This guide is aimed at players who have just started playing in a new patch. The rewards for set bonuses are different than they were before the Legion expansion, and so this article will give you some information about that change as well as what sets to get first if you’re considering buying your own new gear via PvP or PvE.
As part of the Shadowlands 9.2 Eternity’s End content release, Tier Set benefits have arrived on the PTR. Our Rogue Guide Writers have shared their early opinions on these tier benefits, giving insight into the implementation, relative strength, and even some important input, despite the fact that they are presently untestable owing to PTR worlds being unavailable.
The Tier Set benefits for all 36 specialties in the 9.2 Eternity’s End PTR have been datamined. Below are all of the bonuses and armor models.
9.2 Bonuses for Tier Sets in All Specializations Models from the Mythic Tier Set (9.2)
Our Guide Writers have offered their early thoughts on the 9.2 Tier Set extras. Below you’ll find a list of all of our previously published opinion pieces.
The 9.2 Tier Set Bonuses: First Impressions
First Impressions of the Hunter Tier Set First Impressions of the Rogue Tier Set
First Impressions of the Death Knight Tier Set First Impressions of the Demon Hunter Tier Set First Impressions of the Druid Tier Set First Impressions of the Mage Tier Set First Impressions of the Monk Tier Set First Impressions of the Paladin Tier Set First Impressions of the Priest Tier Set First Impressions of the Shaman Tier Set First Impressions of the Warlock Tier Set First Impressions of the Warrior Tier Set
Initial Thoughts on the 9.2 Set Bonuses
Whispyr (Assassination), JustGuy (Outlaw), and Fuu1 (Subtlety) from our Rogue Writers team have analysed the freshly datamined tier set bonuses to give you a better idea of how they’ll effect your specs in Shadowlands 9.2 Eternity’s End.
First Impressions on Assassination Rogue Writer
The Assassination tier set seems to be a move in the right way toward a more poison/bleed-based spec, but it still has a number of flaws.
The two-piece boost, for example, seems to be a fantastic deal at first glance, but upon closer scrutiny, it isn’t worth it rotationally or in terms of damage, owing to Shiv’s low bleed damage and low uptime. Our Rupture and Garrote (on a character with no dominance shards, to keep it consistent with a 9.2 character) contribute for around 15% of our total damage, according to some fast napkin calculation. Shiv has a 40% uptime, and the bonus offers a 25% crit chance. After some tedious arithmetic, the total boost to bleeds would be about 10%, putting the bonus’s power somewhere between 1% and 2%. However, this does not take into consideration the interaction with the four-piece during Vendetta, so it may be a bit higher. To say the least, it was unimpressive. During the period, I feel the set bonus should also boost the critical strike probability of Deadly Poison. This would not only encourage the famous gameplay of pooling into a Shiv window and maintaining high Envenom uptime throughout the debuff period, but it would also offer Shiv a more defined identity, as it would simply be another debuff to sustain. It would also have more powerful interactions with the other four pieces (where the poison portion of its effect is a confusing addition).
On Vendetta, the four-piece bonus has an Exsanguinate-like effect. It’ll be interesting to watch how it impacts reapplied bleeding during Vendetta. If reapply bleeds also have the Exsanguinate effect, it will force us to recast our Rupture and Garrote before the conclusion of Vendetta to receive the greatest impact. The bonus’s burst potential is really rather good, but it suffers the same fate as the two-piece bonus. The boost will be ineffective if the baseline bleeding do not cause harm. The fascinating part is that it also causes toxins to expire 100 percent quicker. This, in my view, is an odd inclusion. In single target, the damage over time impact from Deadly Poison accounts for just 3% to 4% of our total damage. Furthermore, applications of Deadly Poison reset the damage over time component of the duration, which also refreshes the tick. This creates an intriguing situation in which 100 percent quicker does not always imply twice as many ticks. On the PTR, we’ll have to see how it goes. With the elimination of Shrouded Suffocation and Expedient corruptions from Battle for Azeroth, Exsanguinate (and, by extension, the almost similar effect from the 4 piece) has become the tree’s weakest skill, unable to capitalize on any niche.
It would take a significant boost to the 2 piece, an extra effect, or a re-imagining of the 4 piece bonus for the tier set to be effective for us. While I admire the benefit as a single target concentrated burst specialized, it falls short of capitalizing on the notion and gives mediocre advantages. Both of these boosts include the text “Shiv’s debuff” or “on your target” as an added annoyance. Our tier benefit is now totally single target, which is a big deal for the few Assassination rogues who haven’t gone Outlaw or Subtlety yet in Mythic+. In any Mythic+ group, single target and priority damage is a big component of the damage, but measuring it on a damage meter is tough, and the community’s impression of the Assassination rogue dealing low overall damage will harm.
Guide to Assassination Rogue
First Impressions of an Outlaw Rogue Author
My first reactions to the new Outlaw tier set are positive, although it needs some numerical tweaking. However, I like the concept of this set, since it has a number of potentially adorable synergies and builds. This contains the utterly worthless conduit Ambidexterity, which may be useful if Blade Flurry is added to your single target rotation. It may also improve other legendaries, such as Concealed Blunderbuss, provided the flaws that afflict this legendary are fixed, since it will drastically speed up the time it takes for the 4 piece set bonus to proc. Greenskin’s Wickers seems to be a no-brainer with this tier set, however the problem is that the two sets activate at almost random times, potentially causing you to spend your legendary buffs on Pistol Shot procs without any Opportunity procs to go along with it.
The 2 set seems to be around a 5% dps gain if it doesn’t give combo points, but probably around 10% if it does. These numbers aren’t final because getting specific spell data off the PTR is difficult, but the 2 set seems to be around a 5% dps gain if it doesn’t give combo points, but probably around a 10% dps gain if it does. The 4 set, on the other hand, is less than 1%. The fourth set is mediocre at best. There is a lot wrong with the bonus that the 4 set offers, and it needs to be corrected as quickly as possible. The first problem is how seldom this procs in the first place; on average, you only receive roughly 6 additional spells every encounter. The second problem is that Between the Eyes already has a monster that has upwards of 90% uptime, thus the Tier set resetting the cooldown would just add to that number. The third problem is that the procs are practically random, which means that the 4 set may proc when Between the Eyes has just 1-8 seconds left, hardly refunding the cooldown. Finally, even with the 4x crit multiplier, Between the Eyes doesn’t do much damage on average. It often crits for the same amount of damage as a Dispatch crit.
Basically, this set doesn’t proc well enough, and when you receive the payout, it’s not what you expected. My recommendations are to simply increase the frequency and strength of the procs. Remove the cooldown refund and replace it with a flat enhanced damage effect, which will be more in line with the spec’s mechanics and give better flow. Another idea is to make it such that each “hidden bullet loaded” causes both Between the Eyes and Pistol Shot to deal more damage, to truly get into the gunslinger theme. I believe this set has a lot of promise in terms of design, particularly with a lot of undervalued elements like past poor legendaries, conduits, and even even a new stat priority to accomodate. Hopefully, the less popular legendaries wind up being stronger, and the 4 set gets a bump.
Rogue Outlaw Guide
First Impressions of a Subtle Rogue Writer
Given that it provides a proc-based power to another fairly strategic/linear specialty, the Subtlety Tier set was a pleasant surprise.
Every time you use Shadowstrike, the two-piece bonus Immortal Technique has a chance to trigger a five-second version of Shadow Blades. While this may not seem to be as spectacular at first, it becomes apparent after doing some basic calculations. During a confrontation like Guardian of the First Ones, a Rogue normally has 80 to 100 Shadowstrike spells. Given the current high proc probability, this is also the average time you’d gain from the tier set’s Shadow Blades proc. This should, at the very least, quadruple Shadow Blades’ uptime, resulting in higher passive damage production and a significant gain in combo points. The additional combo point income will reduce the cooldown of Shadow Dance due to Deepening Shadows and will end up in a positive feedback loop where a higher uptime of Shadow Dance will allow more casts of Shadowstrike and, as a consequence proc the two piece bonus Immortal Technique more frequently.
The additional set of four pieces Immortal Technique would work nicely with the two-piece bonus, feeding the feedback cycle even more. This boost also has the benefit of working regardless of target counts and being relevant in AoE.
There are a few noticeable interactions: the legendary power Akaari’s Soul Fragment, as well as Perforated Veins, will benefit from the increased number of Shadowstrike casts created by both bonuses, and Weaponmaster’s potential boost. Edge of Night will benefit from the overall increased combo point generation because to the Kyrian covenant skill Echoing Reprimand combined with Resounding Clarity. Because it creates additional four-piece bonus procs, the Shuriken Tornado skill will become more potent in cleave and AoE scenarios.
Both tier set bonuses have a little rotational influence; although they may increase the frequency of our primary cooldown Shadow Dance or force us to utilize a finisher early, they do not modify the rotational details.
As a result, Subtlety’s Tier set bonus seems to be highly promising, and might place the spec in a very good position. The set’s disadvantage is that it requires a lot of uptime, which might make cooldowns like Shadow Dance seem less powerful owing to the increased frequency of usage. I would have liked a boost like Item – Rogue T21 Subtlety 2P Bonus, which interacts with our major cooldowns and is not proc reliant, or something that modifies our rotation like the azerite power Night’s Vengeance.
There’s also a lot of doubt regarding the implementation, which necessitates further testing. In terms of phrasing, the four-piece bonus Immortal Technique seems eerily similar to Akaari’s Soul Fragment, suggesting that the Shadowstrike casts created by the proc may just deliver damage and not accumulate combo points. It’s also unknown if the proc interacts with other systems, such as Akaari’s Soul Fragment, Perforated Veins, Weaponmaster, or Find Weakness. The effectiveness of the two-piece bonus Immortal Technique will also be determined by the Shadow Blades proc’s refresh behavior. There’s also the worry of tuning, considering that comparable proc-based skills have been substantially nerfed in the past, such as Item – Rogue T21 Subtlety 4P Bonus, which fell from a 10% proc chance to 4%.
Rogue’s Guide to Subtlety
