OMG Nelf/Gnome Rogue?!

warriorpoetic

This question is driving me crazy - I'm on my second day on the outlands pvp server with the nelf and I'm worried I'm making a big mistake - I'm hearing all these great things about the gnome's racial escape artist and how it's invaluable to rogues as opposed to a nelf's shadowmelt when they have stealth already - Also people are saying that it's so damn hard to target a gnome because of their size and how they're easy to miss.

Please help me decide which is the best alliance race for a rogue!

(Want him for PVP)

Funky

gnome, escape artist

Ivan

Personally, I'm a huge fan of dwarf rogues. Easily one of the most under-represented class/race demographs which doesnt make sense to me, especially considering how powerful stone form is.

Granted, if the reported change is to go ahead and blind becomes a physical ability then stoneform will no longer remove it, which will be a bit of a loss to the class racial but that remains to be seen.

You also have similar issues with targeting, but then any sensible (read pr0 like me) PvP'er uses tab/shift tab to target anyway, so thats a very minor issue.

Shadowmeld is somewhat useless for rogues, as it really only provides an extra stealth level while they are stealthed. Which can be very useful in this day and age of everyone loaded up with stealth detection gear but ultimately crap by comparison to dwarf/gnome.

The 1% dodge is useful, its true but again fails pathetically behind.

Quite a while ago (I believe around 1.13) I rolled a premade gnome rogue on the PTR's and I just found escape artist to be very lacking. Since then however, its received some serious buffs and is now a very solid ability for a class that is hindered greatly in doing what it does, by something as simple as snares.

But sadly, PvP these days basically equates to arenas and there I think at least, escape artist suffers. Snares are much less of an issue with your teams own snares and Blessing of Freedom being thrown around. Primarily your role will be to lock down classes, rather than killing them (though that is a bonus). This means that if your target is running away then s/he isnt truly healing anyway so you are still doing your job.

Arenas is full of CC's and snares, and I believe this is where stoneform truly shines. The ability to dispell all dots magical or otherwise with the press of 2 buttons, thus allowing you to vanish is indispensable and vastly out performs the ability to escape 1-3 snares a round.

Now that that is out of the way, the true rogue racials are clearly orc and undead (it needs to be said ).
Fear is the counter to stuns in arenas, instantly casted or otherwise and will of the forsaken allows you to diminish one more fear, allowing you to trinket out of a second, meaning you are essentially free to do your thing.

Blood fury is a great way to boost out some extra dps at the cost of risking permanent injury (or death ). But the resistances to stuns is incredibly powerful in the right circumstances i.e. a rogue vs. rogue match-up (opener generally = a win, in equal gear, equal skill situations and a healthy chance to resist the stun is massive in this type of situation), while kiting warriors and even very powerful versus shadow priests and fire mages (all 3 of them). It may also be a factor versus improved concussive shot but hunters (at least hunters with improved concussive shot) seem to be rarer than fire mages these days.

I presume though, you are mainly looking at alliance races for all this, so I just want to be clear and provide a brief summary.

Dwarf++

P.s. dont knock +10 frost resistances and treasure finding is ftw

ZorbaTehZ

Gnome anything > * .

nix

Pffft human ftw, i get the jump on every rogue im up against which usually leads me to killing them pretty fast with the racial perception.

Escape artist is nice but tbh you can just specc imp sprint to compensate if not a gnome, Ivan is right in regards to hitting tab to aim. Only noobs have trouble with gnomes as they try to click on them

Dwarfs Stone form is really nice and will help taking down the mighty warriors (i hate warriors)

Nelf rogues.... are **** ;D tbh if your getting hit by melee your gonna hit evasion, and if its on CD i dont think the 1% is gonna save your ass.


So IMO its a toss up between Human and Dwarfs for your rogue choice, ultimatley it doesnt matter which you choose though as in a BG your racial isnt going to save the day. It may though in a 1 v 1 situation.

rainbow kirby

Dwarf or gnome I'd go for - my lowbie rogue is a female gnome. I seriously hate Night Elves, so I'd pick anything other than them

TheDoc

horde so i cant comment

just that 90% of noobs roll a nelf/gnome rogue

:P

as a shadow priest and a guild that level in close proximity to each other, we have the least problems with rogues killing them in pvp

[DM]-TheDOC-

[DM]-TheDOC- wrote:

horde so i cant comment

just that 90% of noobs roll a nelf/gnome rogue

Also horde, but all the gnome rogues I see in BGs are twinks! So it's a common one anyway