Rogue Damage Abilities

Damage abilities

These are abilities primarily used to deal damage and build up combo points.

Sinister Strike
An instant attack that causes 72 to 73 damage in addition to your normal weapon damage. Awards 1 combo points.

The basic damaging attack for a Rogue, this is the basic combo point builder. What this means is that in almost any situation you can consider your energy regen, which is 20 per tick, and know how long it will be before you have 5 combo points for a finisher, assuming you have the improved sinister strike talent, which makes the cost of the ability 40 energy. Using this knowledge to your advantage will allow you to better time stuns and gouges to allow the enemy minimal time to attack while you prepare your finisher. The most important thing to understand about sinister strike, as well as the backstab ability and ambush, is that these attacks are instant. This means that the most important stat on any main hand weapon is the maximum and minimum damage range. Your weapon speed is effectively the global cool down on all abilities, since you can sinister strike whenever you have energy, independent of the weapon’s own speed.

Backstab
Backstab the target, causing 150% weapon damage plus 210 to the target. Must be behind the target. Requires a dagger in the main hand. Awards 1 combo point.

Almost identical to ambush, except usable out of stealth, it is the primary damage dealer for most dagger Rogues. Coupled with the improved backstab talent it has the tendency to crit relatively consistently, dealing massive bursts of damage, especially against targets with little armor. Like sinister strike, this is an instant attack and its damage output is extremely dependant on the damage range of the dagger being used. Considering that this ability uses 60% of your energy gauge, its extremely important to time this ability to leave you with a little energy left over, either for a finisher or stun.

Riposte
A strike that becomes active after parrying an opponent’s attack. This attack deals 150% weapon damage and disarms the target for 6 sec.

This attack is only obtainable through the combat talent tree, so most dagger Rogues at least won’t have it. The damage works essentially the same as ambush and backstab. That is, it's an instant attack and weapon damage range determines how much it contributes to overall dps. The significant difference is that there is no talent that would enable it to crit with any consistency comparable to either of the other abilities. Though it deals a decent amount of damage for its 10 energy cost, the real value of this ability is in its disarm effect. This is extremely useful against warriors and Rogues, as they are likely the only ones who will be meleeing you in most cases. However be warned, many Rogues and warriors have either weapon chains or pieces of armor that have an immune to disarm equip bonus.