I heard the "bring the player not the class" mantra pre-WOTLK and on paper it sounded good. Given equal gear and skill, it shouldn't matter what classes you bring, right? Wrong.

Instructor Razuvious -- heroic mode you need 2xPriest for mind control or you don't complete Naxx.

Ret Paladins, Spriests, and Survival Hunters pretty much required in raids for mana return to the raid. Without this, Ele Shamans, Mages, and Boomkin cannot sprint the marathon (that they were never meant to run) and poor Resto Shamans go OOM in 30 seconds flat thanks to no ability to downrank for reduced cost.

Rogues? Who (other than groups exploiting the bug) brings them to raids? Not our group that's for sure -- because they're all take and no give in the all-important buff arena.

Feral Druids? We don't bring those either. Same problem as rogues, as what used to make them worth bringing (Leader of the Pack) is now something we get from our Fury Warriors who do far, far more damage.

Warlocks? We bring 1, and it's me ... and if I wasn't a warlock, myself, our raid wouldn't bring a warlock, either ... as they're a DoT class in a Burst world.

Enhancement Shamans? Are you kidding me?

We're approaching the 4 month mark since WOTLK's release. Dual spec is coming. Pures are already out-DPS'd by more flexible hybrids ... hybrids that will be multi-role mid-raid with dual spec and have ZERO drawbacks unless serious nerfs are coming.

There used to be some skill required to determining a raid mesh and stacking characters within it to maximize output. Now you don't need to stack them in groups of 5 ... and the only skill you need is sense enough to avoid the classes that Blizzard's seen fit to leave gimped.

I'd really love to "bring the player not the class" but you know what, when trying to optimize how much content we cover in one night, as a raid leader I'm still bringing the class, not the player ... because that's what's in the best interest of everyone in the raid -- especially with some classes being completely out-classed by others.

Am I the only one who feels like this? Am I the only one who worries that dual-spec will hit without class balancing being somewhat done beforehand ... resulting in an even greater divide between the uber classes like DK's and the gimped ones like Feral Druids?

-- G

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Q u o t e:

Warlocks? We bring 1, and it's me ... and if I wasn't a warlock, myself, our raid wouldn't bring a warlock, either ... as they're a DoT class in a Burst world.

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Sounds like "Bring the Player, not the Class" to me.



Overall, from what I've seen, the mantra works well. They need to fix balance issues, but the idea still stands strong. Now once Ulduar is released, THEN things might be more class-based depending how hard they scale it.

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Q u o t e:
Sounds like "Bring the Player, not the Class" to me.

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You're reaching by saying that. As the organizer I'm sort of forced to take myself and I'm not someone with a bazillion 80's. The point I was trying to make with that bullet is that the ONLY reason I take a warlock is because I have to.

-- G

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Q u o t e:


You're reaching by saying that. As the organizer I'm sort of forced to take myself and I'm not someone with a bazillion 80's. The point I was trying to make with that bullet is that the ONLY reason I take a warlock is because I have to.

-- G

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Why wouldn't you bring a warlock.. Or more specifically, an affliction lock ?(Because other spec's DPS is nowhere near where affliction is, ATM) Who the hell cares about burst in a raid format. Damage output should be a major priority as well, when selecting classes to bring. In a raid where most boss fights are longer than 2-3 minutes, even with top end guilds and DPS, and thats where the Affliction Lock Shines.

And don't say anything about their lack of raid utility, because they may not bring active battle debuffs or replenishment like other classes, but the Health Stones and summoning have got to count for something.

You forgot to add how this PvE concept also screwed up PvP by making classes capable of absorbing lots of damage able to also produce lots of damage.

In it's most basic form. Let's just consider survivability and damage. Low will be 1 and high will be 2.

Previously on WoW.

Pure = survivability 1, damage 2 = total 3
Hybrid = survivability 2, damage 1 = total 3

More or less equal balance.

Now in WotLK.

Pure = 1 + 2 = 3
Hybrid = 2 + 2 = 4

Sure it's an overly simplistic model, but that is basic issue in a nutshell.

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Q u o t e:


Sure it's an overly simplistic model, but that is basic issue in a nutshell.

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Oh shut up. Things were never equal when your "2+1=3" because damage was valued>>>>>>>>> over survivability in PvE. Its not like it wasnt tried, and "hybrids" had to be healers. Unless their DPS is competitive, guilds wont consider bringing them. That has been established with 4 years of warcraft.

Live with it.

I believe I was talking about how it's screwed up the PvP game.

To solve the PvE issue, what Blizzard -should- have done was make Tanking and Healing more "fun" and desirable for players. Instead, they've created Healer shortages, by introducing their first "hero" class as a Tank/DPS class and allowing Hybrids to do so much damage. This ALSO screwed up the PvP game further.

Gadson's point is quite valid. Most of the squishy classes are at a pretty firm disadvantage in PvP right now -- mages excepted -- as they have adequate avoidance and have been shown quite a bit of love.


Note:
This isn't about warlocks, it's about a concept I see that sounded good, but failed. However, at the risk of derailing the initial topic and my quest to see if others feel as I do, I'll anwser the query about why I'd not take a warlock to a PvE raid given the choice to take it or something else -- as I think it underscores my feelings.

My answer:
Because hybrids (and some pures) are putting out more damage and are more flexible -- allowing our relatively static (and consistent) raid composition to adapt with the minor inconvenience of a respec -- and no loss of functionality to the raid. I'd take a DK, Ret Pally, Fury Warrior, Spriest, Hunter (not hybrid), or Mage (not hybrid) over a warlock any day given the present state of the game. Rogues actually have it worse -- we don't have a rogue in our guild that isn't an alt ... and we don't, at this time, want one, either, despite the exploit some use.


Back on topic:
I should qualify this a bit. We care about boss AND trash DPS/damage. Let me put it another way - we actually care about overall output, not just boss output. Before you blast me, you should understand why.


Conventional wisdom throws everything but boss damage out the window. We don't because unlike the supposedly-wise conventional wisdom, we recognize that the faster trash dies the more bosses you can reach and defeat in a given amount of time ... and that Patchwerk numbers are just numbers in a vacuum that have no real meaning other than a demonstration of raw potential given how simple the fight is (and how no other boss fight except maybe Gothik is as braindead).

Chain-pulling trash with the best overall-DPS-to-boss-DPS ratio we can muster based on compositional choices ... allows us to clear all 25-man content in 3-4 hours depending on how much we goof off on our run. And we're getting faster.... This is largely due to balancing for overall output, not single-target, boss output (like Patchwerk). It also has a bit to do with creating a synergy of mana hungry casters with mana-providing hybrids so there's next to no downtime between pulls ... and weaving in enough non-squishies and healers so that deaths are minimized. We're nearly 50% melee these days because of this. By comparison, pre-BC we carried a whopping 6 melee and 3 were tanks (one tank of which was a feral druid so he could DPS when only 2 tanks were needed).

This approach seems to yield the best TIME management. It's not friendly to rogues, warlocks, feral druids, enhancement shamen, or other borked up class/spec combinations ... and quite frankly I feel Blizzard's failure to keep those class/spec combinations inline with other classes that dominate them is the raw reason for the issue that taking the player, not the class, has failed.

I just can't pick and choose players without considering class/spec unless I'm willing to gimp my raid or make things take longer for my raiders...

That's from this raid leader's perspective.

-- G

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Q u o t e:
Gadson's point is quite valid. Most of the squishy classes are at a pretty firm disadvantage in PvP right now -- mages excepted -- as they have adequate avoidance and have been shown quite a bit of love.

This isn't about warlocks, it's about a concept I see that sounded good, but failed. However, at the risk of derailing the initial topic and my quest to see if others feel as I do, I'll anwser the query about why I'd not take a warlock to a PvE raid given the choice to take it or something else. My answer: because hybrids (and some pures) are putting out more damage and are more flexible -- allowing our relatively static (and consistent) raid composition to adapt with the minor inconvenience of a respec -- and no loss of functionality to the raid. I'd take a DK, Ret Pally, Fury Warrior, Spriest, Hunter (not hybrid), or Mage (not hybrid) over a warlock any day given the present state of the game.


I should qualify this. We care about boss AND trash DPS/damage. Let me put it another way - we actually care about overall output, not just boss output. Before you blast me, you should understand why.


Conventional wisdom throws everything but boss damage out the window. We don't because unlike the supposedly-wise conventional wisdom, we recognize that the faster trash dies the more bosses you can reach and defeat in a given amount of time ... and that Patchwerk numbers are just numbers in a vacuum that have no real meaning other than a demonstration of raw potential given how simple the fight is (and how no other boss fight except maybe Gothik is as braindead).

Chain-pulling trash with the best overall-DPS-to-boss-DPS ratio we can muster based on compositional choices ... allows us to clear all 25-man content in 3-4 hours depending on how much we goof off on our run. And we're getting faster.... This is largely due to balancing for overall output, not single-target, boss output (like Patchwerk). It also has a bit to do with creating a synergy of mana hungry casters with mana-providing hybrids so there's next to no downtime between pulls ... and weaving in enough non-squishies and healers so that deaths are minimized. We're nearly 50% melee these days because of this. By comparison, pre-BC we carried a whopping 6 melee and 3 were tanks (one tank of which was a feral druid so he could DPS when only 2 tanks were needed).

This approach seems to yield the best TIME management. It's not friendly to rogues, warlocks, feral druids, enhancement shamen, or other borked up class/spec combinations ... and quite frankly I feel Blizzard's failure to keep those class/spec combinations inline with other classes that dominate them is the raw reason for the issue that taking the player, not the class, has failed.

I just can't pick and choose players without considering class/spec unless I'm willing to gimp my raid or make things take longer for my raiders...

That's from this raid leader's perspective.

-- G

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I agree with you from a time management persepective, but I think you're looking at a few minutes, certainly not hours. There's a point where you have to look at some things like spec, but good players that are relatively decently geared can obliterate the current content in a timely manner, even heavy on some of the aforementioned "useless classes." This is from my experience, though I'm certainly no expert. But, I do contend that with the current content bring the player not the class is certainly possible and even entirely viable without entirely gimping your raid. There will never be balance to the point that every class has a full set of buffs that they toss on the raid at all times and so forth. There will always be overlaps, for there not to be would get a little ridiculous. As far as feral druids and leader of the pack, in the new patch fury warriors are getting nerf bombed big time, so I'd assume that wouldn't be as much of a consideration going forward.

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Q u o t e:
As far as feral druids and leader of the pack, in the new patch fury warriors are getting nerf bombed big time, so I'd assume that wouldn't be as much of a consideration going forward.

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We're watching this one with interest. I'm sort of hoping to see Arms become viable, again.

-- G

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Q u o t e:


We're watching this one with interest. I'm sort of hoping to see Arms become viable, again.

-- G

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whats with the -- G? your name is posted next to all your posts anyway? lmao...

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Q u o t e:


We're watching this one with interest. I'm sort of hoping to see Arms become viable, again.

-- G

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I hear that.

I'm kind of hoping they turn Sub into a heavy buff/debuff tree, which may or may not give Blizzard an interesting fiddle to play when it comes to this 5% hybrid tax.

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Q u o t e:
whats with the -- G? your name is posted next to all your posts anyway? lmao...

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In internet speak, this is how you represent raising your fist up so your mate can punch it in a gesture of gangster pride.

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Q u o t e:


We're watching this one with interest. I'm sort of hoping to see Arms become viable, again.

-- G

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I believe it will. I mean, I have a warrior as well, though not 80 yet. I have to admit I was kind of looking forward to tearing things apart with titan's grip. However, from the perspective of a hunter, the warrior isn't a pure dps class and it was kind of awkward seeing warriors putting up the sort of numbers they were in comparison to the pure dpsers, though I don't generally complain when it's people in my raid because that helps us all. On the high end though, which is where the devs say they take their data from, they were consistently outdpsing all classes since the removal of the penalty from TG, from the spreadsheets i've seen anyway. So fury has sort of had a nerf aura around it for a while now. I also would like to see arms be viable. I don't like seeing any class have what pretty much equated to a useless tree.

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Q u o t e:
whats with the -- G? your name is posted next to all your posts anyway? lmao...

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I'm 'old skool' and actually sign things I write. That's effectively my digial signature. There's no good reason for it -- just something I do.

-- G

I think with the addition of more complex DPS rotations for nearly all classes, they have gone a long way toward making skill play a larger part in raids.

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Q u o t e:
I think with the addition of more complex DPS rotations for nearly all classes, they have gone a long way toward making skill play a larger part in raids.

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I'll agree with this. However, no amount of skill can take a class/spec combination that has unresolved, fundamental issues ... and put it (consistently) on par with the classes that don't have such issues.

I'm no advocate of the nerf bat, by the way -- I don't like nerfs. I'd really rather see the borked class/spec combos fixed but unfortunately I think that's more design/programming time than issuing nerfs ... and thus less cost-effective.

Blizzard is a bottom-line company now that Activision has sway. Gone are the days of not releasing anything until it's ready -- as evidenced by WOTLK's release ... which is how we ended up where we are. :(

-- G

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Q u o t e:
I think with the addition of more complex DPS rotations for nearly all classes, they have gone a long way toward making skill play a larger part in raids.

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I would welcome a more complex rotation in surv to be honest. One of the things that keeps me occupied is proc watching. As I said earlier, I'm from marks, so when they completely demolished volley and nerfed steady shot i pretty much had no choice at that point, as I had been able to contribute in other ways, mainly aoe damage, though i still could put out solid single target, just not equivalent with that of a BM prior to 3.8, and the marks rotation was using was far more complex than anything i've done in surv, with my damage spread out far more evently. Though I have fallen into survival and enjoy the fact that my raid buff makes healers <3 me (that extra heal you toss me is going to get you way more mana back through the entire fight than it cost :) in other words) , and just enjoy playing the spec overall as well. It doesn't hurt that it is extremely more mana efficient. The only way I'd go back is if they completely gimped it and my contribution was hurting the raid significantly.

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Q u o t e:


I'll agree with this. However, no amount of skill can take a class/spec combination that has unresolved, fundamental issues ... and put it (consistently) on par with the classes that don't have such issues.

I'm no advocate of the nerf bat, by the way -- I don't like nerfs. I'd really rather see the borked class/spec combos fixed but unfortunately I think that's more design/programming time than issuing nerfs ... and thus less cost-effective.

Blizzard is a bottom-line company now that Activision has sway. Gone are the days of not releasing anything until it's ready -- as evidenced by WOTLK's release ... which is how we ended up where we are. :(

-- G

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I agree with you to an extent. However, fixing the borked class/spec combos is going to inherrently cause nerfs. I look at it pragmatically. If they have a warrior doing more dps than all other classes and they want all pure dpsers to do more damage than hybrids, then you're looking at significantly buffing 4 classes off the bat, to the point that they're doing 5 percent more dps on average in high end full geared content, to avoid a nerf. Not to mention the fact that you're going to have to buff the other 5 hybrids to simply make them equal to warriors. This makes the fights even easier. Meaning you either leave them easier or make them harder, both of which are going to cause tons of complaints. I hate being nerfed, make no mistake, and my class has been slammed with them lately. I do understand the reasoning behind it though. I will say that sometimes it's too extreme for my tastes. I'm not so sure fury should lose what's probably going to equate to 10 percent of it's overall right now, which is probably about where they'll be. But that's just my own opinion.