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Banelorne's Stealth-Based Executioner Builds: Maximize Your TR's Solo Capabilities.
todesfaelle
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Banelorne's Stealth-Based Builds
A Growing Compendium of Builds Based on Stealth.
Table of Contents:
- Post #1: Introduction, The Race and Attributes, The Powers and Feats.
- Post #2: The Main Skills Used for PVE and PVP, Gear and Stat Preference.
- Post #3: The Stealth Rogue's Ioun Stone, PVP Strategies for the Stealth Rogue.
- Post #4: The Solo Dungeon Challenge, The Mindflayer's 5-Man TR Stealth Delving Section (coming soon!)
- Post #5: The Alternative Gloaming Cut Stealth Build
- Post #7: NEW - The Stealth-Based Whisperknife: A Ranged Stealth Build.*
Introduction: My name is Banelorne Fellbanner (Tiefling), and Banelorne Fallbanner (Wood Elf), previously from the Mindflayer Shard. I'd like to share some alternative ways of playing as a Trickster Rogue to my fellow Rogues, and to people who may be looking into making one; a build that combines both "defense" and offense at the same time. I believe that as players, we should be playing our class based on how they were designed to be played. A Trickster Rogue playing as a "trickster", and not as a DPS beat stick, can be also be as viable and opens a new sense of awareness for our TR class. This Stealth Build concentrates on maximizing the effects and duration of our biggest class feature, Stealth. You infiltrate the enemy ranks or base undetected, and before they realize your position, you would have already dealt a serious amount of damage to them already; or better, they'd be dead.
Stealth is such a wonderful mechanic as it gives us the ability to become undetectable to most, if not all monsters in PVE, as well as some players in PVP. This in turn increases our overall survivability and also allows us to maximize our damage without worrying much about getting hit back (unless we're standing in an AoE zone, which we can easily avoid via dodge). Stealth gives us power and a clear role. And as such, this build will try to lay down the foundations of what all Stealth-based Rogues should have, their advantages and disadvantages, and their overall purpose/roles in PVP and PVE.
First and foremost I'd like to show you all a short summary of the pros and cons of being a Stealth Rogue.
The Pros of Playing as a Stealth Rogue.
- Higher than normal survivability compared to most other TR builds thanks to maximized/permanent Stealth in PVE.
- Deals a competitive amount of damage despite being a defensive build.
- Very cheap to create and doesn't require high end enchantments.
- Offers fun alternative ways of playing as a rogue, giving players a wider array of methods to play in solo and group play.
- Effective in solo play.
- Very agile which acts as a gap closer for most scenarios.
- Easy to complete in terms of gear.
The Cons of Playing as a Stealth Rogue.
- You don't always get maximized damage as compared to full cookie-cutter Executioner builds.
- Not too much of a player-killer build in PVP.
- Zero AoE. But Rogues weren't meant to do AoE anyway.
- Minimal Burst Damage in PVP. Requires a lot of timing in order to make the most out of the damage skills we have PVP.
- Heavily reliant on having Stealth on.
- You'll be getting a lot of abusive PM's from people you play against in PVP.
And that is basically the main pros and cons of playing as a Stealth Rogue boiled down small points. This build is by no means built to be intended for PVP play and is mainly used for PVE settings. However, it does not mean that it won't function well in PVP. As a Stealth-Based Rogue in PVP, you won't be getting much kills as most DPS-centered Rogues do, and by using this build, what you lack in DPS, you'll have to make up with craftiness and time. Your kills come a lot slower, but our ability to deal a consistent amount of damage while eluding the enemies is our main mode of offense. This is how we get kills. We do it slowly but surely; like predators in the dark.
If you like dealing insane damage and doing instant kill moves on players, and dealing maximized damage in dungeon runs, it's better to go for the cookie-cutter executioner builds. But if you're looking for a way to be a "trickier" Trickster Rogue, then this guide is for you. Please continue reading if you are part of the latter, and we shall aim to emphasize the "Trickster" part in the Trickster Rogue much further.
Part 1: The Race and Attributes
Now that we've laid down the main points we're going to tackle for this build, let us discuss some of the more minor portions for the entirety of the build, mainly the race and the more important stats. A stealth rogue aims for maximum survivability while balancing DPS in return so we do not lose our roles of being strikers. As such it is important for us to choose races which give us the needed stats to deal damage or take damage. The main three stats which we will prioritize as Stealth Rogues are as follows.
Main 3 Attributes.
- Dexterity: Our primary stat and our main source of Critical Hit chance. You can never go wrong with getting more than 100% damage increase in Critical Strikes. The Executioner Tree excels in making the most out of crits, so we'll take advantage of that by pumping points in this stat
- Strength: Gives us a flat damage boost whether we are in Stealth or not. It is arguably better than CHA due to this mechanic.
- Charisma: Increases our Combat Advantage damage. And as Stealth Rogues, we are almost always in stealth so having a few points in this stat always help DPS.
For our stats, you'll want to prioritize Dexterity > Strength > Charisma. Dexterity gives us a higher chance for a shot for increased damage. Strength increases our base damage, and is always particularly reliable stat which also gives us added stamina regeneration. Charisma is a nice stat that gives us added deflection, and added companion stats. This build is flexible, and there is no solid way to roll your stats with this build. In the end it will all boil down to your preferences.
- Dexterity: Increases our Crit Rate by 1% per Point, Increases our 0.5% Deflect per Point.
- Strength: Gives us a 1% flat damage boost per point, 1% more Stamina Regen per Point.
- Charisma: 1% more Combat Advantage Damage per point, 1% more Deflect per Point
So you'll have to choose which combination of stats you want. If you want high DPS, go for DEX + STR. If you want some Deflection on the side as well as burst, going for DEX + CHA (the combo I use for my Tiefling) would be solid route to take. But if you want to increase your flat damage in Stealth, geting CHA + STR would give you a stream of reliable Stealth-based damage. In the end it will all boil down to how you wish to play your Stealth Rogue. You'll have to determine your own play style, as each player's style will be different from the other. It's up to you as to how you'll be separating yourself from the others as a unique entity in the game.
In order to get these stats, here are some of the races in which provide us with at least 1 of those 3 stats, along with Racial Features that aid us with our sneaky play style.
Tiefling: Tieflings are arguably one of the best PVE rogues in the game particularly because of their Racial Trait, Bloodhunt. Bloodhunt will allow Tieflings to deal an extra 5% more damage against opponents with HP's below 50%. So technically, this will equate to a 2.5% damage increase if you get a 100% uptime against the opponent (because you don't get the bonus on the first half). It's like you had an STR Stat of +2.5 with this Racial Trait on, and you can never go wrong with this. The 2nd Racial Trait of Tieflings, Infernal Wrath, isn't exactly the most useful or reliable of Racial Traits, but it can help though it will not be all the time.
Drow/Menzoberranzan Renegade: One of the best races for this build primarily because it gets a +2 to both DEX and CHA, which are 2 of the main stats of a rogue. Faerie/Dark Fire is a useful Racial Trait as it reduces your opponent's Defenses by 5%/10% respectively. That's pretty huge, and will be really helpful when paired up with Armor Penetration. Considering Duelist's Flurry's attack speed, it's not that hard to imagine these 2 traits having a significant uptime against opponents.
Halfling: They get the same bonuses as the Drow, +2 to DEX and CHA, however they get a nice added 3% to deflect attacks AND they get a whopping 10% resistance to Control Effects. 3% deflect is the equivalent of 6 points in Dex or 3 points of Cha, and 10% Control Effect resistance is the equivalent of +10 Wis. Those are pretty huge boosts, making Halflings a very viable choice not just for Trickster Rogues but most probably all classes in the game. If you maximize CHA + DEX using a Halfling (+16 CHA/DEX, +12 STR at initial roll, then a +2 DEX/CHA bonus), you'll get a whopping total of 15% extra Deflection Chance at level 60 simply from stats alone. You can become incredibly tanky with a Halfling.
Half-Orc: Hand's down, the best race in terms of dealing damage thanks to +2 to STR and DEX. I can't really imagine how a bulky race like an Orc would be dexterous in anyway, but they are in this game, and they are efficient in what they do. They get an added +5% critical severity making their critical strikes hit harder. Paired up with some points in DEX and Critical Strike, they'll be able to take those critical hit damages even further. They also get a nice movement speed boost of +10% whenever they first get into combat. That +10% added speed may be just what the Half-Orc needs in order to reach the position he wishes to go to much faster.
Human: Humans are just incredible. They get +3 Heroic Feat Points which allows us to give our Stealth Rogues more utility. They only get +2 in a single Attribute, but the 3 heroic feat points they get are so much worth the loss in the other +2 Attribute Points. They are able to specialize in more areas than most other races.
Wood Elf: Wood Elves are a not-so-popular choice for TR's despite them having all the tools they need in order to become really good Rogues. Wood Elves are able to get +2 on DEX, which equates to 2% more crit and 1% more Deflect, and their Racial Bonus, Elven Accuracy, increases your crit rate by a flat 1% further. This will make it easier for us to take our crit as near to 50% as possible. Wood Elves can also take INT as their Secondary Attribute in order to be able to reduce their Cooldowns by 2%. If a player wishes to spec for my alternative build, Wood Elves are a great choice.
Sun/Moon Elf: Both are very good races and are pretty much similar to one another. It's just that Sun Elves are able to generate AP faster since their Racial Trait allows them to gain 2% more AP, while the Moon Elves are able to regenerate their Stamina 1% faster and generate 1% more AP. Moon Elves are sort of chop suey-ish, but they are really beautiful. If you have the Knight of the Feywild Pack and want to play as a pretty and sneaky TR, Moon Elf is a good choice. But otherwise, going for Sun Elf is also good. Both races have an inherent +2 to INT, making them a solid choice for the alternative builds. Taking DEX after which will increase your crit stat in order to give you more burst. The best part about Moon and Sun Elves however is their ability to mitigate CC by 10%. That's equivalent to 10 points in WIS, which is really huge. Both races are a viable choice to take and you surely will not regret it if you choose to go for the alternative build.
Part 2: The Powers and Feats[/center]
As a Stealth-based Rogue, we'll need to concentrate on powers and feats that make full use of the Stealth Mechanics, and to have a way to deal with the environment if by any chance we find ourselves in a situation where our stealth bar is depleted/almost depleted. Here are some of the skills in this build that we shall need in order to create an effective and flexible stealth rogue.
Powers:
At-Wills:
- Sly Flourish (3/3): A reliable at-will. Very flexible and easy to maneuver.
- Cloud of Steel (3/3): Very useful in whittling down your opponent's HP from Range.
- Duelists Fury (3/3): You'll always have this slotted for PVE. It's our major source of damage for PVE settings.
- Gloaming Cut (3/3): This will be one of our main PVE and PVP at-wills, and pretty much what makes this build unique. It's slow and hard to control, but it hits really hard. But once feated, it also replenishes 10% of our Stealth Meter per hit. So even though it is slow, it generally helps us stay in Stealth for a much longer period of time, to the point of it being permanent.
Encounters:
- Lashing Blade (3/3): If used from Stealth, it's a guaranteed crit. It's one of the biggest sources of burst for TR's in both PVP and PVE.
- Bait and Switch (3/3): This will almost always be in our bar unless we PVP. I have this slotted all the time in PVE, however. It replenishes our Stealth Meter when we use it from Stealth, and when it gets hit by opponents, it generates a LOT of AP for us. This skill can give us an almost full AP bar per use. It's that useful.
- Impossible to Catch (3/3): This skill used to be hated by a lot of TR's because they deem it as something that's not "useful" for it doesn't do anything for a rogue's DPS; that is until more players saw the beauty in this utility skill. Nowadays, a lot of Rogues swear by this skill for both PVP and PVE. It's one of our main tools for survival. It allows us to negate CC for 5 seconds and during those 5 seconds, we also deflect any incoming attacks. When used from Stealth, it allows us to dodge ALL attacks. This skill allows us to land Duelist's Flurry with more ease since we cannot be interrupted during the time we are under this skill's effects. This skill never left my bar since Open Beta.
- Shadow Strike (3/3): This skill is just made for Stealth builds. It's simple and straight forward, it replenishes your Stealth per use. And when used from Stealth, it Dazes your opponent. It has low DPS but what we want with this skill is basically its ability to replenish our Stealth. This will never leave our Skill bar.
- Smoke Bomb (3/3): Hands down, this is most probably one of the best CC skills in the game. It has NO target cap, meaning you can daze an unlimited amount of targets with it as long as they come within its vicinity. Daze lasts for 5 seconds, and this means 5 seconds of breathing room for your allies against mobs.
Class Features:
- Sneak Attack (3/3): One of the main Class Features we'll be using in this build and it makes us run as fast or faster than the regular 50% speed mounts we see in the game. This feature will provide us with the mobility we need in order to position ourselves well in battle, and hide much faster from enemies when possible. It does not do anything useful for our DPS, but you run really fast and it allows you to reach strategic positions much faster.
- Tenacious Concealment (3/3): This is a feature we'll be switching to and fro from time to time. Tenacious Concealment allows us to ignore 90% of the damage that our Stealth Bar takes whenever we get hit by an attack. This means that an opposing Rogue's Path of the Blade will not put us out of Stealth that fast, and we our position will not be revealed that quickly even if there are AoE's flying all over the place. This is also the most effective counter for Bilethorn Enchantments as it takes away a lot of our Stealth per proc.
- Skillful Infiltrator (3/3): Our second main class feature. +15% movement speed is just incredible when paired up with Sneak Attack. Contrary to popular belief, the movement speed increase is indeed very noticeable and it allows us to position ourselves quicker than usual. It also gives a nice +3% to crit and deflect. Critical stats give us a higher chance of scoring better damage, and deflect gives us a better chance of not being hit too hard. 3% of each makes a good difference.
- Invisible Infiltrator (3/3): Something you'll be using very often in boss fights. This will guarantee you that you have Stealth on after you use a daily. Meaning you can take your time to reposition yourself somewhere you know you won't be getting hurt. The best part is that it increases your damage by 15% on use.
Dailies:
- Lurker's Assault (3/3): I'm not sure where to begin explaining about how good this daily is. It replenishes our Stealth Meter rapidly, almost giving us 10 seconds of permanent stealth. And you'll almost always get a complete bar of stealth after using Lurker's Assault. To top it all off, you also get a +25% boost to damage when you're under the 10 second effect of Lurker's Assault. This means Duelist's Fury for PVE, and Cloud of Steel for PVP, becomes really threatening hard hitters. Paired up with Invisible Infiltrator, you get a total of 40% damage increase whenever you use this skill.
- Bloodbath (3/3): 5 seconds of Invulnerability while damaging your opponents. Even though it hits for low amounts, if you have a decent Life Steal stat, the 5 seconds of Invulnerability paired up with Life Steal can allow you to replenish considerably high amounts of HP. It allows you to replenish a good amount of Stealth as well during its animation.
Total Amount of Skill Points Used: 49.
For the remaining points you are free to allot them in whatever skill you choose, but these are the ones you'll be switching to and fro from time to time, depending on the situation you are in. Here's a screenie of the skills I took for my own build.
I will further explain the setup I use most of the time in PVE and PVP settings in another section of this guide.
Feats:
Heroic Feats:
- Action Advantage (5/5): 10% more AP whenever we deal Combat Advantage, something we will regularly benefit from.
- Weapon Mastery (3/3): 3% critical might not seem much at first, but that's similar to getting +3 to Dex. We should take advantage of getting more crits in while dealing combat advantage for an increased output in damage.
- Toughness (2/3): This feat gives us an added 6% to HP and for Rogues, we can never really get enough HP because we're quite flimsy. Added survivability goes a long way.
- Twilight Adept (5/5): A really, really underrated feat. It restores 10% of our Stealth Meter per dodge. While that does not seem much, that 10% refill is practically the equivalent of 1.5 seconds of waiting for the a regular steatlh refill, and you can do this refill in a split second using a dodge roll. It can effectively extend your Stealth duration when travelling in hostile territories such as in PVP, allowing you to remain undetected for a longer period of time. And often times, the 10% Stealth you are able to gain from this feat might also be just the right amount you need before you get your stealth meter back up and running. This helps significantly increase our overall survivability.
- Improved Cunning Sneak (5/5): +20% to the Stealth Meter, yes please. You can never go wrong with this as a Stealth Rogue. Combined with the Battlefield Scavenger Set we can easily attain from the PVP store and we can get a whopping huge +40% boost in Stealth. This also means that the Stealth that gets refilled by Twilight Adept is increased in turn. The other damage feats sound nice, but as Stealth Rogues we concentrate on utility than raw damage.
Total Points: 20
Paragon Feats: The feats chosen for our Paragon Feats are chosen based on this one question; how often will I be able to benefit from this? An acceptable answer would be "always" or "most of the time."
Saboteur:
- Cunning Stalker (5/5): An incredible feat that further increases our AP gain by 20% whenever we are in Stealth. Paired up with Action Advantage's +10% AP gain from dealing combat Advantage, this helps take care of our awfully slow AP bar refills. Significantly, by the way. It also works with the AP we get from the Bait and Switch dummy.
- Sneaky Stabber (5/5): The feat that turns a crappy at-will like Gloaming Cut into a reliable beast skill. This will allow us to replenish 10% of our Stealth Bar per hit, which essentially prolongs the time we are in stealth whenever we use it while stealthed. This feat allows us to remain in stealth PERMANENTLY in PVE. It's a cheap way to achieve permastealth and mostly anyone can achieve this permastealth without much need for INT or Recovery stats.
Executioner:
- Dazzling Blades (5/5): A not so effective means of reducing Cool Down, but it works with any of our At-Wills. Every second shaved off from our Cool Downs is a step away from Death's Doors. We're not thrill seekers, and we don't like that door.
- Thrill of the Kill (5/5): +1% to our AP whenever we kill an opponent. When we put all our other AP gain feats and feature into consideration, this 1% AP per kill turns into a very reliable source of AP. Not too useful in PVP, but this is mainly a PVE spec. And we tend to kill things a lot in PVE.
- Brutal Backstab (5/5): +25% more Critical Severity when Stealthed, this Paragon Feat was made for Stealth Rogues.
- Critical Teamwork (5/5): This feat is by far one of the best support feats in the game, in my opinion. It gives a flat 5% critical strike to your entire team. Not only do you get to benefit from it, your entire team also shares the same buff. This is always active, which is the reason why I chose this in place of Deadly Momentum. You can benefit from this feat in both PVP and PVE.
- Overrun Critical (1/1): This is by far the only useful final paragon feat as compared to the other Paragon Feat Branches. This gives us a good chance of dealing an additional damage of 30% of our Critical Severity on a non-critical strike, whenever we crit an opponent. This will begin showing its effects once a player reaches at least 33% - 40% critical rating. It's an incredible means to deal obscene amounts of damage even though we are a defensive build.
Total Points: 41.
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Now that we've laid down the powers and feats that will allow us to maximize Stealth, its effects and advantages, we shall now proceed to the skills that should be slotted in the skill bar. The skills I use in PVE and PVP look really similar and has very little variation. This means that it'll be easy to adapt the play style in both PVP and PVE, which is to stay in the shadows, do your best to not get noticed, then strike when you see the opportunity.
At-Wills:
Encounters:
Class Features:
Dailies:
Rotation: The rotation using this skill set is basically this for PVE settings. Once you see an enemy, you Stealth up, sneak up on them and stab at them via Gloaming Cut. If it's a big target, use Duelist's Fury to shave out some of the target's HP. Once you see that your Stealth Bar is almost depleted, use Shadow Strike for a free refill, and to get some AP on the side too. In order to maintain a permanent Stealth, use Gloaming Cut this time around. And when you see that the bar is almost depleted, use Bait and Switch for a free refill and some more AP. Attack some more using Gloaming Cut to prolong your Stealth, and by the time your Stealth is almost over, you'll notice that Shadow Strike has already been refilled and ready to use so pop one of those out. Keep using Gloaming Cut again, and by the time your Stealth is almost depleted, you'll notice that Bait and Switch is already refilled. And you can keep repeating this for an indefinite amount of time. It's cheap, easy to maintain, and with enough Recovery you might find that you can keep doing this rotation using Gloaming Cut and Shadow Strike only. This is perfect for PVE settings as it doesn't provoke any aggro at all from enemies.
If by any chance you mess up somewhere in the process, Lurker's Assault will be able to help you reset your rotation without having the need to go out of Stealth. It also provides you with a good 60% damage increase, which gives us a good reason to use Duelist Fury at this state.
This "rotation" may need some taking used to, and it definitely involves some practice in order to get the timing right but it's not that hard. I tested this rotation on Epic Karrundax, solo, had my entire party leave, and went all the way to Pyraphenia. It took me an hour and thirty minutes to get to her and beat her but I never died in the process of testing this new skill set.
The best place to practice the rotation would be the training dummies in Trade of Blades. It's not that hard to nail, I assure you.
The Maximized Stealth Setup
At-Wills:
Encounter Setup:
Class Features:
Dailies:
Rotation: Our PVP rotation is a whole lot funner than our PVE rotation and probably less action-packed as well. It's a stress free way to earn points and some kills on the side. Our role in PVP is not to be a beat stick, we don't regularly kill people like our other ally TR's, CW's, or GWF's. As Trickster Rogues, we aim to trick people, to deceive them and make them guess what we're going to do or where we're going to strike next. Our PVP battle is more psychological, and we aim to take advantage of behaviors players usually show in PVP. It's up to the user as to how he wishes to use this build, and how far he can take it in PVP. This build equips us with maximized Stealth which is a powerful psychological tool against any opponent. People tend to fear what they cannot see.
Our main goal is capturing towers for our team, and blocking our opponent's point gain increase. Whenever we step on the opposing team's tower platform, that tower will stop generating points for the opponent. And if you step on it long enough you get to capture it for your team. You net 300 points, equivalent of 6 kills in the process. And if you get to face an enemy while trying to take the tower, you will get another 100 points, 50 for the kill and 50 for the tower rush. Netting you a total amount of 400 points in that tower. But let's just hope that most of the towers you try to take will be undefended. When you find yourself in a position where you see two enemies running towards you, and you are alone. Do not try to be a hero and attempt to take both of them by yourself specially when using a Stealth build. It's best to just stealth up, run away, watch them from somewhere hidden and nearby. And once you see they're gone, go back to their base and take it again. You'll find very little opponents that is able to notice that their tower is being taken as soon as they leave for tower 2. They'll be too preoccupied with the idea of defending/taking that tower.
Some people might call this cowardly, but I prefer to call it a strategy. I will happily take the opportunity to screw up the opposing team's point gain and run away from battle whenever I can. This stealth rogue build also nets me a good amount of top scores thanks to this strategy.
Just remember to stay in stealth for as long as possible and evade the attention of your opponents. Take the long paths if you need to, and make sure no one will know where you're going. The benefit in this is while your allies are trying to defend/take tower 2, you are taking your opponent's tower. Your opponents then has 2 things they can do. They can either send someone to stop you, which you will inevitably win since the Trickster Rogue specializes in 1 vs. 1 battles, or 2 people. 2 opponents gone from tower 2 gives your allies a better chance in taking tower 2. While you keep your 2 opponents fixed on you on your opponent's base, your allies will get an easier time taking the tower they wish to take. This acts as a good support for the team as well as being an offensive maneuver as well. PVP is not just about skills, it also involves strategy. And competitive battling is always funner when you put strategy into consideration.
Hybrid One-Shot/Stealth Setup
At-Wills:
Encounter Setup:
Class Features:
Dailies:
Rotation: The goal of this setup is to make your Stealth in conjunction with ITC frames of immunity last more than 16 seconds, which is Lashing Blade's CD with at least 25% RSI. This makes it so that you remain undetected to your enemies until your Lashing Blade goes out of CD once more to score huge numbers against your opponents.
The basic rotation is use Stealth, use Cloud of Steel on the opponent until you score a crit for Overrun Critical proc, once you score a crit, wait and do not attack for 3 seconds so you go out of combat, then pop an Overrun Critical-empowered + First Strike-empowered Lashing Blade that hits for an extra 35% of your critical severity and +15% increased damage on top of the sure critical strike mechanic of LB. This'll take a HUGE chunk of your opponent's HP. This can only get more powerful if we have Invisible Infiltrator + Lurker's Assault activated if we choose to slot Invisible Infiltrator.
We then use ITC, then Shadow Strike on the opponent to regain Stealth. After which, we are immune to CC and we deflect all damage. All we have to do is to wait until the 4th or 5th second of ITC and then Stealth up. By then our Lashing Blade's CD should be at around 10 seconds. Gloaming Cut (feated with Sneaky Stabber) + immediate Dodge after using Gloaming Cut will ensure 20% Stealth refilled per combo used. What I do is wait 3 seconds in between using this combo (so I go out of combat), then Gloaming Cut benefits from First Strike's 15% increase in damage. It hits hard, harder when the opponent's HP is lower than full. It crits as hard as a non-critical Lashing Blade. So after using Gloaming Cut every 3 second interval, Lashing Blade is out of CD, you still have a decent amount of Stealth to try and proc Overrun Critical once more, and the cycle of dying enemies repeats itself.
The only down-side is that it can be pretty challenging to manage the cooldown of Lashing Blade when you have someone damaging you in Stealth or when your opponent managed to stack DoT's on you. Tenacious Concealment should help, but we lose run speed which is important for gap-closing. Nonetheless, it helps us correct our combo.
First and foremost, I'd like to forewarn people who are intending to use this build that this is a gear-specific build. In order for it to run properly, a player must need either the Battlefield Scavenger Set, or its more powerful counterpart, the Battlefield Skulker Set. Battlefield Scavenger is fairly easy to collect in PVP. Within a few hours of playing PVP Domination, a player can earn enough glory to be able to purchase the entire set. So if you're a new level 60 TR, just pop a few matches in PVP when you have the entire day free. They are really cheap, but they give us a lot of good boosts that most other sets do not have such as additional HP and Armor Penetration, 2 very important stats in damage-dealing and survival. The 2nd set, however, which is the Battlefield Skulker set, is a little harder to obtain. In order to earn the gear for free, one must grind the Gauntlgrym events particularly the PVP and Dungeon in order to be able to get around 10 Grym Coins per the entire event. Each Grym piece, however, costs 40 Grym Coins. So you can just imagine how long that would be before a player can reach the needed amount of Grym Coins to receive their pieces without using AD's. But persistence pays off! If all else fails, there's always the Auction House that sells the pieces for below 200k per piece. These 2 sets boost our Stealth Meter by 20% and 25%, a small boost that is big enough in order to dramatically impact our rotations and increase our room for error. The hard part about playing stealth builds is managing the cooldown of your encounters. But that's about it. Once a player has that down, the rest will come to them with experience and time.
If a player can purchase the entire Grym Set right off the bat, I suggest doing so. But if not, and the player currently does not have the means to get the Grym Set, I highly recommend purchasing the PVP T1 Battlefield Scavenger Set before going for the Grym Set. 20% Stealth which costs below 40k AD's is too good to pass on. Get the entire set as soon as you hit level 60.
Now that we have discussed the most important part about the gear, I assure everyone that the latter part is more lax and people will be free to experiment according to how they see fit. I will discuss some of the contributions that other Stealth TR's added for the build later, but on my part I stack the following stats in order to maximize the damage output of a Stealth TR that specs towards the Executioner Path.
This way, I get to maximize the amount of times I get to proc Overrun Critical which is a very good source of damage increase in both PVE and PVE. However, some players have had the opportunity to play around with the build even further than I can. I'd like to offer you guys these wonderful posts made by our own fellow Stealth TR's, and I assure you guys that these will be VERY insightful. They contain topics from gear up to strategies, so before you completely spec into the build I'd like to request the good people of our TR community to read the following posts first which will be included in the Contributor's Corner in the next post.
So this is basically what I'm using on my Ioun Stone. There are a variety of possible load outs for a player's Ioun Stone, but what exactly should we be looking for when stacking stats on our augment companions? The main reason why people take Ioun Stones is to stack as much stats as they can, but a more intelligent way to use the Ioun Stone is to stack stats on it until you get closer to or reach the soft caps of your desired stats. For instance, for my stone, I slotted as much critical chance as I could in order to get my crit nearer to 50%. Right now I have 49.5% which is close enough. At the same time, I also stacked a little ArPen in order to get me to 24%, which is the soft cap for Armor Penetration, and it's also pretty much the average defenses of bosses in dungeons. I also stacked Recovery in order to get to 30% RSI, to create a larger room for error for my Stealth Rogue. This will increase my AP Generation and decrease the cooldown of my Encounters at a more desirable amount.
But allow me to stress this once more, that there is not one correct load out for Ioun Stones. In the end it will be based on what stats you want for your rogue, and what you want your rogue to do. For a general guideline of what stats you may wish to stack on your Stealth TR, you may refer to this list I have below.
Offensive: These stats will mostly affect our offensive capabilities. Stack these until you reach their soft caps, or until you reach your desired percentage.
- Critical Chance: Increases your Critical Strike chance. All Executioner TR's benefit from this stat a whole lot. You'll want your Crit Chance to be as near to 50% as possible. Do not go beyond 50% as this stat has a very steep point of Diminishing Returns.
- Armor Penetration: Stack this until you get 2540, which is equivalent to 24% ignored defenses. It's one of the easiest stats to stack until the soft cap.
- Power: Once you have those 2 stats capped, Power will be your go-to stat. It does not have diminishing returns, but will keep on adding a flat amount of base damage to your attacks.
Defensive: These stats will primarily affect our defensive capabilities. We will not be able to use these stats much since our main form of defense is Stealth.
- Defense: Will decrease the amount of damage we take based on the amount of Damage Reduction we have. As long as you have roughly around 20% Damage Reduction, you are good to go. Stacking this any further will not benefit us.
- Deflect: It may be useful for saving our hides from time to time. It will greatly reduce the amount of damage we take if it procs, but this is pretty much based on a percentage which can make this stat pretty unreliable if it's not stacked until 33%. We don't want to rely on a luck stat like this.
- Movement: I consider this to be a defensive stat because it allows us to escape AoE's without the need for dodging. If we move fast enough out of red zones, we can save our dodges for something which we may truly need it on. This stat is hard to stack, and we get our Movement Speed from Sneak Attack and Skillful Infiltrator. Do not stack any further than what you can get from Dark Enchantments in your Utility Slots and those Class Features.
Utility: These stats help us not by increasing our offensive or defensive capabilities, but rather by giving our main mechanics some utility.
- Regeneration: This stat is only useful for us in PVP. But for PVE, we should not even be getting hut much. We have potions and Life Steal if we wish to recover our HP. But otherwise, this stat isn't all that useful for PVE. For PVP however, Regeneration is awesome.
- Life Steal: Our main sustain stat. This will allow us to heal our HP based on the amount of damage we inflict on our opponents. This stat becomes better with the support of the Dread Ring Boon, Endless Consumption as it will give us the chance to steal 3x more HP with Life Steal.
- Recovery: One of the stats we'll be able to use a whole lot. Recovery decreases our encounter cooldown, and it also increases the amount of AP we generate from attacks and by using encounters. This will take us faster to Lurker's Assault which is a 10 second 25% DPS increase, and it'll also give us more room for error by reducing our encounter CDs.
So in essence, there is no correct load out for Ioun Stones. There is only what you want to achieve. Feel free to stack whatever it is that you are comfortable with using. Because as long as you think it supports your play style, that is pretty much correct.
As a Stealth Based TR which concentrates on PVE more than PVP, we usually would like to try and avoid any encounters we know we will lose. This includes 2 - 5 vs "you" fights. We do not excel in such situations and it would be within our best interests to run away from such encounters in PVP as we most definitely would not be able to kill anyone in such a gank. Steer clear from anything that may spell your death as there is nothing to gain in dying in PVP, unless you are in that on situation where you are staving off 3 - 4 of your opponents in their own base in order to psychologically prevent them from getting to tower 2. Stealth Rogues are able to do that, and for a good minimum of 30 seconds, 30 seconds enough to allow your allies to cap the towers that are in need of capping. Staying alive as a Stealth Rogue means you have a better and faster means of reacting to what your opponents do in battle. And staying alive means your opponents will always be on the look out for you, the prey whom they failed to catch. A stealth rogue is so hard to kill in PVP and when played right, you can get a high amount of score, decent kill number, and zero deaths.
I shall be dictating the strategies I use in order to effectively defeat players in 1 vs. 1 scenarios. And in the later part of this post, I shall also include other strategies which allows us to escape deadly PVP situations, and various means of harrying opponents.
We are unlike other TR's who spec for maximized damage. What we gain in survivability, we tend to lose in DPS. But it doesn't mean that we do not have the ability to kill other classes. Stealth TR's should not have any trouble facing up against CW's, DC's, and DPS TR's, but GF's and GWF's may prove to be troublesome in PVP. However we mostly do our best to escape conflicts we cannot win and we do our best to force our opponents in 1 vs. 1 scenarios where we are guaranteed to either win or escape, mostly unharmed. Here are some strategies which helps define what a Stealth Executioner can and cannot do.
The Stealth TR and his Purpose:
- As a TR who specializes in remaining unseen, you should aim to abuse this fact by back-capping the bases of your opponents and preventing them from gaining any points. The opponent's base is most usually a undefended point in the area, because tower 2 gets all the action. Tower 2 PVP-ers will be too preoccupied in what they're doing that they'll fail to realize that their tower is being taken, which will cause you and your team to get an increased amount of points in time. In order to fully succeed in doing this, however, you must have good allies with you. Particularly the beefy ones like Clerics and GF's at point 2, with a CW backing them up for support. Your performance is most usually highly dependent on your allies, and your allies will be highly dependent on how well you can harass your opponents into making them stay in one point as they cap the needed towers. You have, as a stealth TR, the capability of a whole party when it comes to making people stay in one point. You do this by staying stealthed and preventing your opponents from mounting up. This will severely affect your opponent's mobility, giving your allies more than enough time to cap tower 2, and rush to where you are to provide back up and eventually taking the match to the opponent's towers. If your opponents aren't smart enough, they will try to take back their tower instead of taking other undefended points. This behavior can be most usually observed in pug PVP parties, and should be exploited whenever possible.
A stealth TR's mode of attacking the opponents is mostly psychological. People are afraid of what they cannot see, making them feel stressed. This will, in turn, increase their aggression towards you, making them try to find you, thus preoccupying them and allowing your teammates to operate without facing too much opponents. They will try to find you, but to no avail, because you specialize in staying stealthed. When you are almost out of stealth and have no means of refilling it, you hide. Since you cannot be seen, most people will think you are still stealthed even when you are already hiding somewhere refilling your stealth bar. You will notice that they will run around on their towers or randomly attacking hoping to hit you. But you're already far away, watching them. The optimum time to strike your opponents back is when they think they are safe, this is most usually the times when you see them mounting up. Since you are a fast runner thanks to Sneak Attack and Skillful Infiltrator, you will be able to get in their range to be able to spam Cloud of Steel at them, making them fall prone from their mounts before they can fully escape their tower.
I shall post screenshots of optimum hiding places in both Hotenow Domination and Rivenscar Ruins; hiding places which will allow you to remain unseen while you see most of what's happening in the area. Using your terrain to your advantage is a strategy, so please do not think of hiding as cowardice. If it gives your team the victory, playing as underhanded as possible would be preferable.
Sometimes, however, you shall be forced in a 1 vs. 1 combat situation. Any TR should be able to handle this as we excel in 1 vs. 1's. I will list down my strategies in 1 vs. 1's and how I win them as a TR with gimped DPS. We lack severely damaging encounters, which is why we shall aim to use the power of our at-wills wisely, our terrain, and our opponent's behavior. We shall aim to counter most popular class strategies.
But first and foremost, allow me to discuss a little bit more on some gear issues on PVP. Please refer to the screenshot below.
As you can see, I have replaced the following gear with alternatives that contributes to Regeneration.
Why the regeneration gear, you ask? The answer is simple. It's because as stealth rogues who can enter combat without risking ourselves much from getting targeted, the times we stay in stealth provide us with so much time that we can virtually heal ourselves to non-critical HP levels without using potions, only by using regeneration and life steal. When those 2 stats work in conjunction with one another, no matter how low our health is, we can easily gain it back by going to stealth. Run away from dangerous areas if you have to, as long as you are alive and are able to come back into the action at top shape, all is well. This also helps us regenerate our lost HP when we can't count on the bugged floating pots in PVP.
For reference, these regeneration gear can be attained by the following means.
These gear are particularly cheap yet the benefits they give us can be immense when played right. And by right, I mean carefully. And now we go to the individual PVP strategies which helps us achieve careful play technique. It's okay to be aggressive at times so long as we have the opportunity to do so, but for a Stealth TR who must be careful of not messing up his cooldown and rotation, the only way to play is cautiously and strategically.
In order for me to be able to test the survivability of this build, I took it upon myself to challenge this build to see how well it can hold in solo scenarios. And what better way to test this than to solo some of the hardest contents of the game; dungeons. Dungeons that are supposed to be taken by 5 players can be soloed by this Stealth Rogue build. So far I've done Lair of the Mad Dragon up until Temple of the Spider and I'm planning to continue this up until Normal Dread Vaults. I was also doing Caverns of Karrundax a while back but sadly the game decided to disconnect me in the middle of the dungeon run, just before I got to fight the 2nd boss. It was a disheartening experience but I will be sure to try again when I'm able to just so I can complete my list.
So far here are the dungeons I've managed to solo and the screenshots I took in order to commemorate the times I was able to successfully challenge these dungeons without dying, not even once.
Finished Dungeons:
Upcoming Solo Runs:
I've been fortunate enough to have not died, not even once in any of the dungeons I've soloed so far. I've had several different encounters but the experience I've gained through soloing each one dungeon helped me conquer the one I've been planning to run through next. I hope these screenshots somehow convince people to try and run this build in the future, and I dream that one day I can find someone in one of my future runs who uses the same build as I am. Just imagining how much a 5 man Stealth TR party can do in a dungeon... that would be a pretty awesome sight.
Intro: Hello once more, everyone. The idea behind this build started out as a replacement for Banelorne after the developers attempted to nerf the Stealth Mechanic. It was supposed to result in a build that is still able to attack while in stealth, while still being able to maximize stealth uptime, even with the nerf for Stealth. But it's a good thing that the changes were retracted even though we have been nerfed severely. I never got to test if this build would work with the stealth nerf (theoretically it should), but what resulted from my testing is a Stealth Build that has a whole lot of room for error in PVE and can still function well in PVP. However the trade off is that this build is a whole lot less flexible than the original build. So if you're the type of guy for experimentation and variety, the original build should prove better for you. But if you want a Stealth-based build that has a large room for error while still being able to play solo, this build is for you.
Ability Scores: You'll want the exact following stats at creation, and the following stat allocations up until level 60.
So at level 60, we'll have 20 STR, 20 DEX, 13 CON, 20 INT, 12 WIS, 15 CHA. If you have an Ioun Stone, you can also forgo a bit of points on INT and allocate them in other ability scores. But every bit of INT helps.
Race: Wood/Sun/Moon Elf, Humans, or Tieflings. I chose the Wood Elf for the added +2 to INT and DEX. I could have also chosen Sun/Moon Elves but they weren't there back then when I made this TR. Rolling a Human with +2 to INT would give you the ability to put points in Disciple of Strength or Scoundrel Training. Both are really good 3/3 Point Feats. Similarly, Sun and Moon Elves get +2 to INT and DEX, and they also have a nice 10% CC resistance. Tieflings with +2 to INT is also a viable choice. And they look really cool too.
The Power Bar:
At-Wills:
- Gloaming Cut: Our main source of Stealth refills once we are engaged in combat. We recover 10% of our Stealth Meter per hit, and this scales well with the additional Stealth time we get from Battlefield Skulker's set bonus and Improved Cunning Sneak, giving us a total of 45% increased Stealth time, while replenishing 10% of our Stealth Meter per hit of Gloaming Cut. It also deals an increased amount of damage the more the HP bars of our enemies gets reduced.
- Duelist's Fury: This shoud be in every PVE'ers power bar unless you're a Scoundrel. With the recovery bonuses we get from gear and the Ioun Stone, we'll be able to weave this in our rotations for extra damage.
Encounters:
- Impossible to Catch: With the fully optimized build, the CD on this skill should go for as low as 13.5 seconds, which is a huge reduction from the usual 18 seconds it has. This skill allows us to eat AoE's in boss fights and increase our uptime against bosses, and this skill releases and from any Control Effect and makes us immune to any further CC skills and damage for 5 seconds. This gives us breathing room to use Shadow Strike to regain our Stealth back.
- Shadow Strike: I'll only put 1 point in this skill for this particular build. The added +20% Damage Increase it gets from Rank 2 and 3 won't really do much for our DPS. We're taking this skill for its utility purpose.
- Lashing Blade: I mainly use this for PVP as it gives us huge numbers when used from Stealth. A very dangerous burst skill. Lashing Blade, pop ITC so you are immune to CC, then use Shadow Strike and go back into Stealth again and start dodging to refill your Stealth meter a bit via Twilight Adept while using Cloud of Steel to ready yourself for the next attack.
- Bait and Switch: A skill I have slotted in boss fights no matter what. It takes us closer to Lurker's Assault, which is 10 seconds of unlimited Stealth and +25% boost in damage. Bait and Switch makes getting a daily every 20 seconds possible, which means we can use Lurker's Assault every rotation when done right.
Class Features:
- Tactics: +15% AP Generation on top of +10% AP Generation from dealing Combat Advantage Damage via Action Advantage AND Cunning Stalker's +20% AP Generation while in Stealth, we'll get a total amount of +45% AP Generation that stacks on top of the other. If we also put the +20% more AP generation we get from Recovery, we'll be having +65% AP which is huge, since TR's generate AP the slowest compared to all the other classes. This will inherently increase the AP generation of all the skills we use, taking us one step closer to Lurker's Assault, the skill that gives us a superb increase in damage output. You can't go wrong with this.
- Tenacious Concealment: A very defensive feature right here. This will allow us to reduce the amount of Stealth we lose from getting damaged while in Stealth. When we have it at max rank it will reduce 90% of the loss in our Stealth meter, thereby protecting our Rotation from being messed up. This is a good life-saving feat right here that further increase your room for error in combat. Very useful against TR's who like to use Path of the Blades in PVP as you can maintain your stealth while eating their PoB.
- Sneak Attack: +30% more mobility while in Stealth. The faster we move, the less time we consume in attacking and escaping. A very good gap closer for PVP as well.
- Skillful Infiltrator: +15% more mobility, +3% Deflect/Critical Rate. You can't go wrong with +3% crit and +15% more mobility. When paired with Sneak Attack, you get a total of +45% mobility, which is pretty much the same speed as a regular horse mount. Being able to move fast while hitting hard is one of the perks of playing Stealth builds.
Dailies:
- Lurker's Assault: It also gives us the ability to regenerate Stealth rapidly, thereby increasing our Stealth uptime for an effective 10 seconds. We can use Duelist's Flurry within this span of time without worrying about going out of Stealth. Using ITC while under the influence of Lurker's Assault also will not take us out of Stealth, giving us the ability to eat red areas in boss fights while still dealing damage and bleeds. This is the only daily we need to use for PVE.
- Shocking Execution: Not too useful for PVE as Lurker's Assault has everything we need for PVE. But for PVP, this skill is just awesome. Don't shy away from using it against heavily armored classes like the GWF's, GF's, and DC's. We gain AP much faster than usual thanks to people who attack our dummies, which is why we get more opportunities to use this daily in PVP.
Feats:
Heroic Feats:
- Toughness (2/3) or Action Advantage (2/5): 4% more HP. This will increase our room for error if by any chance we do get hit while in stealth. As for the latter, 4% more AP generation will take us a bit nearer to Lurker's Assault each time we deal damage. Every bit of AP helps.
- Weapon Mastery (3/3): We'll be wanting as much crit chance as possible in order to maximize our damage. 3% nearer to 50% is always a good thing.
- Swift Footwork (5/5): 10% faster Stamina Regeneration doesn't seem like much at first, but when you stack it with the Stamina Regeneration Bonus we get from our Strength Bonus, we'll get a total of 20% Stamina Regeneration. Being able to dodge 20% much faster than usual allows us to negate damage 20% more likely. Not to mention dodging also allows us to regain our Stealth thanks to Twilight Adept. We're going to be adding another 10% from the capstone boon from Sharandar in order to take this bonus even further.
- Twilight Adept (5/5): 10% Stealth Regeneration each time we dodge. This will increase the number of uses dodge has. We can use it as a gap closer, an ability to evade damage, and now we can also use it to "trade" stamina for stealth thanks to this feat.
- Improved Cunning Sneak (5/5): +20% Increased Stealth Meter. From testing, this is also the feat that allows us to not go out of Stealth when using Lurker's Assault. Without this feat, any encounter we use while in Lurker's Assault will take us out of Stealth.
Paragon Feats:
- Saboteur:
-- Cunning Stalker (5/5): +20% AP Generation while in Stealth. We love AP as it takes us to Lurker's Assault much faster. Take this.
-- Sneaky Stabber (5/5): This is pretty much the feat that makes our build unique. Replenishes our Stealth Meter by 10% per hit on top of the +30% Stealth Meter regeneration when we kill an enemy with it. This allows us to effectively increase our Stealth uptime in PVE and deal damage in the process.
- Executioner:
-- Dazzling Blades (5/5): 5% to reduce the CD of our Encounters by 1 second. Unreliable, but proc-ing that lucky hit could change a lot. Take this so you can go to the next tier.
-- Devastating Shroud (5/5): A skill that allows us to kill 2 people in PVP consecutively. More kills, funner game. Increases our Critical Severity by 10% for 6 seconds after using it, making Lashing Blade hit harder if used from Stealth!
-- Brutal Backstab (5/5): +25% Critical Severity while in Stealth. Just so good! We'll be stacking on a lot of Crit, Power and Recovery using this build, so it'll give us a good increase in DPS provided we can take our crit to at least 35% so 1 out of 3 attacks will be a critical. That's a big enough number right there.
-- Critical Teamwork (5/5): This feat will give you 5% extra critical chance and to your teammates as well. 5 points on this will be quite the investment.
-- Overrun Critical (1/1): The reason why Executioner Rogues deal insane damage. This deals 35% of your critical severity in damage. And, well, imagine you had a Perfect Vorpal Enchantment which gives +50% Critical Severity. You're stealthed, which gives you another +25%. So that means you have 150% Critical Severity. Take 35% of 150%, which is around 50% of the Critical Severity, and you basically just dealt damage equal to that of the Perfect Vorpal itself, effectively doubling its effects. Take this.
Gear and Stat Choices: Our gear, just like any rogue who specializes in stealth, absolutely has to be Battlefield Skulker. No other set can give us survivability and offensive capabilities. With increased 20% stealth from Improved Cunning Sneak, and the Skulker Set's +25%, we'll get a total amount of +45% stealth, significantly increasing our stealth uptime. But the goal of this build is to reduce our need for 2 stealth refill skills to only 1. Getting INT to 20 was the first step, and this is the second. The third step is to stack Recovery until you get around 1730 Recovery for an added 15% RSI/AP Gain, giving you a total of 25% RSI and 30% AP Gain with Tactics. You can do this by equipping the following items together with Rank 7 Silvery Enchantments which are fairly cheap in the Auction House.
This is a relatively cheap build particularly because the maximum amount of AD's you'll be spending per enchant will be around 50 - 55k, and those will be the Silvery Enchantment Rank 7's. We can further increase our stats via the use of Ioun Stones. We'll stack Armor Pen, Power and Critical for our Ioun Stone slots, turning our damage output from a paltry sum to decent.
For my Enchantments, I use the following.
The important part will be slotting your offense slots with the Silvery Enchants. You can opt to choose another enchantment for your defense slots but I like having extra Life Steal, specially in PVP where we have the luxury of not being damaged a lot. You can heal back most of the damage you've taken by attacking while in stealth.
For my PVP Gear, I use the following.
I'm using gear that gives me the best balance of Regeneration and Recovery, just enough to give me the Stealth time I need and the ability to heal up whenever I'm in Stealth. Regeneration works really well with Rogues since we have the ability to not get hit by remaining unseen thanks to our Class Mechanic. This allows us to freely stack up the HP we get from Regeneration and heal up as if we had potions ticking for us constantly.
Weapon and Armor Enchantments: There are a variety of ways in which you could set up your TR with this build. It is heavily gear centric, and what you give it will define the roles it shall do for PVP and PVE. Some of the most viable Weapon and Armor Enchantments in which I think this build will greatly benefit with are as follows.
Weapon Enchantments:
- Greater/Perfect Vorpal Enchantment: The most OP enchantment in the game, and TR's are able to abuse its effects the most as it is a Critical stat-related enchantment. It gives us a significant boost in DPS.
- Plaguefire/Greater Plaguefire Enchantment: A highly underrated Enchantment. The normal version of this enchant can reduce the opponent's armor by -30%, and the greater version reduces it to a maximum of -45%. This stacks with Armor Penetration, mind you, and a player using this enchantment can take a person's armor mitigation to negative levels. Useful for both PVE and PVP as the entire party benefits from the debuff it gives to your opponents. The lesser version of this Enchant is also good enough.
- Bilethorn Enchantment: For the TR's in budget. I say, this is a really useful enchantment for PVP most specially if you're facing rogues. It deals poison damage after 4 seconds to your opponents depending on how much you hit them. Let's say you're fighting another TR. When it comes to TR vs. TR fights, the one unmasked first is most usually the first to die. Bilethorn helps us do this as the poison damage it does damages a TR's Stealth Meter.[/B]
Intro: Hello once more, Stealth Rogues. I come again with another Alternative Build for Stealth Rogues designed for PVE, but it also has some PVP capabilities though it will not be as effective as the original build based on Gloaming Cut. This build was designed to take care of the problem that Stealth Rogues encounter whenever they enter the dungeon together, and that is basically this. Whenever there is more than one Stealthed Rogue in melee range of the boss, the boss will be inclined to spam melee range AoE's in order to hit the rogues attacking the boss. So this led the Stealth Rogue community to the conclusion that soloing bosses is a better and more reliable way of taking care of a boss rather than grouping up together. But with this new Whisperknife stealth build, it will be more than possible to fight a boss with the support of someone else; unseen allies attacking from range, without incurring the wrath of a boss' melee range AoE.
Ability Scores: You'll want the exact following stats at creation, and the following stat allocations up until level 60.
Race: Wood/Sun/Moon Elf, Humans, or Tieflings. Any race that can get +2 to INT will be perfect.
The Power Bar:
At-Wills:
- Disheartening Strike: The bread and butter At-Will for this build. This At-Will is able to do insane damage, but it needs some time to happen as it is a DoT. Whenever this At-Will crits, it's completely possible to get 12 - 15k critical bleeds out of it. But what we want here is this At-Will's ability to be cast from range. It has a range similar to that of Cloud of Steel and if we can do this while in Stealth, all the better.
- Duelist's Fury: For striking big mobs, and that's it. It is not recommended to use this against a boss as it will make them spam their melee-ranged AoEs. The melee rogue should be the one to stack the bleeds on the boss.
- Cloud of Steel: This will be our secondary At-Will for both PVP and PVE. A good source of ranged damage whenever Disheartening Strike is currently bleeding the opponent. Has 8 charges but it deals a decent amount of damage.
Encounters:
- Shadow Strike: Bread and butter for Stealth builds. Refills Stealth.
- Bait and Switch: Something to take us faster to Lurker's Assault for an extra dose of damage and stealth uptime.
- Smoke Bomb: We should not be using this skill often, however there will come times when we absolutely need some breathing room to correct our rotations. This will be the skill that helps us do it since we do not have access to Impossible to Catch. It will Daze the mobs surrounding us for 5 seconds unless they are immune to CC. This should give you the window of opportunity to use Shadow Strike to regain Stealth so you can continue with your rotations.
- Impact Shot: A hard-hitting single-target ranged skill. Slot this only when you are confident that you won't fall out of Stealth in combat and will not have much use for Smoke Bomb. This will only be used when you are under the effects of Lurker's Assault, so you will not go out of Stealth when you spam all 3 shots. You'll need to use Shadow Strike to get a full refill after using up all 3 shots, however.
Class Features:
- Dagger Threat: One of our main CF's. 15% more damage whenever you are within 20' of your target. 20' is roughly the distance of 2 and a half of your dodge range. It puts us in a safe distance away from bosses.
- Tactics: Extra 15% AP generation. Will take us closer to Lurkers Assault. We want this slotted as often as possible.
- Tenacious Concealment: Useful for keeping us Stealthed despite the DoT's, Bleeds and damage we may sustain from enemies. 90% Reduction in damage to our Stealth Meter.
- Sneak Attack: +30% more mobility while in Stealth. Will be useful for keeping up with MI Stealth Rogues when running in dungeons as they are 15% faster thanks to Skillful Infiltrator.
Dailies:
- Lurker's Assault: This is the Daily we will use the most in boss fights. It'll increase our DPS by 25% and rapidly regenerate Stealth, allowing us to have virtually unlimited Stealth when under its effects.
- Whirlwind of Blades: A daily that can be used for mob clearing. It hits for a decent amount and it increases our Power by 10% for 10 seconds after using it. Use this against groups.
Feats:
Heroic Feats:
- Toughness (2/3) or Action Advantage (2/5): 4% more HP. This will increase our room for error if by any chance we do get hit while in stealth. As for the latter, 4% more AP generation will take us a bit nearer to Lurker's Assault each time we deal damage. Every bit of AP helps.
- Weapon Mastery (3/3): We'll be wanting as much crit chance as possible in order to maximize our damage. 3% nearer to 50% is always a good thing.
- Swift Footwork (5/5): 10% faster Stamina Regeneration. A much needed feat since we are relying on dodges to refill some of our Stealth in order to extend it further.
- Twilight Adept (5/5): 10% Stealth Regeneration each time we dodge. Synergizes well with Stamina Regeneration from Elven Resolve and Swift Footwork.
- Improved Cunning Sneak (5/5): +20% Increased Stealth Meter. From testing, this is also the feat that allows us to not go out of Stealth when using Lurker's Assault. Without this feat, any encounter we use while in Lurker's Assault will take us out of Stealth.
Paragon Feats:
- Saboteur:
-- Cunning Stalker (5/5): +20% AP Generation while in Stealth. We love AP as it takes us to Lurker's Assault much faster. Take this.
-- Nimble Dodge (5/5): Dodging costs 10% less Stamina, and this is doubled to 20% whenever we dodge while in Stealth. More dodges means more Stealth uptime from Twilight Adept.
- Executioner:
-- Dazzling Blades (5/5): 5% to reduce the CD of our Encounters by 1 second. We will be using At-Wills a lot, and having 1 second off your encounter CD's will definitely help your rotations.
-- Determined Pursuit (5/5): Just so we can take the next feats. But this will be particularly useful for adding some utility to your Vengeance's Pursuit, since it'll give the encounter some nice control mechanics on top of it having no cooldown. Not that we'll be using VP a lot.
-- Brutal Backstab (5/5): +25% Critical Severity while in Stealth. This will make your Disheartening Strike bleeds tick harder.
-- Critical Teamwork (5/5): More critical chance for us and will take us to 50% crit chance much easier.
-- Overrun Critical (1/1): Our Whisperknife build doesn't benefit much from this feat, since our main skill will be Disheartening Strike which does not proc Overrun Critical. But let's take it nonetheless because this will make our Impact Shots hit a lot harder when they crit.
In essence, what we have right here is a Whisperknife Stealth Build that concentrates on getting the most out of Disheartening Strike's DoT. Disheartening Strike hits really hard, but its effects will only become apparent in time. You need a total of 5 seconds to fully see the effects of this At-Will. But within those 5 seconds, you can stack this DoT on more than 1 enemy so this'll be helpful in dealing some damage against mobs when clearing rooms with other TRs. But what we want from Disheartening Strike is its ability to deal damage from afar.
The melee-based Stealth Build has one glaring problem in boss fights. Having more than 1 TR in melee range of the boss makes the boss spam a melee range AoE which can be quite problematic, as it makes the boss fight inherently longer since the stream of DPS against the boss is not consistent. But with a Whisperknife around, we'll be able to have a melee on the boss, and Whisperknives to support the melee with ranged DoT's. There can be more than 1 Whisperknife, and even if the melee falls in combat against the boss, the Whisperknives can continue his work and take down the boss with their ranged attacks. It's similar to the play style of a Hunter Ranger or a Control Wizard. You hit things from range, but the only difference is that you are cloaked with Stealth. And this is basically the gist of this build. The next section will discuss the gear and stats for our Stealth WK's.
I am sick of my Wizard. Maybe PvE seems cool but when it comes to PvP and I see Rouge on my way I am like 'Oh no, I am dead again.' Wish me luck
Trent82: Trent82 has explored an alternative stat setup for playing the Stealth Rogue, particularly by stacking Recovery as the priority stat. He has achieved a build that allows more room for error, and gives him a quicker means to pop Lurker's Assault faster which inherently increases his overall damage output in dungeons. More info on his posts!
l0th4ri0: l0th4ri0 is one avid contributor towards our small stealth TR community. He has discussed some of the most viable ways to effortlessly level up your stealth TR much faster, particularly by using Regen gear when questing. He has also discussed some of his dungeon delving strategies and play styles using his variant Saboteur Stealth TR build which specs into the Sab Tree instead of our usual Executioner Tree. Read more on his posts by clicking his name!
Fabfesta: Fabfesta has discussed some of his experiences and strategies using this build, and a little bit of theorycraft. He has also managed to go the furthest reaches of an epic dungeon all by himself, and I myself have ran an epic dungeon with him, just the 2 of us. More info on his posts by clicking his name!
Klixan: Klixan, like l0th4ri0, has discussed her strategies on leveling your TR much quicker. She attested to the effectiveness of Regen gear while leveling, and included some of her experiences in narrated format. A read that's well worth it so click her name!
Kingculex: Kingculex has created an extensive writeup about how he combined his own unique Executioner Build with this build and got good results. If you're interested in reading a detailed writeup about an alternative build, click the name!
If you have something you can share to our small TR community, please do not hesitate to do so! This is not just my guide no more, and I'm proud to be able to compile the information and experiences that all stealth TR's should know. You could be next, so no matter what the info you have, whether it be something that pertains to PVP or PVE, please share them! We would be more than happy to have another contributor around.
A good max stealth saboteur build would probably only work with the Human race particularly because of the 3 extra Heroic Feat Points they can allocate to Scoundrel Training, a good feat to increase the flat damage of the TR in Stealth. Afterwards, taking the following feats would give the Human TR a reliable source of flat DPS that doesn't rely on crits, as well as giving it good utility and survivability.
Heroic Feats
- Action Advantage: 5/5
- Weapon Mastery: 3/3
- Toughness: 2/3
- Twilight Adept: 5/5
- Scoundrel Training: 3/3
- Improved Cunning Sneak: 5/5
Paragon Feats
Saboteur:
- Cunning Stalker: 5/5
- Nimble Dodge: 5/5
- Expert Sneak: 5/5
- Sneak of Shadows: 5/5
- Ruthless Efficiency: 1/1
Scoundrel:
- Underhanded Tactics: 5/5
- Nimble Blade: 5/5
Afterwards, concentrating on STR and CHA, as well as gear that gives incredulous amounts of power such as the Master Assassin set would turn this build Sab build into a steady DPS hitter thanks to Duelist's Fury and Stealth. It has more survivability than an Executioner Stealth TR, but it deals less damage over time.
i want to try your executioner build but i'm not sure about the starting stats.
How would you roll your stats if you would start from anew?
And which two would you boost with the levelups?
I personally would go for 18 DEX, 13 STR, 13 CHA. Then put a +2 on CHA, and if possible DEX as well. But I rolled a Tiefling. If it were possible for me to reroll my character, as in create a whole new one, I'd make a Human Rogue so I can take the extra 3 Heroic Feat Points. But as a Tiefling with extra scores on Constitution, I tend to be able to take a lot more damage than usual.
As for the stat boosts on level ups, I mainly prioritize CHA and DEX. Stealth Executioners get a lot of combat advantage opportunities thanks to stealth. And the added crit% from DEX really helps boost the increased CA damage.
I hope you all enjoy the images! And look forward to me soloing Karrundax and Dread Vaults as well, sadly I'm only confident enough to be able to solo their normal versions. But in the future, I also might be soloing epic dungeons if by any chance I succeed in the normal version of the Dread Vault.
Even if Halfling is the worst choice of the 4 eligible races, i simply like the style of it
After which you might want to stack some Armor Penetration or Recovery instead of Power. Recovery for increased AP gain and faster recharge speed for encounters, and ArPen for a more well-rounded overall damage.
In PVP and PVE so far, I'm able to go into stealth for an average of (give and take) 30 seconds. 8 seconds from regular Stealth, 8 from Shadow Strike, 8 from Bait and Switch, another 8 from Shadow Strike because it has already finished its CD by the time the Stealth I got from Bait and Switch is about to run out.
When used with Lurker's Assault, that adds another 10 seconds to my Stealth time, and another 5 - 6 seconds from the rapid regeneration I get from Lurker's Assault. I can then repeat the entire process mentioned above in order to get an extra 30 seconds of Stealth since the main skills in my PVE/PVP toolbar has already finished their CD's by then. After which, collecting AP all over again for Lurker's Assault will be an easy task thanks to the AP we get from Lurker's Assault and the decent AP we get from using Shadow Strike. We get to use it twice per rotation.
Also, about adding 2 points to Toughness, wouldn't it be better if you add 2 points to Cunning Ambusher instead? I don't think 2 points to Toughness is really necessary as your build focuses on staying hidden most of the time.
Cunning Ambusher is nice, really. But we normally do not slot damage encounters in our encounter slots.
I actually think that Cunning Ambusher is pretty good in PVP. But in PVE settings where remaining in Stealth should be the utmost priority, the times we are out of Stealth would be the same times we are trying to get back into Stealth. So that means we will not be attacking when we run out of Stealth. Most probably dodging to regain some Stealth and waiting for Shadow Strike to fill up.
Although I would invest points in it rather than 2 points in Toughness if I liked to PVP better than PVE. 2 points would work remarkably with Impossible to Catch. As soon as you are almost out of Stealth, pop one ItC, deal an extra 4% damage while waiting for 2 seconds for Shadow Strike to fill up again if the rotation is done correctly.
Second sorry for my school level english ( long sentences...:rolleyes: )
I have 2 questions :
1) is wicked reminder a viable sobstitute for bait and switch ?
( I am probably wrong since I am a bit of a n0b but I would like to know ur opinion anyway ):
for some reason I hate the fact that BAS makes u get out of battle ( I understand that it refreshes your stealth bar but it also makes u leave battle in the middle of a rotation and not as a way to escape critical situations )
or what about this for the encounters : bait and switch /wicked r./shadow strike ?
2) what stat would you put into your gear first ( after crit/pow ) ?
I am currently geared 2/4 shadewalker and 2/4 master duelist.
Now I would like to give priority to armor penetration ( in the remaining gear and in enchants ) and then maybe recovery ?
and Wicked Reminder pops you out of stealth when using it while B&S doesnt which is the whole point of taking it
Hi and thank you for those interesting questions. Unfortunately Wicked Reminders completely defeats the overall purpose of taking a Stealth Build as it always puts us out of Stealth when we use it. While it does do quite a considerable good damage, it will also risk us being detected, hence making enemies attack us. This applies to both PVE and PVP. It is an absolute must for players who wish to take the Stealth Build to have Bait and Switch and Shadow Strike in their encounter slots. The last encounter slot, however, is your free choice. You can use Lashing Blade, Wicked Reminder, Path of the Blades, basically anything you want in which you think will work on the given situation. But you must have BaS and SS on your encounter slots, always. So your second suggestion is acceptable for a Stealth Rogue build. BaS, SS, Wicked Reminder.
Wicked Reminder gives quite a good sum of AP per use, so if you are finding the need to generate extra AP whenever you are out of Stealth, use Wicked Reminder. But this puts you in front of harm's way. When a CW pops a choke on you in PVP because you are out of Stealth, all the enemies will be attracted to you, the glass DPS whose kill score is ripe for the taking.
And I'm not sure about what you mean when BaS makes you leave battle. It actually only does a little roll animation which is a good pseudo-dodge that helps you escape deadly encounters. I can't count the many times I've used BaS to prevent my opponents from killing me in PVP while I'm out of Stealth. It also gives you a LOT of AP when your opponents attack it. In PVE, this is always. In PVP, it's best to leave these baits in front of people whom you know will attack or unintentionally attack it with their AoE. Faster way to refill Shocking Execution for PVP. Also please do take not that if you use Bait and Switch and Impossible to Catch while engaged in a battle, they will generate AP for you. From my experience, Bait and Switch gives roughly about 9% of your AP, while Impossible to Catch gives 11%. that's 20% faster to Shocking Execution or Lurker's Assault.
Second, for your gear, since you will not be using Battlefield Scavenger Set for the +20% increase in Stealth (a god send, really), you might want to stack up on Recovery. It will make your encounters recharge faster and it gives you an increase in AP gain. Armor Penetration is nice, really, but you can easily get 30% from a Plague Fire enchantment. 22% is the optimum ArPen people would usually advise you to take, so 30% is pretty much overkill. All for the cost of 500k AD.
I see...
anyway trying to translate properly (I would like
so my worries with BaS is that...yes it can save ur life...but if you use it in a rotation doesn't it make you lose too much time ? since it makes u roll back and you have to walk back into battle so isn't the loss of dps too much ? ( but I totally understand that being stealthed gives u advantages...also considering feats )
again sorry for my english and ty for the quick response...
havent you read my previous post?
no I didn't
OK ty for the explanation ( I only used BaS at the beginning and then left it )
Huckasex is correct.
Also, using Bait and Switch when you are not in Stealth does not refill our Stealth Bars so it's best to always use Bait and Switch while in Stealth in order to benefit from the free stealth refill. But there are times when you are out of Stealth and you need something to distract and trick your enemies; BaS is the perfect skill for that. This gives you some time to heal up and replenish your Stealth Bar even just a little bit. The clone in which BaS produces will act as a tank, taking the aggro that is directed to you.
It's fine even if you lose time for DPS. What's important is that you are alive, because being alive allows you to deal more damage in the long run. It also takes a load of your cleric's shoulders whenever you are in an encounter.
For DPS, we generally have Sly Flourish and Duelist's Fury for PVE settings. Duelist's Fury deals an immense amount of damage when used continually and the damage you deal to your opponents tend to lessen the speed in which your Stealth Bar is depleted. We do not have high burst damage unlike the other Rogue builds, but if you give it enough time, you'll notice that the Rogue without Stealth tends to die faster than the one that is spec-ed for Stealth. A dead rogue loses more time for DPS than one that is alive. We shouldn't always rely on the clerics for our survival after all.
But...what do i do versus 6-7 trash Mobs if i have / want to kill them? Duelist has a very little cone effect (2 degrees actually). Funny to kill bosses while in stealth tho.
Thanks for the fun and this guide!
Edit: Do you really recommand the pvp armor set? It has 20% more stealth bar but
1) 0 power on it, so i would basically lose 1.000 power compared to my green equip lev58.
2) It has a lot of ARP on it while you recommand plagued enchantment?
3) What is the use of lifesteal on it when we fight stealthed (nearly) all the time?
As for the second set of questions. Yes, I really, really can't stress how good it is to have the 20% more stealth. You can try to use other sets like Shadewalker for the immense recovery (to help you regain BaS and Shadow Strike much faster), or Master Assassin (in order to get insane amounts of Power when using Lurker's Assault, you'll be able to use it mostly every encounter in epic dungeons). But the 20% Stealth on Battlefield Scavenger prolongs your time in Stealth, making sure that the down-time of your stealth is kept to a minimal level as much as possible. I tend to slot Impossible to Catch simply for the purpose of attaining invulnerability while waiting for 2 - 3 seconds for Shadow Strike to finish recharging.
1. Power is a nice stat but ArPen scales better at higher levels from my observation (and reading other guides). You can try to run Radiant Enchants in place of Azures, but this will lessen the proc rate of Overrun Critical which is a good source of our DPS. You do get better flat damage however.
2. I'm still in the works with this build as well, since I'm a fairly poor player, supporting some lower leveled players with items once they reach level 60. I do not have the resources yet to further test out what other gear sets or stat combinations is good. But for my experience you can never have enough ArPen in PVE. Most mobs tend to have around 20%, but some have beyond that. I'm using a Lesser Plague Fire due to my AD resource problem, but in theory, this build would dish out damage so much better with a Vorpal Enchantment. When running Executioners, one can never go wrong with Vorpals.
3. I mainly use the Battlefield Scavenger for the stealth bonus. The Life Steal is a plus. But throughout my runs, although we fight nearly in Stealth all the time, there will be times when you accidentally make a mistake and you get damage. The life steal... well, it saves up for pots. Not entirely useful but good nonetheless.
Maybe ill give it a shot. Since it works for you it shouldnt be so bad :-)
I was refering to Metzli's Dungeon DPS Guide. Well, not because i dont trust you but because i want to consider more opinions before spending some of my gold / diamonds (on my CW i got nearly all available sets to test stuff out with the conclusion that all 4-piece set bonus are bugged. So yes I like playing around a bit to build my opinion but i also like reading other opinions)
He writes:
"T2 Sets
I am just going to list the sets in order of best to worst, and list the set bonuses gained:
1. Swashbuckling Captain - 450 recovery, 6 second 1014 power/recovery buff (3 stacks of 338).
2. Sinister Shade - 450 Crit rating, 6 second 1013 Recovery buff (may have less than 100% uptime).
3. Master Assassin - 450 Power, 6 second 1350 power buff after using a daily
The difference in the overall damage you gain from each of these sets is tremendous."
[ Edit: However...
I know this guide is about the trickier of the rogues, not the more powerfull. But...isnt it legit to ask at which point some more dps would do the same if not better and which way would be the best for it? I hope you get me right :-) ]
A compromise? Or worse simply because of the lack of any ARP?
The T1 Set "Master Duelist" offers power, crit, recovery, deflect but no lifesteal. The 4-piece bonus is: "Every 4rth At-Will strike reduce Encounter power cooldowns by 1 second." Which does indirectly affect our stealthbar and AP because we can use baith, shadow strike more often? Beside our 5 seconds immunity to all impossible to catch. I have no clue if this set bonus is working because i didnt test it out. An interesting low-tier alternative with more dps than the pvp armor for us? Some toy to play around :-))
He also writes, this one could be interesting for your own build maybe:
"If you have a 25% vorpal enchant, you are aiming for ~3500 crit rating.
If you have a 12% vorpal enchant, you are aiming for ~2750 crit rating.
If you have no vorpal enchant, you are aiming for about 2000 crit rating."
I have no clue where he takes these numbers from tho. Opinion, fact? Dunno, but at least this enchant would not collidate with our in build massive ARP we already have?
From my personal experiance (no dungeon yet) I think at some fights (mostly boss fights) Tenacious Concealment is a lot better than Skillfull Infiltrator. 15% runspeed +3% crit + 3% deflect = yes + yes + mh? but -90% stealth loss from incoming damage = YES
I tested both and was surprised how helpy Tenacious Concealment is. In most tough fights there is more or less aoe in it. When i decide to stay inside aoe (some are not that painfull so i can pot it out) i simply can do a lot dps while staying stealthed. When walking around the world or in pvp runspeed is very welcome tho!
Ok, i died 2 times when leveling to 60. One time i was testing out Smokebomb. I instantly re-replaced it with imossible to catch because this is so much better.
One more thing for you to read. sry for the textwall!! :-)
I think youre guide is really really nice. New players could search an advice what stats to go for tho. Some direction to go for. Lifeleach, crit, deflect or power? Recovery?
If you choose plagued as enchant, whats the number of ARP to be in a good place, do you still need any?
I found some link in the above mentioned guide that is extremely helpfull: http://i.imgur.com/CoHLjkU.jpg (All pvp+T1+T2 armors for rogue.)
EDIT
OK, i bought the armor set for 40 gold. Here is my feedback, but first your rotation:
Since i mainly use Duelists`s Flurry(DF) on bosses / tough target it is interesting what i found out (I dont mention the Daily):
1 Stealth - ok I am Mr. Obvious here :-)
1A without the set: one possible combo of DF before unstealth
1B with the pvp armor set: its not possible to stay in stealth and hit 2 full combos of DF
= I have to use a couple Sly Flourish in case B to be most effective
before:
2 Bait and Switch.
until now it is no big difference because BnS wont give us back stealth = 1 Combo of DF with whatever set I use before BnS.
2A without the set: again: only 1 possible combo of DF before unstealth
2B with the set: if i dont care because 3) Shadow Strike will put me in stealth again it is exactly 2 combos of DF before i unstealth and and have to pop 3) Shadow Strike >>> hitting stealth again.
Now its time to hit Impossible to Catch or even before the 2nd combo of DF to get some distance (avoiding damage on me while stealth / Shadow Strike reloading
If i definitely dont want to be hit after Shadow Strike runs out there is also not a big difference in having the set on or not because there is no time for a second DF then.
The brigde to 0 this time could be the above mentioned T1 set. If it works properly. Because it should easily reduce the cool down of Shadow Strike for another series of DF.
without the pvp set its around: 7 seconds
with the pvp set its around: 5-6 seconds
with the T1 pve set its around: ?? seconds (to be tested yet)
Basically, with the pvp set i win a series of DF and 1-2 secs on my cooldowns if i dont care to unstealth until I hit Shadow Strike. Of course sometimes its more praticable or even possible to kite and use the normal stealth, but in tough fights (with ranged mobs) every second unstealthed may be a deadly one.