Before we talk about rogue representation here, let’s take a look at the class breakdown for the 8 teams at the final and their current SK 100 3v3 represention.
Classes Appearing in the Blizzcon Finals
Warrior – 2 Mage – 3
Rogue – 4 Priest – 4
Death Knight – 4 Druid – 1
Warlock – 1 Shaman – 0
Paladin – 3 Hunter – 2
SK 100 3v3 Class Distribution
While these numbers are very much generalizations, it gives us a fairly good idea of where things stand regarding class representation in top level 3v3. You can say what you want about WOTLK pvp balance but in comparison to any BC season things are far more balanced and diverse (a lot of people forget that the only real team that mattered by mid BC was WLD and to a lesser extent RMP). Every single class except for shaman will be attending blizzcon, and RLS came close to that and continues to show potential and success on live and in tournaments. Not only that, it appears that shaman will be the biggest winners in 3.2 so expect their tournament representation to improve. Hunters have low representation but I consider them to be more of a niche class not having many line ups to choose from other than DK/Hunter/Pally. You look at the bottom of the SK list and you see Death Knights and Warlocks, and these are two classes that still have the absolute potential to be first and win tournaments and I don’t think many will disagree with that.
So let’s talk about rogues and where we stand in all of this. Despite going from the most popular class in the past to the currently least played class in WoW…
Data as of Aug 3 2009 all realms US+EU
…we continue to succeed in top level 3 v 3 arena. This is in large part to our viability as a support ms class with quick burst and strong defensive cooldowns. In the fast paced game that is WOTLK 3v3 arena, rogues continue to shine. RMP is stronger than ever and RLS or RLD are both viable. Not only that, like any melee class, rogues can fit into the majority of cleaves and serve their purpose; although I’m no fan of cleaves they can be very effective, as exemplified by the Taiwan’s “DKP” team. Now let’s take a closer look at the Blizzcon Bracket and the rogues competing.
Rouges Involved
Player: Joseph “Enforcer” Morrone
Team: SK Gaming
Composition: RMP
Region: US
Thoughts: Known for his agressive tournament play and popped collars, Enforcer AKA Sekko brings a lot of practicality to RMP rogue play. SK has been on a hot streak and the chemistry between Pookz, Realz, and Enforcer seems to be working so far. Playing personally against and even briefly with Enforcer I personally think he has both the confidence, skill, and teammates to succeed. Not only that but you’re looking at the RMP that recently has had the most success against the “Anti-RMP” hunter cleaves that will be in this final as well as the most success in the all important mirrors. This will certainly be one of the teams to beat at Blizzcon.
Player: Woojin “Hannival” Kim
Team: Button Bashers (AKA HoN)
Composition: RMP
Region: Korea
Thoughts: People who saw HoN play in the past will notice the abscense of Dker from the lineup, who’s performance at ESL was only overshadowed by the amazing 2v1 of Orangemarmalade that still has people talking (and I have to say his performance there was a big step up from what I thought was mediocre play, especially noticeable in the 1v1s during past Korean BC Tournaments). The ESL global finals really moved the team from a top RMP to arguably the best in the world, and they are known for the immense amount of practice and unique strategies (even without Dker, I hope we’ll get to see some arcane / dance action which really added flavour to ESL). I also think it’s pretty safe to say a HoN vs SK matchup is what a lot of people are hoping for, so we’ll see what Hannival can do to protect his priest against the slurry that will be X6tence’s DHP in the first round.
Player: Yu-liang “KH” Huseh
Team: DKP
Composition: Death Knight, Rogue, Priest
Region: Taiwan
Thoughts: The only rogue still in the tournament that isn’t running RMP, even as cleave that does say something. A lot of people look down on the Taiwanese teams and their regionals but I kind of see this as an underrated team that has a lot of potential here. This cleave is very versatile and if it’s played correctly it will be difficult for rmps to shut down. The pressure will really be on KH to be able to do damage effectively, shut down opposing rogues in the rogue v rogue meta game that exists when RMP faces Cleave, and being about to recognize and respond correctly to swaps that will undoubtedly be made to him. I have to say that of the rogues in this tournament, his individual performance will likely matter more for his team than any of the rogues running RMP where I believe the most pressure is on the mage, so we’ll see how things go. I’m assuming this team has something up its sleeve for DHP teams because it’s going to be difficult to cleave an unsnareable hunter or tank his damage while trying to kill either a DK or Pally with their plethora of defensive cds and overall survivability against melee.
Player: Te-Chen “Tank” Liu
Team: All Pass
Composition: RMP
Region: Taiwan
Thoughts: Looking at another Taiwanese team that isn’t going into this tournament scaring much of the composition. They are the runner ups in the Taiwanese regionals and aren’t as well known in the US or EU so their not getting much respect. I really can’t help but root for a team like this even though I know very little about them so I won’t elaborate much further without more information.
I would like to add that the relative balance and diversity found in this tournament is a big positive for competitive wow. People love to complain about WOTLK but in my opinion the competitive scene has only because more balanced and this tournament should be a lot of fun to watch. Good luck to all the rogues and players competing.
My Biggest Challenge in WoW: Finding the Right Team
So before the summer hit I really felt that everything was moving in the right direction for me regarding arena. I was in the process of establishing a very serious RMP with Aeias and Massive. I had the synergy of playing with Aeias over the course of several thousand rogue / mage games, and regardless of how meaningless and worthless 2v2 is becoming, having that kind of synergy to know how to coordinate cc or when to burst and to be able to rely on a teammate really carries over well to 3v3. We were about 2600 before the rating change and after only a few times playing we were doing really well, close to top 5 and with fair success against the top teams in rampage. Unfortunately, I was unable to play for about a while and Aeias has been unable to play for at least the summer, and massive transferred off and focused on other things. This put me in a situation of being back to square one, needing a new 3s, a situation that after several weeks I’m still in.
Now at this stage in playing WoW I really don’t want to waste my time playing with players whose goal isn’t to be the best, and after getting a flavour for 2v2 as priest rogue I really begin to understand the true state of the bracket and that it currently appears to have no future. I’m also learning first hand just how difficult it can be to find two other players with the talent, commitment, patience and focus to build a team. I really believe that you need to play together with a team for a long time; playing together as much as possible in order to really build a top 3s team, not get emo or care about rating. This isn’t an easy thing to find.
Currently I’ve been playing some rogue / lock / druid and I’m not sure exactly what this comp can accomplish against a slurry of cleave teams, althought Psyhawk’s 3k rated team shows it has a lot of potential. So right now I’ll continue to explore different set ups until something clicks with the right players and I find a team worth investing time into.
Filming continues…
I want to stop talking about Eviscerate 10 but I really can’t as it’s probably what I’ve been spending the most time on in WoW as of late. I’ve made a lot of progress and things continue to move in the right direction, I’ve also started working on a trailer and actually editing what I have. I’m missing a lot of content still. The soundtrack is decided for the most part and is pretty much set in stone. I’m hoping to release it in September but October should be the latest, like I said in the past I refuse to rush this.
Related posts:
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Comment by Bloodborn — August 3, 2009 @ 11:41 am
Second? damn.
Good post, no need to rush the Evis X vid, would be best when you have all the footage you want.
Comment by Jiona — August 3, 2009 @ 11:56 am
Trance or DIE!
Btw Good read but u should find another rogue hero ( as ming would say) get him into this becouse article each week or 2 is really somewhat dissapointing
Comment by Desolator — August 3, 2009 @ 12:28 pm
Loving the article mate. I wish you the best in finding a good 3’s team.
Oh, and while I’m here I recommend you listen to a few of Globus songs, I think you might like them atleast for the epic value.
http://forum.kinoshka.com/files/redaktor/video/trailers/new7/trailer_sound/Globus/
Comment by Dcduo — August 3, 2009 @ 2:07 pm
Good read. rly looking forward to EviscX, hope you have the same music-style as the other Eviscerate movies =)
Comment by disabled — August 3, 2009 @ 3:55 pm
finally a new article!
ive experienced by myself that rogue/priest is pretty fucked up since both protpaladins and restodruids win the manaduel with ease while being extremely hard to gib and tunneling their partner wont get you anywhere.
have you tried HFB rogue/restodruid yet? imo its very strong.
Comment by Reflex — August 3, 2009 @ 5:07 pm
Great read
Would love to hear what you have to say about the not-done-well Rogue Q&A
Comment by Evolas — August 3, 2009 @ 8:46 pm
Akrios,
Love your site. Tis the best most informative site for a specific class. Do you know of any site similar but for a mage?
Comment by Crib — August 3, 2009 @ 10:13 pm
WTB Happyminti! or Mahiko
Comment by Remenission — August 3, 2009 @ 10:25 pm
Akrios,
My suspicion is that the few still playing the class are veterans.
I wanted to chime in on what you said about finding the right teammates: I am in total agreement. I’ve been amazed (and frustrated to the point of canceling my subscription last month after four years) at the lack of realization in the general WoW populace of the commitment, focus, talent, and patience it takes to be the best you can be in arena.
On top of it all, I dislike the mischaracterization of a passion for pvp and arena as some kind of unhealthy, necessarily rageful competitiveness, when in truth the pleasure isn’t from winning (nor the displeasure from losing) but the fun comes from using one’s class abilities to their fullest potential.
Comment by gnomie — August 3, 2009 @ 10:45 pm
Glad to read a new article ! You could maybe make a review of the Rogues Q&A finally displayed on the wow web site ?
In my opinion, it is quite disappointing in many aspects, and confirms that the 3.2 will certainly not change a rogue’s life (just look at the list of the incoming change for our class and compare it to the other classes ! Thress lines, that’s all. And what in them? Rogue can now use Axes. Awesome. There are plenty of existing things – abilities, talents – that would need change, but instead of that we’ve got a new, and pretty useless(regarding our gameplay), ability).
Well, some points of the Q&A that still deserve consideration (I only focus on some PvP aspects):
1) About Vanish, Blizzard is aware of the issue. Good thing, it’s not like we all experience it since three years. The solution would be a “1 second minimum, no matter what else happens”, of stealth, while you vanish. I think only experience can tell if this would really solve the issue in most cases.
2) An intersting line, if only it could have a real impact say, in the 3.3:
“Long-term, we’d love to see more of the utility talents from Subtlety core for the rogue class in general, or alternatively, we’d like to see more of the damage boosts from the other trees made passive so that rogues of all trees were choosing utility versus utility when making talent choices instead of utility versus damage.”
Indeed, rogue PvP specs are limited due to the fact that you cannot reasonnably skip some core talents, such as those contained in the sub tree (those around stealth / stealth detection for exemple, and basic cool-downs such as blind, Clos, and obviously Preparation), and perform well in serious PvP (this is also true for Assas talents, and they refer to it as the “damage boosts talents”). Putting some of these as general abilities would free some space for, say, (Blizz is maybe affraid of this word when it comes to rogues) some imagination or renewal in the rogue talents. I don’t know if we can expect a defaut Shadowstep (remember, CloS was once the ultimate talent of the sub tree), still.
3) A good joke, about CloS: ” It’s meant as a tool that’s part of a toolkit, not an I-win button.” This is to justify the 90 and not 100 % immunity. Go ahead and say to a Ret Paly: bubble is a tool that’s part of a toolkit (oh and it’s not like Paly possess a good one. They just can remove stuns, snares, magic, poisons, etc.), so there are 10% chance that you are not in a god mode while you bubble (it would be like a goblin bubble). Of course CloS has a reduced cooldown, but it’s not like a 100% CloS would makes us gods… Moreover, CloS is most of the time used as a defensive ability, so I don’t see it becoming an “I win button” even with a 100 immunity.
Well there are many other points that would need comments… Maybe you’ll adress them, Akrios?
Regards,
Baruch
Comment by baruch — August 4, 2009 @ 12:31 am
Quick question Akrios, who calls the switches in your team if they’re even called?
Comment by Mattee — August 4, 2009 @ 8:42 am
Oops didn’t mean that as a reply lol. Anyway, same deal, who in your 3v3 team calls the switches if they need to be made?
Comment by Mattee — August 4, 2009 @ 8:44 am
patch out tommorrow
wednesday 
Comment by chickenfillets — August 4, 2009 @ 8:53 am
He used Immediate Music a lot in videos, so I really don’t think Akrios has never heard of Globus.
Comment by Sunseeker — August 4, 2009 @ 8:54 am
Warlock, Druid Rogue is a lot of fun, was running the setup with a friend on another rogue to get that friend his shoulders etc… Like our main problem was cleave teams, sat on the lock and rolled his face in. Then we sort of replace our lock with someone else seemed to do a lot better, yet cleave is still a bitch for us to beat, havnt really played games in awhile. Pyshawks Lock druid rogue team, back when they were on Vindication was pretty crazy, we fought them a few times, 50/50 for the most part.
Comment by Suishi — August 4, 2009 @ 2:24 pm
Shit ! Akrios we need ur fuckin movie right now !
Comment by Resilencelol — August 5, 2009 @ 2:08 am
haha a nice little read artical
can’t wait till ur evis 10 
:D:D i would like ur opinion on the rogues Q&A which i thought was quite disappointing. I am also curious of what question you would’ve asked during the Q&A and i wish to c that published
Comment by Kunagi — August 5, 2009 @ 2:42 am
“I’m also learning first hand just how difficult it can be to find two other players with the talent, commitment, patience and focus to build a team. I really believe that you need to play together with a team for a long time; playing together as much as possible in order to really build a top 3s team, not get emo or care about rating. This isn’t an easy thing to find.”
I totally hear on this part man. Its extremely diffcult finding the right teams mates, that wanna actually commit to a team and not get all emo. Its frustrating to say the least.
Comment by Bloodyfaith — August 5, 2009 @ 6:20 am
@baruch..
Rogues have been indirectly buffed an incredible amount in 3.2. Nearly all their hard counters, including DKs and ret pallies have been nerfed an incredible amount. Ontop of that, the massive mage buffs give comps such as rogue/mage and rogue/mage/priest incredible help.
I think Rogues really got the best deal out of this patch. Before the patch it was only ret pallies and death knights who I feared, but now I can take on anyone and win pretty easily.
Comment by suprise — August 5, 2009 @ 7:27 am
I hope you’re right, though my point was not exactly to say that rogues are too weak nowadays ! It’s just that some talents or abilities change (and by change I don’t mean “buff”) would be nice some day, regardless of other classes nerfs. (For instance, I wonder if ShD will now become a serious option for arenas, so that we’re not forced to spec Mut (although I personnaly am a big fan of it, pre-wotlk)).
Comment by baruch — August 5, 2009 @ 11:27 am
Completely true. The few people that play rogue now are veterans from TBC or before.I wont quote blizz saying rogues have the highest skillcap etc etc but face it in competitive PvP only a skilled rogue can manage nowadays whereas in TBC you could afford to make a few mistakes each match and still pull through.
Comment by Rohan — August 6, 2009 @ 9:38 am
“Data as of Aug 3 2009 all realms US+EU”
no wonders, just lol =)
Comment by Deadlycuts — August 25, 2009 @ 11:42 pm