Best "soloing" and "farming" class in the game

[Ebonheart]

So I've returned to WoW recently hoping for a more casual approach with the goal of soloing old world dungeons/raids and rares, etc.

I had plenty of success on my Death Knight and I often found myself feeling invincible and with my limited experience among the other classes found them to be the best. The things I could pull of with the DK, I couldn't imgaine myself doing it with any other class. Dailies were made much more fun, since it was easy to round up 15+ and simply AOE them.

The screwed up part is that since I don't really like tanking as a role especially in current content, and don't really find the class as fun as it once was during WTLK as DPS, its kinda a pain and very frustrating especially when you need to grind the gear for it. I just don't enjoy Death Knights outside its niche role of soloing content so they are not on my list.

I've narrowed it down to a few classes from people's experience and the classes' capability and potential.

The second best solo class in the game universally accepted are Hunters. They have a pet that can tank with very good AOE damage.

However, Warlocks have improved a lot in this expansion and they are a very strong contender for that spot.

Paladins are another one on my list. However, I often find Prot to have really low DPS compared to Blood Death Knights. And Retribution, you often find yourself sacrificing your DPS to heal yourself. But again I've not done much soloing on my Prot Paladin. I solod a bit with Retribution. Can someone care to expand on Paladin's soloing capability?

Monks are pretty unkown to me. I have no experience with them as a class, but when I played the game, I saw a Brewmaster Monk solo the Warbringers and that was pretty impressive at a time when only Death Knights were able to.

Warriors are the last on my list. Second Wind is a very crucial part to soloing however, I simply hate the idea of beeing at 35% for the entire duration of the fight never being able to regen my health especially since the way Victory Rush works.

Am open to all suggestions and recommendations. If you have anything else to add or feel that I've skipped something or maybe am even wrong on a few points, please feel free to mention it.

P.S Not looking to play a Death Knight. Therefore its not included in the poll.

[Deleted]

Just because you have some OCD that makes you uncomfortable with warrior healing doesn't make them bad at farming. You can't mix opinion with fact.

Also, from a "farming" perspective, you've listed the classes from a perspective as if they were naked. Locks are probably the absolute top when it comes to farming in AoE scenarios since you can just lol around as destro and destroy any pack of mobs (while moving) in half a second.

Jumping from mob to mob is a race where a feral would probably win. A warrior might win if the mobs are relatively close and if you only need to kill 3-5.

[Keny]

after DK , Hunters are cool, but not as much as dk for soloing

[Shuji V2]

That's simple, Warlocks.

Together with DK's they have to be the strongest for soloing and farming.

Edit:
Also hunters? What the..? Anything a hunter can do, a warlock does it much better. I'm not even sure if a hunter can be considered as best in both categories.

[Marthenil]

Really depends on what kind of farming?
If you mean grinding easy mobs then I'd say hunter due to just being able to spam 1 button.
If you mean gathering then Druid for insta-flight form with DK and Pala being close seconds for increased mount speed.
If you mean harder content then DK and Lock.

[Msshammy]

For farming mass amounts of mobs I prefer my frost DK over all my other toons. For soloing dungeons/raids I roll blood DK in dps gear. However, for soloing tough mobs I find my warlock to be far superior. On the Isle I have no trouble taking pretty much anything I want down. Cinderfall is a perfect example lol. Unfortunately you are right about ret paladins. I find myself having to sacrifice way too much dps for healing and their aoe is just horrid Can't speak for monks as I haven't spent much time on them at all.

[Dasani]

With DK's being the obvious answer, i'll say monk out of the things you have listed here.

Hunters can be good at soloing certain things, but anything they can't kite or their pet can't tank, they really can't do anything about.

Monks can tank things like warbringers very easily. Their self heals aren't that fantastic but with guard and high avoidance, they don't need a terrible amount of healing anyway

Unrelated but i'll also say monks are my favorite class to run with lower level people, like if you're running someone through dungeons or whatever. You can basically top anyone's health off with a single healing sphere (without considering chi wave bounces that will be happening constantly) and your statue can put a guard bubble on them that will protect them from any damage they could possibly take. That is beside the fact throwing on SCK or RJW and just running through an instance without ever having to stop. Clearing lower dungeons is as fast and easy as simply running through it as fast as you can as if there were no mobs there in the first place.

Plus monks are just cool.

[Cobaltius]

That's simple, Warlocks.

Together with DK's they have to be the strongest for soloing and farming.

Edit:
Also hunters? What the..? Anything a hunter can do, a warlock does it much better. I'm not even sure if a hunter can be considered as best in both categories.

I have both a Hunter and Lock as my mains now, I tend to agree even the big blue pet seems to hold agro better than my turtle tank pet.

[Shuji V2]

I have both a Hunter and Lock as my mains now, I tend to agree even the big blue pet seems to hold agro better than my turtle tank pet.

Yeah, warlock pets are far stronger and more versatile than hunter pets. Voidwalker pretty much snaps aggro immediately and never loses it where you will find yourself having to Feign Death/Misdirect all the time when you use a turtle. Besides that, when you face a hard hitting boss as a Warlock you can summon a new voidwalker while the current one is at 20% or something (endless supply of tanks without getting hit) where hunters just can't do that (need to revive). Also the portal is just epic for soloing stuff.

Then of course we have Rain of Fire. Endless stream of fire balls from the sky allowing you to pull anything and keep on running. Also the self healing they have is ridiculous.

[LocNess]

Warlocks overall. DKs are good, but they are slow at times, Warlocks have top DPS on top of good survivability and range for pulling things if farming.

[Nelle]

Hunter, anyone stating otherwise is doing it wrong!

[Normie]

Warlocks and DKs are farming made easy. If blood had better DPS it would be absolutely ridiculous.

Protadin DPS is almost unplayably low for soloing.

I don't have enough experience yet to comment on BM or MW for soloing but they seem promising.

[Deleted]

Gonna go with monk because of RJW, at least for low level stuff.

[Deleted]

hunters and warlocks. DKs and monks are not bad at all but the top belongs to the pet classes.

should add IMO.

[Anium]

As an ex Hunter, my vote would be for them.

[Deleted]

I am going with hunter, becuase of their stealth, quad pet resurection. pets with buffs, pets will bloodlust, etc...

[Trubo]

OP: it depends largely on the content you plan on doing. If you're planning on soloing stuff that would grant high (e.g 150k+) Vengeance, then Prot Paladins and Brewmaster Monks are probably the best for that. If you're doing stuff that's lower Vengeance (e.g. 20k-70k) then Blood DKs shine since their survivability is not a function based on Vengeance.

That's not to say that other classes can't do relatively high damage taken fights but the gear requirements for them are fairly obscene compared to tanks for the most part. Now if you're just interested in farming world mobs then Warlock is probably best for that since they have good AoE, single target, mobility and voidwalker.

hunters and warlocks. DKs and monks are not bad at all but the top belongs to the pet classes.

should add IMO.

Everything that has been done by a Warlock or Hunter in MoP content has been done by at least one of the tanking specializations, usually at lower item levels; for example take into consideration the first few Heroic 25 LK solo kills and compare gear, number of attempts and kill time relative to Enrage between Blood DK, Hunter and Warlock (only three I know of that did it before 5.2).

[Thelxi]

Currently I would definitely say warlock, simply because they are unbelievably flexible in what kind of survivability they need.

Hunters and DKs are amazing too, but occasionally being strictly melee and a pet class is a problem among other things.

Warlock all the way in MoP. It might change next expansion for warlocks though, and I have a feeling that it will.

[Mukor]

leather and lowbie cloth farming is easily done by hunters. keep mend pet up while having him run all over the area, spam multi shot and they're down.

soloing old raids DK and destro take the lead. imo

it all depends on what you're farming and where you're farming. imo

[Nemah]

DK in blood spec and dps gear (with gems and all that too) is top for most.

If you're against DKs (which is arguably gimping yourself as a "pure" soloist), warlock, then hunter. For warlocks with GoSup the Void Lord is hands down the best tank pet in the game. You *can* micromanage the Void Lord, but you don't have to.

Hunters have a great deal of self and pet healing through glyphs and talents, plus the pet abilities themselves. Some pets require minor amounts of micromanaging, but overall not much.

Monks I can't really speak to. The only thing I've farmed regularly on my monk is Naxx 25…which is a joke anyway.