What are the Classes FOR?

[Trien]

Druid
Secondary healer or secondary tank in 5 man. Yes I know there are lots of druids who claim to have primary tanked or primary healed in a 5 man but I bet it was in a very experienced group and with top end gear. In any case, you wouldn't chose a druid as healer above a priest or as tank above a warrior. In a raid the class has massive utility thanks to the buffs, heals and being able to secondary tank when needed. Very powerful class PvE generally and always wanted in any raid. Also wanted 5 man so long as you already have a warrior and priest. The druid can be both secondary tanks and secondary healer as needed and when those roles aren't needed he can dish out some useful DPS as well. On my server most druids are forced into a healing role only due to lack of preists.
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Forced into healing due to lack of priests was a very true thing for me bringing my druid up... we simply had no priests (save a few very low level alts) in the guild. So, when it came to doing quest runs (5-man) in the instances, guess who ended up stuck being healer? Ended up respeccing out of a mainly feral build in late L40's because of this. But I must defend the druid class, and say that a druid can primary heal these, even without a group that's well equipped. From BRD in the late L50's, to LBRS, Strath, and Scholo... and this is before many of the recent nerfs to these instances to make them easier. We were never spectacularly geared... Experience wise? I suppose we'd played enough togethere levelling up that we knew our roles, and how to improvise due to non-ideal party makeup.

Which leads me to another thought about all this talk of classes and their specific roles. So often people are looking for the 'ideal' group makeup that they don't necessarily explore the possibilities of running with less than ideal groups... though I can't blame them for random pickup groups since you don't know the players involved. But those who have had to push the limits have a bit more appreciation for what classes are really capable of. Druid tank? Paladin main healer? 4-manning specific parts of instances since you can't find a full group?

The 40-man endgame raids are fun for their groupwork and coordination, but unfortunatley does tend to narrow each class down to a specific few skills (as has been mentioned)... but it is the 5-man (or less!) groups where one really gets to stretch.

Anyone up for 5-manning UBRS? (No, we've never finished it, but we've tried!)