Ultimate Guide - Choose your class and spec!

Hey all!

Too many classes, too many specs and too much time spent to level each of them up. Choosing your class is the most important choice when building a character, and often the hardest (after the name, ofc)! I'm not gonna tell you to play whatever you want, if you are here it is because you are not sure what you want! But being completely honest, all classes and specs have their niches, you just have to decide whatever you like to do! I am by no means an expert on every and each class, what I am aiming to do here is to give a general view of the end-game scenario for each spec, and where and how they shine! I am not showing a very close view of each spec, if you got interested in one of them and want to know a bit more, either go look for their specific Forum section or ask in comment section! By the end of the guide there is a section showing my personal ranking from easiest to hardest leveling classes, make sure to check it out!

Observation 1: Whenever I talk about PVP in this guide I’ll be talking about arenas (mostly 2v2), as this is my experience, unless stated otherwise. Battlegrounds, World PVP and Duels are not my specialty and I do not have the knowledge to talk about, so sorry! However, I am a proud PVP newbie, do not take my word as the whole truth!

Observation 2: This guide is based on my experience on the Icecrown Server. Please, if you are playing on other server and have a different view of things, let me know so I can make this guide as complete as possible!

And here we go! (Alphabetically)

1- Death Knight

The Death Knight (DK) was introduced in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion and you can only create one if you already have a character level 55 or above. Any race can become a Death Knight and they already start at level 55 in a specific land. (By the way, pretty much the whole expansion is based on the DK's lore). They are plated melee combatants that wield two-handed or two one-handed weapons. They can actually use a lot of skills from a fair distance and make use of a variety of diseases (damage over-time or DOTs) and summon some minions to fight with them, they use Runes and Runic Power as resources. They have three specs, Blood, Frost and Unholy.

1. Blood - Blood is a interesting spec. They wield two-handed weapons and its characteristic attribute is a lot of self healing and pretty interesting damage in low levels/gear (despite some known bugs lowering their damage) with a pretty simple rotation. It is usually considered as a tank spec, though. You will often find Blood DKs in raids as off-tanks, not meaning that they cannot be DPS or main-tanks (don’t let people tell you what you can’t do!). It is arguably the best spec for leveling.
2. Frost - Frost is also a semi-hybrid spec. They wield two one-handed weapons and can be tanks or DPS. Frost tank is not optimal for very end-game content, being mostly used in easier raids/dungeons. The Frost DPS though is a different story. Arguably the best DK spec until very close to BIS (best in slot) gear it can dish out loads of single target damage. However, it is worthy noting that in order to do so, they require a bit of practice as their rotation is not the easiest.
3. Unholy -Unholy is the "most optimized" DPS spec for ultra late game environment, as it can bring a lot of utility with some debuffs and dish out great Area of Effect (AOE) damage as well as single target. It is also considered the best DK PVP spec.

2- Druid

The good old Druid is one of the most versatile classes in the game. They can be anything! Melee or caster DPS, tanks or healers. They have the ability to shapeshift, and they will pretty much be shapeshifted all the time, whether being a cat, an owl(sorta), a bear or a tree (some people don't like being shapeshifted as you kinda lose your "indentity", bear that in mind). Their specs are Balance, Feral and Restoration.

1. Balance - Balance is the ranged caster DPS of the druid. In order to do so, the druid transforms into an "owl" form. They are a jack-of-all trades king of none kind of spec. They have their small niche on PVP and are very desirable in any PVE encounter, but not because of their damage, it is okay, not outstanding nor mediocre, but because of the great buffs they bring to the raid! They actually have one of the best AOE bursts of the game with the combo Starfall + Hurricane. They use both DOTs and casting skills and are a little bit dependent on critical hits to proc some buffs that increase their damage, making them both dependent on RNG and very sad when the procs happen by the end of a fight or just before movement is necessary.
2. Feral - A feral druid can be either a melee dps cat or a tank bear. The cat form has the, almost unanimous, hardest rotation in the game, meaning that a bad player drop significantly your DPS abilities, however, unfortunately, a very good player will not be topping any DPS meters either, but being in the middle of the pack. They use energy and combo points as resources and can become invisible to pounce at their unaware prey. The bear form is a very good tank due to its enormous, and I mean, enormous amount of HP, using rage as a resource. They are arguably the best tanks when multiple creatures are present and are reasonably desired in any raid. I cannot discuss feral viability on PVP as they are not that common to see one, however, skilled cat-form players are very hard to deal with.
3. Restoration - Resto druids shapeshift into a funny looking tree to heal their folks. Their healing is mostly based on instant cast healing over-time (HOT) spells, making them the perfect group-healer (meaning that they will me mostly in charge of healing people that took damage from AOE effects rather than the tank directly). They are arguably the easiest healing spec for new players due to their great mobility (instant casts) but only for a PVE scenario, for in PVP, only very skilled Resto druids can survive the relentless attack of other classes.

3- Hunter

If you ever played Hearthstone you might associate hunters with unskilled, unclassy, upfront rude people. Well, you are not 100% wrong! I'm kidding, I'm a hunter player myself and could not love the class anymore! They are a ranged DPS class that use pets as allies and shoot arrows (or bullets) to damage their foes. Its specs are Beast Mastery, Marksman and Survival.

1. Beast Mastery - This is pretty much as straight forward as it gets. This is the face-hunter of WOW. BM hunters brings out the most damage possible of their pets while keeping a very simple rotation of their own to damage the enemies (literally two buttons). They can also tame unique creatures as their pets, and a lot of tutorials on where to find those creatures are available. This is definitely the best leveling spec, as your pet will be doing most of the damage (even outdpsing you in some cases). As you can check in the Armory section in this website, even though BM does not pull the highest raw damage of hunter specs, many very end-game raid guilds bring them because of the buffs they bring.
2. Marksman – Marksman hunters make use equally of physical and magical damage. They are the most common hunter spec in end-game situations because they simply “outperform” the other two. Do not get me wrong, I’m not saying MM is the best hunter spec. But for PVE they will most likely maintain a little bit higher DPS (not that much by any means) and on PVP situations they are also the most common, simply because BM are not suitable for PVP and the next spec (Survival) is a little bit weirder and harder to play, once again, a skilled Survival can end up doing as well as a MM.
3. Survival – Survival is by far the least played and least known hunter spec. They are more dependent on traps, DOT and quick thinking than the other two, making them a little trickier for new players. There is not a lot of information on this forum about survival hunters as there aren’t a lot of survival players. But trust me, a good survival will do as well as any hunter other spec on PVE and arguably even better on PVP, as most enemies won’t know very well what you are doing sometimes.

4- Mage

Now coming to our next full DPS class, the mages are the usual caster master of the elements class. They can use Arcane, Fire or Frost abilities to control the field and damage their enemies.

1. Arcane – Arcane mages are the easiest late game mage spec to play in both PVE and PVP situations, although it does not perform very well on the former. I consider Arcane an intermediate mage spec for PVE meaning that you will level as a Frost mage, re-spec to Arcane mage when hitting level 80 and then re-specing again to fire when you reach very high gear score. Not to say they are worst than fire, they bring some useful buffs to the party. But people usually get bored of paying arcane mages after a while, as their rotation is very simple and at some point you will start to see the fire mages topping you on the DPS meters.
2. Fire – Fire is one of the highest DPS at BIS PVE encounters (arguably the second highest). They dish out incredible amounts of damage, but are very dependent on critical hits and procs to trigger their abilities, making them a little dependent on RNG, not as much as Balance Druid, in my humble opinion.
3. Frost – This is the first spec we discussed that simply is not viable in one situation. You will never see a Frost mage in an very end-game PVE scenario as they are heavily outperformed by both other spec and do not bring any major utility. But, once again, they do have their niche. They are the best leveling spec, bringing a lot of control and slows, and even a pet some levels later. Their other appearance will be at the PVP. They are without a doubt the best PVP mage spec, if you have never been kited around by a good Frost player, you do not know the true face of sorrow. Being a walking slowing machine is not that easy though, they are extremely fragile, you have to be very reactive and anticipate your enemies to outperform them.

5- Paladin

Paladins are very versatile plated combatants that use the Light to both protecc and attacc. They are the most played class (followed by Death Knights, Warriors and Druids), but for a reason, all three specs perform very differently yet very well at end-game scenarios and they bring lifesaving skills to the raid as well as awesome buffs. Its specs are Holy, Protection and Retribution

1. Holy – Holy is the healing spec of paladins. They are specialists in healing big amounts of health in a single target (or two targets). They are the best tank healer in the game and they bring so much to the raid that it is rare to find an end-game raid without them. Besides that, they are a part of the arguably deadliest combo in PVP, alongside with warriors. They are a fun spec to play for both new and veteran players, since they have an “easy mode” where they just heal the tank, but to bring the full potential of the class, you need a lot of skills and knowledge.
2. Protection – Protection Paladins wield a one-handed waepon and a shield and they are great tanks. Just as Holy and Rets, they bring a lot of great buffs to the party and are usually the main tank in the raid, for they are able to maintain good aggro in both single target and AOE scenarios while managing defensive cooldowns and damage mitigation skills. However, if PVP is your thing, I cannot say whether they are suitable for that, I’ll probably say they are not, since finding a high rated PVP prot paladin is a very tough task.
3. Retribution – The infamous retribution is the DPS spec of paladins, they wield two-handed weapons. They are infamous because pretty much anyone can appear on the top parts of the DPS meters while playing a Ret Paladin, as their offensive rotation is reasonably easy. However, there is an enormous difference between a good Ret and a bad Ret! The bad Ret deals a lot of damage. The good Ret deals a lot of damage while being one of the best supports in the game, with a lot of buffs and life saving skills. They also perform very well in PVP scenarios, being famous for killing people almost instantly.

6- Priest

Priest are the “caster counter-part” of paladins, as they also serve the light (or shadow)! They have two healing specs Discipline and Holy and a DPS spec in the Shadow tree. They are cloth-wearing people, but in my opinion, they are the toughest of them, having a lot of defensive cooldowns and control abilities.

1. Discipline – Discipline priests are specialists in preventing damage, they mostly rely on giving shields to their allies. And that is exactly the reason why they are a bit challenging for new players, as they require good knowledge on each encounter to fully shine. They perform very well on PVE and on PVP as well, being welcome in most raid groups, making them a solid choice for any player that is willing to dedicate themselves to the class.
2. Holy – Our second Holy spec is a healer as well, the most hipster healer in the game. They are much rarer than their Discipline siblings, mainly because they are weird. By weird I mean that people don’t know them very well and are only willing to let a Holy Priest in their raid if they know the player is good. Don’t get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the spec for PVE, it is just that they are probably a bit more challenging to perform as well as the other healers.
3. Shadow – The black sheep of the family, Shadow priests are the emo DPS priests. They assume a form of pure shadowiness and rely on DOTs to deal most of their damage. Just like Ret paladins, they bring a lot of great buffs to the party and, in some situations, can let their damage down a bit to support their friends. (Almost) Every part should have a shadow priest, as they are simply great! On PVP they also do very well, but as all clothiers, they are super squishy and susceptible to bursts.

7- Rogue

The dual-wielding stealthy son of a b*tch assassin that will camp low-level areas and kill you until you create another character to play just until they are gone. They are the most “selfish” damage dealers in the game. They bring very little utility to the group, their thing is dealing damage, and a lot, using energy and combo points as resources, the rogues also poison their weapons and make use of any dirty trick you know to further hurt their victims. Rogues, alongside with Warlocks, are the least played class. I don’t really know if there is a solid reason for them being underplayed, they are quite fun and have more complex rotations to their names, maybe people are not selfish? Let’s go to their specs: Assassination, Combat and Subtlety.

1. Assassination – Assassinations are a weird spec at the least. They can be very top of DPS meters when very well geared, but they are “out-performed” by the Combat spec. They are completely outclassed by the Subtlety spec on PVP and by the Combat spec while leveling. On the bright side, they are a lot of fun. If you don’t mind being in 4th instead of 3rd in the DPS meter and like the playstyle, they might be the spec for you.
2. Combat – Combat is the PVE spec of rogues. They run away a little bit from the stealthy assassin type, as they wield sword or maces and are more of the upfront style of play. They are by far the best leveling rogue spec overall and are arguably top 3 DPS when fully geared.
3. Subtlety – Subtlety is the PVP spec of Rogue. Some people will say they are better than Combat in some levels during leveling, I cannot argue as I’ve never leveled as subtlety. However, along with Frost Mage, they are the only two specs in the game that are just not viable in end-game PVE. If you want to kill some newbs, this might the spec for you. Note that, as all rogue specs, you are fragile and need to be very careful and precise.

8-Shaman

The other master of the elements class, Shamans make use of totems to buff their allies and debuff their enemies. They have a lot of totems. A lot. Not knowing what their totems do and when to use them is the greatest mark of a newbie Shaman. Believe me kids, totems save lives. They have two DPS specs Elemental and Enhancement and a healing spec, Restoration.

1. Elemental – Elemental Shamans are the casting DPS spec, they are masters of burst damage, making them excellent on PVP in the hands of a very skilled player. On the PVE side of things, their damage is a little bit disappointing, being mid-bottom tier. However, I cannot recall how many times I’ve seen in the Global Chat “Look for Ele Shaman, last spot in the raid!”, as there aren’t many of them around. They bring great buffs to the party and are somewhat easy to play decently on PVE encounters.
2. Enhancement – Enhancement is a different kind of Shaman. They dual-wield maces (usually) or axes, while not letting the typical totem mechanics aside, being the best shaman levelling spec post level 40ish (before they, they all suck). They are a super fun class to play, as they don’t have a set rotation as many of the others, they have kind of a priority list, making the gameplay more fluid and a bit more complicated as well. Unfortunately, on Warmane, Enhancements do not have an extraordinary damage, while not bringing a whole lot of buffs to the raid that an Elemental could not bring, making them less favourable comparing to their caster cousins. However, check the Armory and you’ll see many world-top guilds running Enhancements on their best raid groups. Be good and shut everyone up! They are absolute beasts on 1v1 duels, but that’s pretty much all their PVP has to offer.
3. Restoration – The healer spec of Shaman is the most versatile healer and I’ll explain why. They are not the best at tank healer nor at group healing, but they can do pretty well at both, being able to replace any other healer in any group (expect if there are some buffs missing of course). They bring the whole totem kit and some nice buffs. PVP wise they are not as frequently seen as Holy Paladins and Discipline Priests, but they don’t perform terribly either. They are a pretty close contender to the easiest healer in the game, might be a good choice for healers wanabees.

9-Warlock

Warlocks are exclusively DPS casters that have fallen to the dark side of the force. They are cloth-wearers that bring pain and fear to their enemies. They heavily rely on Damage over Time abilities to deal their damage and can summon demons to fight by their side. As mentioned before, they join their Rogue friends as the least played classes in the game, the main reason in their case, though, is because they require moderate to high skills to pull out a good rotation and even then, their damage is not competitive with some of the other classes. Its three specs are Affliction, Demonology and Destruction.

1. Affliction – Affliction is the Warlock spec that specializes in increasing to the maximum the damage from DOT abilities. They are the best leveling spec until around level 50 due their nice self-healing and mana management. Affliction is the top dps warlock spec in high gear environment and can apply a lot of pressure in PVP scenario by DOTing multiple targets and utilizing different forms of crowd control effects.
2. Demonology – Demonology aims to bring the most damage possible out of their summoned demon. They can summon an exclusive creature (around level 50, and that is when they become the best leveling spec) and can even Metamorphose into a demon themselves to dish out loads of damage. Demonologies have a tougher time when dealing damage, both because of their more complicated rotation and simply because they deal less damage than Affliction Locks. Worry not, Demon-lovers, Demonology Locks are one of the most wanted specs in the game. They bring an outstanding unique buff to the party, almost all raid groups want at least one warlock (they can teleport allies, give a resurrection stone to the healer, etc) and most commonly they want a Demonology. If you want to be “different” while still being wanted and would commit to learning the challenging rotation, Demon-Locks could be the choice!
3. Destruction – Destruction warlocks are a bit different from the other two specs. They excel at dealing burst damage. They are the highest damage warlock spec in low level 80 gear situations. On PVP, they are a bit harder to play than Affliction, but I wouldn’t consider them worse, a well-timed burst will most often than not kill a target.

10-Warrior

And here we are at the last class, hang on, we’re almost there. The plated Warriors are brute combatants that use rage as a resource. They will be charging at your face and slowing you to beat you to the ground. They have two DPS specs as Arms and Fury and a Tank spec as Protection. They are considered a very straight forward class, meaning that newbies like us can do pretty well on them, even though they might need some macro management to fully shine.

1. Arms – Arms Warriors use two-handed weapons and rely on both DOT and instant damage abilities to wear down their enemies. Even though they can perform very well in PVE scenarios when well equipped, an Arms warrior will fully shine on PVP. Get your Holy Paladin buddy and just climb the 2v2 ladder. They are hated for a good reason, once an Arms is at your face, your face will mostly likely be at the ground. They are heavily dependent on gear, though, as the other warrior specs also are, and the BIS weapon is the infamous Shadowmourne which can be a little pricy to some. Some people say it is not worth it playing Warriors, Ret Paladins or DKs without the Shadowmourne. Well, the statement has its merits, but I think the classes are great and that should not keep you away from them!
2. Fury – The Fury warriors wield two two-handed weapons. Yup, you heard it right. The last talent on the Fury tree let them wield two-handed weapons in just one hand. This pretty much defines their playstyle. They deal most of their damage by just swinging their massive weapons at people’s faces (white damage) and, if 1 Smourne is good, can you imagine two? No, they can't use two Smournes (Unique equipped items), but using two ultra strong weapons will yiled ultra amounts of damage. They are heavily heavily dependent on gear, but close to BIS gear, nothing outdpses a good Fury warrior at PVE. They do not perform that well on PVP though, as they lack the CC and mobility of the other specs.
3. Protection – The tank warrior spec is a super fun one to play. They are by far the best leveling spec if you do not have heirlooms or money to buy top gear for each level. You will probably be doing 50% of the 5-man RDFs once you get your Revenge skill. The dream fades a little bit at 80 though. They can tank everything on the game. Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise. But some humans can jump almost 10ft high, that does not mean that every human can do it. It is a very tough spec to tank properly mainly because you don’t have the damage mitigation or the HP the others have to offer, as well as your defensive cooldowns are a bit scarce. You depend on blocking attacks, if you don’t, oh boy. They are heavily dependent on having a great healer by their side, most healers are super scared when there is a Prot Warrior. You’ll have to find very good healers and even then prove you are trust-worthy. On PVP, they mainly shine on 1v1 duels due to their huge CCs toolkit.

We did it!!!! We briefly went through every spec! I hope that by now you have a better idea of what to expect from each of them. But as promised in the beginning, here is my personal leveling tier list for people without any heirlooms:
Leveling tier list

1. Easy mode – Beast Mastery Hunter ; Retribution Paladin ; Death Knight (post 55, ofc)
2. Decent mode – Warlock (Afflic + Demon) ; Protection Warrior ; Enhancement Shaman (post level 40)
3. Middle of the pack – Frost mage ; Shaman (pre-level 40)
4. The struggle is real – Priest ; Rogue.

None of the things written on this guide are the absolute truth! Please feel free to make comments and suggestions on everything! I hope you enjoyed and if you have any further questions, make sure to drop them in the comment section and me and the other people on the forum will try to address it!
Good hunt and good game!

Bloou

Detailed and full of humor lol, great job. Afaik tho, you can't wield two shadowmournes because they're Unique equipped.

LOL, I knew that, but 3h into writing I was seeing everything in double haha! Thanks so much for the feedback and the suggestion :)

Interesting guide. Which classes would you say are the easiest and hardest to play in end-game PvP and PvE though?

Really great guide, precise, reliable and funny! Good work!

Nice job.

Also to metion that Balance Druids in Owl form brings best dance :3

Quote:

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Originally Posted by drujaga

balance druids in owl form brings best dance :3

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soooo true