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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsDealing with off-specs (or being one)
by Mike Schramm 
Oct 5th 2006 at 1:06AM
Righteous Fury has an interesting little piece up about off-specs-- you know them, they're the weirdos who play their class to do something other than its standard role in endgame raiding. Feral druids, DPS-adins, Fury warriors, Enhancement shammys, and (perhaps most of all) shadow priests. The convention says warriors spec prot, pallys heal and buff, and priests use +healing gear, but these guys (and girls) choose to buck the curve.What he says rings true to me because the guild I play with has finally reached the point where we're getting serious about raiding. My GM hasn't asked anyone to respec yet, but he's put it out there that we want to beat these bosses and get the gear-- if you can't do the job given to you because you're specced for PVP instead of raiding, you've got to move out of the way for someone who can, or do what's best for the raid. And I'm right there with him. Holy priests are the best healers in the game, so most priests should be holy and healing. Protection warriors have the tanking tools, so if you're MT, you better be prot.
I'm not saying there's not room for off-specs-- there's a guy in my other guild who's such an awesome shadow priest (shout out to Gregorus on Thunderhorn-A!) that the whole guild has shadow priest alts just because they've seen what he can do. I main tanked for him in Strat, and when he told us early on that he "tanked by healing," he wasn't kidding-- the mobs all hit him way more then they hit me, and yet he kept us all healed and up with Vampiric Embrace and his +shadow gear. After seeing that, of course I had to have my own shadow priest, and when she hits 60, I already expect that I won't be able to raid with her under normal circumstances. No problem-- I'll melt faces in PVP with her, and raid with my prot warrior.
On the other hand, if I need a DPS for a raid, and a shadow priest can roll out as much damage as a rogue or a warlock, then we're talking. But from what I've seen, off-specs can do those things, just not as well. Gear to gear (without extremely expensive potions), can a feral druid tank as well as a warrior? Can a shadow priest out-dps a rogue? Because if not, I'm giving those spots to PVE specced raiders.
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, PvP, Instances
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 3)
Avenge Oct 6th 2006 1:33PM
Have fun dispelling bubbles... I will still slam your cloth wearing ass into the ground. I like how people think that Divine Shield is the only thing that Paladins have to fall back on, hell I don't even use it unless being jumped... just to piss off the horde. Other than that I'm not really concerned with one class having the ability to dispel my shield. But I guess I should just pretend to be upset about it so that priests can feel good about themselves.
Donner Nov 2nd 2006 12:02PM
I really dont agree with this entirlly. just because your an off spec doesnt mean you cant heal. You just cant heal as well but serriouslly if someones going to be that anal about spec they need to learn that off specs arent bad. Furry warriors for instance may not do as much damage as any other dps class but they have two things that make them great. First they have higher armor then most classes which means they can out last a rouge without even trying in a raid. two they have one of the greatest abilities in the game execute, that one ability when it crits can cause alot of damage.