defending themselves on your burst window. And finally, it gives great burst damage thanks to the talents Nightstalker and Master Assassin, granting you 10% extra damage and 30% extra Critical Strike chance, respectively. The cooldown is only 1min, so it lines up perfectly with a charge of Thistle Tea for extra Mastery, Kingsbane and the on-use PvP trinket. All those combined together make for very high burst.

It is worth mentioning that the build can be tweaked slightly. If you opt out of Kingsbane and Crimson Tempest and instead pick Doomblade and Serrated Bone Spike you let go of a lot of burst damage, but gain sustained damage. Bone Spike allows you to build a lot of Combo Points for very cheap, and is one more bleed on your targets for extra damage thanks to the talent Lethal Dose. In addition not having to use Kingsbane during Shadow Dance allows you to focus more on CC and on reapplying empowered Garrote while Dance lasts, which results in higher overall damage. If you decide to tweak your talents this way then you can also play with a less Critical Strike and a bit more Haste, as it is more beneficial if you do not play Kingsbane.

You can choose three of the following PvP talents; each has its uses, but some are better for certain strategies than others. The top three choices are the most useful but can be replaced with other PvP talents, depending on your team's goal.

Smoke Bomb creates a smoke cloud around you. Enemy players who are outside the cloud will not be able to target anyone inside it. This talent is mandatory for multiple reasons. Firstly, it can help you land a kill by stunning a target when they have no trinket. By using Smoke Bomb right after a stun, you will prevent the healer from saving their teammate. Secondly, you can use it defensively to save yourself or an ally from a lethal cast about to go off, such as Greater Pyroblast. And lastly, you can use it to prevent incoming crowd control on you or your team if such crowd control would result in you losing a game, such as a Polymorph or Repentance on your healer when they have no trinket, and you are low on health. As you can see, this talent is helpful in many different situations, which is why it is so powerful. In every 3v3 scenario, this talent is a must-have, but in a few 2v2 match-ups, you will not pick it as you will mostly attack the enemy healer.

Dismantle is a strong PvP talent that allows you to disarm an enemy for 6 seconds every 45 seconds. Disarming an enemy can delay their next kill attempt or stop it entirely if they have pulled the trigger. It is a great pick against Warrior, Rogue, and Marksmanship Hunter. It is also helpful against other Hunter specs. However, they can still use many threatening abilities while disarmed, and the same goes for Retribution Paladin and Death Knight. One thing to note is that you can use Dismantle offensively against Death Knight and Warrior, as being disarmed prevents the use of Death Strike and Die by the Sword.

Veil of Midnight has become a decent defensive option in some specific scenarios since it was recently nerfed. It allows Cloak of Shadows to cleanse physical debuffs on top of magic ones. It is very useful against Feral Druid, other Assassination Rogues, or even Arms Warrior.

Control is King is a nice talent that gives you a lot of Energy back when you use Kidney Shot. It can be a nice pick if you don't need other talents, as it allows you to be certain you will always have Energy to spend on your burst windows.

Hemotoxin causes Shiv to reduce the target's healing received by 30% for 9 seconds. This used to be a very powerful talent, but after multiple nerfs, it is barely more powerful than Wound Poison. Therefore, you will only pick it if you do not need other utility talents, such as Dismantle or Maneuverability.

Death from Above is an interesting PvP talent. The interesting things about this talent are that it makes you immune to crowd control when you use it and is usable from range. It will make you land at your target location. It can be considered in 2v2 against an enemy that is hard to reach, such as a Frost Mage, or against a setup comp that relies on stuns on you to kill you and will kite you in between stuns, such as Rogue/ Mage. Unfortunately, there will often be three better options, so you will end up not picking this PvP talent much.

The first PvP talent will almost always be Smoke Bomb. To fill the last two slots, you will need to look at what you are facing. If there is a DPS that can be disarmed, such as a Warrior, Rogue, Death Knight or a Marksmanship Hunter, you will pick Dismantle. If there is a DPS that will apply Physical debuffs to you that you would like to cleanse, such as another Assassination Rogue or a Feral Druid, you will pick Veil of Midnight. In other scenarios, you may pick any other optional talent as long as it fits your needs.