These saber-rattling pirates have managed to weaponize gambling.
As the Lawless Rogue, you use the Dice of Fate to deal maximum damage to your enemies. Other damage dealing specializations include the Assassination Rogue and the Subtlety Rogue.
The most important changes
Of all the rogues, the outlaws have received the most serious changes. The various poisons that were only available to assassins in Battle for Azeroth are back.
Also, two of the most important abilities have been changed: Fate Dice and Between the Eyes. Fate Dice no longer cost combo points, but are now subject to a cooldown. You can lower the cooldown via the passive skill Restless Blades, just like your other cooldowns.
Between the eyes no longer stuns your target. Instead, it increases the critical damage a target takes by 20% for 15 seconds at five combo points. Blade Vortex now only hits a maximum of four enemies besides the primary target, deals more damage, and no longer has two charges. In return, Blade Vortex can apply your poisons to secondary targets.
The talents, on the other hand, have changed very little. In addition to a few tweaks, you’ll get back Dread Blades as a talent, which have the same function as the artifact in Legion: when used, Sinister Strike, Ghostly Strike, Ambush, and Pistol Shot replenish all of your combo points, but using finishers will cost you 5% of your current health. Shredding is no longer a talent, but falls under your base skills.
How to play the Outlaw Rogue
You should prioritize your attributes as an Outlaw Rogue as follows:
- Agility
- Versatility
- Critical hit chance
- Mastery
- Speed
| Stage | Talent | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 15 | Ghostly Strike | Strikes at an enemy, dealing physical damage and making them take 10% more damage from your abilities for ten seconds |
| 25 | Acrobatic Strikes | Increases the range of all your melee attacks by three meters. |
| 30 | Deeper Stratagem | You can have a maximum of six combo points, your finishing moves eat up to six combo points, and your finishing moves deal 5% more damage. |
| 35 | Cheat Death | Deadly attacks set your health to 7% of your maximum health instead of killing you. After that, your damage taken is reduced by 85% for three seconds. This effect can only occur once every six minutes. |
| 40 | Prey on the Weak | Enemies that you incapacitate with Nasty Trick or Kidney Chop take 10% more damage from all sources for six seconds. |
| 45 | Alacrity | Your finishing moves have a 20% chance per combo point to increase your speed by 2% for 20 seconds. This effect stacks up to five times. |
| 50 | Blade Rush | Charge your target with blades drawn, dealing 1,371 physical damage and 686 damage to all other nearby enemies. While Blade Vortex is active, damage against secondary targets is increased by 100%. Generates 25 energy over the course of five seconds. |
Basically, as a rogue, you use energy to build up combo points, which you then use up in powerful finishing moves. The goal here is to find a balance between energy consumption and the use of other abilities.
Your most important tool as an outlaw rogue are the fate dice. You use them to get various buffs. You’re mainly trying to get the two buffs Broadside or Merciless Precision here. Since re-rolling the dice in Shadowlands is not as easy as it was in BfA, the rule of thumb is: If your only buffs are Melee and/or Buried Treasure, you should re-roll the dice.
Otherwise, your primary goal is to keep Chop up at all times and use Ghostly Strike, Blade Rush, and Adrenaline Rush as often as you can. In order to deal as much damage as possible, it’s best to try to link the effects of the skills.
For example, when you activate Adrenaline Rush, make sure you can use Between the Eyes and Ghostly Strike right after. This way, you’ll benefit from increased Energy regeneration, while your target will take significantly more damage. When fighting multiple targets, you should also consider Blade Vortex to deal damage to all targets.
