Instead of adding new classes. How about new specs added to existing classes?
Examples:
Add Trapper to Hunters and make it the old Survival spec.
Add Inquisitor to Priest and let it wear chain.
Add Neceomancer to Warlock
Add Bard spec to Rogue.
Adding new specs might be easier than adding a whole new class with three specs within it.
Ummm but adding a new class would only be 3 new specs. Adding a new spec to each class would be equal to what, 4 or 5 new classes?
I like the idea of adding new specs and providing new/revamped roles to a class.
I’m not sure about armor, but some new weapon types could be called for.
The only caveat I see is balancing the specs, especially after only getting 2 specs for Demon Hunters.
I’m just not sure if that many additional specs are entirely feasible at this juncture.
Before doing anything, how about fixing all those talents that nobody ever takes because they’re trash? At least half the talents in the game are useless.
Yeah we need a ranged warrior
Make me a Gunzerker 
Warhammer space marine is awesome as well 
why not both?
new specs AND a new class. hell, toss in a couple new races while youre at it blizz
I think you’re overestimating their creative bandwidth.
adding new specs to the classes would be 100000000x more work than a new class.
And we all know these lazy trav untalented devs just want to do the minimal phone game work.
What possible explanation could this have?
Suddenly a Rogue is going to pick up a lute?
This ship has sailed. LONG, LONG ago.
It’s called mail, and eww? All things considered, this one would wear leather anyway.
This idea has been floated many times in the past, and with much better ideas than yours. No offense.
Dark Ranger please
So, it sounds like you’re a maybe.
shaman earth tank wow’s problems solved. seriously i’d rather have them add to what exists i know they still have a few good devs that could come up with something okay. and maybe hire more class devs in the first place they say they make money show it and actually hire people who could help fix this game like class devs.
New specs would be neat.
But a new class provides content in the form of having a reason to level a new character to play the new class.
A new spec is something I log in to an existing toon, swap specs, and continue as if nothing had happened. And in all likelihood, I’d just end up swapping back to one of the other specs after playing around a bit anyway.
For that reason, I think the game would get more mileage out of favoring brand new classes over specs, even if there ARE some solid concepts for specs that could work on existing classes.
Honestly, delete mail. It’s a poor excuse for an armor classification and is interchangeable with leather with the way they design things (maybe barring the old stuff that was intended for low level plate users before unlocking plate). Blizzard already passed the threshold of caring about armor type balancing – they clearly view Personal Loot as a reason to ignore it, so let’s stop shoehorning Mail into the game.
There’s my barely-a-tangent hot take for the day.
Not really, most classes share spells between specs. All warriors get charge for example. Specs added to existing classes could repurpose existing spells which would drastically reduce the amount off work needed.
Assassins disguising themselves as entertainers to get access to their targets is a fairly common trope. DnD has an entire bard college based on it.
Personally I would really like to see paladins get a bow based ranged DPS spec.
If they do add new specs, personally I’d love for some sort of quest line to open the spec.
Example the OP mentioned Necromancer for Warlocks, it could be some quest involving the Primus (the father and creator of Necromancy) and prove your worth to be bestowed such knowledge and abilities.
Shamans involves going down to Deepholm and assisting Therazane, once completed she grants true power of Earth unlocking the Earth Warden spec.
Basically it gives purpose, backstory and gives life by going back to older zones. Could also be a difficult scenario, so it’s not really given to everyone at once, think back to MoP and the green fire quest, it was tough as hell, but if completed you get a nice achievement, spec and title to go along with it, but could be easier as the expansion goes by but you don’t get a title, like the Warlock Greenfire. My lock always has the Black Harvest title, it’s a badge of honour.
This way eventually everyone gets it, but gives a little reward of a title to those who put the time and effort in.
12 classes divided by 3 specs on average per class, it’s the equivalent of 4 classes technically. But druid has 4 specs already, so it’s the one class that can be ignored. How much work it would be is hard to say as you have to remember that if they’re specs of existing classes, they already have a baseline of class skills to work with. They’d basically just be flavors of the classes we already have.
Say they added necromancer for Warlock. You already have curses, drain life, etc. implemented. You only need to add a playstyle theme at that point. Affliction warlock for example has 10 spells and a passive, and if we’re being honest, there’s a ton of similarities to what destruction and demonology already have (“big CD summon” darkglare vs summon infernal and summon tyrant / “shard spender highlight ability” malefic rapture vs chaos bolt / hand of Guldan).
They also don’t really have to do a whole backstory for a new class this way, the same way Demon Hunter and Death Knight got.
I’m not saying this idea should happen, or that it’s less work than a new class, but it’s arguably much less work than you might assume at first glance.
Oh! I got some ideas!
Warrior: Gladiator Spec, DPS with a one hander and a shield.
Hunter: Marauder Spec, Melee range tank sharing health and defenses with a close in pet. Both able to take hits and taunt allowing the first tank spec that can off tank itself. Focus’ on dual wielding.
Mage: Spellbreaker spec, melee-medium range tank that gains polearm, warglaive and shield use. (Actually uses polearms or staves in one hand slot with off hand shield.) Give us back the concept of spellbreakers, maybe have a line about the Blood Elves, Nightborne and Night Elves (Shen’dralar) teaching the concept to other races.
Rogue: Sniper spec, DPS using rifles, bows and xbows. Extreme range and massive damage from stealth with abilities to move it back into stealth if combo’d together right.
Priest: Inquisitor spec, a holy dps spec that focus’ on damage dealing.
Warlock: Provacation spec, tank spec that focus’ on building demonically charged barriers and forcing your enemies to attack you, where you sap their strength from their attacks and give them to your demons. I imagine it would have its own special demon summon (though I can’t think of what demon would be best) that does the majority of this specs damage while you take the hits.
Paladin: Avenger spec, dps holy spec dealing damage at range using judgements seals and holy blasts.
Alternative: Rift Blade, a void based spec of the paladin representing, like with priests, some void users who have chosen to wear plate and use the void. In lore would not be common or a “taught” school of paladins but rather be something else.
Druid: N/A, they already have four.
Shaman: Earthwarder spec, tank spec using a shield and earth based abilities.
Monk: Soemthing something the crane… ranged dps spec using the Crane as its basis.
Demon Hunter: Destruction (for lack of a better name) spec. DPS Ranged spec using glaives and blasts of fel to decimate your enemies.
and to even them to four spec… Compulsion spec, also dps but has a lot of cc type abilities and focus’ on turning enemies against one another very temporarily forcing them to hit their allies. much of this spec relies on moving around and is best against groups of enemies.
Death Knight: Death Spec, a tank spec that using death runes to deal damage and force the enemy to focus on them. (Part of this would also see Blood DK’s become a healing spec. Using the blood of their enemies to heal their allies.)