If You Were a Casual Gamer...

[Kevin]

My thoughts, this is all for PvE as I figure a casual gamer will be more into that than PvP. I'm also thinking a casual player will spend a lot of time under L50 so what you can do end game is mostly irrelevant. A lot of the lounge thought is geared towards that in general it seems so I'm trying to think of life up to 40 to 50 as the primary concern how the character grows is probably more important than how the character plays once grown up.

Warrior: This is the class I have the most experience with and for me it has been the must frustrating class to solo with. You have more downtime (you need food and first aid when solo like no other) depending on your spec your solo killing speed can be pretty miserable too. You are heavily equipment dependent and while smithing can keep your armor mostly up to snuff, smithing doesn't do jack for weapons until the higher levels or unless you get lucky and find some of the drop only recipies at level appropriate times. Alechemy or engineering would probably help your soloing a lot. Your only healing is pots and bandages and food. Your only escape is turtle down (def stance shield on) and run to mitigate the damge. Getting a group is relatively easy though. With a healer behind you, you become very powerful as you can just sit there do a few AoE attention grabbers and slowly kill the whole mess of mobs. I've played a lot of warrior with a priest behind him (Gnolack and Aleri) and it is a very different story. We still don't kill quick (def spec and holy spec) but we can surive a lot and safely run from pretty much anything. So fine if you are getting into pick-up groups a lot, tough choice for pure solo. Not a bad casual choice though.

Paladin: Up until L31 at least I have never played anything easier to solo. The hard shell, self healing and bubbles make it easier to keep going and easier to get away from bad situations than a warrior. For me the names of the seals and what they did was not intuitive. I had to keep looking at what it did and then what it did judged. The name wouldn't make it obvious for me. It will take some study to figure out what the best way to seal -> judged -> seal would be, but you don't have to do that to kill and survive you can just put up a seal and go. Pulling is the biggest problem and could be the biggest learning curve as you don't have a ranged pull unless facing undead or until L40 if you spec that way or from tradeskills. Killing speed, up to the 30's at least, is very much on par, if not better than a warriors. Still have equipment dependencies just like the warrior but for me they weren't as harsh simply because you could self heal and the DPS at those levels isn't really any different, actually the paladin was generally better DPS because the seals would do more than the warriors rage abilities as far as damage goes. Main tanking instances as a paly is not as simple, groups may not be as willing to take you, which to me is stupid becuase I love having a paly as an off tank the few times I've had one. The aura the blessings the ability to prevent anything from running, the additional healing (since an off tank pally won't be using nearly the mana a MT paly would) I just love having one around. I'm not sure that post 40 would be as much fun and I've read that things start to get worse the older they get and you have to play better and better to just try and stay level. I'm not there yet though. Good overall choice will work well for grouping and solo play.

Hunter: Hunters are very solo friendly and you can not use their skills and still do quite well. The learning curve to figure out pets isn't really that steep and if someone points you to a couple of websites you will know where to find the beasts to learn the skills to teach your pet. I think even a casual player who only has a couple of characters would be able to get it figured out pretty quickly. As far as how to use the pet you can pretty much leave it on defensive and not think about it for solo play and be mostly just fine. It won't be the best way to do it, but it will work. If you can't control it well in an instance you can put it away and still be an decent DPS dealer. But it isn't hard to learn how to control the pet well. You can get away with crappy equipment and still be effective. Wing clip and/or your pet being sacrificed to the hold the mobs can get you out of many hairy situations. Solo is easy, finding a party is more difficult than some classes. A very solid choice for a casual player though as I don't think the pet will be a big obstacle and you should still be able to get groups.

Warlock: Very fun class to play, but not a casual friendly one. Blizzard even says this class is for more experienced players. I agree there and see no need to elaborate further.

Priest: It isn't hard to solo with this class even if you don't go shadow, though it can be slow to solo. I haven't really run a priest solo past L20 but I've seen Treesh do some solo work with Aleri and it really doesn't change much. You pull with a smite, hit it with mind blast as it runs it, pain it (instant cast so the last spell to hit it with on the run) swing at it and renew or bubble while you beat on it with additional healing and refresh of pain as needed. Renew has always been better than the bubble for me takes less mana and I come out healthier in most cases. You won't have problems finding a party either. Bubble and renewing while running away works in most cases and is usually more reliable than the warriors turtle up and go. Not a bad choice for a casual player though the slower kill speed if they like to solo a lot could be frustrating.

Mage: Bit of a learning curve as you will have a fair bit of spells at your disposal and it can take a bit to realize that some of them are for the same purpose. Good escape skills (frost nova and blink can get you out of a lot). If you go alchemy you have pots you can drink to keep you up longer. Learning to nova and quick bandage can keep you alive pretty well too. Kill speed is good. Solo equipment isn't that important and what to choose (more int please) is pretty simple. Finding a party isn't hard. Not a bad choice and if you want to sling spells a lot probably the best choice.

Shaman: Totems can be a bit tricky to figure out for some. Melee skills are alright. No way to garauntee a self heal like a paladin bubble or 5 talent points and concentration aura though, unless you go 21 points into restoration (L30), and that can hurt at times. Some decent escape skills and good pull skills. No more durable than a hunter though and less durable than a druid when taking a beating. Equipment choices can be tougher or you need to use multi sets because you can want stats for melee and casting, it's easy to burn out your mana quickly and have none left for a heal if you need it. A good solo class, probably the easiest to get to the late teens, but they get harder after that. A solid party class if you can figure out your roll but they are trickier to play than a paladin I think. I don't see them as highly casual friendly but I don't see them being totally frustrating if you go that route either.

Druid: Very fun class to play. You can play the whole game effectively without ever shapeshifting. You can solo pretty much just like a priest does with the added ability to root things and continue to cast if you don't want to stand there and beat on it under your renew. The overhead of hotbar management how to play a pseudo rogue and a pseudo warrior might not make it the best choice for a casual gamer, or they might make it the best choice because you could get to see a lot of different aspects of the game. This is a zero downtime solo class when you figure it out. If you are low on mana you don't need to drink just go bear or cat form (depends on how hard the enemies hit for optimal choice) and have a fight or two while you regen. Sure you can't use pots or items while shifted but you should be able to get through a fight or two in feral without needing to heal. Then pop out rejuv to heal and do a couple more fights if the bar isn't full enough. When you get good you can shift in combat for healing or rooting or what have you and up your effectiveness even more. Groups shouldn't be hard to find though with a pick-up group you will most likely be locked in one roll. If I'm the only healer around as a druid I usually will sacrifice some of the fun I could have with shifting to other forms because of worries about messing up an "oh crap moment". If there is someone else around who can heal even just a little so that you have time to get back to caster form to heal, a good group would be wise to let the druid change rolls as needed. Druid equipment choices get hard if you don't want to carry multiple sets and even if you do multi set, when to change (since you can't change in combat) becomes another complication. A very fun class but not casual friendly in my mind.

Rogue: A very straightfoward class. You sneak-up you do damage as fast as you can and you move on. You have solid escape skills and with a high base dodge are pretty tough. There can be some issues in the teens if you get in places where you have to deal with multiple mobs but that just teaches you to run better or adds to downtime some. Learning your instance roll can be frustrating as well since if you aren't paying attention can get you and your party killed. A solid choice for a casual player.


Professions.
As has been said, most of the tradeskills in this game are relatively pointless at lower levels. I also see a casual player wanting the crafting to work along with growing up, something more integral to the character or something that is more or less ignored. I also don't see a casual player being able to afford to outfit themselves from the auction house unless they make that a goal of theirs. So crafting will be to help outfit themselves not really as a means to make a money. This all goes out the window if you have a casual player who likes to play the market or is money focused. I just don't see most of them that way.

Smithing can be helpful for a hardshell because the armors will generally be better than what you find get as a reward, the weapons generally won't be. You'll need to know to hold every gem you see for the recipies that you don't know how to make and you will suffer some space problems from it but it isn't bad.

Leatherworking can be helpful for druids, rogues, hunters and shaman as much of the armor you make will be better than what you find or get as a reward. You can chew a bit of space in the field but generally don't need to stockpile anything. Most of what you bring back to town can be turned immediately into a finished product to vendor sell or wear.

Alchemy and engineering can be helpful for everyone. But they both can chew up space which can be a concern if you don't have someone feeding you bags.

Tailoring is nice for making bags but most of the cloth wearers aren't highly dependent on equipment so while it will help for that it won't help as much and if you take skinning with it will be a source of income for you even if you just sell to vendors.

Enchanting isn't for the casual. If you need to buy your own bags, if you don't know how to use crafting to make make money, etc the game keeps your purse pretty empty through L40 and enchanting just makes that worse.

Now all that being said, you can take two gathering skills and simply sell at the AH, if you don't mind doing that and then use the money to buy equipment. That will actually work quite well too. Heck I made a skinner miner just for that purpose and he made enough money doing that to help with Gnolack's and Etheramwen's mounts significantly. Of course I didn't buy any equipment for him since I had high level feeders so he had more income that you would if you bought stuff.