Outlaw Rogue DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents Battle for Azeroth 8.0.1

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Last updated Yesterday at 19:20 by GrayHound 19 comments

General Information

On this page, we present the viable talent choices for Outlaw Rogues in World of Warcraft Battle for Azeroth 8.0.1. We detail what each of the talents do and in which situations they should be taken.

The other pages of our Outlaw Rogue guide can be accessed from the table of contents on the right.

About Our Author

This guide has been reviewed and approved by Gray_Hound, a Rogue theorycrafter who raids in Strawberry Puppy Kisses. You can find him on Twitch and Twitter.

1. Talent Choices for Outlaw Rogue

Level	Choices
15	✔ Weaponmaster	✔ Quick Draw	✘ Ghostly Strike
30	✔ Acrobatic Strikes	✔ Retractable Hook	✔ Hit and Run
45	✔ Vigor	✘ Deeper Stratagem	? Marked for Death
60	? Iron Stomach	✔ Cheat Death	? Elusiveness
75	✘ Dirty Tricks	? Blinding Powder	✔ Prey on the Weak
90	✘ Loaded Dice	✔ Alacrity	? Slice and Dice
100	✔ Dancing Steel	✔ Blade Rush	✔ Killing Spree

Talents can be freely changed when out of combat and in a rested XP area (such as an inn or a capital city). Moreover, Tome of the Tranquil Mind Icon Tome of the Tranquil Mind and Codex of the Tranquil Mind Icon Codex of the Tranquil Mind can be used to temporarily allow players to change talents anywhere, as long as they are out of combat.

2. Talent Cheat Sheets for Outlaw Rogue

Optimizing talents on a contextual basis is the highly recommended method of setting up your build, as many talents offer unique strengths in the right situation. We have decided to list a "cheat sheet" of sorts below, however, to help with a quick set-up that should be just fine for most encounters. If you want to fully optimize your ability to play this specialization, we recommend reading the entire talents section here to gain additional insight on when swapping your talents would be beneficial.

2.1. Raid Encounters

Level 15: Quick Draw
Level 30: Hit and Run
Level 45: Vigor
Level 60: Cheat Death
Level 75: Prey on the Weak
Level 90: Alacrity
Level 100: Blade Rush

2.1.1. Heavy Cleave & AoE

Level 15: Quick Draw
Level 30: Acrobatic Strikes
Level 45: Vigor
Level 60: Cheat Death
Level 75: Prey on the Weak
Level 90: Alacrity
Level 100: Dancing Steel

3. Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

✔ Weaponmaster

✔ Quick Draw

✘ Ghostly Strike

Tier 1 talents focus on improving Combo Point generation.

Weaponmaster causes your Sinister Strike to have a 10% increased chance to strike an additional time.
Quick Draw causes Opportunity procs when consumed to generate 1 additional Combo Point and deal 50% additional damage.
Ghostly Strike strikes an enemy, dealing Physical damage and causing the target to take 10% increased damage from your abilities for 10 seconds. Awards 1 Combo Points. Has a 30 second cooldown, which gets reduced by your finishers.

Quick Draw Icon Quick Draw is currently the best option based on damage, and it is not as restrictive as some of the other options.

Weaponmaster Icon Weaponmaster is an acceptable alternative to Quick Draw Icon Quick Draw.

Ghostly Strike Icon Ghostly Strike is currently the weakest option in this tier, in large part due to the excessive cooldown, loss of uptime in case target dies, and fairly low damage bonus.

4. Tier 2 (Level 30) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

✔ Acrobatic Strikes

✔ Retractable Hook

✔ Hit and Run

Tier 2 talents focus on improving your mobility.

Acrobatic Strikes increases the range on all your melee attacks by 3 yards.
Retractable Hook reduces the cooldown of Grappling Hook by 30 seconds.
Hit and Run increases your movement speed at all times by 15%.

This tier is largely a matter of personal preference, or is specific to the encounter at hand.

Acrobatic Strikes Icon Acrobatic Strikes is a good choice on cleave encounters as it also extends the length of your Blade Flurry Icon Blade Flurry. It can also allow you to stay in range of the boss even when mechanics would normally zone you out. Retractable Hook Icon Retractable Hook is a fantastic alternative as it allows for snap mobility, which never fails to be useful. Hit and Run Icon Hit and Run is good for kiting or moving between targets.

5. Tier 3 (Level 45) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

✔ Vigor

✘ Deeper Stratagem

? Marked for Death

Vigor increases your maximum Energy by 50 and increases Energy regeneration by 10%.
Deeper Stratagem increases maximum Combo Points to 6, allows finishing moves to consume 6 Combo Points, and increases the damage of finishing moves by 5%.
Marked for Death marks a target and instantly generates 5 Combo Points. The cooldown is reset if the marked target dies.

Vigor Icon Vigor is currently the best option damage wise, and also the simplest to use.

Deeper Stratagem Icon Deeper Stratagem leads to a bit slower rotation (as compared to Vigor Icon Vigor), however it is fairly good for damage in some builds.

Marked for Death Icon Marked for Death can be decent on big AoE, especially if targets die very quickly, leading to a lot of resets quickly.

6. Tier 4 (Level 60) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

? Iron Stomach

✔ Cheat Death

? Elusiveness

Tier 4 talents improve your personal survivability.

Iron Stomach increases the healing received from Crimson Vial, healing potions, and Healthstones by 30%.
Elusiveness causes Feint to also grant 30% reduced damage taken from all sources.
Cheat Death causes fatal damage to instead reduce you to 7% of your maximum health and grant 85% reduced damage taken for 3 seconds. Cheat Death cannot save you from damage greater than double your maximum health. It has a 6-minute cooldown.

Elusiveness Icon Elusiveness is technically the best talent in most situations, but requires you to be extremely proficient with Feint Icon Feint usage and very aware of incoming damage. Cheat Death Icon Cheat Death is a good choice for players in a raid environment, as it is entirely passive and great for soaking raid mechanics when needed. Generally, Cheat Death is best for learning encounters and soaking high damage mechanics, whereas Elusiveness is great for soaking frequently occurring mechanics.

Iron Stomach Icon Iron Stomach is by far the best choice for leveling and world content, as it improves your self-sustainability noticeably. Iron Stomach does not have much potential a raid environment.

7. Tier 5 (Level 75) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

✘ Dirty Tricks

? Blinding Powder

✔ Prey on the Weak

Tier 5 talents focus on improving your crowd control utility.

Dirty Tricks removes the Energy cost from Cheap Shot, Gouge, and Sap.
Blinding Powder reduces cooldown and increases range of Blind.
Prey on the Weak causes targets afflicted by your Cheap Shot or Between the Eyes to take 10% increased damage from all sources for 6 seconds.

Prey on the Weak Icon Prey on the Weak is the strongest option in this tier, as it allows you to increase everyone's damage by 10% for 6 seconds, on stunnable enemies. While many enemies are immune, this is still the best of all available options.

Blinding Powder Icon Blinding Powder can be useful, if you need to hard crowd-control some mobs, as it gives you more range for it, and lowers the cooldown. However, there are generally better crowd control abilities available from other classes.

Dirty Tricks Icon Dirty Tricks has practically no instance PvE usage as you are unlikely to use any of the abilities it affects during the fight.

8. Tier 6 (Level 90) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

✘ Loaded Dice

✔ Alacrity

? Slice and Dice

Tier 6 talents offer finisher modifiers.

Loaded Dice makes activating Adrenaline Rush cause your next Roll the Bones to grant at least two buffs.
Alacrity causes finishing moves to have a 20% chance per Combo Point to grant 2% Haste for 20 seconds, stacking 5 times.
Slice and Dice is a finisher that replaces Roll the Bones and consumes Combo Points to increase attack speed by 50% and Energy regeneration rate by 15%, lasting longer per Combo Point.

Alacrity Icon Alacrity is the best choice in raids and dungeons, provided you are able to consistently maintain your stacks for most of the encounters.

While Loaded Dice Icon Loaded Dice does help reduce the random aspect of Roll the Bones Icon Roll the Bones a bit, it currently lags too far behind Alacrity Icon Alacrity to be competitive for damage. And if your goal is to completely eliminate randomness, you would be better off picking Slice and Dice Icon Slice and Dice.

Slice and Dice Icon Slice and Dice is currently the weakest option-damage wise in this tier, however it does result in the simplest gameplay and is by far the most consistent.

9. Tier 7 (Level 100) Talents for Outlaw Rogue

✔ Dancing Steel

✔ Blade Rush

✔ Killing Spree

Tier 7 talents focus on shifting the playstyle in new directions.

Dancing Steel increases the duration of Blade Flurry by 3 seconds and its damage by 5%.
Blade Rush charges you towards the target, damaging all of nearby enemies, and generating 25 Energy over 5 seconds. While Blade Flurry is active, it will increase the damage of the AoE component by 100%.
Killing Spree teleports you to your target and attacks 6 times over 2 seconds. Killing Spree is affected by Blade Flurry and will hit nearby enemies for 100% of the damage during it.

Killing Spree Icon Killing Spree is decent in damage, and very easy to use, while also offering the highest burst potential in this row.

Blade Rush Icon Blade Rush is the highest damage talent on paper, but very closely trailed by Killing Spree Icon Killing Spree, and does not have as much burst.

Dancing Steel Icon Dancing Steel is a great option on sustained AoE fights, but does nothing on single target, and is less competitive on quick AoE burst phases.

10. PvP Talents (War Mode)

In Battle for Azeroth, there will be the option to go into "War Mode". Enabling War Mode provides the following benefits:

PvP talents enabled in the outdoor world.
10% increase in World Quest rewards at maximum level.
10% more experience gained while leveling.
Earn Conquest Points which can reward gear every week.

With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended to enable the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at maximum level. However, you will make yourself available for open world PvP, and the possibility to be "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

10.1. Outlaw Rogue War Mode Talents

In this section we will rank the PvP talents best for leveling and doing solo / small group PvE content. Below is a ranking of both General PvP Talents and Outlaw Rogue-specific PvE talents.

10.1.1. General PvP Talents

Adaptation is likely your most passive choice, since it will automatically remove loss of control effects over 5 seconds. It is recommended for leveling to take this PvP talent.
Gladiator's Medallion is an on-use ability that removes all movement impairing effects and all loss of control effects.
Relentless is also a passive ability, but it does not automatically remove crowd control abilities, but instead reduces the duration.

10.1.2. Outlaw Rogue PvP Talents

Take Your Cut causes you, and allies within 8 yards to gain 15% Haste for 8 seconds after you use Roll the Bones (or Slice and Dice). It is fairly good, since it acts as a mini- Adrenaline Rush and has decent uptime when you are questing in open world.
Boarding Party makes Between the Eyes increase the movement speed of all friendly players within 10 yards by 30% for 5 seconds. It is useful when fighting mobs that get "scared" and run away at low health, as you can stun them and catch up to them quickly.
Maneuverability makes your Sprint suppress all movement impairing effects, thus helping out a bit with mobility.