Rare characters

[Quark]

Everyone's played the "what if" game. We all have dream items, dream builds, and combinations that are either awesome in power or good in power and yet still unique.

This is one I thought up when I heard Thunderfury procs off procs. I'm not sure if it does that anymore, given the nerfs to it, but the combination itself looks to be quite fun anyways.

Rogue Build

Key Talents:
Improved SnD -> keep SnD up, more attacks means more procs.
Improved Instant Poison -> Only 4 points, but gives Instant a 28% proc chance instead of 20% (Crippling, Deadly, Wound all start at 30%, Instant and Mind-Numbing at 20%).

Precision -> more hits = more procs
Blade Flurry -> more hits = more procs
Sword Specialization -> The melee attack proc can, you guessed it, proc others :)
Adrenaline Rush -> more SS = more procs :)

Main Hand: Thunderfury, for its obvious speed and proc. Depending on how nerfed it is, other options might be better now. Vis'kag, while lacking in pure DPS compared to BWL loot, has a proc also :)
Off Hand: Maladath or Brutality. Maladath is faster (more procs), but helps your overall skills less. That's not as important with this build, though (especially with Thunderfury), so we'll take it.
Trinket #1: Hand of Justice. Proccing for procs :)
Trinket #2: Darkmoon Card: Maelstrom. Yep, this interacts with other procs.

Weapon Enchants: Dual Lifestealing.

What is the end result when all this is put together?

Melee Attack (MH) -> can proc Thunderfury, Lifesteal, Instant Poison, Hand of Justice (new Melee Attack (MH)), Maelstrom, or Sword Specialization (new Melee Attack (MH)).
Melee Attack (OH) -> can proc Lifesteal, Instant Poison, HoJ, Maelstrom, or Sword Spec.
Special Attack -> can proc Thunderfury, Lifesteal, Instant Poison, Hand of Justice (new Melee Attack (MH)), Maelstrom, or Sword Specialization (new Melee Attack (MH)).
Instant Poison -> can proc Lifestealing. Pre-1.9 this supposedly proc'd Thunderfury too (if the MH's poison). Not sure about the others.
Lifesteal -> supposedly can proc Maestrom, Thunderfury (pre-1.9) - again being MH's Lifesteal. Haven't heard about the others.

You can see where this gets fun. One special attack could have a field day on procs, especially chain-proccing. Combine this with Thunderfury's good damage on its proc and you have why (pre-nerf), a Thunderfury Rogue can do very good damage despite having a weak Sinister Strike. If anyone has a definative yes/no on certain procs, I'd love to hear it.

So, what's your wierd setup?

[Artega]

Something along the lines of "WHY WON'T IT JUST DIE!?", and "JESUS FSCK KEEP IT AWAY FROM ME!" rolled into one.

Key Talents:

Improved Revenge - Pretty sucky right now, but it'll no longer cause or be subjected to diminishing returns in 1.9. Rogues and anything that tries to melee you down will be stunned extremely often, with no chance of immunity or resistance.

Concussion Blow - Still subject to diminishing returns, but since Improved Revenge won't screw with this anymore, a great deal more viable when using it on the same target. Stun-on-demand. Combine this with War Stomp and people will hate you.

Improved Shield Bash - Three seconds of silence on a short cooldown, plus a nasty six-second lockout if you interrupt a spell. Combine this with Concussion Blow and War Stomp and it becomes very easy to silence a caster for more than twelve seconds (unless he's using only instants, in which case it's about eight or nine.)

Improved Shield Wall - An additional five seconds of near-invulnerability without any kind of damage penalty. When used at the right time (e.g. when you MUST get that next Shield Bash off so your teammates can finish the caster or target), it can make a massive difference.

Shield Slam - A potent, instant attack that can also dispel protections and buffs. Does pretty decent damage by itself (crits can go over the assumed cap of 1100 on clothies Sundered enough), and the ability to kill a life-saving buff like Power Word: Shield in addition to the damage is incredible. It CAN be hard to get that 30 Rage if you aren't getting pounded on (which you WILL be getting pounded on if you're attacking the right targets), but Bloodrage and Berserker Rage can help that somewhat.

Piercing Howl - Powerful AE snare that has no diminishing returns and a very cheap Rage cost. Very useful in almost any situation, and it goes from effective to downright obscene in Warsong Gulch, where a single well-timed Piercing Howl can literally win games for you.

Necessary Equipment:

Green Whelp Armor: Crappy Armor and no viable stats, but the effect doesn't appear to have a PPM cap, and since people will be pounding on you anyway, you might as well pound them right back after a fashion. Incredible when flagrunning in Warsong Gulch; it's endlessly amusing to watch Rogues suddenly fall asleep while chipping away at your mammoth HP.

High Warlord's Shield Wall: The best example of its kind, but it can also be replaced with far more easily-attained versions such as the Crest of Retribution and Force Reactive Disk. Add on the Blocking enchant to make the proc happen more often (as well as light up Revenge more frequently) and you can cause some pretty nice damage.

Silent Fang: In my opinion, one of the best-possible one-handed Warrior PvP weapons in the entire game. The proc is somewhat low (it appears to go off once every two or three fights), but when it goes off, it gets noticed. If this proc happens, you can VERY easily completely and utterly take any caster out of the fight permanently (considering he has an extremely low chance of surviving the duration of the number of stuns and silences you can chain with this one, even if it's just you attacking him.) This proc can (and will) win games of Warsong Gulch for you.

Since I do Warsong Gulch more than any other kind of PvP (what can I say? I love CTF in all its forms), most of what I plan out is designed around strategies for it.

You can be both defensive and offensive with this build, and are equally suited at both. Your mythic durability and defensive capabilities make you an excellent flagrunner if you have sufficient healer support, and you can also grab the enemy's flag and run around in circles to cause a distraction that will (more often than not) be long enough to allow your team to get your flag back. Defensively, you can take any caster out of the game with your myriad stuns and silence abilities, and a well-timed Shield Bash+Concussion Blow combo on the flagrunner's Priest can doom his efforts. You can also do adequate flagrunner-defense, using your silences and stuns in an offensive manner, silencing Mages and stunning Rogues pursuing your flagrunner.

You can melee down nearly any class of any talent spec out of sheer durability and versatility, especially if you take advantage of the Whelp Armor's sleep proc to use a Bandage and get out of combat for a Charge.

If you happen to take Engineering with this build, you really will become the definitive caster-killer. Rogues may cause more damage in a shorter amount of time, but NO ONE will be able to match your sheer capability to incapacitate, annoy, and prevent casters from doing what they do. Use your abilities on Mages and Warlocks to prevent your allies from taking damage, or use them on Priests to prevent your enemies from receiving life-saving heals and shields.

[Zarathustra]

Troll shaman. Tons of spirit. Combat Endurance.

I want to SEE his wounds healing in battle.

[Artega]

We did this with a Troll Warrior, since a Warrior's base HP regen is higher than any other classes', with a Rogue coming in a relatively close second. A Warrior with high Spirit would regenerate HP faster than a Shaman with Combat Endurance and high Spirit.

I believe he regenerated something like 10-15 HP/tick in combat, not counting any trinkets and other nifty things. I think we managed to get him up to around 23 HP/tick with some specific gear. Amusing to watch him heal while people would leave him stunned or whatnot to bandage up, but not nearly as effective as simply killing the target :)

[Yuen]

Quark, you should check out some of Ming's (from Server Lightning's Blade) combat sword videos, and you can see your dream as a reality :). She has been using that same maelstrom/LS/HoJ/SwordSpec/weapon+poisonproc proccing build for a while now - with very very good results. (You may have to search to find the right video - she has done videos with a large number of talent builds/weapon combos)

(Of course you may have already seen them since Ming is pretty well known :))

[oldmandennis]

There is a very annoying rogue on our server who seems to make it a point to come after me with thunderfury every time we cross paths in BG's. :(

But seriously, I think the days of those being given to rogues are over now that people know what they are for. The proc is just too potent PvE in a tanks hands, and the drop rate too low, I think ~1 every 6 months for guilds running MC consistantly. Our guild is sitting on 2 of the same binding, and our MT has gone so far as to purchase the elementinium he needs.

[Quark]

But seriously, I think the days of those being given to rogues are over now that people know what they are for.
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No, they're over because Blizzard killed the proc. Rogues could proc that thing an incredible amount in a short period of time, but Blizzard really nerfed it (and reduced the proc's usefulness). Many guilds went with an "MT first, Rogues next" philosophy because of the pure damage a Rogue could (past) do with Thunderfury in their hands, some went with "whoever spends points", others took less common approaches ... now I think it'll be "MT1 first, MT2 second, MT3 third ... then maybe we'll see".

[Frag]

Speaking of which, does anyone have some hard data on Thunderfury now? Is it an upgrade from Quel'Serrar in terms of tanking? I'd imagine so, but you never know how heavy handed they were.

~Frag

[oldmandennis]

No data, but I did UBRS through the beast with a war with TF, and saw a LOT of the WW graphics. Of course, for any fight where melee is ok, it might make sense to go with Quel on the tank and TF on the DPS

[Descended]

Rogue Build

Troll zerking now doesn't suck completely. I'm not sure it is worth giving up on other racials, but I did use /combatlog and saw the speed bonus from Slice and Dice and zerking stacked in 1.9.x.

Hrm... now that I think about it, I think the issue with the zerking speed bonus used to be that it didn't stack with Blade Fury; I must check this when I get home. If it does, my troll roguette should be able to get a 70% attack speed increase when I use Fury, zerk, and SnD, assuming that the 10 to 30% attack speed bonus is a linear function of your health (since I typically hit it when I'm at about half health).

On the subject of Hand of Justice, I note you specify that the bonus attack caused by Hand of Justice is a mainhand attack. The reason I was bumping about in my combat log was to verify this very thing. I picked the Hand of Justice up this weekend, and was concerned at first, since my dps over a half hour of Twilight farming in Silithus didn't show an increase in dps from my previous evening's. That turned out to be a fluke; another hour of farming showed an increase over my trinket from Raventusk. However, while looking through the combat log, I saw several cases that I was fairly certain showed an offhand attack triggering a Hand of Justice offhand attack (although there were far more cases of an offhand attack causing Handing of Justice to trigger a mainhand attack). It could be the timestamps in the combat log being screwy, though; the combat log uses the client's clock, and it looks like messages from the server sometimes get bunched up together and then shipped out in a rearranged or arbitrary order. Perhaps this is the doings of a messaging function on the server that is responsible for queuing up messages for delivery to clients, or perhaps the messages are being sent by UDP (which might explain by I occasionally found a section of time where there seemed to be a missing mainhand attack).

[Quark]

Hrm... now that I think about it, I think the issue with the zerking speed bonus used to be that it didn't stack with Blade Fury; I must check this when I get home.  If it does, my troll roguette should be able to get a 70% attack speed increase when I use Fury, zerk, and SnD, assuming that the 10 to 30% attack speed bonus is a linear function of your health (since I typically hit it when I'm at about half health).

Nit: Speed additions are done after each other, instead of at the same time. Thus, a SnD + Blade Flurry speed isn't 150% -> 100+20+30, it's 156% -> (100*1.2)*1.3. Check the character screen DPS to confirm this when you have both up. So this makes the Troll Bezerker thing even better when used well.

This, of course, assumes bugs are fixed with 'zerker.

On the subject of Hand of Justice, I note you specify that the bonus attack caused by Hand of Justice is a mainhand attack.  The reason I was bumping about in my combat log was to verify this very thing.  I picked the Hand of Justice up this weekend, and was concerned at first, since my dps over a half hour of Twilight farming in Silithus didn't show an increase in dps from my previous evening's.  That turned out to be a fluke; another hour of farming showed an increase over my trinket from Raventusk.  However, while looking through the combat log, I saw several cases that I was fairly certain showed an offhand attack triggering a Hand of Justice offhand attack (although there were far more cases of an offhand attack causing Handing of Justice to trigger a mainhand attack).  It could be the timestamps in the combat log being screwy, though; the combat log uses the client's clock, and it looks like messages from the server sometimes get bunched up together and then shipped out in a rearranged or arbitrary order.  Perhaps this is the doings of a messaging function on the server that is responsible for queuing up messages for delivery to clients, or perhaps the messages are being sent by UDP (which might explain by I occasionally found a section of time where there seemed to be a missing mainhand attack).
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Hmm ... do you have a %s breakdown of this occurance?

[Descended]

Hmm ... do you have a %s breakdown of this occurance?
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I just spent about an hour looking at my combat log from Monday and Tuesday night. I grepped out some of the junk so it was harder for me to get confused. This time I didn't see any Hand of Justice procced attacks that were conclusively made with the offhand weapon.

I did, however, find some really weird stuff. Blizzard's combat log is a treasure trove of inconsistency. For example, there are times when my 2.7 speed mainhand weapon will go over 4 seconds between swings, if Hand of Justice procced in between. I'm beginning to suspect Hand of Justice resets the mainhand swing timer, although I found two cases where that didn't seem to be true (unless the server or my internet connection lagged by over a second both times).