Before I get started with the guide, a couple things I want to cover... I currently have 3 TR's. My main is Setherio (Tiefling), then I have Kira (Half-Elf), and Veritas (Drow). Initially I was only going to make Veritas a Whisperknife based on my testing on the preview shard, however, I respec'd Setherio just to see how well he would do and am quite pleased with the results. The reason I was only going to make Veritas a Whisperknife is being my build relies a lot on Critical Strike % and she has the highest DEX than any of my other three characters.
Also note: I don't have "godly gear". I use mostly R6 Enchantments (a couple R7s), and lesser armor/weapon enchantments. This setup does NOT REQUIRE godly gear (though, I'm sure, having all ancient and fable weapon sets as well as rank 7+ enchantments would be much better...).
With that said...
Trickster Rogue Whisperknife: Tactical Executioner (PvE)
The main focuses of this build are shows by feats. Focuses on Damage, Combat Advantage, Stealth (entering and leaving), and has tactical aspects to it. From feats (and some companions) this is a simplified list of bonuses:
- Critical Chance +8%
- +25% Critical Severity while in Stealth
- +3% Max HP
- +6% damage after leaving Stealth
- Encounters deal 6% more damage.
- If used within 6 seconds of leaving stealth, +12% damage.
- Damage from STR increased by 6%
- Stealth lasts 8% Longer
- +2% AP Gain (with Elven Haste Boon)
- +12% AP Gain in Combat Advantage (Stealth or from Personal Feat or teamwork)
- +27% AP Gain in Stealth w/ Personal Feat Tactics
- +20% Combat Advantage
- At-Wills have 5% chance to reduce cooldown by 1 second per strike.
- -10% threat on a Critical Strike
- Stamina regenerates 10% faster in Combat
- 13% faster if using Stone of Might upgraded to rare
- Life Steal has a chance to steal 3x the amount. (Dread Ring: Endless Consumption Boon)
The idea behind this setup started out being a support party member, though can easily be the main single target DPS party member as well. Whisperknife gives you more tactical options and if once you learn to use them to your advantage (
and the party's advantage) it seems to fit in quite perfectly. With bonuses for Combat Advantage from feats to dealing DoT with Disheartening Strike, you will use Stealth more tactically as a Whisperknife than you do as a Master Infiltrator.
Stealth: Stealth is used tactically. You will be inside and outside of stealth a lot. Bonuses for being in Stealth is that it gives you Combat Advantage also lessens your Threat immensely. When you leave Stealth, thanks to a feat, you deal an additional 6% damage and can retain Combat Advantage bonus for a brief period of time.
At-Will - Primary: Duelist Flurry - couple this with Deadly Momentum feat, grants you (up to) +15% critical severity regardless of whether you're inside of Stealth or not. Using this At-Will will also proc Dazzling Blades a lot more than any other At-Will, giving you greater chances to reduce your cooldown timers by 1 second.
At-Will - Secondary: Disheartening Strike - I can't go on how useful this is when used tactically. Basically this At-Will is quite strong and will hit the enemy for X amount of damage (I can usually crit a good 2-3k). Then every second for five seconds it repeats that damage.
- I usually start out with this At-Will, tossing a dagger at several enemies as I approach them (a nice way to cut down on adds over time). When focusing on a single enemy, such as a boss, I will cycle between this and Duelist Flurry to keep up Bleed, Critical Severity, and the DoT from Disheartening Strike.
Encounter: Vengeance's Pursuit - There are two actions in this encounter. The initial action (a dagger toss) and the follow up action (a teleporting dash/slash). When using it, you mark an enemy for pursuit, lowing it's damage done to you. You then have 10 seconds to initiate the follow up action. If you don't initiate the follow up action within 10 seconds, the initial action is reset The dagger toss WILL NOT remove Stealth and has a range of 80'
- Follow Up Action: Teleports you to the marked enemy allowing you to break free of any controlled effect on you.
- - Follow Up Action: In Stealth - When you are in stealth and use the follow up action on your target, you will teleport to them, stunning them momentarily. (Long enough to Shadow-Strike ->Stealth->Lashing Blade if perfectly timed).
- - Follow Up Action: Outside of Stealth: This is the part I absolutely love about Vengeance's Pursuit. You will teleport to your marked enemy and deal a whirl wind flurry of attacks. If you land a crit on your primary target, all of your (AoE) hits will crit. If you mark a target as a CW performs Singularity, then perform the follow-up outside of stealth right as the enemies drop, you can dish out a good amount of damage. I think my record so far is a crit on 16 enemies ranging between 3-6k each. Follow up with a Dazing Strike to perform a much higher damage attack on 3 enemies (I think Dazing has a limit to 3) and Smoke Bomb to stun all the enemies is a tactic I often use... which leads me to my next two encounters....
Encounter: Dazing Strike - Strong encounter, small AoE range, can hit up to 3 enemies (AFAIK, max is 3...) dealing a good amount of damage with a decent cooldown time - also stuns the enemies
Encounter: Smoke Bomb - Stuns enemies within the area of the smoke bomb for a period of time (5 or 6 seconds?).
Encounter: Shadow Strike - Used primarily to gain an instant refill of Stealth.
Encounter: Blitz - Strong (5 target) cone-shaped AoE used primarily when soloing or doing skirmishes. Dagger Threat does help with this giving it a +15% bonus damage if used within 20' of enemy.
Daily: Primary - Hateful Knives - Lash out with knives, knocking your target down; coupled with the paragon feat "Seething Knives", you gain 25% stealth upon use and each attack on that enemy will restore 5% stealth (for a short period of time.)
Primary Class Feature: Dagger Threat - Your ranged dagger attacks deal more damage when you are within 20 feet of your target. (Each rank +5% buff).
Primary Class Feature: Tactics - +15% Action Point Regain
Primary Class Feature: Advantageous Position - After leaving Stealth, for a brief period you maintain Combat Advantage and take reduced damage from ranged attacks. (Each Rank: +1s duration).
I always use Advantageous Position and switch between Dagger Threat and Tactics. Dagger Threat will increase the damage of Disheartening Strike, Cloud of Steel, Vengeance's Pursuit, and Blitz. As for Advantageous Positioning, you gain Combat Advantage after leaving Stealth. Mixing this with the Heroic Feat - Cunning Ambushes (+6% Damage after leaving Stealth) - it gives a fairly good damage bonus. Pulling off a Vengeance's follow up right after Stealth ends can do some hefty damage to a closed group of foes.
Details and Strategies of this Setup
This build is primary aimed as a support role for a party as well as fairly simple soloing capabilities.
Group Parties (Dungeons, Foundaries, etc)
Encounters: Vengeance's Strike, Smoke Bomb, Dazing Strike
In group parties, Whisperknife seems to play a perfect support role, though, can take lead on single-target enemies. Entering battles, from the distance, enter Stealth and throw some Disheartening Strikes at the strongest enemies and/or the most annoying enemies (such as Archers). In epic dungeons, throwing Disheartening Strike on those weak ranged enemies (up to 80' away) can easily kill them in a couple of seconds. Start to run in, tossing Vengeance's dagger at the toughest enemy and a disheartening strike at him (you will not lose momentum with either of the two attacks, nor will you lose stealth). If you run out of Stealth prior to reaching the enemy, use Vengeance's Strike to teleport to them dishing out AoE damage and follow up with a Smoke Bomb. If you reach the enemy while still in stealth, throw down a Smoke Bomb and release Vengeance's follow up. At this point, you can either hold onto Dazing Strike for as-needed basis for a stun or use it to dish out damage. Follow up with duelist flurry and throw Disheartening Strike. Repeat the two At-Wills to keep both Bleed and Disheartening's DoT. At times, throw some Disheartening Strikes at enemies around you to quicken their demise.
My favorite time to use Vengeance is when a Control Wizard begins to perform Singularity, at which, I toss Vengeance's Dagger at a foe about to be pulled in and throw some Disheartening Strikes at foes around. When the foes are pulled into the air, I follow up with Vengeance while outside of Stealth (hoping to crit) to deal some fairly good AoE damage and follow up with a Smoke Bomb or Dazing Strike.
Group Parties - Dungeon Bosses
Encounters: Vengeance's Strike, Shadow Strike, Dazing Strike (or Lashing Blade)
This is where it can get quite fun and you're fairly active. To begin a boss encounter, start out with entering Stealth and throwing daggers from Disheartening and Vengeance at the boss while running towards him. I like to keep Vengeance's follow up ready for when I have to dodge roll out of a sticky situation or if the boss likes to teleport and/or jump around. When reaching the boss, switch between using Duelist Flurry and Disheartening Strike to keep various DoTs on him. Once you exit stealth, perform a Dazing Strike (or use Lashing Blade instealth of Stealth right before Stealth runs out) for some burst damage and follow up with Shadow Strike. Keep in mind, with feats and Class Features you gain a fair amount of increased damage as Combat Advantage will stay on you after you exit Stealth as well as a 6% increase in damage once you exit Stealth. When you're ready, throw Shadow Strike and re-enter Stealth.
*These were recorded on preview shard prior to live release and gear is a lot different than what is posted in the next post.
Updated Tuesday, December 10,
@9:09 PM. Added more detail of power setup and a couple preview video links.
Comments
*Also My Character Setup Screen Shot Post*
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Just a major concern, how do you deal 1v1 with a DPS speced CW? You can't ITC, can't perm stealth(recharge speed too low), while having a low defensive stats. Not to offend you, honestly, one rotation with ice knife of a good geared CW is enough to bring you down my fren.
ITC is a CC breaker. Vengence is too. But everyone freaks about ITC being gone, they don't even look at what it's replaced with.
Just to chime into the topic of Whisper TR vs. CW, abilities that Stun/Slow/Daze CW's will make it easier for us to land DF. DF's 3rd hit in itself is a CC immunity so as long as you time things right, the control powers of the CW should be disregarded by your own CC-breaks and immunities.
You cannot compare ITC with Vengence. ITC is a utility skill w/o requirement that is far more useful anytime u hit it while Vengence has to focus a target to unleash and break free. Imagine u are in a low life situation, would you want to go near the enemy as a TR? I doubt so.
@todesfaelle
Its hard for you to land your DF vs a skilled CW, they can hop like a rabbit Cleric. Daze/stun/slow etc helps to land perhaps but you only buy yrself a little few secs while a little margin of errors brings you down immediately.
And certainly w/o ITC to increase your resistance while DF, the chance of bringing down a tanky GF or GWF becomes impossible. You will drop before they do.
As for low defense, none taken. One reason I picked that last boon was for 10% Stamina regeneration in combat. I focus on Flurry and Dodge rolls (shifting) for immunity and vengeance timed right can get me out of sticky situations just the same.
Also, when I update the guide (working on it right now), I should point out that this isn't primarly a PVP build - I aimed it more towards a party and soloing. However, it does fair well in PVP when used right.
To answer your question about one-on-one with a CW... I'd enter stealth, -> Vengence Dagger Toss -> Disheartening Strike (for DoT) -> Vengeance Follow Up in Stealth, stunning the CW (can do from 80' away) -> Lashing Blade (or Dazing) should just about kill the CW.
Though, in PVP, I find it more useful (for PARTY) to stay tactical, throwing vengeance's dagger at a foe facing an ally, tossing a Disheartening Strike at each enemy in range (range is 80') slowly cutting away at them, following up with vengeance's teleport to stun or aoe attack, right after using dazing and smoke bomb then re-enter stealth (if used vengeance's follow up outside of stealth and run away while throwing another Disheartening strike).
Side note: As I pointed out in the OP... This is just a guide to help people get started. It's still a work in progress for me. I'm not amazingly geared/spec'd out. This guide is aimed for people who want to try alternative styles of play for TR and who may not have high-quality gear. And it is just a guide, something to give a decent start. I strongly feel people should try various things and not rely on guides unless they use the guide as just that - a guide.
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It also doesn't seem to stun for me when used from stealth. Neither does the 100% chance interrupt/ 40% slow from spending 5 points in the feat.
Damage reduction from marked target is only 10%, damage is 1.2-1.7k-ish for me (~4k for dazing), cd is rather long, plus the delay for tele mentioned above (for this reason I'd rather stick with deft for gap-closer)...
Not sure if only I experience these problems, I'd love VP if it actually does what the tootip says
I have no take in whatever rotation you use. Fyi, during preview i tried all sorts of whispering build, none was as useful as master infil. However, it can be a fun build of cos
I am just trying to point out that you should state clearly the purpose of the guide and how feasible it is, be it for PVP/PVE or both, in order not to mislead any kind souls here. If i were to go for your build and take it that it's purely for PVP in any situation and gotten smash in the face, i may be disappointed.
Nonetheless, thank you for the hard work in coming up with something new that may lead to a competent build for the community.
True. But then again it's hard to land anything on a good CW. And a good TR would be able to land a DF on a good CW. Bringing down a tanky GF or GWF has always been hard even for MI's, unless you focus on them and pop Shocking Execution when their HP is below half, which applies to Whispers as well. Nothing much is changing here other than the play style. I get that this isn't your play style but for people who doesn't want the easy mode ITC (which I love, btw, and will never replace) this guide will definitely help them. All builds offer something different, and people read builds in order to get to know which one suits them the best, right? Anyone can fully optimize their builds afterwards anyway, specially if it's a flexible build which has a lot of room for customization.
I'm more of a PVP player rather than a PvE player so.... I probably use different skills than other Whisper Knife TRs.
The At wills I use most of the time are Sky Flurry and Disheartening Strike, though I would occasionally use Duellist flurry for PvE.
The encounter powers I use in PVP are Dazing Strike, Vengeance Pursuit and Deft Strike. This might be weird for some people but my style of play in PvP is utility, cc and gap closers. Alot of people like Lashing Blade and it can be good but I feel like 1 crit hit of Disheartening Strike does the job. At the moment I have no problem with these encounter powers in PvP against other players and 90% of the time I can win against other damage dealers 1v1 unless they are also good with their class. Stealth is also your best friend when using skills
The Daily Powers I use are Hateful Knifes and Lurker's Assault because they are both gap closers and give either Combat advantage or damage and Stealth. As I said, my style of play is utility and gap closing so these are the perfect choice. Some would recommend Bloodbath as an alternative but most of the time it doesn't work for me either they are a bit out of range or you get cc'd in the start-up and it does nothing in both instances and you just wasted all that AP.
Shadow Strike + bait and switch + dagger at 80' range? shouldn't be that hard to dot people to death while they run around trying to find you.
Thank you for your feed back You're absolutely right, I know a lot of people like to stick with PVP setups and, personally, I'm more of a PvE person. I (tried to) modify the title to reflect the build is meant for PvE. If I were to make a PvP Whisperknife, it would be slightly different with feats and powers.
mrsnaggles points out in an above post on this page some PvP considerations for Whisperknife that work quite well. And using Disheartening Strike and Bait & Switch to remain in Stealth, poisoning your enemies to death is feasable. And interesting approach would be Shadow Strike, Bait & Switch, and Vengeance. Throw Vengeance on them and right as you're about to run out of Stealth, follow up to stun them and use Shadow Strike, dodge roll away while re-entering Stealth (note: This is just a theory, haven't tested it yet... I'd imagine your Recovery would have to be fairly high and maybe some points in INT to pull this off).
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I don't have Disheartening Strike yet, but I am having some good knifey fun as it is, just using Cloud of Steel and Blitz. The Ancient Mulhorand daggers I bought cheap are probably a bit OP though, as is the temptation to stick one of my Lesser Plaguefires in there (but, but... I already have them just sitting there!).
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I don't know the original cooldown period without recovery/int/etc but I remember it being something around 15.x-16.x seconds. I went out of town a couple weeks ago for a week and since I got back I noticed there was no cooldown timer on Vengeance's Persuit. A patch came out, I expected that to be fixed, but still nothing. I'm questioning myself on what they're planning to do with it. I doubt it's meant to have 0 cooldown time. I did notice that if you hover over the icon when it's in your Power Tray/Encounter Tray it says "At-Will". If you hover over it in the Powers (menu/selection/thing) it says "Encounter". I also noticed the damage difference when viewing from the tray to the power.
I have no idea what's going on with it...
Anyways, I have a massive update to the guide coming soon (tonight or tomorrow).
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I love this Encounter as it is... pls leave it like that...and pls ignore that lunatic becky that is not even lvl 30... and still do not know what things are best for the class ...
It's not intended. EVERY encounter-skill in the game has a cooldown. And as setherio noted the skill tooltips are even bugged. I'm master infiltrator tr myself and was heavily against the usefulness of whisperknife when it first came out since for me it felt like a lackluster. Even though i think whisperknife needs much tuning, I don't think this is the way to do it.
Gloom level 60 Control Wizard
Dusk level 60 Trickster Rogue
Dawn level 60 Devoted Cleric
Eclipse level 60 Hunter Ranger
Wrath level 60 Great Weapon Fighter
Jinx level 60 Scourge Warlock
now after i understood what the new powers do and how to use them i think its best path for pvp and pve alike major dps for any tr that knows how to use those new features,
Which is why it's specifically stated to be a PvE build.
Pinny Foxfang - 60 Guardian Fighter
Pinny Foxfire - 60 Scourge Warlock (Temptation)
waiting....
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I am not an Int based rogue and cant perma stealth as a result, but my new build seems to be seriously more effective in PVE and in the couple of dominations i have played, its been soooooo much fun.
Let me begin by saying i suck at pvp.
I can admit it.
And with this build, i can harass like crazy and support my team very effectively.
My K/D seems to stay even but I get a boatload of assists and points for helping or soloing the outer capture points and jumping into 2 to harrass/debuff and teleport in for a kill
I dont expect to dominate with my build, but I swear i have a bigger smile than at least 6 other players in PVP all the time.
The WK really puts the Trickster in the Rogue
Major thanks to the OP for all of his time and information sharing.
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Thank you for your kind words and I am glad it helped out. I will be adding a PVP portion to this. Also, note: GF's HATE Hateful Knives in PVP Serves them right for keeping me prone/dazed/whatever until I'm dead >_>
But you are absolutely right. My goal in PVP is to, as you said, be a trickster. Enter stealth, tag someone (usually a CW), then Disheartening Strike on all I see and follow up on my VP to the CW and (if out of stealth) Enter Stealth -> Lashing Blade. VP is also very useful to "escape" an oncoming enemy. Just toss it to an enemy behind the one charging you, and when that oncoming enemy gets close, follow through on it and kill your mark.
I played with Banelore (Permastealth MI) on my most recent WK setup in PVP and we did great teamwork. Since I'm in and out of stealth, and he's perma stealth. A Great combination is to get Banelore on a mark and hold it. An enemy will be trying to kill him. I'll show up (entering from Stealth) and they'll think I'm the one they've been attacking. I use my skills (VP, Disheartening, etc) and dodge around. Now they're completely focused on me and Banelore can perfectly execute assassin-style kill (as I wear him down with my Disheartening for a good DoT and whatever powers I have and the enemy never sees it coming.
HR's are also a prime target for WK to kill as they (from my experience) never seem to see it coming.
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You said you use Shadow Strike in your rotation, but you only have one point put into it, may I ask why? (just curious)
Also, I see you're using the Battlefield Skulker's set. Do you suggest that set or is it more use what you like/can get your hands on?
I'm playing something similar (WK/Exe), and it took the disheartening strike feat as well, on my secondary, PvP, TR.
Basically i stay invis, dot them with DS till it crits, then lob cloud of steel, and use SS and B&S to make sure they never see me
It's pretty effective, but she has no gear right now (I need 1000000000000 glory) so i suspect it will get better.
But seriously man, ignore the haters. People hated on my MoF build till i put up a video of us smashing CN. People say i can't give up skillful/SE/ITC and I get it, they're great, but maybe WK can be good if geared and played correctly, so keep trying.
Everything you need to know about CW:
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?780981-Chem-s-CW-Compendium-Everything-you-need-to-know
It's all about refilling stealth, not damage
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