◊ Shalas

WoW is a very difficult game. Sometimes you even have to push multiple buttons at once or push buttons at the right time.

 

• JohnLocke

There was a thread similar to this one about the easiest class to play in a raid if you have a large ping. It ended up in the trash heap.

 

• The Gopher

Damnit, beat to it.

 

• Bass

See, that's where this thread is different. This is about the hardest class.

I can't speak for any other class, but Hunter DPS is very, very hard. You have to time shots between other shots. If you're pro, you can do two shots between another two shots. It's mind-blowing, and that's not even the hardest part! There's also Hunter's Mark, and moving your pet towards your DPS target.

 

• The Gopher

No way, with warrior sometimes I have to heroic strike instead of just letting my weapon swing for white damage, and knowing when to do so is really really hard.

 

• JohnLocke

It's science.

 

Elerion

If you are raiding in a high end environment, the biggest damage difference between people will be their gear and their priorities of dps vs safety vs utility. No dps class is difficult enough that you'll see skill make a huge impact on damage meters (high end, obviously).

The biggest challenge is usually avoiding fire, so I guess you could make a case that things such as melee range and shadow word death make a class "harder" by decreasing fire survivability, thus giving you less of a buffer.

You'll also have the occasional person even in the high end that does suboptimal damage because they didn't bother to do the research, but I wouldn't call research "hard".

 

• Intermission

Just a note on hunter 'make a macro and afk' misconception:

Very few combinations of specs/haste/latency can actually make spam macro to dps. Even if they can make a macro to spam, it will still do considerably less damage than hand weaving. And then there are many specs / latency levels where you simply cant make a macro, and you must hand time every shot.

It's not a "hard" to perform a manual 1:1.5 rotation (auto - steady - auto - steady - multi - auto - steady - auto - steady - arcane -- repeat), but it does take considerable focus. Adapting to a 1:1 while under haste (imp AOTH, DST, Rapid Fire, Bloodlust) (auto - multi - auto - arcane - auto - steady - auto - steady - auto - steady -- repeat) is not "hard" either, it's just another thing to focus on, along with the encounter itself... running from fire, getting portals, watching debuffs, etc.

However it would be infinately easier if they took timing out of the hunter rotations, and made them simply a GCD/Cooldown/Energy limited rotation similar to:
LightningBolt - LightningBolt - ChainLightning - repeat
Shock - WF totem - Agi totem - repeat
Frostbolt - repeat
Shadowbolt - repeat
4 combo - SnS - 5 combo - rupture - repeat
and many others.


DPS classes simply come down to 3 things.

1) Encounter difficulty. This is the same for all classes really. Every now and then you have rogues kicking stuff, mages sheeping stuff, hunters kiting stuff, but the same encounter design and gameplay are similar for all.

2) Cooldown management. Again, this is really the same for all classes. Trinkets/ManaPots/Resist-or-HealthPots/HastePots/DestructionPots/Gems/Flamecaps/Healthstones/etc (consumables) mixed with RapidFire/BeastWithin/IcyVeins/BladeFlurry/etc (class cooldowns) mixed with Bloodlust/Drums/EncounterVunlerabilites (raid cooldowns). Some need to be stacked, eg trinkets with haste pots, some need to be spread, eg Rapid Fire away from Blood Lust.

3) DPS method. This is the only real variable. Some classes are rediculously simple (eg frost mages) and some are more complicated (eg arms warriors, hunters). Some classes are global cooldown/ability cooldown reliant, and some are timing reliant. This is the main difference. The timing reliant classes typically require constant focus. GCD/Cooldown reliant classes dont need to devote as much brainpower to the task of dpsing, so can often focus more on points 1 or 2 that I mentioned above. Which is why I believe some classes can be "harder" than others.


Affliction lock resists, warrior rage management, and hunter haste adaptation, and threat mechanics are other little goodies thrown in to the mix.

 

◊ Shalas

Non-troll response:

There are three factors of "skill" involved in being a good warm body in WoW:
1) Gear selection.
2) Not standing in fire
3) Pushing the right buttons

1 and 2 are not class related. Some classes are more intutive to gear than others, but regardless of class someone who does no research will be badly geared, and if you do a minimal amount of research the gear selection process is essentially identical for all classes other than the occasional specs like affliction warlocks (even shadow priests aren't completely trivial anymore).

3 does have some variance, but only at the low end. A faceroller is going to do far better as a fury warrior or mage than as a hunter. However, regardless of class or spec a faceroller is going to be terrible. There is no spec where a player who can't handle a hunter shot rotation due to skill isn't going to be worthless. The difference in difficulty is like the difference in difficulty of various Kirby levels -- sometimes you just have to hold down the forward button until you win, and sometimes you have to dodge things while holding down the forward button. None of them are a challenge, so who cares how they are relative to each other? At the high end, the simpler classes begin to develop some complexity. Everyone starts to deal with optimizing cooldowns for that half percent boost. Even destro warlocks become nontrivial once you're looking at squeezing out another percent of damage by better timing lifetaps.

There's only a significant spread in difficulty if you're satisfied with 80%, and if you're satisfied with 80% you're a scrub.

Finally, a quote by Zyla on a related topic:

 

Draele

Affliction Warlocks. Yes, our DPS Stinks, but I'd put money on it being the most intricate DPS spec. DoT rotations (especially on multiple target fights), weighing whether or not a target will be alive long enough to even warrant casting DoTs, or just some of them, managing trinkets for maximum benefit while applying DoT and two forms of activate mana management to prioritize between one another depending on the situation(watching pet mana, how risky a situation is, etc) all the while nuking between it all like everyone else.

Rantings of the Afflicted, a Warlock blog: http://draele.blogspot.com/

 

PSGarak

My sympathies lie with affliction warlocks below the hit-cap, 2H fury warriors, and probably mutilate rogues. Mutilate and high-miss-rate affliction have the most intricate and reactive decision trees for maximizing their DPS, and timing slam with flurry requires fast and accurate reflexes required. Possibly enhancement shamans as well--I know there's some interaction between the windfury cooldown and stormstrike, but I don't know how impactful or difficult it is.

Personally, I always think of 'hard' in terms of requiring the player to make tactical decisions, usually also requiring it be in a timely fashion. For that reason I think of difficulty occurring when either (1) the decision is probability-based and therefore must be made on the fly, or (2) the problem has not been solved analytically and therefore requires player judgement. And personally, I disqualify mage cooldown-management because for each cooldown you only have to decide once or twice a fight, not every single swing timer.

Warlock DPS, because of lifetap, also gets honorable mention for having DPS cycles become involved more than a normal class in Getting Out The Way.

http://armory.mmo-champion.com.nyud....88847noszh.png

 

◊ Kaubel

Nothing productive is going to come from this thread.