Blizzard says that Dracthyr Evoker COULD get a third spec, but it won't be a tank....

[FossilFree]

Thumbs up for the creativity. Not super sure I am a fan of the acid-parts truth be told, considering the green dragonflight isn't really known to use that iirc, but the melting part and fire wall seems neat.

Thank you!

As far as the acid use goes, the green dragons Dreamscythe, Hazzas, Morphaz, and Weaver in the Sunken Temple dungeon all use Acid Breath. That was my inspiration

[Ghanir]

Thank you!

As far as the acid use goes, the green dragons Dreamscythe, Hazzas, Morphaz, and Weaver in the Sunken Temple dungeon all use Acid Breath. That was my inspiration

It is troo, you are correct on that one. But aren't these green dragons less aligned with the green dragonflight under Merithra/Ysera and more alongside the corrupted dragons of nightmare or corrupted areas like the Sunken Temple?
The point might be moot cause green dragons in general (outside of Classic content) are associated with acid, but outside of the ones from Classic I don't know any other green dragons who use such abilities.

I personally associate green dragons almost exclusively to preservation along the lines of healing and the Emerald Dream, but my knowledge about the main branch of the green dragonflight could very well be lackling.

Trying to put a little effort into thinking about the concept the idea of using toxicity and acid as a form of damage seems very sinister to be comin' from the green dragonflight. Like the point of toxicity and acid is to break things down, right? Seems very contra-productive to the reputation the green dragonflight got goin' for them.
Actually makes me wanna rethink the idea of a tank spec for the Dracthyr with the green dragonflight being utility and sustain to the black dragonflights sturdiness, tenacity and being physical. Sort of like a physical version of the Paladin (but that might just come off as too much like the Death Knight).

[FossilFree]

It is troo, you are correct on that one. But aren't these green dragons less aligned with the green dragonflight under Merithra/Ysera and more alongside the corrupted dragons of nightmare or corrupted areas like the Sunken Temple?
The point might be moot cause green dragons in general (outside of Classic content) are associated with acid, but outside of the ones from Classic I don't know any other green dragons who use such abilities.

I personally associate green dragons almost exclusively to preservation along the lines of healing and the Emerald Dream, but my knowledge about the main branch of the green dragonflight could very well be lackling.

Trying to put a little effort into thinking about the concept the idea of using toxicity and acid as a form of damage seems very sinister to be comin' from the green dragonflight. Like the point of toxicity and acid is to break things down, right? Seems very contra-productive to the reputation the green dragonflight got goin' for them.
Actually makes me wanna rethink the idea of a tank spec for the Dracthyr with the green dragonflight being utility and sustain to the black dragonflights sturdiness, tenacity and being physical. Sort of like a physical version of the Paladin (but that might just come off as too much like the Death Knight).

I just thought it would be cool to see the offensive side of green dragon magic (that we know exists in the game) in the playable version. Not saying get rid of green from preservation, but rather to show both sides of their toolkit. The Sunken Temple greens are nightmare influenced I believe, which is why they are hostile and aggressive. But it shows that they do have offensive abilities. Plus, dracthyr aren't technically part of the green dragonflight, they are Neltharion's creations, so any green dragon cultural things about using offensive abilities probably wouldn't matter to them. The full toolkit should be available to them.

[Ghanir]

I just thought it would be cool to see the offensive side of green dragon magic (that we know exists in the game) in the playable version. Not saying get rid of green from preservation, but rather to show both sides of their toolkit. The Sunken Temple greens are nightmare influenced I believe, which is why they are hostile and aggressive. But it shows that they do have offensive abilities. Plus, dracthyr aren't technically part of the green dragonflight, they are Neltharion's creations, so any green dragon cultural things about using offensive abilities probably wouldn't matter to them. The full toolkit should be available to them.

Point taken. But wasn't the corruption of the green dragonflight post leaving the dragon isles tho? They would've been created before that, and before Neltharion became corrupted. More info about older green dragonflight required.
I do agree that it's unreasonable to think the green dragonflight wouldn't have any sort of offensive capability, but what reasonable kind I've yet to find out.
Thinking that the kind and docile green dragonflight would be capable of such menacing and cruel offensive abilities I feel we would've been showcased sooner (aside from the classic ones, which I still think is the only (debatable) source of them using it).

[FossilFree]

Point taken. But wasn't the corruption of the green dragonflight post leaving the dragon isles tho? They would've been created before that, and before Neltharion became corrupted. More info about older green dragonflight required.
I do agree that it's unreasonable to think the green dragonflight wouldn't have any sort of offensive capability, but what reasonable kind I've yet to find out.

That's fair. I would like to see it expanded on at any rate, even if we don't get a third spec and devastation just gets a green offensive ability or two.

[Ghanir]

That's fair. I would like to see it expanded on at any rate, even if we don't get a third spec and devastation just gets a green offensive ability or two.

Regardless if I think that the green dragonflight having access to something so antithematic as acid and toxicity I, and possibly many others, would like to see what kind of offensive abilities the current green dragons actually have.
If you're right you also get to boast that you were in fact correct to use it as a basis for your concept of a 3rd ranged dps spec (that is not to say you're not allowed to think of concepts, merely arguing against your concept based on what we have to go off of).
But as it stands now it seems so unlike them.

[Nyel]

We will never get a third spec for Evoker. It's fluff talk appeasing the fans, don't get your hopes up.

[Ghanir]

We will never get a third spec for Evoker. It's fluff talk appeasing the fans, don't get your hopes up.

You might be right. But Blizz has caved to player-demands before, and they should look for more avenues to try and appease the playerbase if the overall feedback to what they reveal is negative (and even if the feedback is only mixed it means they can do better to try and turn a mixed feedback into an overall positive one).

[Xath]

Just cause I am but 1 amongst millions of ppl playing the game doesn't mean I don't exist or affect the statistics, and me speaking up about it is more evidence than just saying "introducing new specs don't affect the playerbase at all".
We here on this forum are but a small amount of the total playerbase and the ones posting are prob. amongst the few that traverse this forum. To say that just because this happened to me doesn't mean it did for anyone else is honestly ridiculous cause at least I have myself as proof that doing so does have some sort of effect while you are just throwing words out without any real proof.



It's easy to speculate that the playerbase is dwindling slowly but steadily, and therefore the tank issue will remain a tank issue for as long as that is the case. To do nothing about it is more detrimental than trying to increase interest in it, be it through additional specs or otherwise.

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Thumbs up for the creativity. Not super sure I am a fan of the acid-parts truth be told, considering the green dragonflight isn't really known to use that iirc, but the melting part and fire wall seems neat.

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Ranged started out as the majority, and the classes introduced makes sense to be more melee-oriented. And we have confirmation that the new class will have 1 ranged dmg spec so what's the rush to get 2, all things considered?

I am neither for- nor against 2 ranged specs, let me just make that clear. Whether they introduce a tank, a melee or a new ranged spec as a 3rd spec option for the Evoker doesn't bother me and infact increases my interest to learn more about them. I am just more pro-tank or pro-melee as a 3rd option if that were to be introduced.

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I never considered this but it is troo. A lot of people do play ranged-dps and they are very limited in terms of tanking-options.

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Paladins can technically do so aswell.

Protection have had its ups and downs but Holy has almost always been a sublime healing-spec. Retri sort of jumps all over the place but is rarely so bad it's "unplayable", at least not over the course of an entire expansion.

Ret isn't ranged

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Nobody said it was for fun. They are also playing characters of multiple classes. They only large-scale did the single class thing in Legion, where Legendaries in 7.0 made a major difference.

No they aren't they literally played multiple characters of the same class the last 3 tiers outside tanks who do gear up multiple classes for viability purposes.

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There's no deep thought there other than about Blizzard's hate boner for ranged DPS, which is why elemental would go tank rather than enhancement (melee is #savage), along with removing balance and whatever the evoker's ranged spec is called. And the lack of coffee is why I didn't have any thought about that to do with mage for tank. And only three specs, no fourth- thus adding a second tank to demon hunter and maybe two tanks to evoker. Or two healer specs and a tank spec. Maybe three tank specs if we're really going all tanks all the time.

I'm actually not onboard with ever class having a tank and/or healing spec, largely because those are restricted roles in group play. Why have 13 or more tank specs when they're all competing for two slots in raid and one in m+ party? The lack of tanks is a dungeon design issue and social issue, and adding more specs won't make more people available to tank pugs.

Yeah Blizz hated range dps so much that a typical raid group's dps comp is 70% ranged lol

[Unholyground]

The Earth Ranger, a ranged melee spell hybrid class utalizing Bows, Crossbows and Guns. Primarily using Earth and Molten effects which imbue your arrows by breathing onto them to create powerful shots disabling enemies and granting close allies with short bursts of bonus fire damage. Then you add in a couble breaths and what not and it is a spec. Maybe the Earth shots can give a small barrier that obsorbs damage to nearby players.

[Ghanir]

Ret isn't ranged

You are correct. I was quoting someone that said that tank, healer, rdps is the dream. But they also said, and I quote: "then we have a second druid type that can actually do everything at a viable level hopefully.
No class will be able to do the same thing the druid can until we have a class with 4 specs, one for each role + 1 of each type of dps.
My response was about the Evoker being able to perform every role, like the paladin can, if they got a tank spec as their 3rd option.

[dragonflight10]

We will never get a third spec for Evoker. It's fluff talk appeasing the fans, don't get your hopes up.

yehh its bait that they use to draw in altoholics aka people who do meaningless things in the game and never do any endgame content, the same people who complain about the expansion for months and yet they are the first ones to buy it.

works everytime xD

[Xath]

You are correct. I was quoting someone that said that tank, healer, rdps is the dream. But they also said, and I quote: "then we have a second druid type that can actually do everything at a viable level hopefully.
No class will be able to do the same thing the druid can until we have a class with 4 specs, one for each role + 1 of each type of dps.
My response was about the Evoker being able to perform every role, like the paladin can, if they got a tank spec as their 3rd option.

Feral might as well be a spec that doesn't exist. It doesn't see raid play and it's bad in M+ they had a brief moment of hope when they had a busted 4 set but it was nerfed before it went live. When I say a druid type I mean range dps healing and tanking.

[Nymrohd]

By your logic Blizzard should just do nothing instead of something when it comes to the tank role then.

Tank concerns don't have to do with playstyle as much as content design. We have plenty of options and tanking looks cool and has solid perks.
I think most of us would love going back to a time when we were self-reliant to a larger degree (e.g. Legion) but Blizzard has decided that tank healing needs to be important (healers have 4-18 other targets to heal anyway, let tanks keep themselves up with tank healing being mostly about picking us back up from tank busters/using externals). But I don't think that's what keeps people from tanking.

But I think the more important part is dungeon and raid encounter design. When it comes to raid compositions, almost all encounters need 2 tanks, rarely can use a third and sometimes can even be solo'd. That means less than 1 in ten raiders can expect to tank (even though tanks are 1 in 6 specs and available to half the classes). In most guilds the result is that only people with near perfect attendance can ever expect to tank and tank spots are almost never open for recruitment. I'd say that raiding as a tank outside of cutting edge content is one of the less challenging roles; we can ignore plenty of mechanics and have to focus on our own things mostly though its definitely always useful to be aware of everything. Still I don't find raid tanking particularly stressful. It's probably a far better introduction to tanking than dungeons can be but so few players will ever get the opportunity to try it. However it is also perhaps the task most dependent on a single other player; a raid tank lives and dies by the skills of their off tank which can be very jarring in PuG environment or LFR.
Then come dungeons. I am sorry but the community makes it very hard for new players to pick up dungeon tanking. Even at low difficulties where one should start the gogo mentality leaves no time for the tank to actually learn routes and mob abilities. And then when it comes to M+ tanks take an inordinate amount of responsibility for the run's outcome, having to know every pull and every ability as well as how everything has to change depending on affixes. Choices in dungeon design and with seasonal affixes in the past that have made very specific routes extremely important (Reaping, Prideful) make the lives of tanks even harder.

I think it would be nice if more encounters required three tanks (and not for the third tank to do something completely gimmicky like running around kiting snared mobs) so there would be more opportunities for a third person to play tank at raids. I would absolutely love to be much more self-reliant again. And as for dungeon design, they need to find a way to make picking a route much more forgiving. My suggestion has always been simple linear unavoidable route through the dungeon but one that leaves you well short of 100% and then plenty of side rooms to both make the dungeon feel more natural/immersive and to let groups choose which additional pulls to take to complete the dungeon.

[huth]

Tank concerns don't have to do with playstyle as much as content design. We have plenty of options and tanking looks cool and has solid perks.
I think most of us would love going back to a time when we were self-reliant to a larger degree (e.g. Legion) but Blizzard has decided that tank healing needs to be important (healers have 4-18 other targets to heal anyway, let tanks keep themselves up with tank healing being mostly about picking us back up from tank busters/using externals). But I don't think that's what keeps people from tanking.

The problem with that healing idea is that it makes tanks nearly unkillable anywhere without a tank buster. While that may well be fun for the tank, it's not much fun for everybody else having to watch the guy pulling the entire zone and hogging it all.


Also note that in N and HC raiding, tank ratio can be anywhere from 1:5 (i.e. dungeon equivalent) to 1:15 depending on group size; you still need 2 tanks in a 10 man group or 30 man group, they don't scale (and it'd be pretty hard to do consistently). So having a third tank isn't that easily done and would put a major strain on small groups.

[Nymrohd]

The problem with that healing idea is that it makes tanks nearly unkillable anywhere without a tank buster. While that may well be fun for the tank, it's not much fun for everybody else having to watch the guy pulling the entire zone and hogging it all.


Also note that in N and HC raiding, tank ratio can be anywhere from 1:5 (i.e. dungeon equivalent) to 1:15 depending on group size; you still need 2 tanks in a 10 man group or 30 man group, they don't scale (and it'd be pretty hard to do consistently). So having a third tank isn't that easily done and would put a major strain on small groups.

We had that healing paradigm for Legion. It worked quite well for instanced content; healers would instead have to deal with more frequent focus target abilities by bosses (which also increases the importance of defensives for all classes). Yeah it was very problematic in the world, mostly for War Mode (some specs would just not die in War Mode).

And yeah the ration does change in flex raids. It usually remains problematic. Still the ratio is only part of the problem with people who might want to tank in raids; the fact that those spots are rarely open for recruitment is the more important issue. As for three-tanking more encounters it could be possible that scaling takes away the need for a third tank in very small raids groups; perhaps output falls enough that e.g. a saberlash mechanic can be handled by just two people or adds can just be dealt by tankier dps.

[huth]

We had that healing paradigm for Legion. It worked quite well for instanced content; healers would instead have to deal with more frequent focus target abilities by bosses (which also increases the importance of defensives for all classes). Yeah it was very problematic in the world, mostly for War Mode (some specs would just not die in War Mode).

And yeah the ration does change in flex raids. It usually remains problematic. Still the ratio is only part of the problem with people who might want to tank in raids; the fact that those spots are rarely open for recruitment is the more important issue. As for three-tanking more encounters it could be possible that scaling takes away the need for a third tank in very small raids groups; perhaps output falls enough that e.g. a saberlash mechanic can be handled by just two people or adds can just be dealt by tankier dps.

I think the recruitment issue is less to do with the number of tank spots and more with the position being absolutely crucial. It usually doesn't matter that much if you have two range or a range and a melee, but when one tank is missing you've got a problem and probably can't engage at all, and they often have specific mechanics they need to know as well. Three tank encounters would only make this worse. We've come a long way from Saberlash. Some mechanics cannot easily or even sensibly be scaled. Does Skorlax ocassionally hit a third target? That'll just lead to random melee deaths. Will he start hitting an extra target at x players? People will scale the raid to avoid the third tank.

AFAIR the ratio for raids was also chosen to be roughly the ratio of tanks available.

[Nymrohd]

I think the recruitment issue is less to do with the number of tank spots and more with the position being absolutely crucial. It usually doesn't matter that much if you have two range or a range and a melee, but when one tank is missing you've got a problem and probably can't engage at all, and they often have specific mechanics they need to know as well. Three tank encounters would only make this worse. We've come a long way from Saberlash. Some mechanics cannot easily or even sensibly be scaled. Does Skorlax ocassionally hit a third target? That'll just lead to random melee deaths. Will he start hitting an extra target at x players? People will scale the raid to avoid the third tank.

AFAIR the ratio for raids was also chosen to be roughly the ratio of tanks available.

I know you have a point about it being hard to add third tank mechanics, rarely have they tried it and have it work in modern wow. I just wonder how else you would ever really have opportunities for new tanks to find guilds. And if the ratio for raids indeed matches tanks available, that's a sad reality for dungeons.

[huth]

I know you have a point about it being hard to add third tank mechanics, rarely have they tried it and have it work in modern wow. I just wonder how else you would ever really have opportunities for new tanks to find guilds. And if the ratio for raids indeed matches tanks available, that's a sad reality for dungeons.

As every person ever looking for a dungeon group as DPS would know.

[Ghanir]

Feral might as well be a spec that doesn't exist. It doesn't see raid play and it's bad in M+ they had a brief moment of hope when they had a busted 4 set but it was nerfed before it went live. When I say a druid type I mean range dps healing and tanking.

Excusing feral as a non-existant spec is not a viable argument. It exists, it has existed since vanilla, and is very heavily rooted in the game's lore.
Even if we humour your thought that feral "doesn't exist" it doesn't mean one of the Evoker's specs couldn't fall into that imaginary category aswell.

There is no arguing that right now we only have 3 classes that can fulfill every role: the Monk, the Paladin and the Druid; and only one of them can fulfill every aspect of every role, and that is the Druid.
Among these 3 none of them are locked to rdps, tank and healer. If the Evoker got a tank spec as their 3rd spec they would be the first class to function as such (if we exclude the druid prior to dividing the Feral spec into Feral (mdps) and Guardian).