"It was not necessarily obvious that your argument against strong hybrid DPS relied on some sort of "greater utility" to increase the damage output of others."

Actually, it was perfectly obvious, even to you. Which is why you responded with:

"So nobody should bring a shadow priest to a progression raid?"

Bringing up a class whose DPS is drastically gimped in order to provide a (previously) essential raid utility shows that you knew utility was exactly what I was talking about. Again, continue with your semantics if it makes you feel smart.


"Enhance? Nah, we got a DK. Elemental, nah, we got a moonkin. More than 1 ret? Nah, 2 paladins is more than enough and the 2 resto shaman cover bloodlust."

I love how you're replacing hybrid classes with OTHER HYBRID CLASSES in order to make your point about not bringing those classes to the raid.

NEWS FLASH: In World of Warcraft, there are only 25 raid slots for 30 different talent specs! The world is reeling with the implications that 7 shamans might not be needed after all. Film at 11.

You bring up all these complicated ways for non-hybrids to handle problems in the raid. of course they can. Any class can handle a problem if they know how to play their class. That doesn't mean it's easy for them.

"Actually, a hunter can easily keep a healer or another DPS person alive. Mob breaking free due to healing aggro? Freezing trap them. Have tank taunt and then MD them to the tank to make sure.

Oh, that mob is going after the tank. Howl of terror if it is far enough away to not cause a problem, get tank to taunt it or fear it until the tank can.

Healer is in trouble? Blind, gouge, kidney shot, whatever it takes to stun the mob to stay off the healer. MD it to the tank and make the tank do more damage as you do that.

Healer in trouble. Frost nova in the path. Let tank grab it. Blast wave it back to the tank. Turn it into a freaking sheep."

Do you not notice that in every one of those scenarios, you are involving more than one person? "Stun it long enough for the tank to fix things" "Trap it and MD until the tank can fix things" "Sheep it until the tank can fix things" "Fear it until the hunter can MD it to the tank so he can fix things"

Shaman: That mob is going after someone. Without relying on any aggro-changing skills or having the tank change anything at all, I will simply stop DPS and heal the person the mob is going after. I can continue to do this until the fight is over if necessary.

Paladin: That mob is going after someone. I have two options that don't require the tank to do anything at all. I can heal this person through the entire fight if necessary. I can throw on a shield, pop righteous fury and tank this mob through the entire fight if necessary.

DPS Warrior: That mob is going after someone. I can throw on a shield, pop defensive stance and tank this mob through the entire fight if necessary.

Moonkin: That mob is going after someone. I have two options that don't require the tank to do anything at all. I can heal this person through the entire fight if necessary. I can go bear form and tank this mob through the entire fight if necessary.

Shadow Priest : That mob is going after someone. I will simply stop DPS, drop shadow form, and heal the person the mob is going after. I can continue to do this until the fight is over if necessary.

Death Knight: That mob is going after someone. I can death grip the mob over to me and tank it through the entire fight if necessary.

None of these solutions involve using skills that are resistable or worry about traps breaking or sheep breaking or the tank not responding in time or whatever. These solutions are the HYBRID class acting like a HYBRID. They're not switching up what spells they use. They're switching their ENTIRE ROLE in the fight. I don't care how much you argue it, a mage is not going to tank a mob that broke loose. A warlock is not going to heal someone who is getting beat on by a mob. The best pure DPS classes can do is buy time and delay the problem. Hybrid classes have the option to SOLVE the problem.

When mages are able to spec into tanking or healing trees, they will nerf their DPS accordingly. Until then, accept the fact that being able to completely change your role at the drop of a hat is worth a 5% DPS penalty.

It seems to me that the only people complaining that they are having to sacrifice a small percentage of DPS for better raid utility are the people afraid they are going to lose their job.

If you're afraid the moonkin is going to take your DPS spot because he provides your same buff and out-DPSes you, I say you need to learn to DPS harder. If a mage in blues is out DPSing a well-played, well-geared elemental shaman, that is a different case, and it is broken and should be fixed. But no one has hit those situations yet. For every WWS parse of an elemental shaman at the bottom of the charts, you can find another where they are at the top.

You folks need to remember that arguing about scaling at this point (even on the beta servers) is like arguing about people in Kara gear right now. The real tests for scaling haven't even started, we're only theorycrafting at this point. When REAL data start coming in, we can talk about scaling issues. For now you should be less worried about what things will be like when we are raiding Icecrown and a little more concerned about not getting kicked from groups at 75 because you don't understand the unbelievable utility your class can bring to a group.