Seeing as there are only two mail classes in Hunters and Shaman, what are the chances at seeing a third mail class in the future? My brother and I have been wishing for years that Blizzard would implement a Bard class a la EverQuest, which in our opinion is one of the most unique MMO classes to date.
We've been teased throughout the years with them, from low level green items (Bard's tunic of x), to NPCs (boss in Stratholme, a ghost iirc), to the April Fool's event back in either Vanilla or BC, which mocked the class by claiming they'd be played in a keyboard, Guitar Hero style. That said, I believe Blizzard denied the intention of ever implementing them, though the same *was* said about Monks.
I could see them in leather armor, but I really dig the idea of them in mail. It would not only give hunters and enhance shammy competition for gear, but also (with a healing spec) resto sham competition as well. Until now, Resto/Ele sham are the only one benefitting from +int mail. One spec could be a ranged spec to challenge hunters for weapons, one melee spec, and one heal spec?
Maybe [they could use] bows, make crossbows Bard only and keep Guns hunter only. Though i would like to see the use of songs in their playstyle, like maybe Song of the Focused, which would grant a hit/exp buff (eliminating some cap needs, even if it were 1%) and Chords of Wisdom, which would grant a Spirit buff, harkening back to the old Blessing of Wisdom Mp5 buff.
HOWEVER:
Their role in combat is a snag for sure. EQ was very auto-attack centered for melee, and bards would do that, but twist their songs to keep buffs, dots, de buffs up. Songs were continuous. The buffs or debuffs would remain until a few ticks after the song was stopped. The whole idea was to hit the button, get the cast off, and immediately stop the song and cast a new one. It worked in rotation, and if done right, you could get up to about 7 different song buffs/debuffs/dots without losing anything. Pretty fun and engaging but would need to be tweaked for WoW