I am not interested so much in the relative power of the traditional offspecs come TBC, but in the social impact that having several viable builds will have on guilds, expecially guilds that aren't totally cutting edge and hardcore.

Right now the only true class that can fullfil two roles in raids viably is the warrior, but apparently in TBC there will be an attempt at reigning in the relative damage of warrior to other DPS classes, and making all the various offspec options of classes viable - shadow priests received a huge boost, druids received huge boosts to both of their offspecs, paladins might end up making viable dps and offspec classes, etc...

Right now, priests/druids/paladins in particular have only one viable role in raids and offspecs are mostly so people can be more viable outside of raids and in pvp, so even the people who played those classes for the versitility ends up pigeon holed into doing one thing and one thing only in raids. Priests at least tend to be very happy healing, and even our shadow priest respec'd to a PI build and is an excellent healer, while we have several paladins who are already looking forward to loldps'ing come expansion, and druids who can't wait till they are viable as feral or moonkins.

How will the influx of all those non-healing roles impact healing in raids? For warriors at least, we have one active protection tank, and every other warrior is either MS or Fury with a smattering of points in prot, and they share tanking fairly evenly, but all jump on the chance to be DPS whenever they can. Will we see the same thing for healers, with healers choosing 'offspecs' and accepting a healing role in raids, but with a sub-optimal build so they can be self sufficient outside of raids? Will we see a divide and no longer associate priest/druid/paladin with healer? How will people decide among hybrids who ends up in what role?

What I predict happen for my guild at least is that people will end up taking sub-optimal raid specs that allow them to perform their raid role passably, and spread out the healing/damage gear evenly among healers - this is obviously very poor for a raid progress stand point but the least socially painful option.

The problem with off specs is that as someone else noted in a different thread, the best way to improve your raid is to take as few healers as possible, the fewest tanks possible, and stack the rest of the raid with DPS. Off specs tend to be a sad compromise between healing and damage or healing and tanking. Even with the right gear, you simply can't be as effective of a healer without the healing talents, and you can't be as effective as DPS or as a tank even with the the talents and gear for it. If a fight calls for you to change roles in the middle it's an even harder trade-off thanks to item budget compromises (ask any druid with Genesis). Increasing the depth of the trees to 41 talents and making the deepest abilities knockout awesome just widens this gap; you're going to see a colossal difference between a Shaman with 41 resto and another Shaman with 21 resto in identical gear, and the same holds true for most other healing classes. Combine this with the non-healing gear selection that non-healing specs often choose even within loot systems that cater to them and you have a significant difference in healing capacity.

The designers have tried to make some other abilities useful in the larger context to promote synergy, but at some point the question will arise of whether or not it's better to just have that class be a healer, or to replace that class with a DPS class. A 41 Ret paladin looks great on paper: keeps other judgements up longer, improves crit for the rest of the raid, can heal passably, but if your raid doesn't need the healing and already has 2 other Paladins for the major blessings, at what point are you just better off dropping him and putting in a rogue that will make up the DPS and then some? How much of a Rogue's damage does a Shaman have to maintain in order for his buffs to the group to win out? Does the mana a Shadow Priest can pump to a group matter enough to warrant a spot instead of a mage? Many of these questions can only be answered through the encounter design we haven't yet seen. There's a damn fine line to be walked in terms of balance: the sum of a hybrid must be greater than each of its parts but none of them alone can eclipse the classes whose primary responsibilities that the hybrid infringes on, they must instead rely on other classes to take advantage of their benefits. An enhancement shaman does no good in a group of casters, and a shadow priest is a huge waste in a group of melees. There's some serious juggling going on to make this all work, and I think the answer will be different for each guild depending on its population, bench depth, and overall class distribution.

I just hope we don't see a huge influx of feral and moonkin druids. I've read threads about druids believing they are going to be on-par with mage/rogue dps as far as end game goes and feral druids thinking the same. All of us have seem the short clip of the feral druid hitting for 2500ish and even one major crit for 4000 but really, I don't think that those specs are going to be more viable than a druid that was spec'd for healing.

That being sad, there are a few other classes (paladins) that could turn out bad if they forget their primary rolls and try to retard-adin spec attempting to compete with other dpsers. I for one think that there are clear defined rolls for classes in a raid set up but I guess we won't know until some of the 25man content is available.

I was intially a paladin, and when my guild started raids, I was apalled at the idea of being a healer more than dealing damage. I ended up making a warrior and am the MT of my guild. With that said, my warrior will be full protection, and I will begin playing my paladin again as a retribution specc'd pvp character. I will likely hop into a few raids as my paladin though to pick up materials for the crafted weapons if need be.

Plenty of guild members will be going "non-raid" specs (in the content we know now) and it kind of worries me. But then again, the arena system and new pvp content makes me think I will enjoy PVP more.

Ret Paladins actually seem like the MOST justified off-spec, to elaborate:
Once the other 2 Paladins place a Judgement on a boss, they can continue tanking/healing without interruption, which leads to more "healing" (since the Paladin doesn't have to interrupt healing to place Judgement of Light on the target) and mana regeneration done. They provide about 30-36% crit (assuming 15-18 damage dealers), and if they require even a small amount of upkeep they become more viable DPS (similar to a Warlock, since Paladins regen mana through getting healed). I think Ret Paladins look fine in the future, just a nitpick.

However, after the first Ret Paladin, they are fairly useless.

We cant comment on "off specs" because we have no idea what the "mainstream spec" of the hybrid classess will be come expansion.

There is only 1 real rule with these situations.
Everyone will want to dps, and not enough people will want to heal/tank.

Its like playing football (soccer) in the park, doesnt matter how many people you have in a kick-about, noone wants to go in goal.

[Double Post]

This works well if you need the same number of healers and tanks for each encounter within an instance. Otherwise it fails horribly.

If different encounters within an instance require different numbers of tanks and healers, your options are:

(1) Overload the raid with both pure healers and pure tanks and let them twiddle their thumbs on encounters where they're not needed.

(2) Have a large number of benchwarmers standing outside the instance waiting to be called in for the encounters where they're needed.

(3) Bring people who can actually switch roles as needed for any given fight.

I'm sure some guilds will stubbornly try to make (1) work, and a few large heavily-progression-oriented guilds will be able to brute-force their way forward with (2), but for the vast majority (3) is going to be the most viable and most efficient option.

It seems the majority of warriors/paladins in my guild are most excited about tanking. 2 of us, including myself, are going prot, 1 is staying holy/ret, 1 is going fully holy, and I only know 1 who is planning on going ret. I suppose the general sway of the masses might be different though.

@Zephro
Yes because Druids are the only class in the game and should therefore be the default best at everything :eyeroll:
Lets not turn this into a "Why my hybrid class should be able to do everything" thread on page 1 please.

I am not so concerned about the usefulness of relative offspecs; for the sake of argument suppose that the various hybrids are all useful and worthy of a raid spot: What now?

I am more concerned how guilds will handle who will do what role assuming blizzard obtains their stated goal of having all specs be viable and useful. I rather enjoy healing, so I am going to spec into the best healing spec once I hit 70 provided there is hard single group content that drops useful upgrades, and that the group content provides better upgrades than single person mindless grinding as is currently the status quo.

I am rather concerned about what Judia and Zephro pointed out, with all healers wanting now to be DPS'ers and nobody wanting to heal; or, similar to the current situation now, where all warriors are fury with a smidget of points in prot and tank only when strictly necessary but do DPS whenever they can and take a mixture of DPS / tank gear to be able to fullfil either role. We never forced specs, and I absolutely don't intend to do it, but we tend to 'enforce' roles, so we ask shadow priests/feral druids to heal if the raid calls for it. I just have this dystopian vision of a future where shadow priests unwilling heal fury warriors who unwillingly tank, and everyone fights over who gets to be the one dps'ing.