#1 - March 28, 2011, 4:30 a.m.
This ability is very straight forward in it's intent and purpose in that it swaps combo points from one target to another for the purpose of using them. Luckily, rogues in PvE have not had to deal with a crippling design problem within Subtlety because the spec isn't raid viable. Sadly, had it actually been a problem for PvE it most likely would have been fixed or already part of 4.1. Specifically the problem is the mechanics of Honor Among Thieves 'wiping' redirected combo points on targets. From what I understand Honor Among Thieves now generates combo points on the last target that a rogue used a combo point generating ability on when anyone in the party or raid crits. This means when a rogue redirects combo points to a new target if a crit occurs before those points are used then they are 'wiped' and a single combo point is generated on the old target. This is exacerbated by the fact that Redirect is on the GCD for some odd reason.
It's unquestionable that HaT mechanics wiping redirected CPs is not intended and needs to be fixed. Rogues can't control or avoid this problem. It's RNG at it's worst. Also, why is it on the GCD? It's already a disadvantage to have to stack points on targets rather than ourselves, but we have to spend an extra GCD on a 1min CD to do what every other class can do instantly at anytime?
#2 Smokebomb
Originally, when Smokebomb was 10secs there was a lot of extra time to get off our abilities and to setup for the kill. The result was that it was too inescapable for some classes at that duration and at that size. So the nerf from 10 to 5secs and from 10 to 8yards was definitely needed if not for the sole reason to commonly force rogues to setup smokebomb with a kidney rather than save it to easily catch trinkets and not allow escape. However, the shorter duration highlights a problem, which again involves the GCD. The window smokebomb creates is crucial and yet the ability puts rogues on a GCD delaying when sizeable damage can be outputted. Meaning that the effective window of Smokebomb for a rogue is only 4secs in the most optimal conditions. That is shorter than most CCs and lockouts and while a healer could trinket those and not smokebomb that's suppose to be the trade-off of having such a lengthy CD.
Now whether or not 5secs minus the GCD is too short a duration is debatable, but the biggest part of this problem is that there is a delay after using it. It leaves a rather sizeable gap between when a rogue uses one of the most important abilities and our next action. We can't even do the simplest thing like shiv or backstab/ambush to proc waylay. Essentially it's become too easy to escape not just the bomb, but the rogue entirely at this critical moment. It's a simple as watching for kidney, holding forward, and trinketing the moment you hear the belch and then usually getting away before the rogue can reliably snare you again. It's like if Shadow Dance started a GCD and had a visual and audio queue to let people know they had 1sec to do something about it.
Smokebomb really does need to function like prep so that we can have instant access to our next action during a narrow window.
