06-03-2008, 03:58 PM
Quote:Gurgthock started a post on the EJ forums to discuss group synergies and inviting ideas on how to minimize their effect on raid composition (the goal being to discourage raid stacking).
http://elitistjerks.com/f15/t26275-consoli..._vulnerability/
Thank you for this link!:) It's interesting discussion; I wish we had the class compositions for the groups getting tossed around. Especially in terms of # of shammies, but I'm sure you've all heard me complain quasi-bitterly about that enough in various threads :D
Quote:Some of the driving forces at work in high end raids, not that every raid does this to an extreme, but the forces exist and have affects:
Warlocks: Given equal gear and skill, add more raid DPS than any ranged class. Might seem obvious for the first three warlocks you add, that all drop curses to buff the raid (CoS, CoR, and CoE). However, it is interesting to note that even after the first three, the fourth warlock and beyond all get to use damage curses, and should out-dps mages at the same gear and skill levels, so there is no real reason to stop adding warlocks in favor of mages, even after three.
I'm not sure I agree, and for one simple reason: mage-ecute. It's substantial, especially on bosses with a tough phase near the end of their health that you want to burn through (mind you, these are becoming a rare breed). Brutallus specifically, often held up as guilty of the worst raid stacking, often has 3-4 mages because of mage-ecute, to the point where it seems to be a jump ball for warlocks versus mages in terms of the meters.
I'd still argue that warlocks have a slight edge, besides the affliction lock, but I don't think it's crippling, and it's definitely not imbalanced enough to offset skill differences between players.
Quote:One interesting side-note on the shaman stacking that exists is that some of it is a result of encounter make-up. If TBC raids didn't have as much raid-wide damage going around, or required a lot more spreading out, extra resto shamans would be in less demand, unless simply for totems/bloodlust. Gurgthock himself points to resto shaman as the worst healers in the game on single targets, in situations where chain heal won't be effective.
Yeah, the TBC raids cater extremely well to chain heal for the most part. I do think that with Wrath blizzard is approaching things from their usual angle, namely instead of nerfing shamans they buff the other healers. Preliminary talents for other healers include a few interesting looking AoE heals for druids and priests. Poor paladins:P I do think this is the best way to accomplish balance, and they've had much success with it (see Shadow priests pre vs post BC, boomkin, most hybrids that have received cool synergies, etc.)
The only way I can see encounter design dictating a move away from raid healing with shaman healers is if we were required to spread out vastly, a la Archimonde, more often. Unfortunately, this would adversely affect CoH, PoM and the new hypothetical druid-AE heal before chain heal begins to suffer, so all healers would be more-or-less reduced to single target healing. Good for paladins, not good for anyone else, including but not limited to shamans. So I wouldn't count on many encounters being designed to nerf chain heal by reducing its ability to bounce around, personally.
Quote:Melee Groups and the Death Knight: Note that if things don't change in WotLK, and assuming the DK needs windfury totem to be effective, and assuming he benefits greatly from attack power, there is a very real possibility that raids in WotLK might look to run two enhancement shaman as a matter of course. As is, with enh-shaman + arms warrior + ret paladin + rogue + rogue groups running around, you often have a 3rd rogue or bear in a secondary melee group. Add DK, and there is a pretty strong driving force behind wanting not just a shaman in melee group number 2, but an enhancement shaman for the extra buffs he provides.
Barring the particular need for a second enhancement shaman, I don't see running with two melee groups as necessarily a bad thing. Thinking out loud,
Melee - Rogues, Warriors, DK, Some Druids, Some Shamans, Some Paladins
Ranged - Hunters, Mages, Warlocks, Some Druids, Some Shamans, Some Priests
Hunters can roll both ways, too, in terms of group comp. Also, in general the ranged synergies are pretty bad so the ranged that don't get an "uber group" don't suffer overtly. So with your standard 15 DPS, and up to three hunters, two melee groups give anywhere from 7-10 melee and 5-8 ranged.
Ranged has had their day in the sun since the beginning of WoW, and giving melee the edge makes a certain amount of sense. How long has it been that you bring ~6 "pure" nukers between Mages and Warlocks, and yet cap out at ~3 "pure" - two rogues and a warrior, usually - melee? Wrath offers reroll opportunities, and is probably the ideal time to do such a paradigm shift in terms of which classes are most in demand for PvE endgame.