Veex/Zileax 2v2: Armor Penetration Stacking A Possible 3.2 Solution For Rogues? RIP Pandemic As We Know It, Triple Threat At MLG Dallas: Enforcer vs Reckful vs Neilyo?

Whether it is meant to challenge Billian's #1 2v2 team worldwide, or perfecting their chemistry for 3v3, Veex's TSG started a brand new 2v2 team running warrior/paladin and DK/paladin, and in just one week they are third place with a 80% win rate.  Warrior/paladin is not exactly a super dominant comp on SK-100, but in the hands of Veex/Zileax, it was a lot of fun to watch. 

Yes, like his journey to deadly gladiator as warlock/shaman, Veex is gracious enough to stream all of his games on Xfire and if you are lucky enough to get in the queue, you too can watch the best warrior/paladin duo in the world beating down the competition.  Veex is using mace spec with full armor penetration gems.  6 red + 3 dragon's eye alone is 177 armor penetration ratings, throw in furious gladiator's pendant of sundering and a pair of armor penetration rings from Uldular, we are talking about a total of 300+ armor penetration ratings to go with his 700+ resilience.  25% armor penetration from gear and 15% from mace spec gives him 40% armor penetration before battle stance's 10% which brings him to 50%.  When Grim Toll procs he mortal strikes DK's for 6000+ damage on live stream, ouch.

Can Rogue Enjoy Similar Success With Armor Penetration In 3.2?

Armor penetration is already our best PVE stat for combat builds, and with expose armor/mace spec and S7/T9 gear, 60% armor penetration before trinket proc is not a dream.  I went on TR and dueled Veex and a few other warriors with S5 gear.  With just 176 armor penetration ratings, serrated blade, expose armor, and AR/prep/mace, the sustained damage was very pleasant.

Unfortunately, for mutilate, 25% of your overall damage comes from poisons, and that does not scale with armor penetration at all.  It also won't do anything against abilities like soul link or 3.2 resilience flat damage reduction, making it weak vs warlocks, probably our toughest opponent in 3.2 arena.  Blizzard chose to cap armor penetration against heavy armor.  Against a warrior with 14K armor, 60% reduction would only take away 6000 instead of 8400, so unless AR/prep somehow becomes the dominant spec of 3.2, attack power stacking is still superior.

RIP Pandemic

With Kintt moving to Emazing Gaming, scout reported a rumor that most of the remaining members of Pandemic are quitting and the sponsor was informed.  About time!  Pandemic will finally be able to reload their roster and there are so many outstanding teams out there for pickup. 

Looking at Ohnoes's response to one of his loyal fans, one has to wonder why didn't they do this at the end of 2008 season, when it was clear the team was going nowhere.  One must love the sour grape of "you must be RMP to win anything" when 1 out of 4 teams from US/EU going to Blizzcon is RMP.  The game must be terrible when you can't win anything, that is always the way it works right?



Triple Threat MLG Dallas:  Enforcer vs Reckful vs Neilyo?

It can certainly happen and it would be the most exciting battle of the rogue heroes of all time!  We have Enforcer, widely considered the best rush down rogue in tournaments today and two titles in his first two tournaments with SK-US's RMP.

We have Merciless/Vengeful/Brutal/Deadly Gladiator Reckful-kun, who transferred to BG9 (to avoid the freight train that is Veex's TSG and add furious gladiator to his collection?) and took 1st place in just one week.  Several sponsored teams are looking for a superstar rogue right now, and maybe Pandemic or Gravitas will even pick his entire team up?

And last but not least, we have Neilyo-kun, whose name showed up on the register as the new Team Fnatic with Yog/Douja as rogue/lock/shaman.  I hate to see the end of Hafu/Glick Fnatic.  I think Douja is too soft to ever win a championship and Neilyo-kun is past his prime (his container is old compared to the 17 years young/beautiful body Enforcer possesses), but looking at Realz's career without Serennia-sama, maybe there is hope for this team after all. 

According to Neilyo-kun, Yog is "far and away the best warlock in the game today", he made the same statement about Pookz's mage and looking at Pookz's tournament record, I do believe Fnatic made the right choice of rebuilding around Yog, I am just not sure if Neilyo/Douja are the right pieces.  Afterall Pookz had to leave Neilyo behind to win his championships, will Neilyo serve as another stepping stone here?  We will see!