Hardest DPS-spec ingame

[bluehippo]

Feral druid...or enh shaman. They are both pretty much equal for the hardest rotation.

wait what.... Enh shaman rotation is't hard it's about watching CD and hiting 14545415456540.00.021345102354984541
365464 buttons at the same time it's not hard my main is a enh shaman

[Np3228]

hardest spec, meh there is none. well yeah maybe the longest learning curve but in due time its gonna be easy.

what matters is depth imo and that's not something feral wins at all.

[Morbownz]

There is a huge difference between playing a spec and mastering a spec, you see the difference in VoA PuGs usually when encounters might encourage players to do different things.

I dont think it matters which class/spec might prove more challenging, a good player will pick it up and progress.

[CobraN]

There's already been a million of these threads ...

There is a huge difference between playing a spec and mastering a spec, you see the difference in VoA PuGs usually when encounters might encourage players to do different things.

I dont think it matters which class/spec might prove more challenging, a good player will pick it up and progress.

No dps spec is really hard for a good player ....

[Grimbold]

Hancer shaman is hard why? Dont you just need to watch the maelstorm stacks and stormstrike?

[Asgard]

CLEARLY Feral druid. And by far. Why ?
- Omen of clarity, when this procs, you've got to choose the right ability to use, and quickly
- Energy + Combo management (ok same as rogue)
- 4 buffs/debuffs to keep up (SR/Rip/Rake/Mangle), and some requiring 5 CPs, which you have to ANTICIPATE
- Shred requires to be behind the target. Yep, that's not hard on saurfang, try faction champs >< that fight is a pain in the ass

But as someone said, if you're not the mangle bot, it's easier.

I'd say in a sens feral and enhancement are the "same" : buffs and debuffs, priority etc. But as an enhancement it's like "Ok so SS isn't up, FS is on target, go ES" (didn't play since 3.2 must have changed ), whereas feral is "My rip is going to fall in 8sec, so I should have 5 cps by then". Anticipation is what makes the greater difference.

Also, at the guy talking about 2 buttons and 3 buttons class specs, the "normal" feral priority list includes :
- Shred
- Rake
- Mangle
- Rip
- Savage Roar
- Ferocious Bite
- Tiger Fury
- (Berserker, FFF, innervate, battle rez, these are once or twice a fight I'm not couting them)
That's 7 spells to manage. While keeping behind the mob that this freekin tank keeps moving all around...

[Spazcat]

My main is a feral druid and I have to say after trying other classes for once, such as DK, hunter, warlock, warrior, and mage. I find the feral druid cat rotation by far the hardest. There are so many things to watch and if you mess up once, the next 5-6 global cooldowns are completely off of what you should have been doing. It takes time and practice but for such a hard rotation the dps in the end pays off. It's definitly a FUN spec. I hate specs that dont require much thought, always good to stay active and the feral rotation really keeps you active in a raid. but with how much you have to pay attention to the rotation, sometimes u dont pay as much attention to boss mechanics and you mess up. but practice makes perfect and after a while the rotation becomes autonomous sp*. Thats my 2 cents on it. Frost Dk iv tried, heh the rotation is pretty tight, but who plays DW frost DK's anymore. who cares lol!

[xoxoAlu]

frost dk aren't hard. they just aren't cake. :P

enhancement is similar, its a pain balancing mana and shamanistic rage with cooldowns, but if you have trouble, just get shock and awe,and you're set.

I haven't had the luxury of trying out a feral druid, tho everyone seems to agree they're the hardest. ( next thing ima lvl. XD )

and affliction is just a pain... Tho hardly difficult. :P

[tkoreaper]

Add Demo Warlock to the list and I'll give my vote.

[IngoDent]

Was enhancement in TBC, end-game, tried going enh now again in WotLK, wasn't that hard, but it was harder than what it was in TBC, it's about awereness of proccs, knowing what to use and when, and reacting quickly.

I've not been feral druid DPS on mine, but when I have had to go kitty.... Zomg. Not pleasant

Never tried DW frost DK.

Got a lvl 70 twink lock, and if I'm doing a boss as affli, I don't feel the rotation is hard... Takes a tiny bit of awereness, that's all. (Not tried at 80, but it shouldn't be that much different, right? Right?)

I'd have to vote for hunter, based purely on the amount of people who get it done right. It's abysmal.

[Jon]

This question again?

By now everyone should know the answer is feral druid.

[littlepiggy]

i like all the people that say "there is no spec that is the hardest" well, unless every spec hit the same button over and over, then one spec is indeed going to be harder than the rest making it the hardest. also i bet 90% of the people who say that can't even play their own spec correctly, let alone another one. =D

as someone else mentioned, i would LOVE to see a feral druid hit 100% uptime (or even close) including ramp up time (because it's impossible to truly get 100% uptime) there are other classes that also don't have 100% uptimes, but they are *easier* to play than feral

[Fornaw]

Personally I think Feral is harder than 'hance, but then I've been doing enhance for 2 expansions and I've only messed around with a level 80 feral for a couple months.

Still anyone who says enhance is faceroll needs to go look at the shaman boards here. We have one of the hardest specs in game. It's not just "watch the maelstorm stacks and stormstrike", you are also watching lightning shield, magma totem and flameshock, which is going to get even rougher given haste scaling on flameshock. We actually have more timers to watch and more abilities to use than feral, and feral timers are actually timers, unlike stormstrike, maelstrom and lightning shield. The only thing that makes feral harder is energy (you can say CPs, but at ICC gear levels 1 CP generator=2 CPs almost always).

People who argue enhance, frost, or aff are faceroll are often the same people who demonstrate they haven't mastered their own spec yet.

[Insomnium]

DW Frost is a fun spec imo. And yes it is pretty much a rotation.
I stopped playing feral back in TBC was quite the mess even then.
Havent been Enh for long, but can say it takes alot to get it 90% right. I keep feeling im doing something wrong. Both shaman an my druid are main spec resto though <3.

[Ceara]

Depends on the fight.

[karth]

mage fo sho :P

[Shæa]

To be honest with you, the amount of addons that are made for this game make any spec simplistic. It all just depends on setup and filtering. Yea you have to watch Procs, but it's pretty simple other than that. Power Auras pretty much makes it so you can play blindfolded by giving sounds/images when things proc. Idk, with a basic UI, Affliction Locks and Feral Druids. But let's be serious, everything is pretty simple given the right UI.

[Samy13]

im feral dps/tank too.
Feral dps i hard cose if you lose one of 3 buffs/debuffs you lose alot of your dps. To maximamisse your dps you must use and FB, if you are lucky you can use it on Omens procs, iff you are not, you must be sure you wil have combo points for next SR;RIP o.O., For sad this sometime is pure luck and making feral dps most random unpredictiable rotation from all.
Btw if yo say for how many buttons, than you can say feral dps is SHRED(on macro /cast Tiger's Fury(Rank 6)
/cast Shred(Rank 9 ) 5 combos rip/sr/fb and mangle/rake refresh.Berserk always after Tiger's fury on 80-100 energy and watching somo1 death watching who healer lose fastest mana O.O .

[cyqu]

Enhancement shaman?

I've played an enh shaman since 2007, and they're really easy to play.

yea but your a bad enhance shaman that doesn't care about min maxing... soooo...

[Mmogeek]

I played both feral druid and enh shammy (main) and they're both harder than my other dpses.

Druid-
Keep savage roar up (buff)
Keep mangle up (debuff)
keep rip up (debuff/bleed)
Shreds/rakes (idk bout rakes, been awhile)
Ferocious bites when it wont screw up your other abilities
Tiger's fury (w/e ur energy gets low)
Faerie fire (5mins debuff)
Berserker
cower sometimes
And raid helping (brez/innervate/heals) altho lets face it you don't have to do all the time xD


Shammy-
Lightning bolt/chain lightning (on proc)
Stormstrike
Magma totem (20s totem)
Flame shock (dot)
Earth shock
Flame nova (yup even on single target)
Lava lash
Lightning Shield (when charges are at 1)
Shamanistic rage (on cd with 2p t10 or otherwise when mana gets to 20-30%)
Spirit Wolves
Heroism
SAA won't make it faceroll, following saa personnally makes me lose dps as the priority sometimes get messed up when 2 cds are up at the same time (wich happens alot)

On aoe shammies tend to be harder than druids.

To compare any of those to a ret pally is pure sillyness. Many people say they're not hard? True its all easy to play once you've been doing a couple raids but with those specs, dps can be either maximized or plain regular. I doubt any of the ppl saying they're easy are part of those maximizing them.