As you may or may not know, Blizz has being doing Q & A sessions for each class. I posted the entire Q & A below and I’ve also posted some comments of my own along with it, just thoughts and opinions on some questions. It’s worth a read if you’re looking for some Blizz perspective on the future of the class.
Today we continue our class Q&A series with the development team, in which we’re taking a look at each class and answering some of the top questions brought forward by their communities. Next up, we explore the most asked questions from the rogue class and find out more about the design philosophy and expectations for the class, as well as what may lie in store for it in the future.
Community Team: This segment is all about the rogue; we will delve deep into this class with Greg Street and discuss the elements that make the rogue class incredibly unique.
Q. Where do rogues fit into the larger scope of things currently and where do you see them going from this point forward?
A. They’re a premier melee dps class — the personification of skulking and swashbuckling flair. It’s their primary and only role — they’re not going to turn into tanks or healers.
Rogues were once the best dps class hands-down, and a lot of the other classes were just there to buff rogues. Rogues were supposed to be selfish and not bring many buffs or utility of their own. We’re not really happy with that design any longer, and have pushed rogues to be a little more normal — great damage in the right conditions, but also some good utility and synergy as well.
Rogues have nearly always been strong in PvP, just because their shtick of coming out of stealth to stun and then unload on an opponent translates so well to everything from Arena to random world ganking.
Q. What is it that makes them unique compared to all other classes?
A. Rogues have a complex resource system with the balance between energy and combo points, and rely on active abilities to respond to situations rather than passive effects. This leads to a very interesting tension between planning out what you’re going to do ahead of time and reacting to proc-based resource gains (energy/combo points from things like Combat Potency, Relentless Strikes, and Ruthlessness), and rationing your active timers and abilities to survive.
Akrios: The above section is a fair overlook on the rogue class. I’m glad they see rogues as more of a utility class in the future, I don’t think many people will disagree with that being a more interesting direction than a pure damage class. Our resource system is interesting but atm energy management is a lot less important than it was in the past, other than pooling energy for burst you don’t need to do much.
Community Team: Let’s look at rogue abilities, the combo point system, and the feedback our rogue community has provided on some of these.
Q. Do we feel the current combo point system is working out fine for rogues, not just for Subtlety, but for all three trees? Are there any plans to improve how combo points are awarded later down the road?
A. Yes, but there’s always room for improvement. Combo points are meaningful in all aspects of the game, and provide a necessary limiter on some of the rogue’s more powerful abilities. Too many combo points runs the risk of completely overwhelming your normal abilities and breaking the natural flow of the class, as Subtlety rogues who raid probably know all too well. I would expect that abilities that modify how combo points are acquired are something we’ll probably be careful with in the future.
Overall, we really like the way the combo point and finishing move system works. If anything, the risk is that we could push too many other classes towards this system, which makes it less unique for the rogue.
Akrios: I agree that the combo system is one of the strong points of our class, it makes things interesting and keeps us unique. I agree that it’s working well but it would be cool to see things that have been talked about in the past, such as mobile combo points or simply have combo points as personal buffs rather than debuffs on a hostile target. I think this has been a long forgotten idea that would make rogues much more versatile and make switches in PvP more realistic, and have less reliance on vanish.
Q. Vanish, as you know, is one of the class’s staple abilities that sets it apart from other classes. However, there are times when Vanish doesn’t execute (more…)
