Rift Rogue Bladedancer Guide

Rift Rogue Bladedancer Guide by Avilah

Introduction:

Hey guys after a lot of testing, advice from people and forums, this is how I play blade dancer. This is probably one of the harder specs to use in raid environments because of dance timing and chaining abilities while trying to match the tempo of the encounter. Honestly, I don’t really like this spec but it will be one of the most used in Tier 2. In all honesty I don’t think it should be because to me it seems like padded DPS but then again all we care about is the big numbers and ability to interrupt. This is my first time writing a guide but it seems there is no updated Bladedancer guide and everyone is interested in it.

Big credits to MartialBob and Muspel. AND DEATHHEATHEN

Pros
Decent ST DPS
On Demand Burst AoE DPS
High Control of Damage Modifiers (You choose when you want to do the big damages)
Provides 5% crit debuff
Has interrupt

Cons
No Disconnects
You must know fights beforehand to maximize dance rotations
Encounter sometimes doesn’t line up with optimal rotation
No macros other than focus interrupt

The build:
61BD/3NB/12SIN
http://rift.magelo.com/en/soultree#ws/xkGB5liGkG8/yr8

Buffs: Combat Preparation, Leeching Poison, Virulent Poison
Note: I actually have Defensive Pose on my bar because it is very useful for the 15% move speed. (Great for getting to portals faster)

Dances and Rhythmic Abilities:
This is what makes the Bladedancer. There are a total of 6 Dances (Yes I even use Side Steps in raids). Whenever you trigger a dance, you gain 250 Attack power assuming you have the 4 piece bonus from crystal. Pre pull you want to use side steps just to get the 250 AP for any ability you are about to use before starting a rotation.

Binary Strike, Quick Strike, Precision strike. These can be fun or annoying. You have to use Binary Strike before you can use either a Quick Strike or Precision strike. Quick Strike gives you 1 Combo Point and Precision strike gives you 2. During Dualism they give 1 extra Combo Point so 2 and 3. Managing when to use either PS or QS is what can make or break your dps. This is due to Deadly Dance. After using a finisher Deadly Dance makes your next three Combo Generating Abilities hit a lot harder (60% at max combo points).

After Pulling I cut Side Steps early and always start rotations with Blade and Soul Parity not Fated Blades. Blade and Soul Parity helps get your duelist pose stacks up faster which equates to 20% extra AP and Weapon Damage.

Stat Weights:
I don’t have these yet but from looking at the Bladedancer I believe the spec is more in favor of stacking AP.

Single Target Section:

Deadly Dance Optimal Reset State (DDORS) – “A point at which the rouge has 0 combo points and QS/PS is available.” -MartialBob
This pretty much means its optimal to finish any Builder Rotation with Binary Strike so that in the next builder rotation 2 out of 3 of your Deadly Dance builders will be either Quick Strike or Piercing Strike instead of having 2 buffed Binary Strikes.

Dance “Priorities”
1. Blade and Soul Parity
2. Fated Blades (This is actually the highest damage but in about 95% of situations in the raid settings you will start with BaSP due to not having stacks of Duelist Pose before pull)
3. Dualism (Strictly a ST Dance)
4. Double Coup
5. Clip Double Coup As Soon as BaSP is back up

Opener
Side Steps -> Flash of Steel -> Binary Strike -> BaSP -> Dauntless Strike or Double Strike (Dauntless if there is no other rogue applying it or Lethal Poison).

Normal Rotation during any dance but Dualism:
QS -> BS -> PS -> BS -> DS

Your rotation changes during Dualism due to extra combo points:
QS -> BS -> QS -> DS
BS -> PS -> BS -> DS

Transitioning in and out of Dualism is the hardest part of this rotation so just keep practicing it until both sets are muscle memory.

If there is any cleave at all you need to add Hundred Blades and Dancing Steel to your rotation. Ideally you want to use them when there is 1-2 seconds left of Blade and Soul Parity , Fated Blades, or even Blade Tempo. Avoid using during Dualism and Double Coup. Sometimes you will have no choice but to use HB and Dancing Steel on demand (ex: Reggie’s Eyes or Brother’s Bugs).

*As Muspel stated it is higher single target dps to use Hundred Blades or Dancing Steel during the end of Fated Blades because they still get the boost from the dance throughout their channel duration. Also it means less time in double coup where you’ll see your DPS drop. However, in a raid setting you should save Hundred Blades and Dancing Steel for on demand AoE because if you are looking for higher single target dps then you should just play Assassin.

AOE Section:

The priority of dances changes when doing AOE damage and goes as follows:
1. Blade and Soul Parity
2. Fated Blades
3. Blade Tempo
4. Double Coup
5. Again Clip Double Coup with BaSP as soon as you can.

Try to use HB and Dancing Steel within FB, BaSP, or Blade Tempo. Besides that it’s spamming Twin Strikex3 then Compound Attack.

Muspel has the best Kalerts for this spec. There may be some boss mechanics added in there but I suggest keeping them because they are helpful. I only tweaked it a bit.

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