Subtlety Rogue DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — The War Within (Season 1)

On this page, we will go over every single talent available to Subtlety Rogues. Many of them are only passive effects, but they all can have an impact on how the spec is played, whether active or passive. To see how these choices fit into how you play as a Subtlety, take a look at the Rotation section of our guide.

While optimizing talents on a contextual basis is the highly recommended method of setting up your build, the talent builds listed below work great for specific purposes.

The go-to build for all Single Target Encounters in Raid.

You can easily import the talent tree below into the game by clicking 'Export Talents'.

The suggested builds might differ based on the current tier's bosses, so make sure to read the dedicated raiding page below.

You can easily import the talent tree below into the game by clicking 'Export Talents'.

Due to the dynamic nature of Mythic+, different affixes and dungeons can change our choice of talents. Check out the Mythic+ page below.

The Class Tree for Subtlety Rogues is fairly straightforward, and the few choices you will have are mainly utility options, which we will talk about in this section.

With the redesigned talent trees, your talent options can change quite a bit. The biggest change you can make in these rows is swapping Improved Sprint or Master Poisoner for Gouge/ Airborne Irritant for some more CC options. However, untalenting Master Poisoner is not recommended.

While Master Poisoner does not increase our output, it makes our Atrophic Poison reduce the target's damage dealt by 3.6% instead of 3% which means that you should always pick this talent for progression raiding.

The options in these rows are extremely limited. However, with the redesign, we are now afforded more utility options than we were before. The only DPS option in these rows is Improved Ambush/ Tight Spender. There is a new talent, Shadowheart, that, unless it gets changed by the time The War Within launches, is dead on arrival because it is literally useless.

Much like in Dragonflight, these rows give us the meat of our DPS options in the class tree. Subterfuge is now a 2-point node, and Without a Trace caps off the right side of the Class Tree. The must disliked change to Acrobatic Strikes; the beloved Melee Range extension is gone and has been replaced with a buff to auto-attack damage and movement speed. However, fret not, because Blizzard has managed to give us a great change to Echoing Reprimand, it is now called Supercharger and its a 2 point talent which gives you +2 combo points to your finishers. This has split many in the rogue community as many enjoyed the mini-game that Echoing Reprimand had but I believe this is better for the overall health of the entire class as it makes it less gimmicky. Also Blizzard decided to give us a choice node between the new Echoing Reprimand and Forced Induction. Currently Forced Induction is a must take talent for Subtlety.

With The War Within, Shadow Dance is back as the identity for Subtlety Rogue. Both Assassination and Outlaw lost access to Shadow Dance. The difference between the ST build and the M+ builds still comes down to you either take Shuriken Tornado, Replicating Shadows, The First Dance or you don't.

These first four rows remain almost completely unchanged; you'll see Without a Trace has been removed completely and replaced with Shadow Focus. Overall, you'll take the same 8 points in every almost build for PvE purposes.

This is where the meat of the War Within changes are. You'll notice Premeditation has been changed and allows you a budget version of Shadow Blades where your next combo point generator out of Stealth generates full combo points. You'll also notice a small change in the middle of the spec tree, the The First Dance/ Master of Shadows choice node has been moved to where Shadow Focus once stood, Improved Shadow Dance moved into the choice node's old spot, and Shadow Dance goes where Improved Shadow Dance was. This is a small shift in the Subtlety Spec Tree, which is welcomed but still not enough, as the Subtlety Spec Tree has gotten the least amount of love from Blizzard out of the three rogue specs.

Much like in our class tree, these rows are packed with output options. If your only care is output DPS, the points you place in these rows are pretty much automatically decided now that they've removed Invigorating Shadowdust. We always take Flagellation, Danse Macabre and Dark Shadow and round it off with Deeper Daggers, Inevitability, Death Perception and The Rotten.

If you choose to, you can enable "War Mode." Enabling War Mode provides the following benefits:

• PvP talents enabled in the outdoor world.
• 10% increase in World Quest rewards at maximum level.
• 15% more experience gained while leveling.
• Earn Conquest Points, which can reward gear every week.

With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended to enable the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at maximum level. However, you will make yourself available for open-world PvP, and the possibility of being "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists.

In this section, we will rank the PvP talents best for leveling and doing solo / small group PvE content. Below is a ranking of both General PvP Talents and Subtlety Rogue-specific PvP talents.

1. Death from Above is just a stronger Eviscerate.
2. Dagger in the Dark — Whenever Stealth is active, you apply a debuff to nearby enemies that causes them to take an additional 5% damage from your next Shadowstrike. Stacks up to 8 times. This is nothing special, but still a slight damage boost.
3. Only two of the Honor Talents increase our DPS while outdoors, so the last choice is up to you on which one you think suits you the best.

Veil of Midnight, Shadowy Duel, Silhouette, Smoke Bomb, Thick as Thieves, Distracting Mirage, Control is King, Dismantle and Maneuverability have limited use in PvE content in terms of increasing your damage in the open-world.