Rogue

The rogue is World of Warcraft's thief and assassin: a leather-clad melee fighter who sneaks up unseen, strikes first, and builds combo points toward a finishing blow. In Classic (patch 1.12) rogues dealt some of the highest damage in raids and were feared in PvP for their stuns and their ability to choose when a fight begins. They also pick locks and coat their weapons in poison, skills learned through class quests.

Role and identity

Rogues fight with energy, a pool of 100 points that refills quickly and steadily. Most attacks cost energy, and builders such as Sinister Strike and Backstab add a combo point to the target, up to five. Finishers such as Eviscerate and Slice and Dice spend all the combo points at once, growing stronger with each one. That rhythm of building and spending is the heart of the class.

Stealth lets a rogue move unseen, slowly, until it attacks or is spotted. Opening from stealth unlocks special attacks, such as Ambush, Garrote and Cheap Shot, and lets the rogue pick its fights. Rogues also take apart enemies who are not yet fighting: Sap knocks out a humanoid for up to 45 seconds, and Pick Pocket steals coins and junkboxes from humanoid monsters. At level 30 rogues also learn Disarm Trap, so they can spot and disable the traps found in some dungeons and camps.

Races

Every Classic race except the tauren could be a rogue: humans, dwarves, night elves and gnomes for the Alliance, and orcs, undead and trolls for the Horde. Night elves' Shadowmeld, humans' Perception for spotting stealth, and gnomes' Escape Artist were all useful, while orcs' stun resistance and undead's Will of the Forsaken were prized in PvP.

Talent trees

Rogues earn 51 talent points by level 60. They can be planned with our talent calculator.

• Assassination improves finishers, critical strikes and poisons. It has Cold Blood, which guarantees a critical strike, and the talent Seal Fate, which adds an extra combo point on critical hits.
• Combat improves straightforward melee fighting with swords, maces, daggers and fist weapons. It has Blade Flurry, which lets attacks hit a second target, and its 31-point talent is Adrenaline Rush, which doubles energy regeneration for a short time. Combat swords became the standard raid build.
• Subtlety improves stealth and openers. It has Premeditation, Preparation, which resets the rogue's other cooldowns, and Hemorrhage. Subtlety builds were mostly for PvP.

Leveling

Rogues level well but must rest between fights, since they cannot heal themselves. Most leveled as Combat with a fast sword or mace and Sinister Strike, using Gouge and Sprint to escape bad pulls and Vanish as a last resort. Stealth lets a rogue slip past monsters to reach quest objectives, which makes many quests faster for rogues than for anyone else.

Key abilities by level

Class quests

• Lockpicking (level 16). Rogues learn Pick Lock at level 16, and their trainers send them on quests that use it: Redridge Rendezvous leads Alliance rogues to Alther's Mill, where they must open a lockbox, and Horde rogues go after pirate chests in Plundering the Plunderers. Lockpicking also opens doors in dungeons and locked boxes that other players find.
• Poisons (level 20). On the Alliance, Mathias and the Defias sends the rogue to a Defias tower in Westfall in Klaven's Tower, where it is poisoned by Zanzil's mixture and must be cured by Doc Mixilpixil in The Touch of Zanzil. On the Horde, Deep Cover leads to a Venture Company tower in The Barrens and on to Serge Hinott in Tarren Mill, who cures the rogue and teaches Poisons in Hinott's Assistance. Rogues make their own Instant Poison, Deadly Poison, Crippling Poison and other poisons from then on.
• Ravenholdt (level 24 and up). The Manor, Ravenholdt invites the rogue to the hidden Ravenholdt Manor in the Hillsbrad Foothills, home of the Assassin's League led by Lord Jorach Ravenholdt. At level 50 he sends rogues after a lost bag, ending in The Azure Key in the Sunken Temple.

In raids

Rogues were among the top damage dealers in Classic raids. A raid rogue stands behind the boss, keeps Slice and Dice up, and spends combo points on Eviscerate, with Instant Poison on its weapons. Their main problem is threat: rogues hit hard enough to pull bosses off the tank, so Feint and Vanish are as important as damage. Rogues also interrupt casts with Kick, and some raids had a rogue keep Expose Armor on the boss.

Combat rogues with swords were the most common raid build, since swords suit Sinister Strike and Combat's sword talents. Dagger rogues using Backstab were rarer, as they need to stay behind the target at all times.

In PvP

The rogue was one of Classic's most feared PvP classes. From stealth it chooses the moment of attack, opens with Cheap Shot, and chains Kidney Shot and Gouge so that the target barely acts before dying, a style players called the "stunlock". Sap removes a second enemy from the fight before it starts, and Blind, Vanish and Preparation give it ways out. Rogues were also notorious for ambushing lower-level players in contested zones, and for guarding flag carriers in Warsong Gulch.

Tier sets

See Tier Sets for how each set drops.

• Tier 0: Shadowcraft Armor, such as [Shadowcraft Tunic].
• Tier 1: Nightslayer Armor from Molten Core, such as [Nightslayer Shoulder Pads].
• Tier 2: Bloodfang Armor from Blackwing Lair, such as [Bloodfang Spaulders].
• Tier 3: Bonescythe Armor from Naxxramas, such as [[forever:item:22476]].

Trivia

• Rogues often sat outside the bank in major cities offering to open other players' lockboxes for a tip.
• Master Mathias Shaw, the head of Stormwind's spy service SI:7, gives Alliance rogues their poison quest.
• The Alliance poison quest takes place in a tower held by the Defias Brotherhood, the band of thieves led by Edwin VanCleef.

Later history

The Burning Crusade let rogues use one-handed axes, added Shiv and Cloak of Shadows, and opened the class to blood elves. Arena play made the rogue's stuns and Sap more important than ever, and later expansions split the class into the Assassination, Outlaw and Subtlety specializations. Poisons stopped being crafted from vendor reagents and became abilities, and pick-pocketing and lockpicking lost most of their old uses as lockboxes grew rarer.

Sources

• Rogue (Classic) on Warcraft Wiki
• Poisons on Warcraft Wiki