There is a weird enhance shaman build that has been working somewhat on private servers. If I can convince my friends to roll horde I'm def gonna mess around with it.
It requires some super specific gear, but it's theoretical damage is pretty baller if you can get it. It focuses on +fire dmg gear, fire dmg on hit enchants, weapons (fire dmg proc dagger and a caster mace), and flametongue.
It'll be a bitch and a half but it'll be fun.
Most people here seems to have forgotten about defense.
The reason Paladins and druids are not viable at high-end raiding is because of the lack of defense. Defense is on all warrior tier sets, while it isnt to be found on the paladin and/or druid sets.
In regards to paladin tanks. Doable, can be done on trash in MC and to some extent in BWL. The issue is that you dont have a taunt ability, which makes paladin tanks useless on several of the bosses in BWL. Gear comes in to play here, where you dont find a lot of non-sets with defense before AQ.
Never really tested or played feral druids as tanks, but the gear is definately an issue. Doable in 5mans though - not possible to hit def. cap.
Think people are in for a rude awakening once vanilla hits. The people who are going to spend the time creating and managing serious raiding guilds, will most likely have been grinding the entirety of the game out on private servers and/or during vanilla. They do not want to bring protection paladins, feral druids if they can get a proper warrior tank. And I'm obviously speaking generally - there might be guilds who'd be willing to bring in some odd-specs and classes, which is seen on several private servers too. But the majority will still be looking for warrior tanks, holy paladins and resto druids.
Destro lock here
Again, this is not entirely true. The encounters were all builds around specific classes/roles - you can find a video on youtube of some bloke (forgot his name) talking about this at blizzcon.
Hunters might do terrible damage, but they're often needed at kiting (Anub) and for tranq shot. So all classes/specs have some purpose on some fights.
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Retribution paladin for days... and days... and days... and days...
Leveling as Retribution was somewhat tedious.
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Paladins could easily get decent defense with the paladin Zul'Gurub enchants (+14), shield enchant and a nice tanking weapon like Quel'Serrar with spell power.
Holy Shield having charges also helped make it very effective at pushing Crushing Blows off the hit table vs bosses.
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Pretty sure you're just making shit up here...
Warriors were by far the best tanks of course, however Protection Paladin's issues were not threat generation (Righteous Fury solved to that), it was mana regeneration.
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Of course it's wishful thinking, but at this moment in time, no body here knows just how they are going to tackle this project. Whether they decide to keep it 100% as it was, or tune some numbers to make other classes viable is completely unknown. To say (not quoting you Perkunas, but regurgitating other remarks in the past) "its highly unlikely" is simply an assumption. No one will know, until official statements regarding development have been made.
So until then, wishful thinking will continue! lol **crosses fingers**
There is noone denying that warriors are the best tank for raiding. But both druids and paladins have their niches where they are better than warriors.
Warriors biggest strenght compared to the other two classes are their defensive tools, they have gear tailored to them so they will always have a advantage on that part.
Paladins are the king of AoE threat, noone can even get close to the amount of aoe threat the paladin produces, making them excellent 5man tanks. But with low end gear you wont be able to survive having many mobs on you so its not really a thing until you have farmed close to preraidbis +.
Druids have a better time than paladins, since they dont need to be def capped due to their easy access to armor cap and high health. Their single target threat is very good, better than warriors. But they struggle with gear as well, and are not really a viable raid tank until you got access to Dire maul gear and preferably some bwl gear as well. Or if you farm rank 12/13 you got bis gear troughout vanilla. Their biggest strenght is their multi target threat (2-4 mobs) where the warrior falls behind a lot. Their mass aoe threat (5-10mobs) is the same as warrior. Perfect 5man dungeon tank and a great 3rd/4th raid tank due to delivering high dps, can tank as good as a fury warrior and can also heal almost as good as a resto druid, just by swapping gear. Making a feral druid THE most versatile specc in the entire game.
When you judge a specc, keep in mind that hybrids ARE actually hybrid classes in vanilla and are not locked to one role.
Warrior
Well, nevermind the gear, but you have to look at what tools the paladin has that will make them viable in various raid compositions.
Their AoE threat is great for 5man, but isn't really of any use in raids, bar an encounter or two, whereas their lack of taunt makes them usless on a bunch of bosses. We previously discussed Blackwing Lair, so Ill stick with that.
Razorgore requires a tank switch (if I'm not mistaken), Broodlord does, 3 drakes do, Chrom do and I'm fairly sure you need to taunt during the fear/class calls on neffe too. Please correct me if Im wrong - haven't raided vanilla for some time. That basically make prot paladins useless on a tonnes of encounters. Again, I'd still advocate that the lack of tier gear is an issue. There's great gear to be collected outside of raids, epescially when you get DM out for shoulders and neck (morris' came out with DM patch I believe, might be wrong), but the gap up to warriors is just huge.
As I stated previously, I dont mind people playing whatever they want, but I think i'd be a shame to have people level (which takes months in some cases) just to realise that they wont be able to play the spec they want.
I'd like to try Prot Paladin to be an immortal, unwavering SoB, but alas, I am a Horde fan, so no palliez 4 muh I might give oomkin a try!
Feral, like ~12 years ago. Love the hybrid class setup, makes for great solo-ers. Also pretty darn good in pvp.
Though just for shits n giggles, I might remake my dual-wield devastate warrior.
But now the biggest part,
is all about the imageand not the art
Raids are not the only thing that needs tanks. 5mans are very relevant even as a raider, good for farming gold and recipes you need for raiding.
One of the biggest problem a warrior has, is that as you get bettet gear it gets harder to tank 5mans since rage generation gets lower, this is where a paladin shine.
I would never use a paladin tank as one of the 3 main tanks, butits normal to have at least one healer paladin specced pretty deep into prot, so when that aoe tanking is needed in raids, the pala can just swap gear and tank.
Razorgore is taunt immune, he conflagerate his main target which means 2nd on threat gets agro.
Broodlord is taunt immune, but he has a ability that reduces threat of his agro target by 50%
3 drakes: flamegore can be tanked by a paladin with no issue. He use wing clip that reduce threat of his target by 50%. The normal strategy for handeling that ability even with warriors, is to have the warrior offtank taunt just before the wing clip and thhe boss turns back to his main target again.
Firemaw can be done same way, but you need to reset debuff so its not worth it to use a paladin on it. More effort for no gain.
Chromaggus is taunt immune, you tank swap by having a tank go out of line of sight when the boss uses Time Lapse, which temporerily remove threat on all members hit by it. After the timelapse debuff expire, the boss turns back to his previous target.
Nefarian is taunt immune, the only ability warriors have that make them more suited to tank, is their berzerker rage which make them immune to fear, but this can be countered by having enough dwarf priests.
So no, the paladin tools are not their biggest issue, they are unable to tank 1 boss in BWL, and 1 where it is not recomended.
That is of course enough to not make it worth it to use a paladin, but they are still 100% able to do it.
So their biggest issue is gear and general surivability that they lack
If they do something to make ferals viable i'l be playing a feral druid for sure. Otherwise i'l be playing a mage leveling as fire this time
I used to main a prot warrior in vanilla and thats something i'l never ever do again.
Devestate is a tbc ability ;-) so no dual wield devestate warriors unless they also decide to make that ;-)
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Feral druid is 100% viable, most raids use 1-2 ferals. But they are not main tanks.
The way you use a feral, is to have them as 3rd/4th tank. In the same talent specc, you can deal almost as good dps as rogues and heal almost as good as a resto druid, just by swapping gear. So if you wanna play a feral, you will be expected to be a real hybrid player and play all 3 roles when needed.
Not really viable until you have access to dire maul and / or BWL gear.
Zul'Gurub was catch up gear, and once you were late into BWL the gear from Zul'Gurub were side-grades at best.
The only reason to go there was the reputation enchants and buffs.
On single tank bosses a taunt isn't needed if you produce enough threat (which Protection could).
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