This may be too much theorycrafting in one place for many people, but I'd be interested to see what people think an "ideal" 25-man raid consists of, assuming you had complete control over class composition and specs. I put ideal in quotes because obviously not every raid encounter is going to be handled optimally by one specific group. So when I say ideal, I mean a group of 25 toons that you think would be able to handle well the vast majority of raid situations. Obviously there's a lot of room for discussion here, and I'm looking forward to seeing what people might come up with. I'll give mine to start:

Group 1

Hunter - 7/45/9
Warrior - 8/11/42
Warrior - 22/24/15
Paladin - 9/11/41
Warlock - 43/3/15

Group 2

Rogue - 14/42/5
Rogue - 14/42/5
Rogue - 14/42/5
Warrior - 22/24/15
Hunter - 7/45/9

Group 3

Mage - 11/47/3
Warlock - 0/21/40
Shaman - 0/5/56
Paladin - 40/21/0
Druid - 37/0/24

Group 4

Mage - 11/47/3
Paladin - 49/7/5
Shaman - 0/5/56
Priest - 23/38/0
Druid - 37/0/24

Group 5

Mage - 11/47/3
Warlock - 0/21/40
Shaman - 0/5/56
Priest - 14/47/0
Druid - 37/0/24

--

I'll explain my group compositions a bit:

Group 1 is obviously the MT group. The Ret Paladin is in there to give the tanks Imp Sanctity Aura, and the Warlock for Imp Blood Pact. Not much else to say there.

Group 2 is physical DPS. They're lumped together so they all get Trueshot Aura.

Groups 3-5 are magic users. I have the Warlocks and Shaman spread out so that each group will get Blood Pact (though usefulness is limited due to the short range) and Mana Tide/Wrath of Air totems. Priests and Druids are spread out for AoE healing. Mages I just split up for completeness sake, though I don't think there's any mathematical reason to do so.

--

As far as specs go:

Druid - Tree of Life doesn't excite me all that much, and I've personally always preferred direct heals over HoTs. For HT spam, I feel like a Balance/Resto build is more effective, and I also like Imp Faerie Fire. I don't know if the armor reduction stacks with Sunder/Expose Armor/etc, but the 3% hit is certainly nice, especially for the tanks and Rogues. The point in Moonkin was because I had a point left over and no decent place to put it, so I figured on fights that aren't as healer-heavy, a Druid could go Moonkin and DPS a bit, while also giving the party the 5% crit aura.

Hunter - Both Marks, for Trueshot Aura, Imp Mark, and lots of damage.

Mage - Balls-to-the-wall Fire damage. Nuff said.

Paladin - Yep, there's a DPS'adin. Why? Four reasons. 1 - Vindication. 2 - Imp Sanctity Aura (+6% healing for MTs? No-brainer). 3 - Imp JotC (+3% crit for ALL attacks? Yes please). 4 - Crusader Strike. This last is probably the most important, because now you only need one Paladin to keep all Judgements up on a mob. That means on a boss, the two Healadins can judge Light and Wisdom, and then the DPS'adin can judge Crusader and keep all 3 up for the duration of the fight. The Paladin specs are also based around having all improved blessings. For instance, the Ret Paladin will do Kings; the 40/21/0 will do Sanctuary on the tanks, and Salvation on everyone else; and the 49/7/5 will do Imp Might, Imp Wisdom, and Light (for the tanks).

Priest - One for Imp DS, one straight-up Holy. Pretty straightforward.

Rogue - Combat Daggers. Removed Imp Expose Armor since it conflicts with Sunder.

Shaman - Mana Tide and Earth Shield. Yep.

Warlock - Changed to two Destro-heavy and one Affliction lock.

Warrior - Changed to one tanking-specced Warrior, and two DPS/tanking hybrids based around a 2H Imp Slam build.

--

So there you have it. Questions/comment/suggestions are all welcome. The only character I've ever played past level 10 is a Priest (aside from goofing off on test realms), so my knowledge of other classes' abilities comes from just reading. I also don't play WoW any more, as I joined the Peace Corps a bit under 6 months ago, and playing WoW from halfway around the world in Africa would be slightly impossible So my experience with TBC is, well, nonexistent. Therefore, I hope this post generates some debate, as I'm sure there's room for improvement.

It's too late to really get into it...

But I'll just say this, the diversification of talents in BC is one of the things that makes it so interesting. Shadow Priests and Feral Druids play very important roles in raiding right now. There are allot of little nitpicky things like combat dagger rogues not using eviscerate, and windfury not getting used at all. The main point is that every encounter benefits from a different raid composition, and you can't just round it up in a tight little package that works for everything.

Well from the first two groups I can tell you play alliance.

I think you probably want a shadow priest and a feral druid, the two superstars of BC so far, or should I say for now.

Survival Hunter? I haven't yet met a hunter who specced Survival for PvE - Expose Weakness is about the only group-viable buff a surv hunter brings, and it doesn't look to be that great.

And yeah, no shaman in the tank group, wtf chuck? No shaman in the rogue group? No warlock in the tank group?

Three prot warriors? Give your warriors a break, let one or two of them spec arms or fury with a minor in prot. You're not going to notice the difference in offtanking.

Warrior/Warlock/Paladin(ret)/Paladin/Shaman (rest)
Warrior (a)/Rogue/Rogue/Hunter(tsa)/Shaman (enh)
Warrior/Hunter(tsa)/Rogue/Shaman/Druid (f)

Mage/Warlock/Warlock/Paladin/Priest (s)
Mage/Mage/Priest/Druid/Druid

Your groups look very strange to me, but maybe I'm the strange one. Mine:

Group 1
Warrior - Protection
Druid - Feral
Warlock
Paladin - Holy
Druid - Tree of Life

Group 2
Rogue
Rogue
Warrior - Fury
Druid - Feral
Shaman - Enhancement

Group 3
Mage
Mage
Mage
Warlock
Shaman - Elemental

Group 4
Hunter
Hunter
Hunter
Priest - Shadow
Shaman - Restoration

Group 5
Paladin - Holy
Paladin - Holy
Priest - Holy
Priest - Holy
Warlock

Based on my raiding experience in TBC up to this point, I like feral druids of both the cat and bear variety, I like elemental and enhancement shaman, I like shadow priests, and I don't like retribution paladins. The only question to me is how many of these "lower dps than a real dps class but result in higher total raid dps via group buffs" classes is too many.

:asciiheadacheguy:

Let's skip to your caveats and work our way back up:

While its limitations are vast, an aura of +100-+200 to healing in a tank group doesn't excite you, while the druid himself is getting a 20% discount on his healing spells?

"When your only tool is a hammer, every problem in the world begins to resemble a nail."

Personal preference should never supercede analysis, and a 25 person raid is surprisingly large enough to fit both direct and over time healing into them. Additionally, if something incapacitates you, what's going to keep the tank alive - your direct heal you can't cast, or the heal over time that's cheerfully ticking away?

It's such a fundamental conversation (as are so many to follow) that it boggles the mind, really.

It does. However, and this is also below, Sunder and EA conflict. So you may have Sunder+FF, or EA+FF, but not Sunder+EA(with or without FF).

It seems you have missed out on the cat DPS revolution, which weirdly is not being nerfed in 2.0.10. http://ctscreens.net/4647 may be handy.

There also was a vastly smaller enhancement shaman revolution. In addition to their already aggro-capped DPS (which may slide down a notch in 2.0.10), and their formidable group buffs in the form of Grace of Air/Windfury and Strength of Earth totems, there's also a little talent down there - Unleashed Rage. I may have blinked, but I never saw the +10% AP buff off on runs with ours.

Swiftmend is amazing. How you could go so close to it and put healing as anything other than a secondary role without getting it... is boggling.

Slow.

1+2 can be gotten by a deep holy paladin who "only" sacrifices half of an int->healing/spell talent. (Illumination + Holy Power = cool).

+3% crit, presuming 15 DPS in the raid is still less than just bringing a baseline DPSer instead.

If it's safe enough for one paladin to renew judges, why isn't it safe enough for all?
If it's not safe enough for one paladin to renew judges, CS is doing nothing for you.

Rupture is cool with mangle.

Who is protection and who isn't should be an artifact of 10 man raids, if that.

Ask any rogue on the planet who has experienced totems if they'd want a group that looks like this. Also, where's the battleshout?

Shadowpriest for mana would be cool too.

Starting the premise from the ground up

Most of our raids are far from any ideal, and that experience is pushing me towards the conclusion that there is a lot of value to heterogenous groups. Sure, half the people in any given group aren't helping the other half by being in that group as another, but in some encounters (Shade of Aran, I'm looking at you) the "best" solutions can be really crazy - warlock and warrior in the caster group to boost HP over street-pizza numbers, for example.

Sebudai -
In a perfect world, no shadow priest with your healer group?

G1
Warrior (Prot)
Warrior (MS/Prot)
Druid (0/30/31)
Paladin (Holy)
Warlock

G2
Warrior (MS)
Rogue
Rogue
Rogue
Shaman (Enhancement)

G3
Mage
Mage
Warlock
Shaman (Restoration)
Priest (Shadow)

G4
Mage
Warlock
Hunter or Paladin (Holy)
Paladin (Holy)
Priest (Shadow)

G5
Druid (Restoration)
Priest (Holy)
Paladin (Holy)
Paladin (Holy)
Warlock

Explanation forthcoming in the morning, perhaps

need some rocket surgeons.

on a more serious note, the change to wrath of air seems to add another level of complexity to shaman placement.

But that's the entire purpose of this exercise, which I explicitly stated in my opening paragraph.

Well, I thought Expose Weakness might be nice because it applies to everyone attacking the target, not just in the Hunter's group. And as I said, there's CC as well. Traditionally I know Hunters were never really used in raid situations for CC, but now that I've heard they can lay traps in combat, I would think their utility in that regard would be quite a bit larger. And Wyvern Sting is another effective method of CC as well. But if Expose Weakness is that lackluster then yeah, I'd switch that Hunter over to Marks as well, since improved traps and Wyvern Sting alone wouldn't be enough to justify going Survival.

I assume you mean for Windwall and Stoneskin totems? I considered that, but at the same time I feel like Mana Tide has greater usefulness for a group of mana users than those two totems do for tanks.

Then who's giving casters Wrath of Air?

Problem is that Blood Pact's range is far too short, and healers/casters generally want to be as far as possible from the mobs. Making a Warlock put Blood Pact up means they have to be within 20 yards of the tanks at all times. At least the Ret Pally is always going to be up with the tanks DPS'ing, and the Pally using Imp Devotion has a 40 yard range.

--

After some more consideration I'll make the following changes: both Hunters will be Marks, with one in Group 1 and one in Group 2. Two of the three Warriors will be hybrid DPS/tanks, with two in Group 1 and one in Group 2, so that Groups 1 and 2 both get Imp Battle Shout. If all three Warriors are needed to tank, then the Warrior in Group 2 could be switched with the Hunter in Group 1, so that all three Warriors get both Paladin auras.

This is why you can put Imp pets on Stay and phase-shifted so they're immune to damage.

All warlocks with the same talents? It's nifty to have 0/2 1/2 2/2 imp HS so people can have a few for certain fights. Only one person needs shadow embrace on most fights, it does not stack, imp is easy to get in range of the tank, yadda yadda.

I think your groups are pretty bad and uninspired, and this discussion mostly pointless.

Pretty much every fight in the game has different ideal groups

Didn't mean to imply that I would never use HoTs, just that I wouldn't specifically spec for them - I'd rather spec for direct heals.

Not really a matter of safety, but rather that I'd prefer having the healing Paladins away from the mob healing, not worrying about refreshing Judgements.

To the OP: Certain comments you have made concerning class roles, specs, and raid composition (especially concerning hunters and shaman), piqued my interested and caused me to look a little deeper into who you are. Thanks to The Armory, we can see that there is no one named Keruen in <Archon> on Scarlet Crusade. In fact, there is no one named Keruen on the Scarlet Crusade server, period. The only Level 70 named Keruen in the game is a Night Elf Druid. The only Level 70 Night Elf Priest in <Archon> is named Aleigh.

I'm not normally one to care who is doing the talking, and I don't normally call people out, but who are you? =P

PS - Currently the typical Hunter "High-DPS Raid Spec" is currently 7/41/0, with people throwing the other 13 points around as they please. Any hunter who puts more than 43 points in Marksmanship is pushing it. Any hunter who puts 52 points in Marksmanship is named xxLegolasxx.

PPS - Always put shaman in melee/tanking groups unless the fight sucks up so much healer mana that they absolutely need the mana tide (aka Patchwerk and...umm...Patchwerk).

PPPS - Warlocks in tank groups plzkthxbai.

PPPPS - Seriously, 52 points in Marksmanship?

Yeah, forgot about the Stay thing. I'll change it in light of that.

Well, I wasn't sure what Arcane damage would be like in a raid situation, and I figured there's no way Blizzard would make bosses susceptible to a debuff as powerful as Slow. If it does affect bosses, that would certainly be enticing.

Haha, this is some kind of joke right? Grace of Air/Windfury (depending on their preference) for either mitigation or threat generation, and Strength of Earth for more threat generation and some extra block.

Maybe you missed the part about where I'm living in Africa and don't play WoW at the moment? I don't know what The Armory is, but if it's some data-collection thing that uses current players, well it's no big shocker that you won't find me in there, as my account is currently inactive and will remain so until after I get back to the US.

Anyway, if you look on CTProfiles you'll find me there. Technically my toon is still 60, since I canceled the account before TBC came out - I just made it 70 on CTProfiles so I could change my spec to what I'd use at 70.

I realize it's hard for most WoW players to be anything other than obnoxious, but please, try. This was a well-intentioned thread intended for me to see other peoples' opinions, and to help me learn as well, since I know my knowledge is lacking. If you see an issue, feel free to bring it up - I'm not averse to changing things. There's just no need to be an asshat about it in the process.

[edited out redundant bit about totems]

Raising the aggro ceiling on a fight is cool, and if I may coin a term, rubbing cheetah blood on the aggro escalator is cool too.

I believe Lifebloom has a HPM triple that of HT.

Last night I was the only healer (... and I'm 0/amgferal/11) for Shadow Lab, got through it just fine. True, it's not a raid. So let's take Maiden of Virtue. When I put on my healer dress, I want the tank to have some strong HoTs cooking on him in case I mess up Repentence.

Once, every thirty seconds (maybe 25, in case one swing misses), walk up to buddy and whack him while casting. Sweet addon called Chronometer, it's like BigWigs for the player. Seriously, the task is really low on the expansion hierarchy of challenges as demonstrated by Karazhan (which is my own, limited context).

Slow does not affect melee time - only casting time, ranged weapon shooting time and movement speed. As such, I doubt anyone would notice if it did work on most bosses...

Re. mages - deep arcane mages are at least equal to deep fire mages on damage output, albeit weaker AE capability. Requesting your mages spec fire for damage is ignoring the mini-revolution of playstyle that's going on in the mage camp as well.

Yes, yes I did. I was too busy banging my head against my desk when I saw "0/52/9" as your hunter spec and "ZOMGNOWARLOCKSORSHAMANINTANKGROUP". My apologies. =P


Feel free to take the Group 2 Hunter and switch him with one of the Shaman in the caster groups. It always happens. Trust me. You might also want to switch the Group 1 Hunter with a Shaman as well. Trueshot Aura isn't considered enough of a buff to justify a hunter taking a melee DPS spot in the vaunted "zomgshamantotems&warriorshouts" group. Plus, hunters generally stand far enough out that sometimes the melee in their group won't get the buff at all. Take out all the Priest/Druid/Paladin healers in the caster groups and put them in their own group. Putting a Shaman with even one healer is a waste of a spot unless that healer absolutely needs to be there (i.e. PoH spam). Yes, you said you put them in their "for AOE healing". But fights that require AOE healing are the exception, not the rule. Better to put the Shaman in a group with all caster DPS so he can give them Bloodlust.

As other people have already pointed out, groups are always made based on the encounter. It is the primary force behind group composition in a raid setting. Trying to create an "ideal" group without taking into account the actual context is a sort of mindless theorycrafting. A better exercise might be to ask people how they create their groups given certain constraints and certain encounters. At least that way you get a better feel for the thinking that goes behind a raid leader's grouping.

As expected, your warrior builds suck. I was ready to make fun of a 22/25/15 build, but I couldnt even see it. But I'll still say making the most useless warrior ability your build core is not the best idea ever.

G1
Warrior (Prot)
Paladin (Holy/Prot)
Shaman (Resto)
Warrior (Fury/Prot)
Warlock

G2
Shaman (Enh)
Druid (Feral)
Warrior (Fury)
Rogue (Combat)
Hunter (Marks)

G3
Warlock
Warlock
Shaman (Elemental)
Priest (Shadow)
Warlock

G4
Hunter (Marks/Beast)
Hunter (Marks/Beast)
Mage
Mage
Shaman (Resto)

G5
Priest (Holy)
Paladin (Holy)
Paladin (Holy)
Druid (Resto)
Priest (Shadow)