For posterity's sake, and because Rohan alluded to a comp that I had toyed with before settling on the one in my last post, here is the other version of my perfect raid, solving the "I want a 3rd healthstone" problem but creating issues with group stacking. Swapped in: Resto Druid, Destro Warlock; Swapped out: Holy Paladin, Feral Druid...
G1 - Tank
Protection Warrior
Protection Paladin
Restoration Druid
Restoration Druid
Affliction Warlock
G2 - Melee
Enhancement Shaman
Retribution Paladin
Arms Warrior
Combat Rogue
Combat Rogue
G3 - Agility Stackers
Restoration Shaman (Grace of Air totem)
Survival Hunter
BM Hunter
Destruction Warlock
Feral Druid
G4 - Caster DPS
Elemental Shaman
Destruction Warlock
Fire Mage
Fire Mage
Shadow Priest
G5 - Healers
Restoration Shaman
CoH Priest
Imp. DS Priest
Holy Paladin
Shadow Priest
This raid composition gets more raw DPS from the addition of the Destruction Warlock to replace the Feral Druid, but loses a true tank, which would force the Arms Warrior into tank gear on certain encounters. The Resto Druid in place of the fourth Paladin is a fine choice, I just love having four blessings as a Ret Paladin, otherwise I miss out on Blessing of Wisdom. I'm selfish. I also swapped the Holy Paladin from the tank group into the healer group, and put the second Resto Druid in there. Double tree aura on the tank! (Tree? No. Double tree? Hell yea! - Mitch Hedberg reference, he was a funny man.)
My issue with this composition is the Agility group (G3). The Destruction Warlock is receiving Ferocious Inspiration and a Mana Spring Totem, but is hardly benefiting from the Grace of Air Totem or the Leader of the Pack buff. I feel like this can be done better. In my previous post, there was no question about where to put people, this comp is a bit murkier...
EDIT: Argent suggested using a Felguard-Demonology Warlock in g3 instead of another Destruction Warlock. It's an idea that crossed my mind, but I have had no experience with Demo Warlocks in raids aside from when our Destro Warlocks respecced for Soul Link when we were learning Leotheras and Kael'thas. I agree that having a Soul Link'ed Warlock in the raid would be useful for caster-tanking on fights like Leo, Kael, and Illidan, but is the damage capability of a Felguard-lock at all comparable with Destruction or even Affliction? Someone link me some WWS reports of t6 Felguard-locks in BT or Sunwell, I want to know.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
The Perfect Raid - Alternate Composition
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6 comments:
Swap the second Destruction lock for a Demonology-specced lock with a felguard?
The Demonology tank would also be handy for tanking with soul link on the 2-3 fights where that's useful.
I'm going to admit, I don't know anything about the management or damage output of Felguard-locks in raid environments. The thought had crossed my mind - the Felguard would benefit from all of the shaman's totems, making that group appropriate for him. HOWEVER, seeing as I don't know the potential of t6 demo-locks, are they capable of putting out 2000-2400 DPS with appropriate buffs and a Heroism during a 6 minute encounter? And isn't managing the Felguard as a DPS pet difficult on many encounters? I'm not dismissing the possibility here, I'm just completely noobed out when it comes to talking demo-locks if they aren't SL/SL for arena. Felguards are uncharted territory for me.
As for the soul-link tank for fights like Leotheras and Illidan, the idea has merit. Let me go look up the DPS potential of SL-Felguard Warlocks in raids and I might edit this here comp.
Heh, now imagine how hard this is going to be when you need to fit 2-3 Deathknights into the raid.
That's why I believe that 25-mans need to be tuned around 5 healers.
@Rohan
/plugs ears with fingers
Lalalalala not listening not listening! Death who? What knight? Can't hear you, plugging my ears!
I don't even want to THINK about how raid balance will be affected when you add a whole new class into the mix.
I'm in total agreement with your past post regarding tank-healer ratios when going from 5-mans to raids, and yea balancing around a 20% healer ratio in raid would be great. But then you've got another problem: you have to very very carefully choose your healers.
5 healer slots, 4 healer-capable classes: Resto Druid, Resto Shaman, Holy Priest, Holy Paladin. If you want total raid balance, you can only take 1 extra of each of these. Right now, raids get by on stacking Resto Shaman + CoH Priest to deal with raid splash damage, which was Blizzard's answer to diversifying raid encounters from plain ol' tank 'n spanks. I'm guessing bring 2x priests so one can get Imp. DS and the other CoH, and just have 1 of the other healer specs? They'd have to either tune down damage or really ramp up healing power/mana longevity to make a 5-healer 25-man comp possible.
Bah, now I'm thinking about it. Dammit Rohan! You're killin' me, smalls...
Since when does Tree of Life aura stack? I haven't been resto for awhile, but I can't think of any other permanent aura in the game that stacks. May have to respec again just to try this out.
No Fury Warrior?
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