Support role in WoW.

[Thenarius]

What do you guys think about a new role in wow? A support that buff allies and debuffs enemies, minor healing ands dps too.

Priests, warlock, rogues and other classes with 3 dps spec could get that, for some gameplay changes.

I would like to play a support role in WoW. Any thougths?

[Isheria]

That doesn't work in WoW because if you're not #1 on meters your spec is underpowered and apparently needs buffs.

[AeneasBK]

So kinda like first iteration shaman and paladins?

[Jmills]

a dedicated "support" role is too niche in a game like wow. We already have hybrids that do everything you outlines. Each class has a raid wide buff, priests, shamans, mages can debuff enemies. there are also many shouts and dots that debuff as well. Hybrid classes such as shadow and boomkin offer minor healing and healing classes such as disc and mistweavers offer minor dps.

With what we have now we would need to take away a lot of things from each class to give them to a new role. Its too much for too little in my opinion.

[Youn]

So, they attempted something similar during TBC. Boomkins, Shadowpriest, Ret Paladins were all considered support specs. As such, they were supposed to do about 30% less damage then a pure dps. What would happen is during farm times, you would have a boomkin in your raid, but during progression you would simply replace them with another warlock.

I love the concept of support as per rift. But, I don't think it could ever work in wow.

[Gurbz]

WoW is too heavily based on the Holy Trinity of Tank-Healer-DPS. If you had a pure support class, it would either be so good that it was required, or so weak that nobody would want to take it instead of another DPS or healer. Plus, historically, very few people play such a pure support role.

In short, adding such a role and making it relevant but not mandatory would require an extreme redesign of almost the entire game, and given the likely low number of people that would be interested in such a class/role it simply is not an effective use of development time.

[isuridedes]

I think such a class would be difficult to make feel unique and worthwhile for a variety of reasons

• Most classes already have the ability to offer relevant buffs and/or debuts
• A class based on this system would necessitate removing such features from other classes in order to make the Support Class more distinct
• The nature of the Class would prohibit any DPS or Healing they offer to be comparable to true DPS or Healing classes in order to make the latter relevant
• Given that, it seems that any Supporting Class abilities would be passive casts (ie. Cast Spell, no DPS/healing happens directly but an effect happens). So as a player you'd use an ability without seeing numbers going up and down. I think that would be 'less than fun' for a lot of players
• Coming up with multiple Support Class Roles might be difficult? Where is their niche? Do you have to spec for "Quasi-Healer Support" vs. "Quasi-DPS Support" ? Is there only 1 spec?

Given how passive the class would (in my opinion) play, I don't think Blizzard would go for it. They radically altered Healing several expansions ago because the role felt so passive and not fun.

[Deleted]

I would love it, the idea is awesome. As for classes and speccs atm, i would say Discs could fill this role. They have plenty of shields already and instead of their dmg/atonement part they could throw debuffs aswell.

Assassination could also see it happen with debuffs to the enemy with their poisons

Warlocks are well defined exept maybe Demo, but affli would fill the support role more.

Paladins could also be good for supports with the comeback of auras and blessings.


Again the idea of support feels really nice and i think every raid would have them

[Heldamon]

Paladins used to be a support class. The result was not get invited to raids.

[Deleted]

Hi guys new poster to this forum please be gentle.

Been playing a shaman since the Burning Cursade expansion. I used to love supporting healing or dps when needed, I felt I could make a difference to the group. Not totally sure what bliz expects for us now

[Thenarius]

I mean a dedicated buff/debuff spec. Like mini-heroism (10-15 sec duration) for one player with a 1 or 2 min cooldown, 20% increase damage on a target (or multiple targets), haste and mana buffs for healers, stuff like that.

I know blizz wont do something like a support in WoW, but I like to think about it, would be fun imo.

[Atelniar]

"Support"-roles existed through Vanilla and partly through to TBC, it was in WotLK and outwards that the support-classes completely lost their original niche. The druid class used to be literally described as "Jack of all trades, but master of none" back in Vanilla. And it was true. Ferals could do dps and tank (quite capably against some bosses). Switch over to healing gear and your heals were potent enough even as a feral spec to be of some use, but hybrid builds used to be a thing. 30/21. which pretty much gave the feral druid access to an instant heal. Hybrid specs were very capable in PvP (in the hands of a good player).

These support classes were usually the "hybrid" classes. Paladin, shaman and druid. In TBC there was a heavy uproar from many hybrid class players who wanted to be more competetive in their respective roles and since that was granted some of their bonuses as a hybrid has been pruned away. Ferals were capable of using bear form competently. Ferals used to be about selecting the right form to handle a situation accordingly. Now it is all about blowing two cooldowns and hope you kill your target, then hide for 3 minutes or stay alive. In the case of druids they forced a fourth spec into the mix to completely destroy the original feral druid identity and create something nearly identical to a rogue but with a different aestethic.

New role? I am sorry mate, but I kind of had to laugh when I read this. Support is an ancient concept in WoW, so ancient people seem to have forgotten that we had it. And while it didn't sit perfectly with the "holy trinity" it did work as the hybrids offered passive buffs that synergized with the dps. Ferals had a talent that increased crit for all melee classes by 5%, for instance.

Essentially, this OP is suggesting we turn the pure role classes into hybrids, what about the original hybrids? Lol.

[PolarityER]

I would love to be a support class. It could be like a hybrid healing, special mechanics that support people need to handle like interrupts and stuff for other roles. Maybe the support class has to keep buffs up, run around doing special roles in dungeons & raids.

[judgementofantonidas]

What do you guys think about a new role in wow? A support that buff allies and debuffs enemies, minor healing ands dps too.

Priests, warlock, rogues and other classes with 3 dps spec could get that, for some gameplay changes.

I would like to play a support role in WoW. Any thougths?

We already have support classes. They are called tanks. They are constantly nerfed if they do any reasonable amount of damage, disrespected by the dps players that need them to accomplish things that they don't need the dps to get done while they happily take it to the face for everyone.

[Echo of Soul]

I think it's a wonderful idea. However I don't believe it would work since you know, "bring the player not the class". Everyone has to be able to do 70-80% of the stuff that exists otherwise it'll make some classes required and we can't have that now can we? :P

I used to love being a mana battery on my shadow priest back in the days. It gave meaning to our awful DPS. DPS still sucks most of the time compared to other classes but we've lost our usefulness, today you can just bring a mage instead since they do everything we do but better.

[philefluxx]

I miss Vanilla/BC Shadow Priests. Support roles are always a lot of fun and imo when you played it well you could tell the difference you made for the group.

[Atelniar]

A bit more on topic, for a support-ish dps experience in dungeons? Try a feral druid with a bloodtalon spec. Tossing heals on others can heal yourself as well if you talent for it, and by healing another friendly target you will then get a 24 sec proc with a 30% boost to your next two abilities. Getting that right without making yourself look silly is about as close as you get to a "support" role for a dps spec these days.

Another issue that the "support" role isn't really needed as crowd control is frowned upon and completely unnecessary in today's dungeon-environment. So yea, there's not gonna be much success playing a support role with today's mentality. The only suggestion I have is to look for a Vanilla server or something.

[Youn]

The real issue is someone does the math. For example: If you raise the raid dps by 10,000 dps by providing a buff but you do 30,000 dps less then a pure dps. It is always better to just bring another pure dps. This happened in TBC with the hybrid/support classes. You might bring 1 of those support classes, but won't bring them all, if the dps check is close.

[THoyt]

Support roles (Paladin/Shaman) didn't work out the first time.

[Deleted]

Sounds boring tbh. If it wouldnt be boring it would be OP. Why pick a support if it wouldnt top any meters, and if you would top the meters why bother picking healers or dmg?