Uh huh.
You realize that all Druids and Paladins can buff, dispel and heal their respective groups right? There is only “slack” if they aren’t doing the job they are brought in for.
I didn’t say “pally” I said Ret Paladin.
Right, so you did.
Pally.
So… I was a pretty hardcore raider in vanilla. We got world 14th kel’thuzad kill. (… and got a shaman ring… as alliance. wee.)
We used dps warriors in our Kel’thuzad kill.
We brought a shadow priest to raids prior to the shadow weaving nerf - if you had 3 or more warlocks, it was worth it for the extra buff to shadow damage.
dps warriors are viable in raids, but for maximum damage in raids you will be wearing leather rogue gear as it is better itemized for dps purposes, especially as fury spec. We had 1 ret paladin but his damage never approached that of our dps warriors in leather and he was sat for a lot of the harder progression fights, whether this was player skill based or just a balance thing I can’t really recall.
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All these 10k pserver guys just don’t know… I’ll take a feral druid, ret pally etc any day of the week if they’re reliable in showing up for raids and a decent human being because trying to get 40 people to do something is hard enough let alone deal with them on voice chat for 2+ hr’s. It’s a lot harder to be picky about who you bring to a raid when the size of the pool to choose from is an absolute fraction of what you can choose from on those 10k pop servers. While my raid takes 30 min extra to complete the meta crew will still be in trade chat looking to pug their last fury warrior.
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You forgot the one class that is always in the top 3 every tier (even back in Vanilla). Warlock.
Killing bosses > not killing bosses.
Sometimes being optimal is how you have fun, because it’s more fun to win than to lose, usually. People play for different reasons.
No one is being told what to spec. People choosing to pick the right talents so they can be the best they can be is not the same as someone telling another what to do.
You’re totally free to put your talent points in random talents and gimp yourself if that’s fun for you.
If they’re going to heal, they might as well be Resto/Holy. If you’re bringing them only for their buffs, why do they need to be Balance/Feral or Ret?
There is slack if the role they were brought in for could be done better by another class. You have to make up for the objectively inferior performance with the objectively superior performance of other classes.
If you bring in an Elemental Shaman for healing, there’s still going to be slack in the healing even if they’re casting heals. If you bring an Elemental Shaman for DPS, there’s going to slack in the DPS even if they’re casting damaging spells.
Or perhaps it’s not “slack,” but rather a shorter rope.
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^this^
Just based on the OP’s question, I’m assuming they’re not planning to be a legitimate competitor for classic first raid clears. If you’re goal is to be in the next wave of highly competitive guilds that are hoping to be clearing raids in the first few weeks they’re up, and you hope to be an active contributor in those raids, then yes, look at the min/max and pick an optimal spec that resonates with you.
If you want a fun group of people to clear some raid bosses and pick up some gear, find those people and play with them. There is an ‘optimal’ way to do the raid fights. There are also successful ways to do content that aren’t that cookie cutter. Find people you like playing with and a spec you like playing and figure out what you can do from there.
It’s true for No-lifer guilds… not true for everyone else.
Think of it like retail wow world first guilds have specific class-spec rosters, a specific tank etc… and where some dps specs/tanks don’t go…
While they are all viable.
DPS checks are a lot lower that people are remembering. Just a minor point to consider when accepting and barring certain classes based on theoretical performance in their chosen roles. A raid full of pure DPS with adiquate tank/heals is surely going to put down boss very quickly. But that doesnt mean a ragtag guild of more casual raiders of a more diverse class and role distribution cannot clear those same bosses at a slower pace. And who’s going to gear faster per week ? The raid with 10 War 10 Rog and 10 Mage all competing for the same BiS ? Or, the more ballanced, mixed raid comp that’s clearing those same bosses ?
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Considering that the classes being discussed usually dont have much use for the class sets in their non healing roles it will probably take even longer to gear with a pile of them in the raid as you will need to wait for all those rare drop non class items to drop often enough for them
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Well, you have to remember that DPS checks aren’t as high as people are remembering. Then there is also the difficulty of getting 40 people to log on consistently every raid night. Chances are that many guilds will have to resort to pugging just to get enough bodies in the raid. If you’re in the guild, you probably still have a chance of getting in even if playing a sub-optimal spec since you are presumably more trustworthy than a pug. As long as you’re not playing a spec which is complete dead weight, you should be fine.
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If the difference between a wipe and a downed boss was a Ret Paladin, then you had more problems than what your class roles were.
With few exceptions, dps was not a narrow margin of success in a raid.
People who fall over themselves about maximizing efficiency like some wannabe groupies of Death and Taxes I have to wonder if they even get the purpose of a game in the first place.
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Are you suggesting you can’t kill a boss if you have a less then optimal build?
I’m going gnome mage, it was my first choice in early BC, and I’m sticking by it as it’s just as good or even better.
We draenei really do have fugly legs, don’t we? I only rolled this character because I’d never had one past 20 before and I wish my heritage had a kilt. ![:laughing:](https://d38bqls1q93fod.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/laughing.png?v=6" ":laughing:")
If by “elitism” you mean those specs are completely useless, then sure. We didn’t make this game, they’re just terrible and remain so until tbc. It’s realistic to expect to not be in a guild clearing AQ40 or Naxx in those specs.
Here is a PSA from my future Mage.
IMMA GOING FOR FIRE FOR RAGNAROS !
TO HELL WITH THE ELITISTS !
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And if everyone in your raid has the mentality that you can play whatever you want, you’ll have a lot of problems.
It’s fun for some people. Some people like being the best they can be.
Not necessarily, but the more people that choose to play a sub-optimal spec/build, the harder it will be.
I totally understand from an individual’s perspective why you’d play something you enjoy over something that is good, but from a raid’s / guild’s perspective, why would you bring something that is objectively inferior to the other options available?
Hahaha, exactly.
Lol, way to carry it to the extreme fallacy bro. Not talking about letting people doing whatever they want. It’s about stop pretending that they can’t.
Besides, If everyone had that prospective, you’re not in a raiding guild. Problem solved.
You need x number of each thing (tank, healer, dps) to handle any instance from RFC to Naxx. If you have enough it isn’t an issue.
As I’ve said in the past, no one is advocating for priests to be melee dps or something totally bonkers.
Not sure what that’s specifically addressing. The min/maxing is more akin to OCD than valuing hard work.
That’s subjective. Again, raids are not built around the “pure” class role mantra. Players established that, not WoW, not Blizzard. Stop projecting.
Realistically yes. You can be the exception if you really, really put forth the effort to be exceptional at one of the hybrid DPS but that is up to you. You will work twice as hard to do less DPS but some people are ok with that. Good luck ever finding a PUG though.