Certainly on PTS Rift Launcher Window, First notes/indications of changes.

[Puandro]

Testing
663 AP
1103 Crit

Lethal and Virulent poisons and Baneful touch buff (no Combat Pose)
Tablet (No Fervor)

Full T3 and Relic weapons.

2.5 Min Parse

Sabdancer 1,296
Sabdancer with Expose Weakness macro into Spike/Sharpnel macros 1,330

[Cleanbeaver]

40NB/18Sin/8RS seems to be doing good dps, more testing is needed.

[Puandro]

Testing
663 AP
1103 Crit

Lethal and Virulent poisons and Baneful touch buff (no Combat Pose)
Tablet (No Fervor)

Full T3 and Relic weapons.

2.5 Min Parse

Sabdancer 1,296
Sabdancer with Expose Weakness macro into Spike/Sharpnel macros 1,330

With Whetstones

[RageHulkSmash]

I hope they have more ranger changes because so far, it's a nerf. Shadow fire got nerfed, and the only other changes I notice are killing focus works with melee weapons and master huntsman increases wolf's heal debuff to 50%. Lame...

Even marksman dps got nerfed a bit. New master archer is a nerfed version of snipers pedestal that you can't benefit from while moving, single-minded fury is a big nerf, old master archer replaced with munitions that can't be used with other weapon enchants... I thought we were going to bring ranged dps in line with melee? Not make mm a nice 3rd role for melee builds...

[Nightwish]

Silly question but anyone else want Rogue Armor Pen was additive?

- Vybz

[Nightwish]

Silly question but anyone else wish Rogue Armor Pen was additive?

I fail, tired, good night.

- Vybz

[Vindicit]

Well with the poison mastery change thats a straight 15% nerf to Sabs so a new build or rotation will be required to matter what after this goes live. But anything other then Sab in a raid is going to be a dps loss if there are more then 5 adds. We need more powerful skills in melee builds that hit multiple targets.

[Puandro]

Testing
663 AP
1103 Crit

Lethal and Virulent poisons and Baneful touch buff (no Combat Pose)
Tablet (No Fervor)

Full T3 and Relic weapons.

2.5 Min Parse

Sabdancer 1,296
Sabdancer with Expose Weakness macro into Spike/Sharpnel macros 1,330

And Whetstones

Parsed Sozu Spec with Electrified Munitions and Lethal and i got 1,253 DPS
Tried Invigorating instead of Lethal and i got 1,225.

Lethal was 20 DPS in the first parse so in raids if a rogue is providing the 5% crit debuff i think the 2 MM buffs will be doing more dps.

[Sorreah]

I have read a lot of "wow that is super op that you can last through a fight with those new leeches." Chlorolocks/clerics/warriors haven't been watching rogues beat their heads against them and fall over for a long while or anything. I know chlorolocks think it is balanced rogues can kill themselves on warlock armor, I know warriors think it is balanced that they can kill rogues by chain block healing everything, and I know clerics think it is balanced that they can slowly waterjet you to death. Please, you are making yourselves look silly.

[Puandro]

And Whetstones

Parsed Sozu Spec with Electrified Munitions and Lethal and i got 1,253 DPS
Tried Invigorating instead of Lethal and i got 1,225.

Lethal was 20 DPS in the first parse so in raids if a rogue is providing the 5% crit debuff i think the 2 MM buffs will be doing more dps.

Added Expose Weakness to my ST macro and Finisher and i got 1,286 DPS

Expose weakness seems pretty good in every macro.

[Azzazal]

will my 33 NB 33 Sin build for pvp be better? I'm hungover so someone feed the changes to me in idiot speak!

[charliekelly]

Well with the poison mastery change thats a straight 15% nerf to Sabs so a new build or rotation will be required to matter what after this goes live. But anything other then Sab in a raid is going to be a dps loss if there are more then 5 adds. We need more powerful skills in melee builds that hit multiple targets.

what? what nerf? lol its still 15% increase as far as i can tell.

[Stimuz]

20% of healing taken vs a target with 50% heal debuff is gonna be like getting healed by a bard. Why so much QQ over that?

[RageHulkSmash]

MY FIRST IMPRESSIONS

RIFT 1.5 In-Progress Playstesting is underway!

PLEASE NOTE – The version of the Public Test Shard for today’s PvP test has some highly experimental class updates well. More details will be available in future update notes, when and if any of the changes are kept.

There are currently some smaller tweaks in play for Warriors and Clerics. One thing that Rogues will definitely notice is that they have received a fairly large update.

General gameplay goals for the Rogue update:

* Competitive PvE Alternatives to Sabodancer, both melee and ranged. Right... Ranged dps got nerfed with these changes
* Competitive PvP DPS. You should fear seeing a Rogue the same way you see a Warrior. Of equal Prestige Rank, the two should be capable of providing a similar amount of PvP threat. Well we got more survivability but our dps didn't change much. Our ranged dps went downward
* Survivability improvements. Some self heal improvements and vampiric-type Healing Siphons - Abilities that reduce the healing intake capacity of one's target, with a portion of the stolen amount going to the rogue. Good changes.
* Better synergies between souls MM and Ranger are better in melee builds, but serrated blades still doesn't help ranged.
* More utility without giving up the majority of their DPS to get it, bringing them closer in line to the flexibility that other callings have. The life leeches and buffed healing debuffs are good.
* Large pack tanking improvements - Improvement to threat on multiple mobs We didn't really need aoe threat as much as physical mitigation, but good changes nonetheless
* Running capacity remains -- BUT, Double-teleport-invulnerable runner (the "bugged" one) goes away. It was long awaited
* Reduction in required reliance on "unfair" tactics (invuls, slips, etc) via adding true competitive power In other words, slip away is getting nerfed hard

Themes used to arrive at the goals:

* Marksman: No longer suffers an identity crisis around being the mobile-soul-that-requires-mostly-stationary-play. Pedestals are gone. Sniping remains. They get enchanted Ammo buffs (via their new "Munitions" line), and can bring one more ability into an AE rotation. New survivability as well. Better synergy. First of all, you removed pedestals but gave us master archer in return? That's a huge nerf, especially considering you never get that buff while moving like we did with pedestals for 15 seconds. How is that less identity crisis than it is now? It's more identity crisis ffs. Munitions are nice but we lost key dps bonuses to gain them (like old master archer, sniper's pedestal, old single-minded fury, etc) which ends up being a dps downgrade.
* Ranger: Synergizes with other souls better. No longer overly dependent on Shadow Fire. In other words, shadow fire is nerfed and we got nothing in return
* Riftstalker: Offensively synergizes through +AP and reflect shields. Some new multi-target threat coolness here too. You should be able to take some RS without flooring your DPS, as melee souls' ability to close all currently lives in this tree. Overall nice, but still lacking physical mitigation
* Saboteur: Use of bombs should not be a DPS downgrade. Ok
* Bladedancer: Should be a viable in-your-face combat rogue. And how are they viable in this regard now? I see minimal changes to them
* Nightblade: Some more survivability, without having to rely on pure immunities. Nice changes
* Assassin: More up front damage, less reliance on super-long, annoying DoTs. Better poisons. Less "waste a finisher to apply a short buff." Slip away should not be a requirement to compete. Slip away will be receiving changes in a future update as well. So slip away will be nerfed and we got some dps and survivability for it. Sure
* Bard: A little more low level survivability - More of a reason to take this as a 3rd solo soul if you're inclined to get some more survivability back. Because 30 hps will boost our survivability immensely, right? /sigh

* Full PTS notes to follow in the next couple of days.

Don't get me wrong, I'm pretty excited to try these new pvp changes. But don't inform your subscribers about "buffs" when they really aren't buffs or anywhere near what you say they are. I really hope there are more changes coming because it looks like a mess right now.

[Puandro]

32 BD
19 Sin
15 MM

1,220