There’s a member in my guild that is ridiculously hardcore into tanking. He just loves to get up close and smash face and take lots of damage. He says that he has a bunch of tanking alts across all available classes and is aiming to have one of each class at 80. Right now he has a DK and a Warrior at the cap, and his Pally is at 51, and his Druid is still a lowly 20.
I asked him which class is his favourite, and he says that the DK is his favourite, but tanking with a paladin is the most fun. He wished that his DK had the paladin’s concecrate, which got me into a neat line of thinking. If I could mix and match abilities from different classes, what kind of character would I want to make?
Tanking
Let’s start with the tank, since my guildie was the one who inspired this little mini-post. Firstly, it would have Dire Bear Form, for the ridiculous HP, and for the cool bear model (have I mentioned that I’m quite excited for the new skins? I’m surprised I haven’t yet!).
Next up is the ability to use a shield. The reasons for this is threefold. Firstly, I want to be able to pull with Avenger’s Shield. It just looks really cool! Secondly, I really like the Shield Slam ability. It does ridiculous amounts of damage (although it’s getting nerfed in 3.2, or so I hear). Lastly, I just can’t stop giggling at the thought of a bear holding a shield.
For its main abilities, I see my shield-bearing bear using Lacerate/Mangle for bleed and TPS, while using shield slam on every cooldown. For AoE, I would have him be able to concecrate while swipe-spamming. Oooh, that’d be pretty awesome.
Healing
Let’s start with a Restoration Druid with Tree of Life form. Next we give her totems of wrath, flametongue and healing stream. Awesome. Give her Titan’s Grip, so I can dual-wield caster staves and enhance both with earthliving. *drools*
For tank healing, I really like nourish, so let’s focus on overloading the tank with HoTs! Give the tree Rejuvination, Regrowth, Renew, and Riptide. Oh baby, that’s going to be some awesome Nourish spam, especially with tier bonuses.
For raid/AoE healing, I’d go with Chain Heal and Wild Growth on every cooldown. And just for fun, I’ll use Holy Nova on AoE trash pulls, even if it’s not that mana effective. It’s about having a blast healing, right?
DPS
Saving the best for last, we have the good old DPS toon. Seeing as I am a ridiculous frost fetishist, my abilities have to deal solely with frost damage. For a change of pace, I am not going with a Frost Mage as the base character. Let’s go with the Frost Death Knight instead! Give him dual-wielding specialization and put frostband weapon on both.
The DK’s main spell rotation will be Frost Shock and Howling Blast on every cooldown, Icy Touch to keep the DoT up, and Frost Strike as the main strike of choice.
To top it all off, I’ll give him the ability to summon a Water Elemental. Oh boy that’d be freaking sweet. I think I just wet myself a little.
I’d love to hear what kind of WoW hybrids that you guys would want to play, so go wild with your creations and leave a comment! See you on the other side of the internether!
Frost is the New Black 
g’mornin!
I used to play a priest, maily on the dark side of the light, but also long time into healing.
Started a toon – a Paladin – who became the mainchar long ago, dpsing, tanking and healing – thanks for the dual specc.
Now playing still the paladin, i started am shaman…
I guess I’ve a crush on hybrid classes with the choice to take more than one roll ingame.
I hear ya. Got the shaman to 59, I’m expecting to be able to dps/heal at the endgame. Gotta love chainheal!
Hehe, fantasy toon building! Like fantasy football except … better.
I truthfully haven’t played enough classes to be able to mix ‘n’ match with any confidence but, dammit, I want to be a *tree with a PW:S* and maybe even fade. I want my damn tree to be protected if it pulls aggro or if the tank is a bit clueless.
The idea of a bear with a shield produces a kind of comical image in my head – but I suspect we’re more thinking of Iorek Byrnison than Winnie-the-Pooh and a dustbin lid.
I was thinking of perhaps mirror image as a healer, but that turned out to just be Moonkin’s Force of Nature, haha! Thinking about it now, if it were like Fantasy sports, I probably would have to part with some existing spells to even it out. I guess I could go without Healing Touch, since I’m spamming nourish anyways.
As for the bear/shield imagery, I’m leaning towards some awesome high fantasy tone, rather than cartoony disney pots and pans mood like you described. Although I think Poohbear with a dustbin lid helmet would be oh so adorable (I’m a Tigger man myself)
LOL oh the possibilities
Tank – Warrior base with paladin’s ability to regen health when being hit and extra rage when blocking or dodging. Would be a plate-wearing AoE tanking powerhouse. (although I love dire bear for the HP, come on, plate wearers look more bad ass)
Heals – meh, take druid skillset, put them in plate (I get the line from snatch in my head “It’s for protection” “Protection from who? Ze Germans?”)
DPS – Picture this: Shadow Priest who could do a shadow version of blizzard, and instead of the priest’s shield which is gold in color, had a purplish shadow version. Add in the warlock drain tanking abilities, I’m in heaven. Oh, and give him seed of corruption cuz it’s fun.
Dang, now I got all excited over something I’ll never get, I almost laughed maniacally there. . .
OMG DRAIN TANKING. DO WANT!
Man this is ironic! I just struck up a conversation with my buddy at work today about mixing-and-matching classes’ abilities! We decided on a shadow priest-esque version of a ret pally. If priests, the holiest of holy classes, can descend into shadowform and melt minds, why shouldn’t pallies have a Tyranny or Slaughter spec? Evil paladins?! Awesome!
Just imagine: Consecrate would be an AoE dot, auras would reduce enemies’ stats instead of buffing allies’, and maybe the pally could even get a shadowform-like ability except more melee oriented.
The best feature though is what we came up with for seals (though they’d work better with the old pally seals: 30 sec. duration, consumed when used). Each seal would start as a self-targeted buff like they do now, except the buff would be much more powerful in exchange for incorporating a balancing drawback. Seal of Decay/Disease, for example, could add a huge poison or nature damage bonus to the pally’s attacks in exchange for eating away at the paladin’s health. Each seal could be released on the enemy, except their effect would be modified by how long the seal was active on the paladin.
That sounds freaking awesome. Normally DK’s would be the anti-pally, but this takes it to a whole new level! I wonder how the judgments would work in shadowform though. I imagine that one judge could work like shadow weaving, causing a debuff that increases shadow damage.
From a blood dk tank perspective, just give me devastate for the sunder armor effect and the ability to toss my axe like Avenger’s shield and I’d be beyond happy.
Seriously, going without Avenger’s Shield after having it for a year is brutal.
If I could only take one ability for my Frost DK, it would probably be sunder as well, although I wouldn’t mind having a righteous fury analog that increases threat caused by Frost/Unholy damage 😀
Awww. If I could pimp my mage, I’d give it plate. And heals. And shields. And lazer eyes. And x-ray vision. And mad good looks.
Okay. Might be taking it a bit over the top. But I really am a mage fan, so that would have to be the base. A fire spamming mage in plate would be fucking sexy. With some Seed of Corruption and mana tap. And just some small heals aswell. Magelockpala? Ye, sure, ty.
I’ve always loved the idea of a techno-mage. Magic-enhanced mechanical suits of plate armor, its arsenal of bombs and missiles complimented by deadly fire magic. It’s the topic of a short story that I’m currently writing.
I recently confirmed that I am definitely a hybrid junkie. I tried – oh how I tried! – to level a warrior. Relly, I did. I swear. But.
How can you wander around without self heals? Or being able to rez? Or walk on water? nononononono. Can’t do it.
So. I confess I am a crazy person. I am leveling my second shaman. wtf? Granted, it’s opposite faction, so…. does that give me a good enough excuse? I probably should have at least gone for a druid. But… who can resist Frostshock?! http://snurl.com/nf57u
So I want to be a shammy that wears plate and can maintain threat. Yessir, THAT would be fun. Simple, I know. But sometimes it’s the simple things, right? Shammy tank ftw!
Whoa…I would give my DK Retribution Aura, and Stealh, plus all of the Rogue stun abilities…oh, oh, oh…I would also be able to dual-wield 2H Maces and Swords with no diminishing returns on my swing! HA HA!!!!