While writing the most recent
Shifting Perspectives column and browsing old records on Druid population statistics, I started to wonder about the various factors that play a role in how popular a class becomes. While Blizzard and Blizzard alone has the exact numbers on who's playing what,
various fan sites have honed data collection strategies over the years and amassed a
pretty impressive pile of numbers. This only got easier
when the Armory launched in spring 2007, and by now I'd be surprised if players weren't at least broadly accurate
about overall trends. If we can trust what we see, how we do best explain fluctuations in class popularity? Has Arena success (or the lack thereof) been as influential as we think? Is class population an accurate, albeit crude, guide to the overall "quality" of a class at any given moment -- or just a guide to the perceived "quality?" I'd be interested to hear what people think.
Having played a Druid since the beginning of
Burning Crusade and observed it going from the second least-played class at 60 to the third or fourth most-played class at 80, I have my own theories about what's influenced Druid population numbers particularly, but I need to do a little more digging before I can be sure. However, I don't know whether any of it really applies to other classes, and the meteoric rise of the Death Knight is a thought-provoking (and somewhat troubling) trend.
Tags: arena, arena-representation, armory, class-popularity, daedalus-project, death-knight, druid, statistics, trend, trends, wow-armory
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Classes, Wrath of the Lich King
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May 13th 2009 at 11:00AM 
Reader Comments (Page 5 of 7)
Kylenne May 13th 2009 1:18PM
Keep in mind though that your gear and skills were not balanced for Outlands content. That roflstomping that DKs do through BC content just does not happen in Northrend, which is why you generally see such a drop off in the number of DKs in NR vs. OL. This is not to say NR is hard or anything for a DK, by all means no. It's just that the ADD children who roll your average terribad DK tend to give up in the face of having to learn a rotation to solo group quests when they've randomly hit buttons from 55-68.
Also, I have had zero trouble beating the crap out of DKs on meters while my bringing various post-Wrath toons through Outlands, including a Ret pally, deep Demo lock, an arcane mage, and a shaman both elemental and enhancement. All of those toons instanced their way through OL with both the rare, solid DKs that knew their class as well as the multitude of bads. All of them topped meters.
If you are geared and know wth you're doing it's not really hard.
T May 13th 2009 12:55PM
Wow, you can see where the dk's came from. Pre-dk, rogues were one of the overpopulated classes. I know a majority of the dk's on my server are rogue / lock re-rolls. All switched for the same reasons too, they were tired of playing a pure dps class, no flexiblity to switch roles.
Trasken May 13th 2009 3:08PM
Shoot, I'll admit I tried a DK out. It was kind of fun being able to wear plate and the like, but honestly after a few levels it just lacked the fun that my rogue has.
Sure I'm kinda squishy, but hearing someone on vent say "blow your cooldowns" makes my day. Especially as Combat.
Maybe it's just me, but I love the various ways we can handle ourselves in those "Oh crap" situations.
Kylenne May 13th 2009 1:07PM
Yes, there are a lot of DKs out there, but the thing is how many of those are actually being played? I would wager a lot less than people think. That 15% number does not tell the whole story.
Just speaking for myself, I have DKs on like 4 different servers that were rolled purely so I could hang out with friends that don't play on my home server. I have no intention of ever seriously leveling them. And the DK I rolled on my home server is a bank toon whose sole purpose is to make money for my real toons (I do quest on the DK, but only for the gold).
And you have a lot of people who rolled DKs on the opposite faction on non-PVP servers just to experience the flipside, plus the people who rolled DKs when Wrath came out but then the novelty wore off. Or the people who started to level and then got sick of Outlands and went back to their mains. Or the way-too-many-goddamn-people-on-my-server with level 58 DKs who sit around effing Silvermoon City in RP clothes all day wangsting. Etc, etc, etc.
I would really be shocked if the percentage of actively played DKs approached that 15% figure. Yes, there are way too many of them, but I don't think it's nearly the epidemic that figure suggests once you get out of Outlands.
AyaJulia May 13th 2009 2:38PM
As has been stated a number of times, the caption on the graph says "Class population at level 80."
These are level 80 death knights, not level 55 death knights that someone made to talk to their friend, not level 58 death knights that someone made for a bank alt, not level 65 death knights someone leveled just so they could have a grand master in another profession.
15% of level 80 players that have logged in within the last month are death knights.
Naix May 13th 2009 1:08PM
Big surprise here that NO ONE PLAYS WARLOCKS ANYMORE. I played a warlock in a top raiding guild for 3 years and here is my take on the class.
1. Warlock's DOTS do little damage and can be COMPLETELY removed/countered by many many classes. It take 18 seconds for a dot to do it's damage for maybe 4k. 18 seconds! They should shorten that to 9 maybe just maybe it would work.
2. Warlocks have NO ESCAPE and no the reverse blink is not an escape.
3. Warlocks primary CC, fear, is USELESS. Don't dare use it while questing cause you get more mobs, instances you get more mobs, and in PVP everyone can break it. Not to mention every time it does work, IT HAS DIMINISHING RETURNS. Making the spell useless.
4. Warlocks stamina buffs were nurfed. /facepalm
5. Warlock damage was good for about ohh 2 hours until a server hotfix came out to make the class less bursty. That makes no sense. The class wears cloth and has lowered HP. You have to be able to put out damage to counter classes/mobs with more health. Now Blizzard takes that away.
Every patch is a nurf warlocks and I could not take it anymore. So I quit.
Kylenne May 13th 2009 1:23PM
I'm a warlock. There's four of us in my progression raiding guild, and top of the meters is always a race between the four of us (myself and one other are Meta/Ruin locks, the other two are Affliction). And we have a balanced, well-geared and extremely talented group of raiders.
I'm going to be a blatantly elitist bitch for a minute and point out that we're still out there, all the nerfs did was separate the wheat from the chaff IMO. People who like to flail and roflstomp their way to high numbers due to FOTM OPness cried about the nerfs and rerolled DKs. The rest of us rolled with the punches and adjusted our tactics and are still comfortably putting out solid DPS. Warlocks require skill to play correctly, as it should be. And that's clearly not for everyone.
Michael May 13th 2009 4:35PM
Are your high?
Half the time for your dots???? Or in other words double your dps from dots?
And seriously, 20k crits? My shadow priest cannot do that, maybe I should cry about that.
Schadow May 13th 2009 5:48PM
@Kylenne:
I completely agree. Warlocks rock these days. My scrub alt warlock can beat regular raiders on the damage charts. And that's with a hybrid Felguard spec.
Our top DPS mage is finding his less-geared alt warlock can do more damage that his main.
All of our trees can be effective (barring maybe deep demonology), we bring raid benefits, and we top damage meters.
If your warlock sucks, you are seriously doing it wrong.
Admittedly, we have to do it differently every patch, and the talent trees are a dog's breakfast, but those who can adapt will flourish.
They are easy to level as they come with a built in tank and have healing mechanics. There's really no down-side to them except that they are a pure DPS class. You'll sit in LFG for a while watching all the "LF2M Tank and Heals for xxx" messages.
kia May 13th 2009 8:54PM
Warlocks are fine. All the FOTM warlocks from arena seasons past have rerolled DKs. Simple as that.
Naix May 13th 2009 11:09PM
"Are your high?"
No just being reasonable.
"Half the time for your dots???? Or in other words double your dps from dots?"
And bring warlock in line with other classes. The name of the game is fast damage and dots dont do that.
"And seriously, 20k crits? My shadow priest cannot do that, maybe I should cry about that."
I never saw 20k crits, 16 at highest, but never 20k. Besides warlocks are so squishy its sad. Your priest is not a pure dps class get over it.
starsfan May 13th 2009 1:14PM
Plate classes are grossly overpowered in terms of damage output to armor currently. More armor should mean less damage and vice versa. I don't see why anyone wants to play pure dps classes like mages, locks, and rogues when you can roll a warrior and be putting out 6200 DPS in 25 mans. Also, in terms of PvP (mostly arena) clothies have to play countless hours of getting just slaughtered to gain a resilience rating that gives them any chance against the plate classes. Yes cloth classes are given the means to get away, but they are always counteracted by Death Grip, Charge, hamstring, or hammers.
MechChef May 13th 2009 1:15PM
I think some rogues have rerolled shammy.
The Chubby Ninja May 14th 2009 1:33PM
It's a flavor of a month thing. People have multiple alts and when their main gets nerfed, instead of staying with it they move onto the next OP'd class. It's a real shame that people would abandon classes so readily.
KilgoreTrout XL May 13th 2009 2:23PM
I can't believe rogues are at the bottom.
I love playing my rogue, especially after getting stupidly buffed in the latest patch.
Simon May 13th 2009 2:31PM
I hope I can offer a useful contribution, being an atoholic...
Druid
My first character is a druid who I now don't play as:
- The feral skins. My eyes. Change them! Now!
- Druids started off as hybrids where you could off-tank, do a bit of healing a bit of DPS - but the game has become a game of specialists now so if I want to tank well, I'll pick a class that is designed for it and has more abilities like the warrior... I do love my druid though.
Warrior
I'm loving my warrior - designed for tanking, lots of abilities and talents so I can do a great job and a variety of ways to tank - the warrior is like the swiss army life of tanking.
Paladin
I'm surprised that so many people play paladins - why? Healing is very boring - whack-a-mole and pretty much just 3 spells that you'd use all the time.
Protection is fine... But just not as good as a warrior and call me old fashioned but I worry about tanking with a class that uses mana that runs out where rage is always being generated.
Perhaps people play so many palas because of Ret - it's a little depressing if they do. It's such a easy spec to play... Note to the devs - designing a class that's all about burst damage means that you have to keep on nerfing it as it will easily become OP!
Mage
I played my mage for a while but then got bored of it. Sadly a class that could be really interesting is mostly just a one button class - talent and glyph up your main nuke and keep on pressing it.... Again and again.
I hope the devs redesign the mage so that it's talents mean that it can use lots of spells - the mage should be an elemental force of destruction using fire, frost and arcane in every fight - not just talenting up and hitting your nuke of choice.
Death Knight
I like my DK a lot - it's a really interestingly designed class (and incidentally you can see that Blizzard have it in them to design an interesting class - the paladin is at the opposite end of the scale though...).
One thing that worries me - those cooldowns when I'm tanking and I can't do anything...
Hope this was a useful contribution!
anonymoose May 13th 2009 2:34PM
I can't bring myself to sift through more than just the first page of less-than-intelligent commentary.
The shift in numbers is plain and simple: anything class that plays as OP for a time will have larger numbers of people playing that class during the time period in which it is OP.
Warlocks were amazing in TBC, and there plenty of them to be had. However, WotLK? Not so much. Thus numbers are down.
Rogues are not nearly as EZ mode as they once were--while well played rogues continue to find ample opportunity to raid as they see fit (or pvp), the numbers are down because in general they are no longer a face roll class for the majority of the population. The recent fixes may change this (and to the skilled and dedicated rogues out there, kudos to you for sticking with it).
DKs and ret paladins, while being taken down a peg or two are still exceptionally easy to face roll with, thus the high numbers. This includes tanking.
This isn't to disparage the well informed and skilled players of each class--but to point out that water seeks the path of least resistance. Even I have a near 80 DK, which I use for farming purposes. It's the ultimate in face roll farming right now, why wouldn't I?
As a healer I would be far more interested to see the numbers for the classes capable of healing, keeping in mind that all the healing capable classes can currently be mashed in with their dps or tanking counterparts in the stats listed.
Possible to break this down so we can see percentage of classes as tanks, dps, and healers?
AyaJulia May 13th 2009 2:39PM
"Possible to break this down so we can see percentage of classes as tanks, dps, and healers?"
Since you can't detect a person's spec with a /who, not on warcraftrealms.com.
Simon May 13th 2009 2:34PM
I hope I can offer a useful contribution, being an atoholic...
Druid
My first character is a druid who I now don't play as:
- The feral skins. My eyes. Change them! Now!
- Druids started off as hybrids where you could off-tank, do a bit of
healing a bit of DPS - but the game has become a game of specialists
now so if I want to tank well, I'll pick a class that is designed for
it and has more abilities like the warrior... I do love my druid
though.
Warrior
I'm loving my warrior - designed for tanking, lots of abilities and
talents so I can do a great job and a variety of ways to tank - the
warrior is like the swiss army knife of tanking and prot is even better now that it can do decent damage. It's a fantastic spec.
Arms... I don't really PvP.
Fury... Hmph. OK so this is all about hitting bloodlust every 8 seconds and then just watching lots of white damage and crits from your 2 hander dual wield auto attack. Hmm. Interesting.
Paladin
I'm surprised that so many people play paladins - why? Healing is
very boring - whack-a-mole and pretty much just 3 spells that you'd
use all the time.
Protection is fine... But just not as good as a warrior and call me
old fashioned but I worry about tanking with a class that uses mana
that runs out where rage is always being generated.
Perhaps people play so many palas because of Ret - it's a little
depressing if they do. It's such a easy spec to play... Note to the
devs - designing a class that's all about burst damage means that you
have to keep on nerfing it as it will easily become OP!
Mage
I played my mage for a while but then got bored of it. Sadly a class
that could be really interesting is mostly just a one button class -
talent and glyph up your main nuke and keep on pressing it.... Again
and again.
I hope the devs redesign the mage so that it's talents mean that it
can use lots of spells - the mage should be an elemental force of
destruction using fire, frost and arcane in every fight - not just
talenting up and hitting your nuke of choice.
Death Knight
I like my DK a lot - it's a really interestingly designed class (and
incidentally you can see that Blizzard have it in them to design an
interesting class - the paladin is at the opposite end of the scale
though...).
One thing that worries me - those cooldowns when I'm tanking and I
can't do anything...
Hope this was a useful contribution!
Schadow May 13th 2009 5:57PM
You are old-fashioned indeed.
Paladins tanks are better than warrior tanks in many respects these days, not the least of which is 100% uptime on block.
We also don't run out of mana unless we REALLY try, or don't try at all.
We can front-load aggro without waiting for rage and build from there at one of the fastest rates among all tanks.
When not tanking, we can heal. When not main tank, we can reduce damage taken for the entire raid.
The limitations you listed for paladin tanks are outdated. This is our golden age.