Do you think they will release classic with unviable specializations?

[Baby Seal]

I hope they don't. The charm of vanilla is that each class has its own niche. You have to remember that raiding was not seen as the end with every other aspect of the game being the means. Druids, paladins, and shaman could tank fine pre raid.
There are some changes that I've heard discussed, such as changing shield slam threat because it broke the threat dynamic of vanilla when it was changed in naxx, or having different debuff limits in raids to keep them from being face roll.

In another life, if they were reembracing classic on LIVE, I think it would be cool if they went farther with the niche stuff. Like what if druid was the king of HoTs. No one came close to their output with heal over times, but outside of a mediocre cool down in swiftmend, they had no way of directly healing. Shaman would be the same thing with aoe or healing through totems, but would have very limited tools for anything else. Paladins would be single target kings. Priests could have mediocre healing but excel with external cooldowns and absorbs.

[Trickname]

Yes.

Contrary to what people seem to think, they can't just adjust a few dials to balance all classes. Any changes begin a snowball effect.

[Jonsse]

It's a false interpretation of Classic to say there are viable or unviable specializations. Classes are what they are.

A paladin is a healer, that can perform dps duties but quite inefficiently or tanking duties in special circumstances.
A shaman is a healer that can perform dps duties in pvp on the others specs.
A druid is a true jack of all trades, most efficient at healing but can perform dps and tanking roles with some limitation.
A warrior is the only class with true triple specialization options.

In vanilla the choice on what you want to do starts when you choose your class. The illusion is that the choice is still available at level 60. It's not, not for all classes. That's a design philosophy found only in the expansions.

When you ask to rebalance the specializations, what you're asking for is abandoning the core design philosophy of Vanilla Warcraft and changing the design philosophy in to that of the Expansions.

[Teri]

Yes.

The game was different, classes didn't have 3-4 "specs" set in stone like today.

Even within the same class/role you could play like 5 different types of frost mages, depending on goals/content/gear.

[chronia]

Yes we think bliizard is targeting the private server community which recreates vanilla 100%.\

Do they though, i'm not a private server expert. But have seen my fair share of private server gameplay and none of the ones i've seen was 100% authentic at all. some recreate a 1.12.1 version which is pretty close to Vanilla 1.12.1 was. But thats not 100% Vanilla. Alot of stuff is already "faceroll" in 1.12.1, classes are as fleshed out as they will be in Vanilla, content is adjusted or nerfed from earlier patches.

A real 100% Vanilla would be to launch a server with the first release build and then according to the original Blizzard schedule release the patches (if you want to be really authentic also replicate the days of downtime and / or lag that came with those patches ).

[glowpipe]

1. Yes. They're not releasing classic 2.0, they're releasing classic.

2. More than warriors could tank. People were just fucking terrible back in vanilla and had no idea how to theorycraft.

pretty sure you are wrong on number 1.

You gonna get a classic _like_ server. Not even gonna be surprised if its just a slimmed down legion. Doubt they gonna use the old talents or even pre cata zones. Seriously doubt they gonna release everything that was broken in vanilla and ultimately made vanilla what it was. Its gonna be legion/bfa without shit like dungeon finder

[Unholyground]

1. Yes. They're not releasing classic 2.0, they're releasing classic.

2. More than warriors could tank. People were just fucking terrible back in vanilla and had no idea how to theorycraft.

Shaman tanking was pretty decent outside of raiding.

- - - Updated - - -

pretty sure you are wrong on number 1.

You gonna get a classic _like_ server. Not even gonna be surprised if its just a slimmed down legion. Doubt they gonna use the old talents or even pre cata zones. Seriously doubt they gonna release everything that was broken in vanilla and ultimately made vanilla what it was. Its gonna be legion/bfa without shit like dungeon finder

They will keep the core of what made it classic.

[Deleted]

Guess we will hear at Blizzcon, wont we?

These forums are 100% assumptions and speculation. Blizzard didn't say nothing about classic other than wanting to release it some day.

[tikcol]

Considering all specs are viable and they hinted on not changing anything, nope. There won't be any nonviable specs

[shaunika123]

What are the other specs that weren’t played?

Demo, Ele sham?

demo lock was one of the best specs of the game lol.

ele sham became decent after AQ and all the spell dmg mail gear.

the only specs that were truly terrible were boomkin and feral

[unbound]

I know a lot of the crowd wants a pure vanilla experience? But do you really think blizzard will release classic and only warriors will be able to tank? Generally curious?

It wasn't only warriors who could tank. Warriors were simple the best tanks...so min/max was at the class/spec. So serious raiders (most actually weren't back then) would push the warrior as the "only" viable tank as a result. I knew a few guilds who weren't pushing to be first, and other tanks actually could work as well.

Think about it the same way as optimal talent choices today. Yes, there is one choice that is superior at each tier, but did you know that there are actually many different choices that are typically within a few percent of that optimum choice? I've gotten a chuckle when running simulations and seeing the less optimal talent choices being only 1% away from the "clearly superior choice".

The same was true back then. A good player playing with a not-optimum class was always better than a so-so player playing with the optimum class...same as today.

In BC (when I was an active raider), I happily ran people through Karazhan without having "needed" classes, and was successful far more often than not. The game has its issues, but it isn't (and never has been) as binary as many people claim it is.

[Sunderella]

classic means classic. with unviable specs and boring chores like weapong training, finite hunter ammo etc. otherwise it would be pointless to speak about classic.

[Swalload]

I know a lot of the crowd wants a pure vanilla experience? But do you really think blizzard will release classic and only warriors will be able to tank? Generally curious?

Well it's either classic or it's not.
People didn't ask for "a version of vanilla where classes can do things they couldn't do back then".

[AwkwardSquirtle]

It's a false interpretation of Classic to say there are viable or unviable specializations. Classes are what they are.

A paladin is a healer, that can perform dps duties but quite inefficiently or tanking duties in special circumstances.
A shaman is a healer that can perform dps duties in pvp on the others specs.
A druid is a true jack of all trades, most efficient at healing but can perform dps and tanking roles with some limitation.
A warrior is the only class with true triple specialization options.

In vanilla the choice on what you want to do starts when you choose your class. The illusion is that the choice is still available at level 60. It's not, not for all classes. That's a design philosophy found only in the expansions.

When you ask to rebalance the specializations, what you're asking for is abandoning the core design philosophy of Vanilla Warcraft and changing the design philosophy in to that of the Expansions.

Came to post something like this. You can't play a demonology warlock because demonology warlocks don't exist. You play a warlock, you can choose to specialise more into Demonology than into Affliction or Destruction, but your core spells are still destruction spells regardless of what you spec into. Specialisations are truly specialisations, not full sub-classes.

- - - Updated - - -

pretty sure you are wrong on number 1.

You gonna get a classic _like_ server. Not even gonna be surprised if its just a slimmed down legion. Doubt they gonna use the old talents or even pre cata zones. Seriously doubt they gonna release everything that was broken in vanilla and ultimately made vanilla what it was. Its gonna be legion/bfa without shit like dungeon finder

Do you genuinely think that with how many times they've said Classic means Classic? I don't think that anybody asking for vanilla servers wants that. They mentioned that previously, calling it "Pristine servers" and it didn't go down well. This was announced as a totally different thing.

[glowpipe]

They will keep the core of what made it classic.

you say that. But yet they ask questions like "Should BRD be 5 or 10 man" if they kept the core and just basically gave us a patch. it would be 15 man or 10 man. not 5

[Unholyground]

you say that. But yet they ask questions like "Should BRD be 5 or 10 man" if they kept the core and just basically gave us a patch. it would be 15 man or 10 man. not 5

Well when I started playing Vanilla it was already a 5 man but you could always do it as a raid if you wanted.

[Deleted]

A warrior is the only class with true triple specialization options.

Yeah, they used to bash everything into good health if needed.

[Chaelexi]

1. Yes. They're not releasing classic 2.0, they're releasing classic.

2. More than warriors could tank. People were just fucking terrible back in vanilla and had no idea how to theorycraft.

You are right they are releasing classic and not Vanilla.......Classic has no definition to what it is, just the definition that you hope it has.....

- - - Updated - - -

Came to post something like this. You can't play a demonology warlock because demonology warlocks don't exist. You play a warlock, you can choose to specialise more into Demonology than into Affliction or Destruction, but your core spells are still destruction spells regardless of what you spec into. Specialisations are truly specialisations, not full sub-classes.

Mages, shaman and shadow priests beg to differ, they were completely different sub classes. Also go play against a demo lock in PVP he mainly dotted you up and laughed as you tried to plow through his huge health pool while he drained your life.

[EternalBany]

What are the other specs that weren’t played?

Demo, Ele sham?

nearly all in pve lmao

shadow priests
ele shamans
enh shamans
retri paladin
bookin druid
feral druid
survival hunter
bm hunter
subtly rogue

[Chaelexi]

What are the other specs that weren’t played?

Demo, Ele sham?

Any dps Sham, Demo or full destro in PVE(it was either 9/21/21 or 30/0/21 as raiding specs), feral druid(some cry babies will try to tell you otherwise), balance druid(you went oom after 30-60 seconds), tanking paly, dps paly(the specs were played to get certain buffs but no one actually played them as their spec role), shadow priest in PVE(mana problems again and in PVE you could oom them and they were useless). There were druid tanks they just were not as good a warriors.