The Rogue Dillema

[Keeblerelf]

Almost every game in which there is a mace spec rogue, I have an insane difficulty surviving in 3s. The rogue pops adrenaline rush, cloak of shadows my root, can't get a cyclone off because I'm stun locked, and will either trinket cyclone/hamstring + pop sprint to lay out his well-timed bonecracker stuns. During this time, my other team mates are getting DPS'd down by the single opposing teams dps, and I find it very hard to kite a rogue which stuns stuns stuns. Cheap shot, kidney shot trinket, mace spec stun, jump down... 50%.... adrenaline rush.... crippling poison.... 30%.... NS + HT... 50% b/c of 5/5 Wound Poison....

Basically, how do you fellow druids contend with mace spec rogues? I notice that if one is on me, my warlock, or frost mage, they completely lock them down.

Help? =<

[buena]

2.3 mace rogues are totally out of hand. The following is the only method I have found that can avoid the possibility of a complete 100-0 stunlock.

Make sure you are out of LoS of their other DPS when the rogue finds you. Barkskin during CS. Trinket KS, fairy fire him, turn into a bear and nature's grasp. He will cloak. Attempt to bash -> cyclone. If it misses then warstomp -> cyclone instead. He will trinket. Then NS cyclone him and travel away. Reapply fairy fire as he comes out of the cyclone and scream at your teammates to snare him.

This takes about 15 seconds during which I blow NS, trinket, bash, NG, warstomp, do no healing whatsoever, and am at the end still dependent on my teammates to peel the rogue. GG 2.3

[Peck]

Unfortunately, I find if the rogue resists or misses bash I'm in a really bad situation usually. Back when I played my rogue I know if i burned all my cooldowns I could pretty much kill any class... in Arena's Rogues always burn all their cooldowns so its always kind of cheap. The most deadly one they have however, is sprint. When sprint is down I find Rogues, mace specced or not, stand little chance of killing me as they just can't keep up.

Buena is right, however, I frequently find myself burning a lot of cooldowns early to counteract theirs, its all I can do most of the time. Also, like he said NS + Cyclone can help GG a rogue. that 3 seconds to get away is deadly (assuming you get a full cyclone off and they trinket it), especially if your partner can get a snare on the rogue to counteract a sprint... if he vanishes or sprints again, utilize feral charge for the 4 second root as it can't be CloS'd or Evasioned...

I know you're tired of hearing it, but its just about outlasting the Rogue's cooldowns, namely sprint. AR does them no good if they can't sprint to keep up with you or 5 point KS you.

[Ridzik]

I know you're tired of hearing it, but its just about outlasting the Rogue's cooldowns, namely sprint. AR does them no good if they can't sprint to keep up with you or 5 point KS you.

naaaa: two sprints, two ar's, two vanish/cs's. one lucky mace stun while i'm in casterform and im screwed. if he gets the opener on me i'm screwed. if i burn all my cooldowns to survive and they decide to fear/blind/whatever me and kill my mate i'm screwed as well. fuck the hemo buff.

and if you meet a druid who can survive a competent rogue/x double dps team on lordaeron tell me his secret pls because i cannot. no pillar means no way to properly los the spriest/mage/lock means death.

i will try buenas way anyway although i don't see why the rogue should allow me 3 gcds of time after the trinketed(!) 5pt ks to follow the get-away-routine. macestun or gauge or imp kick anyone? but i guess anything is worth a try.

[Taffy]

only let them open on you in bear form, and have someone to charge to..

[Valiria]

Trinketing kidney shot is no longer a good idea in 2.3 sadly.

A rogue will find you in stealth (it's inevitable), he'll cheap shot you, then he'll kidney shot you and if you trinket it he will blind you and kill your partner.

At low rating I was bad against rogues, I got better and my rating went up. Then I found better rogues and had to keep learning. It goes on forever it seems, I'm doing 2k 2v2 now approximately and I'm still learning to deal with these pests and as I get higher they'll only get harder.

[Steamboat]

yeah you really need to count on your teammates to rip him off of you more than anything. whether it be a warrior with spamtring and mace procs all over his face or a mage polying/novaing him off of you.

[Healingmuh]

only let them open on you in bear form, and have someone to charge to..

hm interesting..

will try it in season 3.

[Azchire]

It's going to be very important that the rogue doesn't get the opener on you. I've found that when rogues get an opener on me I'm very dead.

As previously mentioned, make sure you stay out of LoS of the rogue's teammates as much as possible, but using their teammates as a feral charge grapple can really save your ass.


Don't get into the habit of trinketing out of a kidney shot unless you're sure you'll have a couple globals free if you do. Trinketing out of KS only to get feared or mace stunned is really gonna kill you.


Have your teammates do everything they can to pull that rogue out of stealth, often that means hammering on their healer to put some pressure on em, but do everything you can to avoid a rogue opener.

[Ridzik]

Have your teammates do everything they can to pull that rogue out of stealth, often that means hammering on their healer to put some pressure on em, but do everything you can to avoid a rogue opener.

you failed to understand what the discussion is all about. rogue + healer = no problem (at least as druid/war). rogue + spriest/mage/lock = ridiculous.

[Renin]

Well in my opinion it all depends on who your teammates are... if you're in 3v3 the whole game depends on you living, personally i play with a warlock and rogue, if the rogue opens on me outta stealth, my rogue opens on him, letting me get away, if he stats sprinting use nature's grasp and faerie fire, once he cloaks pop into kitty and sprint... your sprint is faster than the rogues if you're in 4 piece merc glad which you should be by now... if the rogue switches to you and you're in real trouble, your partners cooldowns should be saved for this... aka deathcoil/blind is what they save for me being in a hard spot... rogues are pretty easy to kite as long as everyone is assisting YOU, which is what your teammates should be doing, since 75% of druid 3v3s depending the druid doing the most cc/helping teammates... the mace rogue is a dilemma, but barsking and bearform with the new natural perfection actuallly takes your damage reduction down to 85-90%... also never switch outta bear unless you feral charge away or you know u can get away from the rogue... unpredictable movement destroys the rogue as well like going the opposite way out of no where....

good luck!
Renin

[Renin]

Also my 3v3 hasn't updated here yet... but it's currently 2307... only played 3 days total

[Azchire]

you failed to understand what the discussion is all about. rogue + healer = no problem (at least as druid/war). rogue + spriest/mage/lock = ridiculous.

You could apply the same to a rogue's dps partner, creating urgency is what you need to do.

[Ridzik]

You could apply the same to a rogue's dps partner, creating urgency is what you need to do.

i don't get it, please explain.

now what i miss in this discussion is the healing part. all the tips regarding rogue/x 2dps teams cover the getaway-and-cc part.

at some point of the match i am no longer free to do what i want (getting away from the rogue while losing his partner in this case) - i actually have to spend some gcd's for healing. most of the common rogue/x dispel my hots (eleshaman, spriest, most locks) while rogue/mage drops my warrior/lock/whatever in no time, even when i get away once in a while.

in addition i have observed i run oom against some rogue/x 2dps teams before they do, mainly against those who can dispel but even some mages outlast my manapool.

[Azchire]

All I'm saying is that you've got to avoid a rogue's opener. in 2v2, your partner needs to start dps on whatever he can immediately to put pressure on the rogue to pop out and help. In 3v3, you need to position yourself in a place that you can avoid attacks from others in the case you do get caught by a rogue, but avoid getting caught by the rogue in the first place.

Having a human warlock in your team is definitely nice. Paranoia + Perception = lolstealth.


I liked your vid btw.

[groshaw]

A rouge, alone, should not be able to kill you. In the very worst case, you should be able to get away from the rogue with 2-3k health left. The problem comes when you have another class (i.e. warlock) doing that extra 3k damage.

My experience comes from 2s with a warrior or hunter. In 3s I have a rogue on my team, which means either the rogue opens on my rogue (after he opens on someone) or my rogue opens on him after he opens on me.

My strat, assuming the worst (rogue opens on me in stealth, my partner is ccd) is as follows. IMMEDIATELY barkskin when he cheapshots you. You should get 3/3 NP up quickly, and thus you will be taking 35% less damage through his opening. Assuming he opens you in cat (from stealth) try your best to shift to bear in between CS and KS. I can usually get into bear about half the time, the other half a skillful mace stun proc or a skillful rogue prevents this. The key to living, at least in my experience, is minimizing the damage you take in the initial burst (which, at worst will only last 10 seconds, the length of barkskin, assuming CS, mace stun, 5 point KS), if i'm at 65% after his CS/KS I will live, if i'm at 35-40% it's a lot more dicey.

At this point, the strat starts to vary, depending on if you got into bear/the other class the rogue has. If it's a lock and you don't get in to bear, it's pretty much gg, as if you trinket KS you will get skillcoiled/feared/blinded to death with no heals, and if you don't trinket KS, the lock gets 5 second of freecasting on you and the rogue beats on you for 5 seconds in caster, which is GG as well. If the other class is anything but a lock, you should trinket KS if you are in caster. Once you trinket KS, the strat continues the same as if you had gotten in to bear form (... shift to bear after trinket).

It is very important that you do NOT try to run after you trinket KS, the rogue WILL catch you (sprint, if you NG he will cloak/sprint). If you are in bear for the KS, just wait it out, he won't do that much dmg. Bash as soon as you are free from stuns. If bash lands, FF then cyclone him. If he trinket's the bash it's GG you win (full duration cyclone = you get away). I usually don't try and run after I cast the cyclone, but instead immediately start casting cyclone again. Most rogues will trinket the full duration cyclone immediately and thus you will get cyclone right back on him after he trinkets, allowing you to get away. If you try to run after the first cyclone, he will likely be able to catch you with a sprint, making it much more difficult to cyclone him, unless you burn NS, which I much prefer to save. The reason you FF before cyclone is to 1) prevent re-stealth and 2) maybe make him blow cloak. If he blows cloak, you're NG is golden. That and if you get a bash on him, you have enough GCD time to get a FF + cyclone off unless he trinkets, and if he trinkets bash, again, it's gg you.

If bash doesn't land, which is 95% of the time, I warstomp/cyclone. You don't get a FF, but you should still live. If both don't land, I start yelling at my partner.

With my warrior/druid team, this works almost 100% of the time UNLESS it's lock/rogue. With lock/rogue, we have about a 25% success rate if the rogue opens me (depending entirely on lucky mace stun procs from my warrior). The best defense to a lock/rogue team, is a good offense. If my warrior can rush in and put enough pressure on the lock, the rogue will have to open on the warrior, which, if you are quick with your heals (and abolish poison), should be GG.

My 2s should be 2250, not updated for some reason.

I'm open to any suggestions/criticisms. Anything to get our win rate against lock/rogue above 25%.

[Ocius]

As a Druid/Warrior team, Rogue/SPriest 2v2 pretty much destroyed our rating in the last week of season 2. We were at ~2300, then played 9 games in a row against Rogue/Spriest, losing 7 of them (both of us are too stubborn to stop q'ing) and dropped to ~2200. The only 2 games we won were because they played poorly (Priest hit me with a fear before I trinketed blind so I got out of both).

Basically the way the games go is something like:

My Warrior and the Shadow Priest start up on each other. Rogue opens up on Warrior shortly after/same time. I pop out (40 yards away, opposite the shadow priest if possible) and trinket (EotMartyr), regrowth, then abolish poison -> lifebloom stack until the Priest starts dispelling. Warrior gets KS'd as the Priest's hamstring is about to fade, Priest silences me and starts running towards me while spam dispelling my Warrior. I have no choice but to move away from the Priest or I'll eat his fear, meaning all I can do to heal after the silence is NS -> lifebloom spam. At this point, if I stop moving I get caught by the Priest and feared -> blinded -> vanish/sap'd, but if I don't stop moving (regrowth) I can't keep up with the Rogue's damage + SPriest DoTs through wound poison. If the Rogue sprints to and blinds (or even just shivs) me it's over, because that gives the SPriest enough time to catch up and I get feared, trinket that, then get blinded and my partner dies (if he doesn't die, the Rogue can just vanish and sap me as blind is about to end).

If anyone's been at all successful against a well-executed SPriest/Rogue team as Druid/Warrior, advice is definitely welcomed :(.

Edit: Rogues are AR/Prep
Edit #2: And don't include Warstomp as part of the strategy. <- Night Elf

[Ridzik]

well i haven't found the magical formula against rogue/x 2dps yet but some things do help:

- manipulate that queuing system to give you BE or NA, LO sucks hard against them for losing reasons
- on BE bring the action to the ground and conquer the bridge yourself
- if i get bursted my warrior is on the rogue, if he gets bursted my warrior is on the x
- my warrior disarms and fears early (to get rid of the trinkets, gg UD)
- given the rogue doesn't find me the first thing i do after popping out early is to ff/cyclone the rogue. ud will trinket now the others will be stuck for 6sec, usually the rogue cloak/sprint/vanish/cs towards me. i try to get out a NS+cyclone before he cloaks/vanishes. if it lands i have 3 seconds to hot and move and my warrior has 3 seconds to get close to the rogue again for harmstringing
- tell your warrior when you used your trinket on fear and have him intercept you asap, it sometimes prevents you from getting blinded
- when the rogue is on you try to stay in bear as long as possible (new pvp trinket helps) and drag him away from his partner. dot the rogue while in bear. sometimes i can survive a whole AR when my warrior doesn't need to much help and disturbes the rogues partner enough. tell your warrior when you got the rogue well positioned and survive him alone. sit through that KS in bear, only use your trinket when you feel you wouldn't survive otherwise.
- remember blind is on a retardedly short cd nowadays. try not to use your trinket when blind could be ready soon.

the good thing with all odds against you is winning feels much better!

[Azchire]

Another little tippytip:


If you know what you're about to fight is a 2dps rogue team, You're more likely to be caught then to catch the rogue especially if they're Alliance. (perception)

Going into the fight with a lifebloom(3) and rejuv has won me games.

The rogue's gonna catch you, so better off being caught with hots on you than be caught in cat form. Kite well, Use your trinket timely, and turtle in bear form wisely and you can win these fights if your partner does enough damage and offers enough interrupt to screw up their pain train.


You're still playing Russian roulette with the RNG most of the time.

[Tribby]

If anyone's been at all successful against a well-executed SPriest/Rogue team as Druid/Warrior, advice is definitely welcomed :(.

As soon as the rogue opens on your warrior he MUST shield up. He also needs perfect spell reflect timing in order to catch mindblast.

Instead of opening regrowth, open clone on the spriest before the rogue pops out. If the rogue opens on you, the warrior intercepts the rogue. If the rogue still opens on the warrior, toss a clone on the rogue. Make sure to keep a trinket stack lifebloom on the warrior as well as abolish when you can and then rejuv->swiftmend when able. Your warrior should also be very mobile intervening away from the rogue, then intercepting to the spriest when they catch up. He must also keep both of them snared as best as possible. Keep in mind, once their trinkets are down cycloning is far more efficient than trying to heal through a wound stack.

Trinketing a priest fear will usually result in a loss, and avoiding that fear via warrior snares + mobility is the key. It's really a turtle and positioning fight while the rogue still has cooldowns (and trinket).