What are the Classes FOR?

[Bolty]

For many WoW gamers, the end game is the raid game. This is actually pretty debateable, since the Battlegrounds addition has enabled players to make PvP the end game and get equivalent item rewards to high-end raiding. But from a PvE standpoint, raids are where its at.

This begs the question: since there are 9 classes in WoW, what are they all for? Did Blizzard successfully implement all nine classes so that they have a utility for a raid or 5-man party, and did they eventually turn out to be what Blizzard originally wanted them to be?

I guess that's two questions, huh?

A look at the nine classes and what they bring to parties:

WARRIOR: main tank. This is the classical tank archetype and it does the job. Clearly Blizzard's intention. Warriors are excellent party leaders and can control the pace all by themselves. If you like leading parties and taking charge, it's easiest to do it with this class than any other. Not that *I* ever try to do that while playing other classes...*whistles innocently*

PRIEST: main healer/debuffer. Blizzard did a good job of making the Priest the "best" overall healer, but by a slim enough margin that other healing classes are not marginalized. This was clearly their intention - to avoid there being only one healing solution in the game. Else, they would have given Priests the ability to cure poisons, remove curses, and resurrect in combat.

DRUID: secondary healer. I still don't have enough Druid experience to determine if it's the un-viability of non-healing Druids that forces them into the healing role end-game, or simply because since they can heal pretty well it's what people want them to do because there's always a shortage of healers. Ever see a bear or cat form Druid in raids?

PALADIN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer. Was this Blizzard's intention? Why does Paladin gear seem to shift from tank-like bonuses to caster-like bonuses as they get higher in level? Was this because Blizzard realized over time that they couldn't make these guys be super-tankish and keep game balance?

SHAMAN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer. Horde equivalent to Paladin, although has no pre-conceived notions of being a tank getting in the way. Seems a straightforward design and intended to be this way by Blizzard.

ROGUE: pure DPS Monkey. Only catch seems to be that Blizzard wanted dagger Rogues to be a more viable end-game choice, but otherwise functioning as intended.

HUNTER: ...DPS? Something tells me that Blizzard never quite had a handle on this class. Remember that it was introduced WAY late in the game, the last class to be introduced by quite a few months. They had grand notions for how pets would work, and the system wound up getting simplified down massively. Hunters are "fill in" slots for groups when you can't find anything else. What was Blizzard's intention for this class - the one thing that would get them invited? Pulling? That seems implied with the tracking abilities and feign death, but in practice it can make a tank's job more challenging in many situations. Imagine if Hunters had the ability to pull things better - such as a "reduce social aggro range" ability and the power to shift aggro from themselves to a party member, like the opposite of Taunt. They'd be wanted by parties constantly.

MAGE: AE damage king/crowd control. Not the ultimate single-target damager, which deservedly belongs to classes that have to get up close and personal to do damage; however, against multiple targets, the Mage rules. I believe this was Blizzard's original intent, although I remember the days when Mages had invisibility and they could basically do *everything* solo, with SLEEP instead of sheep, massive damage, ability to walk invisibly past any mobs, you name it. Then they took it all away, and eventually added sheeping back to give them something.

WARLOCK: DPS/utility. Warlocks have so much utility it's crazy. Many players who have never played Warlocks still haven't the faintest notion of how they work. The problem is, 90% of their utility never gets used in a raid. Soul shard system is still poor because Blizzard needs the system to balance out the Warlock's power by limiting their soul shard capacity. I'm not sure what Blizzard figured Warlocks would do end-game. As it stands they become mostly summoning "whores" and DPS machines. Probably more DPS than Blizzard would like.


Anyhow, those of you with more end-game experience, feel free to correct anything I got wrong or expound on it. Do you think (insert class here) has its end-game role down now in the way that Blizzard foresaw it when originally designing the class? If not, what changes post-release have shifted its role, and what can Blizzard do to shift it back (see my writings on the Hunter)?

-Bolty

[Quark]

WARRIOR: main tank.  This is the classical tank archetype and it does the job.  Clearly Blizzard's intention.  Warriors are excellent party leaders and can control the pace all by themselves.  If you like leading parties and taking charge, it's easiest to do it with this class than any other.  Not that *I* ever try to do that while playing other classes...*whistles innocently*

Warriors can also do sizeable DPS. A DPS Warrior can compete with, but mostly not beat, a Rogue. I'm starting to believe this is the fault of Itemization, not class balance.

DRUID: secondary healer.  I still don't have enough Druid experience to determine if it's the un-viability of non-healing Druids that forces them into the healing role end-game, or simply because since they can heal pretty well it's what people want them to do because there's always a shortage of healers.  Ever see a bear or cat form Druid in raids?

I do think non-healer druids are viable, but due to the sparcity of healing and excess of other classes they get tossed into a healing role. Having 2nd best healer when you want healing is great; having 3rd/4th DPS when you already have 1st isn't so great.

PALADIN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer.  Was this Blizzard's intention?  Why does Paladin gear seem to shift from tank-like bonuses to caster-like bonuses as they get higher in level?  Was this because Blizzard realized over time that they couldn't make these guys be super-tankish and keep game balance?

Paladins ... I just don't know. I don't think Blizzard knows either. They certainly aren't "Holy Warriors" as decribed on the website.

ROGUE: pure DPS Monkey.  Only catch seems to be that Blizzard wanted dagger Rogues to be a more viable end-game choice, but otherwise functioning as intended.

Top DPS with top risks. It doesn't take much to be a Rogue doing top damage. It takes a lot more than people think to be a Rogue doing near-top damage and not dying or draining your healers constantly. Dagger rogues are now viable since Attack Power now gets bonuses from Backstab and Ambush. Again, Itemization is a wierd issue. Sword rogues can keep getting upgrades throughout the higher level instances, but if you're a Dagger rogue your best option is a crappy broken beer bottle from BRD that doesn't even display properly.

MAGE: AE damage king/crowd control.  Not the ultimate single-target damager, which deservedly belongs to classes that have to get up close and personal to do damage; however, against multiple targets, the Mage rules.  I believe this was Blizzard's original intent, although I remember the days when Mages had invisibility and they could basically do *everything* solo, with SLEEP instead of sheep, massive damage, ability to walk invisibly past any mobs, you name it.  Then they took it all away, and eventually added sheeping back to give them something.

You describe it pretty well, but in raiding they often have to become decurse monkeys and forego DPS entirely. Also, Blizzard claims their supposed to be top magic DPS, but Warlocks seem to beat them on that.

WARLOCK: DPS/utility.

Currently balanced by frustration.

[Zarathustra]

From extensive Druid use (and neglecting the upcoming patch that buffs Feral a bit), they are primarily healers in PvE. I'll leave PvP comments to someone more versed in that aspect.

You are right in saying that it could be due to a lack of healing in general. I play a Balance Druid and, when in a raid with ample healing and no need of my help, will outdamage 2/3 of the raid. Last UBRS run where I did not need to dedicate myself to healing (3 priests, a rarity), I ended up #4 in damage. As a side note, I'm generally not crazy about damage meters, but in this instance they were used more as a guage than a competition. No overhealing to skew the results, no stupid moves to increase damage.

That said, at the end of that raid I was filling the hybrid role by going about 50/50 in terms of damage and healing. Why was I healing when I had been primarily artillery throughout the instance? Because I can. It was more important to ensure the tanks were nice and healthy than it was to pound away with Starfire. There were no other Druids, so no other source of Regrowth and Rejuvenation to lend HoTs into the mix.

Far more often than that situation, I find myself as one of the primary healers in a run. And in Molten Core, I tend to be paired up with a Priest to keep the Main Tank up. In those cases, Restoration would serve me far better.

Hence, most Druids in high-level (UBRS, Strat, Scholo) or endgame (MC, BWL) instances are going to see the most benefit from the Restoration tree. They can heal, so it's assumed that they should.

Were there more Priests in the above instances, it would give more freedom to the hybrid classes. But as a Druid is not looked at as a "high dps" class, it would be rare for one to be recruited when the healing spots are already full. People would rather invite a rogue or mage to fill that slot.

[Tuftears]

As far as druids go, I've found that our (Basin) guild runs are far more open to letting druids run around in forms as opposed to labeling them as healers. I've done a lot of high-end instance main tanking, and damaging when we've had enough healing power. However, this is very gear-dependent. You really have to get the right druid who's been focusing on gear for all forms, not just on healing.

It makes a huge difference: my base DPS for cat, going from caster form, is around 70dps; with bear gear, 85 dps, and with cat gear, 100 dps. (that's before adding skills into the mix)

Contrariwise, HP goes from 3.2k for cat gear to 3.7k for healer gear to 5.5k for bear gear, and bear AC goes from 5k to 8.8k.

Really nice part is that I can switch roles within an instance; thus, for a 5-man Baron Strat run, I can go cat for most of the run since a priest main healer is plenty, and for the Baron fight, I can go healing. If you just have two or three characters and pick one, you're locked into that class for the entire run.

As for hunters, we used to have a lot of them running around, but they've been sort of dwindling lately - my impression is that hunters tend to feel like 5th wheels in instances, which is unfortunate since I like grouping with hunters. The dead zone also doesn't help in cramped instances. But yeah, I would say DPS and CC flexibility - the freeze trap comes in really handy in almost all the high-end instances, just not in raids. Especially since you can trap almost anything that's not a boss...

[Thenryb]

My main is in a raid guild which does Molten Core weekly from start through Ragnaros. It seems your assessment of warriors is right on and I also agree with Quark that some arms specced warriors compete favorably with rogues for DPS/

PRIEST: main healer/debuffer. Blizzard did a good job of making the Priest the "best" overall healer, but by a slim enough margin that other healing classes are not marginalized. This was clearly their intention - to avoid there being only one healing solution in the game. Else, they would have given Priests the ability to cure poisons, remove curses, and resurrect in

combat.

My main concern about this class is keeping enough of them interested in their role. We have lost a few who simply became bored of being heal-bots.

DRUID: secondary healer. I still don't have enough Druid experience to determine if it's the un-viability of non-healing Druids that forces them into the healing role end-game, or simply because since they can heal pretty well it's what people want them to do because there's always a shortage of healers. Ever see a bear or cat form Druid in raids?

Even our feral specced druid (who gets ribbed a lot for that build) is a secondary healer and NEVER goes into bear of cat form unless he is sneaking to the summoning spot to save shards.

PALADIN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer. Was this Blizzard's intention? Why does Paladin gear seem to shift from tank-like bonuses to caster-like bonuses as they get higher in level? Was this because Blizzard realized over time that they couldn't make these guys be super-tankish and keep game balance?

I have seen many of our paladins in dresses before getting some of that paladin set gear which likes to drop in MC. Damn useful as secondary healers , buffers /debuffers and that is it. I am not sure many would not have chosen that class had they known how it would evolve.

HUNTER: ...DPS? Something tells me that Blizzard never quite had a handle on this class. Remember that it was introduced WAY late in the game, the last class to be introduced by quite a few months. They had grand notions for how pets would work, and the system wound up getting simplified down massively. Hunters are "fill in" slots for groups when you can't find anything else. What was Blizzard's intention for this class - the one thing that would get them invited? Pulling? That seems implied with the tracking abilities and feign death, but in practice it can make a tank's job more challenging in many situations. Imagine if Hunters had the ability to pull things better - such as a "reduce social aggro range" ability and the power to shift aggro from themselves to a party member, like the opposite of Taunt. They'd be wanted by parties constantly

.

There are always 5 or 6 of them in our Molten Core raids. They serve primarily as pullers and probably lead in DPS on their individual damage meters but are too far away from MA's meter to register on his:)

WARLOCK: DPS/utility. Warlocks have so much utility it's crazy. Many players who have never played Warlocks still haven't the faintest notion of how they work. The problem is, 90% of their utility never gets used in a raid. Soul shard system is still poor because Blizzard needs the system to balance out the Warlock's power by limiting their soul shard capacity. I'm not sure what Blizzard figured Warlocks would do end-game. As it stands they become mostly summoning "whores" and DPS machines. Probably more DPS than Blizzard would like.

-

From my observation, Warlocks are incredibly valuable in MC because of their abilty to banish Annihilators, Surgers , Lava Reavers and the like. I cannot imagine doing MC without a few of them in the party. DPS is also excellent and it is not uncommon to see one of the Warlocks at the top for certain fights.
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[Darian]

WARRIOR: main tank.[right][snapback]86042[/snapback][/right]

One of the two absolute, clear-cut jobs in the game. I don't know that you could create a game like this without "intending" for the warrior to hold this position.

PRIEST: main healer/debuffer.

I suspect this will be even more important when we get an expansion, for reasons which should be apparent to anyone with a good knowledge of Warcraft lore, but the crowd-control ability of the priest is also very important. In Stratholme and Scholomance this is extremely true. However, the priest's general role is equally obvious, and pretty clearly in line with Blizzard's intent.

DRUID: secondary healer.  I still don't have enough Druid experience to determine if it's the un-viability of non-healing Druids that forces them into the healing role end-game, or simply because since they can heal pretty well it's what people want them to do because there's always a shortage of healers.  Ever see a bear or cat form Druid in raids?

We joke about letting GG tank Onyxia with Taranna a lot, but the bottom line is that unless you have a "real" tank shortage, a druid's not tanking. It's not that they can't tank, it's that you need ONE person responsible for holding aggro, and the druid's not going to be that one person. That said, I'm not entirely sure even Blizzard knows what their intentions were with the druid (although they certainly handled it better than EQ, where druids were pretty much just buffbots).

PALADIN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer.  Was this Blizzard's intention?  Why does Paladin gear seem to shift from tank-like bonuses to caster-like bonuses as they get higher in level?  Was this because Blizzard realized over time that they couldn't make these guys be super-tankish and keep game balance?

I think -- and I've rambled on about this previously -- it's because there wouldn't be any alliance warriors. ;) It's got to do with Blizzard's "go ahead and rush to cap" philosophy, mostly. A level 10 paladin with the same TYPE of skill sets as a capped paladin would never get to level 20. He'd give up in disgust and frustration. I think, when you finally get down to endgame, Blizz has the paladin where they want it.

SHAMAN

Although I have one, he's only 24, and since my only capped character is alliance, I don't even have a frame of reference to discuss the shaman end-game.

ROGUE: pure DPS Monkey.

The other clear-cut role. I think their utility is fairly obviously in line with intentions.

HUNTER: ...DPS?

Actually, in end-game, hunters are utility. You never hear "wish we had a hunter around for DPS." It's always "wish we had a hunter around for traps," or "wish we had a hunter around for extra DoTs," or "wish we had a hunter around so we could let his pet pull some aggro and save some healer mana," or "wish we had a hunter around for a feign pull," or "wish we had a hunter around to loot this hunter loot." A well-played hunter who understands his entire bag of tricks is awesome to have on an end-game run.

Having said that... I don't know that the hunter's position is what Blizzard wants for it, because I don't think Blizzard knows either. Again, this comes from sort of throwing it in at the end of the development cycle...

MAGE: AE damage king/crowd control.

...and de-curser. HUGE in end-game. In-line with expectations.

WARLOCK: DPS/utility.

I'd say "debuffer" is more accurate than "DPS," although the one inherently leads to the other. Probably in line with expectations, with the caveats you mentioned.

[jeckwild]

PALADIN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer.  Was this Blizzard's intention?  Why does Paladin gear seem to shift from tank-like bonuses to caster-like bonuses as they get higher in level?  Was this because Blizzard realized over time that they couldn't make these guys be super-tankish and keep game balance?

Playing paladin since launch date.
First, may I disagree on the gear issue.
After Lightforge (which is fairly balanced toward general "I'm not going to die, nuh-uh!" notion), there's 3 sets.
One is Lawbringer - it's clearly a healer/support set, that you get from 40ppl raids, and it's designed to help these very 40ppl raids. If you enjoy PvE experience and behind-the-scene role of a guy who actually can save the day - this is your set.
To help your inner Retribution-self, there's 2 PvP sets, that focus on Strength and Stamina to make you an ultimate flag carrier, and pretty good killer as well.
Actually this is true for any class: more aggressive PvP gameplay rewards you with high-damage PvP set. Raid dungeons give you raid-friendly sets.

Second, the term "tank" differs in meaning, depending on who uses it, in my experience, so...
In my opinion, paladin is not so much of a tank, according to http://www.aartanridge.org.uk/newbies%20guide.htm
He is more of a fighter/cleric, that is damn hard to kill.

[Drasca]

Hunters do a lot of damage, as they are free from aggro concerns nearly all the time, and safely ping enemies. Free hits, basically.

I'd say "debuffer" is more accurate than "DPS," although the one inherently leads to the other.  Probably in line with expectations, with the caveats you mentioned.
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As individual debuffs aren't trackable, and 8 debuffs are still the limit until patch time (requiring a mod just to see them all...), I don't think so.

Probably does do far more damage than originally intended, but pre-60+ gear, also less due to debuff limit in a party environment. They intentionally stealth buffed a certain talent of ours to include a bonus from gear (Shadow Mastery), so we now generally enjoy good times--outside of frustration.

I think they made Warlocks for the Bipolar, or encourage warlock players to have lives outside of WoW by frustrating, as Quark aptly noted, us out of playing our warlock characters.

[Kevin]

WARRIOR: main tank. 
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Can be very solid DPS. You really only need one or two tanks in most cases (though Molten Core makes 4 to 6 very handy at times). Even my protection spec little gnome can climb the DPS charts if you don't need things to beat on me. The other warriors are also very good at tanking lose mobs with their snap aggro. I'm starting to think that mocking blow is really designed so you can get an hold aggro while the CC'rs reapply the CC. Since you can mocking blow then switch off and have the thing smacking you for 6 seconds. It's what I do with Gnolack now. If the mob isn't CC'd by then I drop to def stance taunt it, wait a bit more then start tanking it. Of course if there is a DoT on it or others are firing I tank it right away. An arms or fury warrior can do this role just as well.

PRIEST: main healer/debuffer.
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Yep, and because of shields, AoE heals, and very important debuffs and CC they are clearly better healers than druids. They also get 2 mana per int instead of 1.5 like a druid so a non restoration spec druid has a weaker mana pool. Restoration with innervate has a bigger pool though. But there are a lot of reasons that a priest is a better healer than a druid, paladin or shaman.

DRUID: secondary healer. 
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Right now that is what they generally are because as pointed out there usually aren't enough healers. Taranna in her bear gear (though I am mainly cat focused) can tank quite well. Better than a paladin in some cases because I do have a taunt. If there weren't all the warriors around on our MC runs and if we didn't need Taranna to heal I know she could tank one of the dogs in the packs just as easily as Gnolack could. But we don't need her to tank there are better choices. Last couple of scholo and strat runs she has been allowed to do what she wants, which was mostly cat form and I was holding 115+ DPS easily. I was battling with the mages for the spots behind the rogues and the locks on the total damage dealt. I off tanked a few times a bear and I did some healing, decursing and innervating of the priests. Druids, in 15 man raids really do get to be hybrids. In Onyxia I actually don't heal on the warder pulls after the DPS call goes out and I can contribute OK single target ranged damage with just moonfire and wrath. A druid with a priest or another druid around will get that chance too, but lack of healers has me as a healer. She is 34/17 restoration/feral. A balance druid can do alright DPS as well. I think the druid's roll is fine as a healer but there are so many other choices for tanking and DPS that they don't get to do that. Get to do it so little that I actually forgot that I could do CC in a messy UBRS situation and there was a time that we got two warders by mistake in Onyxia and I wonder how well it would have worked for me and the other druid to chain sleep one of them?

PALADIN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer. 
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Paladins can heal 5 man instances. Tal healed a tribute run with Sharanna, I've healed all the instances Maraudon and below at level appropriate. End game paladins can do OK DPS in 15 man and provide solid healing, Katrin was a big reason the UBRS run that started with just me and a bunch of pubbies but end as mostly Lurkers/Basin/CA was successful because of his healing. The paladin who started the raid was actually doing pretty well on DPS until we got organized enough to have the rogues, mages and locks living through battles. :) A paladin can tank some in Molten Core as well. We have used paladins on the 5 corehound packs when we only had 4 warriors and not enough healers. The are supposed to be buffers but it's a pain in the ass for them to do it with the really short durations. The auras are big buffs as well, 60 more fire resist is quite nice for those that get to stand up in all the AoE fire attacks. The heals they throw around are nice too. I do think that a paladin is operating as Blizzard intended end game, but I don't think that is how most paladin players want them too. Really it seems in Molten Core that a paladin is cleansing casting buffs and throwing a heal out here or there. I think a retribution spec paladin if they wanted to could get in and provid a decent amount of DPS while self healing, though it won't be rogue or lock DPS, I think a paladin might be able to keep up with mage DPS in Molten Core, partly because mage single target DPS really isn't that good.

SHAMAN: secondary healer/buffer/debuffer.
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Shaman have better snap aggro than a paladin and can tank in the 15 man raids. I don't know about molten core. I don't think lack of plate would be that big a deal, I think they would do as well as a druid would. I think a paladin might be able to heal better than a shaman but both can heal 5 mans and shaman have the ultimate wipe recovery ability with the self rez and then rez everyone else. They provide very solid buffs with the totems and can throw some nice healing around. They are not the debuffer that a paladin is even with the totems. A shaman can also provide a good bit of DPS and has good control of that DPS. Shaman look to be doing what they are intended and are a very fluid hybrid.

ROGUE: pure DPS Monkey.
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Quark covered it well. Working as intended in my book.

HUNTER: ...DPS? 
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As Darian said they are high utility actually. There are times that I've wished I had one around for utility. They are aren't bad at DPS and the patch is going to help that. The pet buffs are going to help the DPS even more as well since pets should be much more viable in Molten Core. I have not seen BWL to know about in there though. Though a well played hunter when combined with pet can already compete for the DPS on the 10 and 15 man raids. I like having one or 2 in any 15 man, but since there are a lot of hunters they get excluded a lot as well.

MAGE: AE damage king/crowd control. 
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The are not AoE damage kings in most 10 or 15, the lock beats them. In Molten Core Blizzard is nice on the firelords and the 5 hound packs but most of MC is single target so a mage is reduced to frost bolt/arcane missles and in some fights they are just a debuffer. They have good CC utility in the 10 and 15 mans but really depending on the group mix you don't need any CC in strat, scholo or BRS. I think the mage needs some work for the end game 40 man raids. Working as intended for 5 man though.

WARLOCK: DPS/utility.
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Huge amounts of utility. Can do huge AoE and single target DPS as well. In the small raid they will often beat rogues for total damage because of the high single target and the frequent use of AoE they get to do. I personally think the class is too stong in PvE.

[acidjax]

PRIEST: main healer/debuffer.

I think Priests were also intended to be damage dealers. With shadow talents (damage/agro reduction) they can do some mean damage with just a mana efficient Mind Flay and Shadow Word: Pain. Due to the lack of healers and the abundance of classes that can do damage "well enough", shadow priests tend to be ostracized from dungeon raids. Priests have the ability to heal and people might have trouble accepting them as damage dealers when more healing is what is really needed.

ROGUE: pure DPS Monkey.

I think that Rogues were also intended to have some group utility beyond damage. They excel at stuns and disorientations, having numerous on different diminishing returns timers. Most likely due to raid encounter balance, the majority of mobs are immune.

HUNTER: ...DPS?

In my mind, the Hunter is a low-maintenance damage dealer. Monster AoE skills tend to be primarily point blank and the Hunter is usually fighting out of their range. The Hunter also has Feign Death that works fairly well (so long as it's used before the mobs get to melee range). They can "get away" with a ton of damage without ever getting aggro.

As far as pulling goes, they can be extremely good at it. No other class can consistantly pull a mob with so little damage. A Hunter can use rank 1 Arcane Shot to instantly shoot a mob for 13 damage from up to 41yds away. The Hunter also has Feign Death and Distracting Shot to change his spot on the hate list, depending on what is desired.

[Drasca]

I personally think the class is too stong in PvE.
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Play one. Quark hit the class right on the nose with his comment "balanced by frustration." I'd lend you mine for a day, but its subscription is expired until further notice.

There's an insane learning curve just to use the basics correctly. A lot easier for you, since you've played WoW inside and out and understand many mechanics, but still going to be rough just to figure out one style of lock fighting. While there is high utility and many methods to destruction, its just that more complex to kill a target.

AoE? Untalented, you have one, maybe two attempts to channel very easily interrupted AoE before your mana runs out. 3 if your equipment is fair, and you do nothing else. After that, you must life tap, and hold four other commands in sequence. I'm sure you're up to the challenge if you had said lock, and were tutored on specifics, but any new lock trying to find out on his own will discover a lot more needs to be learned just to perform the basics of damage utility.

Only two classes consider worry about aggro when solo'ing, and that's the two pet classes. Add range, dot timers, fear-aggro, life to mana to life cycles, efficiency, and soul shard collection dilemma into the mix... Fighting your normal single target suddenly becomes a rush to dance with your keyboard.

High Damage and Utility, high preperation cost, high learning curve. Out user interface isn't just unfriendly, or downright hostile, its simply non existent without heavy modding. Our skills aren't even at a fingertip's notice without scripting, planning and reserving 80 buttons.

Druids by comparison are also complex, learning 3 mini classes in one, but the burden to use all at once is limited to one form at a time. Warriors too stance dance when needed, but a lot of the ability is still done through refinement of an already user friendly interface. You're quite capable of providing utility right out of the box. None of this, click 100x just to get one action done if you have no scripts, 4x commands per action if you do.

My friend's rogue interface was a godsend in comparison. 3 total bars, that's it, and one applied for stealth only.

Everything about the warlock is counter-intuitive, and badly (or falsely) documented in-game. Couple that with a difficult interface, and high-ish learning curve to get basic utility, Quark's 'frustrating' comment really hits home. Even our quests that reflect such philosophy of hard-won journeys for power.

[Kevin]

I do play a lock. He's still in his 20's but the game is easy. It's more to manage but it isn't hard to do and it adds a ton of power.

AoE: Let a mage start first or have a good warrior or two and you get hit late or not at all. In 10 man raids there will be a mage around. In 5 man you might not get to AoE as much. Oh well.

Aggro: Yep you have to worry about aggro, not that hard to figure out if you have some patience. My lock tanks for me and a mage, we generally try to have 4+ mobs around with the VW tanking it and we AoE, and yes a VW, like a hunter pet can tank 3+ mobs at once.

Yes high damage and high utility take prep, but in PvE you have the time to do it most of the time.

No arguments that it can be frustrating, but that does not win the argument that played well, and many people can play them well, that they are the most poweful PvE class in the game.

[Chesspiece_face]

Even our quests that reflect such philosophy of hard-won journeys for power.
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90% of the new Warlocks i see get to nearly lvl 20 before they realize or are told that you need to do a quest to get Voidwalker, and that you can do it at level 10.

[andrewlt]

I have quite a bit of experience in high-end raiding (MC/Onyxia/no BWL) so I'm going to share my thoughts.

Warrior: Works well as MT. There are some concerns that they do too much damage when they are not needed to tank in PvE and also in PvP. In MC/Onyxia, the reason they shoot up in the damage meters is mostly because of execute. It does deal quite a lot of damage. In PvP, they seem to be too powerful but it could be just because of the current itemization. I do know, however, of a few arms warriors from raiding guilds who think that talent spec is a little too powerful in PvP.

Priests: They are the best healers, but not that much better than druids. They also have some dps ability so it's not too boring to solo with them. Fear and mind control also adds some utility in PvP. Itemization is a big problem, though, for them, same as with all the other caster classes.

Druids: They are a very close second to priests in healing. In fact, I think they're better than priests in sustained healing so they're more suited to healing dps classes that don't take damage too often. When doing MC/Onyxia, the more hardcore raiding guilds also expect you to spec so that you have innervate and you will be called to cast it, especially on the main healer and some of the offtank healers. The bear form is adequate and can be reliably called upon to tank the adds in the Garr, Sulfuron and Majordomo fights if the raid lacks warriors. The cat form is kinda crappy dps-wise.

Rogues: High dps with high risk and working well. This class actually requires a lot of skill to use in MC/Onyxia. A good one will speed up encounters while a bad one will needlessly tax healers or be dead weight lying on the floor. Knowing when to bandage (don't if you have a DoT) and when to run back to healers or just plain back away from time to time is very important in certain fights. The Magmadar, Geddon and Gehennas fights are a good barometer to judge how good your rogues are.

Shamans: Secondary buffer/healer/debuffer works decently in MC/Onyxia. They are overpowered in PvP, however. For example, they have utility totems that don't scale in mana costs as they level. Level 1 earthshock also works too well in disrupting casters.

Paladins: Ugh. They are very powerful leveling to level 60 and can take elites way above their level so people think they are overpowered. They are extremely broken endgame, however. Arguably, they bring more than shamans to MC/Onyxia because of their blessings. However, most paladins might as well by played by a bot. Casting blessings every 5 minutes and spamming cleanse is mostly what they do. OOC ressing and backup healing do require some thought but blessings and cleansings still dominate their time.

Hunter: They are a pulling and dps class in MC. They are used to pull bosses as well as peel adds towards the offtanks. A good hunter will do more dps than mages and warlocks against single targets. They should also never overaggro as they should be spamming feign death every chance they get, which wipes all aggro on them. They should be very low maintenance, too, because of decent hp, presence of mail armor and feign death.

Mages: AoE and utility works very well. Even with the recent resist fix, however, their single target dps needs a large boost, considering how fragile they are. Their single target DDs are mostly too easily interrupted in PvP. In PvE, the resists of enemies are still too high and they really don't do enough damage on single targets, which dominate the high-end raids. The fire tree suffers from DoTs, which are mostly prohibited in 40-man raids by decent guilds. It also suffers from, well, MC being MC. They are also low maintenance in MC/Onyxia, especially ice specced ones. Ice barrier and fire ward are good at removing DoTs in MC/Onyxia but they do cost mana you'll need in the longer fights. Mages and warlocks also suffer the worst from Blizzard's crappy caster itemization.

Warlocks: Lots of utility and also very excellent in dps. Those shadowbolts are very powerful in MC/Onyxia. Unfortunately, the class is very hard to learn and farming shards is beyond annoying. Their fire talents suffer the same way as the mages' and they also get the same disadvantages from garbage itemization. The 8 debuff limit really screws up their debuffing and DoTs and adding 8 more debuffs to the limit would only help a little bit.

[Trien]

My thoughts on the druid... (leaving out PvP comments for now).

One saying commonly spouted is that while the shaman is the jack of all trades, the druid is jack of one trade at a time...

Pretty good healers? Sure. Somewhat different style of healing than a priest though, with a lack of a short cast heal and a untimered group heal. A good druid can reliably heal any of the 5-man instances, or a couple druids for 10-man UBRS. However, lack of an untimered resurrection means have either a paladin or shaman around, or don't ever wipe.

Pretty good tanks? Not too bad. Can get some really high AC to help compensate for a lack of block/parry, but obviously don't have the skills to generate agro like a warrior. Can tank any of the 5-man instances... never tried a UBRS group without at least one warrior around, but I can't see why a druid couldn't do it either. Require some more care on the part of the party in pulling agro. (Any feral specced druids care to comment on the usage of the higher agro generating bear faerie fire?).

Nukes? Sorta... decent single target damage with long cast starfire, and you can get fairly high DPS with improved wrath (shortened cast time) and +nature/+damage gear.

Cat form? Can pull off some okay cat damage as well (1/3 of a rogues maybe, 1/2 if really well geared), but lacks the stuns and extra skills. Definitely one of the weaker sides of the class though.

So the druid ends up being 2nd choice healer (can't always say 2nd best, since skill has a pretty big impact in this area... maybe someone with a 60 of both classes could comment on it), 2nd choice tank (probably could say 2nd best, due to lack of agro-generating skills, but do have taunts for instant agro pull), and lower down in the DPS department. Oftentimes what I see is if you need a healer or tank and can't get a priest or warrior, then you'll call on a druid (stealth runs aside). Hardly ever is a druid called upon to be damage dealing; I see it only within guild runs. Thus one can ask the question, if you have a priest or warrior, why take a druid? Some argue for backup, if one falls the druid can step in, or if things go bad and you need a 2nd of something, he's there... (so could a paladin in many cases, assuming they're geared with a large enough mana pool, which often isn't the case...) Truthfully, I'm not sure if I can answer this question.

In the 40-man raids, you'll have many of each class, and each one basically ends up doing a few specialized things... be you druid or mage or whatever. For the druid it's MotW, heal, decurse, innervate, combat rez (though I suppose it's better than the paladin's constant rebuffing, and heal + cleanse). There is one balance druid in our MC group though, and he typically ends up in the top 10 for damage (those dratted damage meters, I hate 'em!), and can backup heal when needed. I was going to tank one of Sulfuron's guards once when we were short a warrior, but my ISP decided to cut out right after they pulled, so never got that chance *cries*...

[Kevin]

So the druid ends up being 2nd choice healer (can't always say 2nd best, since skill has a pretty big impact in this area... maybe someone with a 60 of both classes could comment on it),
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I have a 60 druid. My wife has a 60 priest that I've played a few times and played with a lot. The priest is most definitely the more flexible and easier to heal with healer. I really don't even count tranquility as an AoE heal, if you are the only healer as a druid the times when you need to use an AoE HoT instead of a different heal are pretty rare, though there are lots of times I'd love to have a 3 second cast AoE heal or an instant cast weak AoE heal (Holy Nova). Natures Swiftness makes up for not having a shield when healing but not when you have a mage or lock AoE'ing. And the double HoT doesn't make up for not having a flash heal when healing an AoE'r either. Spamming Regrowth and hoping for a crit is your best bet there but that is horrible on the mana pool and of course the tank will be getting hurt while keeping the elite(s) off the AoE'r and you need to get a heal out on them at some point too. Priests have a lot more options there.

Innevervate is the only reason we sustain better than a priest. Mana effieciency on the heals is pretty close (depending on spec) but a priest will have a bigger base mana pool even without the talent that raises it by 10%. The 15% mana regen that a restoration spec druid wil have breaks a lot of times (devs have confirmed this bug) and when it does work is pretty negligable, even sitting around 270 spirit (which is where my druid is at in her typical gear that she uses to heal, that is unbuffed). But priests get 2 mana per int, druids 1.5. So I see priests with 6500+ mana unbuffed and druids in similar level gear at around 5000. Innervate turns that into an effective 8000-9000 pool, but if you dont have innervate you can't even sustain healing longer than a priest.

It's also my observation that if you need to sustain healing that long you either have other healers around or everyone will have, or is taking damage, and the AoE healing would be nice to have and makes up for the fact that I can innervate to heal longer. If there are other healers around that innervate is almost always better used on them anyway so it doesn't help you sustain healing either.

I can main heal just fine and do a lot of healing on the raids when I take my druid and not my warrior. Heck in Onyxia I've got her breath attack timed well enough that I usually land my healing touch right after it hits then see all the priests flash heals get cancelled (a priest can do the same type of thing with a greater heal). I've finished higher than priests in healing done several times on smaller raids as well.

But I'm pretty confident in saying that even a shadow spec priest given similar level gear is a better healer than a restoration spec druid simply because they have so many more options for healing. That being said I still think that if you only had druid healers you could get through Magmadar (all the farther I've gotten in Molten Core) given that you still had the same number of total healers.

[Warlock]

On Warlocks... the class isn't that hard. More to manage than most classes, but still very playable even with the basic interface (all that I use). The pet teaches new players the basics of aggro management in their teens, not halfway through Sunken Temple. In groups they provide decent or better single target damage, good-enough AE, pet for buff or melee offtank or crowd control or caster offtank, wipe prevention, a little crisis healing, runner prevention, demon/elemental crowd control... not a bad little list. I love my lock. Whatever their PVP frustrations they are very solid indeed in PVE.

On Druids... I feel that Druids actually bring more to a 5-man group in which they are present as main tank than they do when the main healer. Having a tank that can shift, Innervate, Instant Healing Touch, Rebirth and then go back to tanking is going to save more groups than having a healer that can stop healing and quadruple their armour.

[kandrathe]

...
HUNTER: ...DPS?  Something tells me that Blizzard never quite had a handle on this class.  Remember that it was introduced WAY late in the game, the last class to be introduced by quite a few months.  They had grand notions for how pets would work, and the system wound up getting simplified down massively.  Hunters are "fill in" slots for groups when you can't find anything else.  What was Blizzard's intention for this class - the one thing that would get them invited?  Pulling?  That seems implied with the tracking abilities and feign death, but in practice it can make a tank's job more challenging in many situations.  Imagine if Hunters had the ability to pull things better - such as a "reduce social aggro range" ability and the power to shift aggro from themselves to a party member, like the opposite of Taunt.  They'd be wanted by parties constantly.
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Since we use mana we are a mage class. Intellect is important to have a large pool to do our tricks, but agility determines the damage we can do. We are like a mage that does physical damage. All the other tricks are comparable to other classes, and in fact shackle, seduce, sheep, or banish, compared with hunter traps with their shorter duration are the least desirable. Actually all hunters would need for being desirable for pulling would be an aggro-less pull over the tank, with a further reach. In fairness, I think the range of non-hunter weapons should be more restricted. The other DPS physical class is rogue, and we are no where near comparable to rogue damage output (nor should we be since rogue need to get into damage range).

[Rinnhart]

Hunters do a lot of damage, as they are free from aggro concerns nearly all the time, and safely ping enemies. Free hits, basically.
As individual debuffs aren't trackable, and 8 debuffs are still the limit until patch time (requiring a mod just to see them all...), I don't think so.

Probably does do far more damage than originally intended, but pre-60+ gear, also less due to debuff limit in a party environment. They intentionally stealth buffed a certain talent of ours to include a bonus from gear (Shadow Mastery), so we now generally enjoy good times--outside of frustration.

I think they made Warlocks for the Bipolar, or encourage warlock players to have lives outside of WoW by frustrating, as Quark aptly noted, us out of playing our warlock characters.
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My guild's rogues can be a great bunch of guys, but I'd take hunters to MC before rogues any day... too bad we're short on them, suddenly. They're the only goddamn people who move when a fricken molten destroyer's sitting on top of them.

[andrewlt]

I compared the healing between a restoration druid and a holy/disc priest. I was basically trying to pick up every talent that increases healing speed, effectiveness and decreases cast time. It's a little more in the priest's favor since some priests spec disc/holy, which has its advantages over holy/disc.

Priests are really much better than druids in hp/sec healing but not that much better in hp/mp healing. Because of more efficient healing, higher mana pool and not having a cooldown on res, priests are much better healers than druids in 5-man parties.

However, in larger raids, especially the 40-man raids, druids add a lot of utility. Gift of the Wild is one of the best buffs around. Combat ressing a tank or a priest can mean the difference between a kill and a wipe. Innervating a priest at the right now is also very, very valuable and important during the longer MC boss battles.

I find that the dps groups in MC can do just as fine with druids than with priests. Also, the mana pool of druids isn't that bad compared to priests. Every class in the game that has mana gains +2 mana/int. One of my guildmates is a pally who has 7k mana fully buffed. I think that was before he won anything in MC, too. Druids are gonna be somewhere between pallies and priests so it's not by that much.