Blizzard published a class deep dive for Rogues and Warlocks in World of Warcraft: Forever on October 7, Wowhead reported, setting out baseline ability changes and reworked talent trees for both classes. Blizzard said abilities and talents may continue to change throughout the beta test.
The post also set out how talents work. Talents become available from level 10 and keep the one-point milestone talents at 11, 21 and 31 points, now joined by a new milestone at 16 points. Players change talents, including Legacy talents, at a class trainer in one of the major cities, and Dual Specialization unlocks at level 40.
Rogue
All Rogue poisons gain additional charges and can now be applied alongside temporary weapon enchantments such as Weightstones and Sharpening Stones. Sap no longer breaks Stealth, Feint's threat reduction is doubled, and Distract now lowers affected enemies' Stealth detection for 10 seconds, which Blizzard noted also tells enemy players a Rogue is nearby. Expose Armor's reduction was raised to match five applications of Sunder Armor, and it no longer prevents Warriors from using Sunder Armor on the same target. Rogues can also now equip one-handed axes.
In the talent trees, Assassination gains Mutilate as its 21-point milestone, a 60-Energy attack that strikes with two daggers and awards two Combo Points, and a new 31-point finisher, Venom, which increases Poison damage by 30% and the chance to apply Poisons by 10%. Blizzard said it wants Assassination to be a Poison-focused playstyle. Combat folds its four weapon specializations into a single talent, Hack and Slash, which also adds a bonus for axes, and several Combat talents gain Backstab support. Subtlety adds Quietus and Cutthroat, the latter giving Backstab a chance to make the next Ambush usable without Stealth, and a new 31-point talent, Thousand Cuts. Blizzard said Rogues keep the highest potential single-target melee damage in the game.
Warlock
Curse of Agony and Curse of Doom become Banes, and only one Bane per Warlock can be active on a target. Curse of the Elements now applies to all magic damage, while Curse of Shadows is removed. Firestone and Spellstone become weapon imbues that stack with other temporary enchantments, granting Fire and Shadow bonuses respectively. Warlock pets now scale from their summoner's stats, Life Tap scales with Spirit, and Drain Soul gains a progressive per-tick chance to grant a Soul Shard.
Demonology's Demonic Sacrifice was redesigned as the 11-point milestone with two-hour effects, and the new 31-point talent Demonic Pact keeps that effect active when a different pet is summoned, which Blizzard said lets Warlocks benefit from Demonic Sacrifice and Master Demonologist at the same time for the first time. In Destruction, Destructive Reach moves to the first row and now applies to all damaging spells, Conflagrate becomes the 16-point milestone, the new 21-point Bane of Havoc copies 15% of the Warlock's damage against other targets onto the afflicted target, and Incinerate is the new 31-point talent.