As the title would state: does anyone have any resources as to looking at Raid make-up?
As the GM of <Extreme> [H] Blaumeux, I have a good idea of how/what I want raids to look like. But I wouldn't mind bouncing them off of other frameworks, if nothing more than for a sanity check.
Any resources, Google docs, or thoughts would be appreciated.
Thank you.
Council Chairman
US-Horde
Blaumeux
@Caperfin got a feeling you have a resource for this somewhere?
I did have a look around Dola but couldn’t find anything specific to group composition like you asked. Pingaan’s sheets are a great general knowledge resource for raids otherwise.
Raid composition in Classic isn't really set in stone. Groups of 40 people are loose enough to afford a few slackers or abnormal builds.
But points to remember are generally:
- Warriors are the best tanking class by far and you should feel no shame turning down a well geared Druid for a mediocre warrior as long as they know strats because of their way better damage mitigation. 1 main tank for the boss that has to be a Warrior and maybe 1 or 2 offtanks for adds that can be low geared Warriors or Druids. However in a fight that has tank swapping you need two dedicated tanks with Taunt ready and maybe leave another for adds if really necessary.
- Priests are the best healer when it comes to raw output, but it's best advised to have at least one Druid just for their unique buffs. Since you're Horde I'll spare you the Paladin buffing details, so have 1 Shaman in every party of 4 melee DPS to make the most out of Windfury Totem. Fill the rest with Priests so you have about 10 healers total.
- That leaves you with about 26 DPS slots. Prioritize Fury Warriors, Rogues and Mages as they should be the core of your army, but have at least a couple Warlocks and remember certain encounters like in BWL require a couple Hunters rotating Tranquilizing Shot but Hunters are generally meh in raiding.
***
In case you're not an autonomous person, here's a mathematically standard raid group
2 Protection Warriors (Main Tank and Swapping Tank)
2 Protection Warriors or Feral Druids (Add swiping/cleaving)
4 Holy Priests
4 Restoration Shamans (Total Melee classes in your raid divided by 4, rounded up)
2 Restoration Druids (Combat Res)
7 Fury Warriors
7 Rogues
7 Mages
3 Warlocks (For banish, curses, summoning and soulstone)
2 Hunter (for Tranquilizing Shot and Aspect)
***
Remember to put DPS groups exactly like this for maximum efficiency and fill the extra empty slots and other groups however you want:
Ｓ - Shaman with Windfury
Ｗ - Fury Warrior
Ｒ - Rogue
Ｔ - Tank
Ｗ Ｗ Ｗ Ｗ
Ｗ Ｗ Ｗ Ｔ
Ｒ Ｒ Ｒ Ｒ
Ｒ Ｒ Ｒ Ｔ
Ｓ Ｓ Ｓ Ｓ
Not only does God play dice,
But the dice are loaded."
- Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang, "Looking God In The Eye"
What makes a warrior taunt better than a druid taunt?Midoo wrote: ↑4 years ago- Warriors are the best tanking class by far and you should feel no shame turning down a well geared Druid for a mediocre warrior as long as they know strats because of the Taunt ability that's essential for swapping and their way better damage mitigation. 1 main tank for the boss that has to be a Warrior and maybe 1 or 2 offtanks for adds that can be low geared Warriors or Druids. However in a fight that has tank swapping at least the main and one offtank HAVE to be Warriors.
My bad, was tired and thinking of the paladin when I wrote the beginning of that post :[
Not only does God play dice,
But the dice are loaded."
- Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang, "Looking God In The Eye"
And what about the part about warriors having 'way better damage mitigation'? Druids can get to the armor cap and have more health than warriors. They don't have a shield, can't use consumables in bear form, and can't push crushing blows off the attack tables. They're not good at tanking more than 3 targets since we only have swipe and demoralizing roar for AOE threat, and we can't block attacks so we're not great against dozens of mobs all doing small damage that a shield would have blocked. But I hear people prefer druid tanks in early MC because a bear in greens has better mitigation and threat than a warrior in greens. There isn't much bear gear in MC so we fall behind in gear until BWL and AQ when gear starts dropping again.
My understanding is that warriors are more versatile and better in many encounters, but bears aren't that far behind. It's more of a 1/1a situation. Bears are closer to warrior tanks than paladin or shamen tanks.
Well, yeah, bear druids aren't much farther behind Warrior tanks, but their damage mitigation comes from dodge mostly which makes the damage they take kind of unpredictable and erratic to healers.
Druid tanking is obviously doable but if you have the option of taking a low geared bear tank or a low geared warrior tank (people will start raiding in their dungeon blues soon) the warrior is the obvious choice
Not only does God play dice,
But the dice are loaded."
- Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang, "Looking God In The Eye"
I'm not sure that's such an obvious choice.
I'm no raid veteran so I'm not speaking from experience. But here's what goes into the equation -
Bears are a lot less gear dependent than warriors are. We don't get attack damage or threat generation from a weapon, we use those slots as simple stat sticks. And we don't have a shield, so there's no worry about having a good item in the shield slot either. And in dire bear form we get a 360% armor boost to go along with talents that multiply our health pool.
Warriors get a tanking set with their T1 set from MC, and Druids get a restoration set with our T1, so we fall behind once the warriors start collecting their tanking gear from MC. We don't start collecting new BoP tanking gear until like AQ timeframe. But in the early weeks of MC, Druids are at least on par with Warriors if not better until the warriors outgear us. We enter MC for the first handful of weeks with more armor and more health than our warrior counterparts and potentially generate more threat with our paws than a green or blue-d out warrior with whatever pre-MC weapon he's bringing to the raid for the first few times.
And once we're outgeared, we still shine as offtanks because our primary threat attack only costs 5 rage so we can maintain threat right below the main tank without needing to take the damage that a warrior tank would that we won't be receiving as an offtank.
Pretty compelling argument. I guess I'm a bit biased from the fact I've only seen five or six druid tanks after raiding for years on pservers and from the nature of the tier sets. Druid tanks need a bit more effort to excel than a warrior would, but no one said it's not doable. Not sure if people on classic will be dedicated enough to kill that meme and I have yet to see any in action, but if you don't learn something new every day of your life, are you really living?
Not only does God play dice,
But the dice are loaded."
- Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang, "Looking God In The Eye"
Hey man that's why I'm here and not on other classic forums like the official forums or the classic subreddit.. our culture here on this forum is to talk things out and try to understand each other so we can understand and learn. Some guys are more abrasive than others 
but we prefer long form posting here and it's more productive than what I see elsewhere. I know you're new here, so welcome 
I agree with you that bear tanks are less common than warrior tanks. It takes a bit more work and research, but given how warriors are one of the most popular classes in the game, and given that there is a good chunk of leather gear that only a bear tank would want... Sometimes the path less travelled is the one to take. I'm expecting much less competition for gear as a bear than I would as a warrior.
I could say something about this, but I can't say it just yet without starting a thread with +300 replies and people loosing their minds.
So for the moment...yes I agree.
