Currently a lot of these threads lately on the board have been dancing about the same question. The hunter thread, the warrior thread, the warlock thread, sustained dps thread and so on. Classes feeling marginized by the abilities of other classes. In some cases there is more truth to it than others, but it still boils down to one question. That being what is the optimal raiding group? For sure it is clearly not 5 of each class. As a former raid leader and someone who has played 3 different classes to 60 I would like it if it would be optimal to make the ideal composition 5 of each class. Now I know each guild has different numbers to work with so that would not always be possible. (well bigger guilds like EJ could probably do it just fine, but the 55-60 player guilds might have an issue) But still I would like a system that really promotes taking between 4 and 6 of each class and starts penalizing raids when certain classes are trivialized (like warlocks are now) by reducing them below 4.

So my questions are (I'm not the best theorycrafter but there are some outstanding ones here):

1. As a raider what you think is the optimal raid composition as of patch 1.12? And no that's not min/maxing for different encounters. If you had a generic dungeon with a variety of encounters what group would you think is most ideal? I'm curious to see how this might change between horde and alliance.

2. What do you think would need to be done to existing class balances/dmg/abilities to make a 8x5 raid group optimal?

5 of each class can still work, but with so many encounters (like Faerlina for instance) being balanced for 6 warriors, drop a lock for a 6th warrior. Drop another lock for a 6th priest, and another lock for a 6th rogue maybe?! I really just can't see need for much more than 2-3 Warlocks in a raid to be honest.

But yeah, if you are talking about a non-stacked raid group and something that is just balanced, 5 of all can still work.

Just my view, but my optimal (Horde) raid group for most encounters would comprise:

3 protection spec Warriors
4 DPS spec Warriors
5 combat spec Rogues
5 frost/arcane spec Mages
3 Warlocks
5 Hunters
1 shadow spec Priest
4 holy/disc spec Priests
4 restoration spec Druids
3 restoration spec Shamen
3 DPS spec shamen


This, of course, assumes you have access to 40 well-geared and skilled players.

In the real world of course, you have to build your raid to the strength of your personnel. If your bottom 1 or 2 Hunters get outDPSed by rogues, then stack a few more rogues in at the expense of Hunter spots. It's all about finding the right mix for your guild.

Erm? Why?

I'd slot them in with DPS classes to get maximum value from totems. Put an enhancement shammy in with a pack of rogues or warriors, have him toss out a few heals as necessary and you've got a mean little self-sufficient DPS party. Like I said though, it's just my opinion.

On crazy solution could be to have 1/2 druid tanks ?
While we are FAR FAR FAR from bleeding edge, we havent met anything yet that couldnt be beaten with 5 or each class.

I think a large part of the problem arises from the fact that warriors are arguably better hybrids than druids. A warror can be both the best tanking class and the best dps class with a change of gear. Druids can manage to be second rate tanks or second best healers. Then you reach the situation where, instead of taking 5 druids and having bear tanks on encounters needing many warriors, you take 8 warriors and just have them DPS on encounters that need fewer tanks.

People wouldnt be tanking 7/8/9 Warriors if fury warriors were not oustripping so many other DPS'ers in a raid, while being able to throw on 8/8 wrath and tank with the best of them.

There is not one fight in the game where I would rather have a druid in bear form instead of caster form. On Faerlina for instance, if I went with 5 Warriors I would just have 1 warrior tank 2 adds the whole fight, as opposed to wasting an additional healer and poison cleanser. It's not like the fight is impossible with 5 warriors, but a 6th one gives you more flexibility most certainly.

Well sure, but thats a fight already where healing is stretched to the limit. Unless you already had a dedicated feral druid there would be no point in taking a healer out to bolster the warrior force. And not many guilds have or allow dedicated feral druids, since its well not that optimal. Maybe if in cat form they could have a more reliable agro dump they might be viable. But right now even if they could get all the AQ gear to get their dmg up that high, they would pull agro and die.

I was hoping there would be a bit more talk on my second question. I know shadow priests are mainly a faction problem. Alliance just makes them so much more viable. But is there anything that would do the same for ferals, oomkins, shamans or pallies? Or is it just pvp spec vs pve spec? I feel the game often just forces people too much when endgame into certain specs. I know rogues, hunters, priests, shamans and druids are fairly shackled, especially rogues and hunters which seem to not have much choice at all. (Combat rogue has what, 1 or 2 points to spare from what I read on the rogue threads) Mages and warriors seem about the only classes that have at least 2 quite different effective builds. Warlocks seem to have quite the variety of builds, but I'm not sure how effective they are.

Put it another way, would you bring 6 protection warriors to Twins ?
Would you tank 6 protection warriors to Noth ?
Anub'rekhan ?
Huhuran ?
Maexxna ?

They why would you be willing to bring 6 warriors to AQ, or Naxx?
Because your dps warriors can tank with 95% of the effectiveness of prot warriors and then for twins whack on DPS gear. If Warriors couldnt tank and dps as well as they do with one spec, people wouldnt be so willing to bring 6/7/8 of them to raids. Basically warrior dps is too good, therefore on fights requiring multiple tanks you dont bother with a druid, you simply bring 6/7/8 warriors instead and then watch then top DPS charts on fights that require 1/2/3 tanks.

If those same 3/4 additional warriors were 20-25th on the damage meters (instead of 1-10th), would you be so willing to bring as many warriors as you do now ?

On twin emperors for bug tanking I prefer a druid tanking because of feral charge being a 15 second cooldown, so they can charge + growl giving ample time for your mages/warlocks to kill the mutated bug. They can also bash as necessary. Any fight which requires high mobility in your tank and has stunnable/ccable adds a feral druid is a better option than a warrior.

Q: What do you think would need to be done to existing class balances/dmg/abilities to make a 8x5 raid group optimal?

A: Re-design WoW character classes completely, from the ground up (excepting much of the stuff like graphics code.) Include things like even scaling mechanics for all classes. Cross-class interactivity mid-fight for classes other than healers. Create actual raid roles, perhaps multiple roles for each class. Maybe even stepping away from slavishly following the rpg model created by D&D.

Though, when I say "re-design," I really mean to actually do it for the first time.