He wasn't saying "there was no moonkin form, there was no ret tree, there was no shadow tree" to be taken literally. He was saying, if you wanted to have even a 1% chance of killing anything you simply did not take those specs, and he is right. But I'm sure you already knew that, given the trolly feeling of your post.
Apply blizzards model to any other subscription service,you'd be outraged:
Netflix adds no new movies for a year, you click a new movie, there's a $5 fee.
You're in an accident, click your onstar button, but there's an addition $20 fee for them to help.
You turn on your tv only to find all you get are the infomercial channels. Every other show is pay per view.
See how dumb that model is?
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed, the hands acquire shakes, the shakes become a warning.
-Kujako-
Paladins were "Ret" in Vanilla because Kings was the 31 pt Ret talent, and you could go 20/0/31 and still have all of the important healing talents so you could stand in the back of the raid in your dress and be the buff/cleanse bot.
http://www.wowwiki.com/Moonkin_Form
Patch 1.8.0 (2005-10-10): Significant talent changes. Added Moonkin Form.
You were right about that, but sadly wrong about almost everything else you've said. This is the 2nd thread I've seen started by you hating on someone or something. If the game infuriates you so much, you might want to pick a new game. I'm not trying to be mean, just honest.
It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed, the hands acquire shakes, the shakes become a warning.
-Kujako-
We do acknowledge that they EXISTED, but any Druid who wanted part in any form of PvE would not go Balance, either Bear Form for Zul'gurub and early MC, or Resto for everything else. Moonfire spam was a viable thing in PvP though, as long as you stood behind a tank, and again, you would rather want a Resto Druid or a Mage.
There will always be exceptions to the rule, but the vast majority of hybrids did only heal in classic.
PvP was a different story, I have many fond memories of my druid in classic PvP. You might not have had great dmg, or great healing. But combined it made for a very powerful playstyle.
I also raided in Vanilla, up through AQ and most of Naxx.
While it's true that you COULD bring along hybrid DPS like balance druids and ret palllies, it's also true that you could raid MC and BWL with 20 people, which my guild did all the time when we had attendance issues.
So yes, technically you are correct about MC and BWL. You could bring along someone with half the DPS of a true damage dealing class or just leave the slot empty. Meh.
But Ghostcrawler is absolutely right that hybrid DPS was not viable on challenging content. Making more specs viable is a feather in GC's cap that people do not give him enough credit for, and to claim otherwise is a nostalgia whitewash on WoW history.
Help control the population. Have your blood elf spayed or neutered.
Precisely this - the change in 2.4 (if I recall correctly) sparked the change that brought better damage meters like Skada and Recount. I recall that DamageMeters was honestly not that great an addon - it was incredibly easy to pad (I played resto shaman, and it would continuously record my heals before and after combat, for example), and overall... it just kind of sucked. Recount was amazing to my guild when it released - I don't recall if DamageMeters could link stuff in chat, but we were thoroughly impressed with it.
Note: I never actually raided in Vanilla, other than ZG which I don't recall being a "real" raid (due to how overgeared the rest of the players were - I was a late starter :P ) that late in the game. My first raid was Gruul's Lair in early BC.
Last edited by Callimonk; 2013-01-02 at 05:58 PM.