Even though I haven't raided on my rogue for about two months, I'm still pretty happy when I look at her gear. 4/5 T4, the Chestguard of the Conniver, the awesome offhand dagger from heroic Ramparts that I obtained after my guild found it in the chest, held the chest open, and summoned me in -- *Monty Burns voice* why, this is less a rogue than a god. (Disclaimer: My rogue is not actually a god, and yours is probably better geared and also prettier.)

But there are two blues disrupting my sea of adequate purples -- I have yet to replace either of my trinkets. And when I talk to other rogues, many of them have the same problem. The truly good epic trinkets for rogues are hard to find or have many competing rogues after them, and many of the other trinkets are just ... meh. So to help out my fellow rogues, I'm posting a guide to some of the best max-level trinkets (as rated by their power and their ease of attainability.)

1. Dragonspine Trophy: Increases attack power by 40. Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to increase your haste rating by 325 for 10 sec. 12% drop from Gruul the Dragonslayer.
   Mmm, haste rating. Even after the nerf, you're still my favorite stat. Before 2.2, this trinket was widely considered to be the best rogue trinket in the game. The passive AP is nothing, but what you're really looking at here is the proc. It used to be a 30% haste increase (?!?) that was up 40 percent of the time (!!!) After 2.2, haste rating was nerfed, so it's now a 20% haste increase whenever it procs. Comments on Wowhead suggest that it's also proccing less, but that's unconfirmed. What we do know is that haste rating is one of the stats that has the greatest increase in your DPS; that this trinket is procced instead of popped, making it less likely to be overlooked; and that Gruul can be killed pretty darn easily, making this trinket the best value for your effort.
2. Tsunami Talisman: Improves hit rating by 10. Improves critical strike rating by 38. Chance on critical hit to increase your attack power by 340 for 10 secs. 14% drop from Leotheras the Blind.
   This takes a bit more effort to get than the Dragonspine Trophy, but the extra hit and crit is pretty nice. The 340 AP is extremely nice, and it being a random proc gives it some points over an ability that has to be clicked on to be used. However, its efficacy is highly dependent on your crit rating. The proc rate is estimate at about 15% -- but that's only 15% of your crits! So if you have, say, 40 percent crit, it'll proc on 6% of your attacks, but if you're only at 20 percent, it'll proc 3% of the time -- half as effective. That's a heck of a crit rating increase for a trinket, though.
3. Hourglass of the Unraveller: Improves critical strike rating by 32. Chance on critical hit to increase your attack power by 300 for 10 secs. 16% drop from Temporus.
   If this is basically a mini-version of the Tsunami Talisman, why is it ranked so high? Well, let's look at the stats -- 10 less hit rating, 6 less crit rating, 40 less AP on the proc -- oh, and it drops in the freaking Black Morass instead of Serpentshrine Cavern. It's probably the best of all the blue trinkets, and not at all difficult to get, seeing how many people run Black Morass to get attuned for Kara. This seems to have a hidden cooldown of around 20-30 seconds, but on the plus side, it also stacks with all the other proc or use-based AP-increasing trinkets.
4. Warp-Spring Coil: Improves hit rating by 21. Your special attacks have a chance to give you 1000 armor penetration for 15 sec. 11% drop from Void Reaver.
   Rogues don't deal a lot with armor penetration in PVE. Our one armor-penetration move, Expose Armor, isn't used in raids with a warrior tank. (Note: On my first-ever raid, ZG, I asked our knowledgable, BWL-geared tank what I should do with Expose Armor. He answered, "Take it off your bar and never mention its name again.") And it's hard to tell exactly what effect armor penetration has on your opponent in certain fights. But after being buffed in 2.1, Warp-Spring Coil, a rogue-specific trinket, is definitely worth a try. The proc rate was buffed from 3 percent to 25 percent off every energy-using move, with a hidden cooldown of (possibly) 20 seconds. As for the armor penetration value, it varies from fight to fight, but a commenter on Thottbot suggests it adds 6-10% extra damage in the low-armor-value SSC boss fights -- although most comments on Thottbot should be taken with a grain of salt.
5. Abacus of Violent Odds: Increases attack power by 64. Use: Increases haste rating by 260 for 10 seconds. 2 minute cooldown. 11% drop from Pathaleon the Calculator.
   Our first "on-use" trinket of the night is also one of the two blue trinkets that are seriously worth running instances over and over again for. This mini-Dragonspine can increase your haste rating by 260, but it has a two-minute cooldown and you have to remember to pop it. As such, this proc is probably going to be up a lot less than Dragonspine's. The base 64 AP is a super-nice addition. All in all, not too bad for a non-heroic piece of loot!
6. Madness of the Betrayer: Improves hit rating by 20. Improves attack power by 84. Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to allow you to ignore 300 of your enemies' armor for 10 seconds. 32% drop off High Nethermancer Zerevor (Illidari Council.)
   If this list was simply of the best overall rogue trinkets, this would be ranked higher. But since the rankings are based on the difficulty of obtaining a trinket, as well as its worth in battle, this drop -- from late in the Black Temple -- has fallen down the list a bit. Otherwise, this is an excellent trinket, with two wonderful base stats (hit rating and attack power) combined with a nice, though not super-impressive, proc. The proc rate appears to be around 2 per minute with no hidden cooldown. Shadowpanther's AEP chart lists this as the third-best rogue trinket (after DST and Tsunami Talisman), and I'm inclined to agree. Good luck getting there, though!
7. Bloodlust Brooch: Increases attack power by 72. Use: Increases attack power by 278 for 20 seconds. 2 minute cooldown. Purchased for 41 Badges of Justice.
   This trinket is the mirror of a lot of rogue trinkets in BC: a base stat increase, plus a use ability that increases AP/crit rating/haste/etc. Bloodlust Brooch stands out by having a fairly high AP increase, and an on-use ability that lasts twice as long as most. Shadowpanther rates this as slightly better than the two blue trinkets mentioned earlier. However, I'm not quite convinced that this is 41 Badges of Justice better than Abacus of Violent Odds or Hourglass of the Unraveller.
8. Ashtongue Talisman of Lethality: 20 percent chance per combo point for your finishing moves to grant 145 critical strike rating for 10 sec. Black Temple exalted reward.
   Why they made the Black Temple exalted trinket best for a non-combat spec I'll never know, but here it is -- the Ashtongue Talisman of Lethality. This is far and away the best trinket available for mutilate rogues, and is also very good for combat sword rogues. Their quick combo point generation means that they'll be able to keep this up 80 to 90 percent of the time on a boss fight, making it an essentially permanent 145 crit increase. Combat dagger rogues build up combo points a little slower, but this can still be a nice trinket for you if you're that far into BT and still sporting some iffy trinkets.
9. Romulo's Poison Vial: Improves hit rating by 35. Your melee and ranged attacks have a chance to inject poison into your target, dealing 222 to 332 nature damage. 29% drop off Julianne in Karazhan.
   Yeah, just what rogues need -- more poisons. But seriously, the hit rating on this thing is killer for a rogue in the early stages of raiding, and is probably the best part of this trinket. The poison is nice but seems to have a very low proc rate -- anywhere from 1.5 to 3 procs per minute. Take it if you need the hit.
10. Vanquished Tentacle of C'thun: Summons a Vanquished Tentacle to your aid for 30 seconds. 3 minute cooldown. 15% drop off C'thun.
    Style points have to count for something, and the rarity, surprise value, and sheer coolness of this trinket make me desperately wish I had a tentacle of my own to hang onto (insert hentai joke here.) A giant tentacle comes out of the ground and attacks your opponent for thirty seconds. Sure, it hits like a little girl and has as much HP as a player-character, but Miyari on Wowhead has found a number of uses: an embarassing way to kill an lower level player acting tough, a damage soak for meteor attacks, an AB flag defender, and an excellent way to PVP-flag farming bots. It can be a great morale-booster for a flagging raid team, or a way to shock bored players out of their complacency. I suggest that you team up with a druid that has Terestian's Stranglestaff and chase around low-level elves of either faction.

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Filed under: Rogue, Items, (Rogue) Encrypted Text