Warriors:
Were the only viable tanks
DPS warriors had to tank some of the time
In Naxx-level gear became OP DPS (and one of the few specs that was viable without tier bonuses). (The problem with warriors being underpowered in low gear and overpowered in good gear was a problem for many expansions due to the way rage generation worked.)
Protection spec was a huge reduction in DPS. Back then tanks did not contribute meaningful DPS.
Had stances and many reasons to switch between them in PvP
Had 30 min cooldowns: Shield Wall, Recklessness, and Retaliation
Fury couldn't dual-wield 2H
Prot warriors needed to press shield block every six seconds to prevent crushing blows and most just macroed it to every ability as it was off the GCD
Did not have many abilities, notably Devastate, Heroic Throw, Bladestorm, or Colossus Smash
Had to carry bullets or arrows if they wanted to shoot a mob at range
In the bug section, see the section on how "block" used to work
Taunt was considered a spell, and because items with spell hit weren't designed for warriors, taunts could fail (9%?) of the time just purely through RNG.
Had class quests for the following: Quel'Serrar, Defensive Stance, Berserker Stance, Whirlwind Weapon, and some quest in Redridge that sends them to Frey Island.
Paladins:
Holy was the only common raiding spec (edit: I guess this is better stated as saying that healing was the only role. One poster on page 31 says that paladins would be every spec because the blessings were in the talent trees and were very powerful. However, the holy talent tree didn't increase healing that much so apparently you'd have three or four pallys healers, but one of them would be specced retribution and one would be specced protection.)
Ret is one of the most different specs from vanilla to now IMO. Retribution received overhauls in each of the first five expansions.
Retribution had tons of skills...and most of them didn't do damage. They didn't even have have Crusader Strike. https://classicdb.ch/?spells=7.2
No spec had holy power
The technology had not yet been developed for attack power to increase spell power, so a ret paladin's spells were extremely weak.
Could not equip a ranged weapon, so the slot sat empty
Would buff themselves with a seal and then what judgement did depended on the active seal
Protection could tank dungeons, but did not have a taunt ability.
If I read Taladril's compilation of tank damage right, in a 6 minute fight a Prot warrior would take 90k damage, a fury warrior decked out in prot gear would take 125k, and a prot paladin would take 150k. i.e. Prot paladins took about 20% more damage than fury warriors, and 66% more than prot warriors.
Protection could increase threat generation through +spellpower items, which were generally not tanking items.
Hand of Salvation was extremely potent in raiding because threat was such an issue.
Blessings were quite important for raiding. They originally lasted 5 minutes, but mid-vanilla they could be extended to 15 minutes if you spent a symbol of kings. They had to be cast on each class, so after every wipe they had to be cast 8 times.
Had Divine Intervention and blessings
Divine Shield lasted as long as a hearthstone cast
Divine Shield locked the player out of all offensive actions
Nothing could get through Divine Shield as Mass Dispel and Chaos Bolt didn't exist yet.
Have a quest line for their epic mount and one for a hammer
Here is a sample ret talent tree:http://db.vanillagaming.org/?talent#sVxhbgsxxMZEb0z
Did not have many abilities, notably Beacon of Light, Crusader Strike, Avenger's Shield, or Hammer of the Righteous
Hunter:
Used mana (and carried and drank mana pots, and I think wore one or two items of intellect gear)
Had to feign death mid-fight and drink https://youtu.be/_j2S1d7Igy4?t=2m30s
Were all named Légölâs (edit: special characters weren't allowed until later, it was xxLegolaasxx for a while)
Had 2 stable slots
https://wow.gamepedia.com/Broken_Tooth
Had a minimum range for ranged attack. It was larger than melee range, so there was a dead zone where hunters could not attack players in PvP, which everyone tried to exploit.
(?) Was marksman the only viable spec?
Had to feed their pets or they would run away permanently.
Had to carry ammo. For a 3-hour raid, this was a significant burden given the small bag space available at the time.
Quivers buffed their attack speed. (Quivers took a bag slot.)
Bow sounds were louder and guns were Way louder. It was more realistic but could get annoying.
Could not place traps while in combat.
Got the Tome of Tranquilizing Shot ability from Lucifron in Molten Core. This was an important ability to dispel enrages on several bosses, including Magmadar, the second boss of MC. Hunters were the only class that could perform this task.
Had a class quest for Rhok'delar / Lok'Delar that started from the ancient petrified leaf from Majordomo Executus (I believe this quest is one of the hardest the game ever had)
Had a special bow from Majordomo Executus that required completing a very difficult quest
Didn't initiate auto shoot by right clicking mobs
Pet abilities had to be gathered by taming beasts that posses them. Taming a beast that knew bite rank 2, allowed the hunter to teach bite rank 2 to other pets eligible to learn it. Beast Lore told you what abilities pets had.
Pets did not automatically go up to the hunter's level when tamed. If a player was 60 and tamed a rare pet or wanted a new animal type, the pet started at its original level and had to be leveled up separately.
The Survival 31 point talent was "Lacerate" which did less damage than a Serpent Sting cast by a level 26 hunter. This was fixed in 1.7. It was arguably the most underpowered end-tree talent the game ever had, and an example of how unbalanced things were until each class had their tuning pass.
Had Aspect of Nature which was an aura that gave everyone in the party 60 nature resist.
Several of the abilities hunters had back then are still in, such as traps, aimed shot, multi-shot, volley, and arcane shot. Marksman hunters actually still have a similar feel to what they used to be. There was no camouflage or self-heal however.
Shaman:
Resto was the only common raid spec.
Could drop a fire, earth, air, and water totem.
Tremor totem, poison-cleansing totem, and disease-cleansing totem were
quite powerful in raids.
Windfury Weapon was OP in PvP as it would proc 3 rapid swings of your weapon which did a lot of burst damage. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja1j7xWpB3w
Enhance was great for highlight videos but due to their very slow swing times were arguably one of the weaker classes in PvP
Enhancement had talents for tanking and using a shield. Although off-spec tanking was viable for dungeons in vanilla for paladins and bears, shamans were...a group had to be pretty hard up before shaman tanking started to sound like a good idea
Had to complete a quest chain for each of the four element totems
Totems only affected players in your group of 5.
Although enhancement shaman wasn't terribly common, Windfury totem and DPS warriors and rogues getting free swings with their huge slow weapons was fun.
Had class quests for their totems and an epic helm in Scholomance
Shamans had almost none of the abilities they now do. Chain lightning, chain heal, lightning shield, purge, and ghost wolf they did have.
Druid:
Had 3 specs: Feral was for both bear and cat.
Resto was the only common raiding spec
Resto did not have an out-of-combat rezz, which was problematic for healing 5-mans.
Resto did have battle rez on a 30-minute cooldown, the only class that did.
Only one rejuvenation from any druid could be on a friendly at a time, which made Healing Touch (Rank 4) the go-to spell
Ferals could not push crushing blows off the combat table (only warriors could, so warriors were basically the only raid tanks)
If I read Talandril's tank comparison spreadsheet right, in a 6-minute simulated fight a warrior would take 90k damage and a bear would take 180k.
Balance had serious mana issues
Stealth significantly reduced movement speed.
Had class quests for their bear form and aquatic form and possibly travel form
Could not equip a ranged weapon
In feral forms, weapons did not contribute to DPS or increase attack power in any way.
Were OP for running the flag in low-level Warsong Gulch.
Did not have moonkin form until patch 1.8
Had hibernate for beasts and dragonkin
Doing good feral DPS required abusing the Wolfsheart Helm and Manual Crowd Pummeler
Bear itemization was bizarre as they scaled extremely well with bonus armor. http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Warden_Staff was BiS for their weapon slot for the entire expansion--basically it'd be like a world quest reward being better than anything from Antorus.
http://wowwiki.wikia.com/wiki/Level_...king_equipment
(Request: what abilities did druids have / not have back then)
Rogue:
Energy regenerated once every 2 seconds, 20 energy per tick
Stealth significantly reduced movement speed
Fadeleaf was required as a reagent for Vanish
Many rogues were herbalists because of the above
Blindweed was required as a reagent for Blind
Combat swords was the intro raiding spec, and Combat daggers was eventually also viable. Subtlety was taken by 1-2 rogues because hemorrhage increased raid DPS. Back then there were specific talents for the different weapon types. (post 173)
Basic builds: http://www.wowhead.com/forums&topic=5962
Had to carry tons of items for abilities to work, such as poisons, a reagent for Blind, thistle tea, a lockpicking set, etc.
Had to level lockpicking as a separate skill
According to some posters were OP DPS. They could equip Thunderfury which may have been part of that.
Were needed for the suppression room in BWL
There was no mutilate/envenom or Cloak of Shadows (Cloak came in BC)
Had class quests at Ravenholdt Manor and orcs got to pickpocket Gamon
Preferred daggers were a slow weapon-speed dagger in the main-hand and a super fast dagger in your off-hand (UBRS dropped Fel Striker, which was pre-raid BiS. It had a proc that caused your next 3 attacks to be guaranteed critical strikes.)
Barman's Shanker was very good because of its slow weapon speed and how easily it could be acquired
Sap would make you drop stealth...right in front of the mobs you were trying to sap. Improved sap gave a 90% chance of this not happening.
There's a post on page 35-36 that has a bunch of details.
Priest:
Healing (i.e. holy) was by far the most common role. After the debuff slots were raised to 16 it was more common to bring one shadow priest for their buff to shadow damage.
Disc bubbles interfered with rage generation, but Power Infusion was nuts on Fire Mage
Had two abilities granted by race, of which Devouring Plague (undead) and Fear Ward (dwarf) were generally the most powerful.
http://vanilla-wow.wikia.com/wiki/Priest_abilities
Human: Desperate Prayer, Feedback
Dwarf: Chastise, Fear Ward
Night Elf: Starshards, Elune's Grace
Troll: Hex of Weakness, Shadowguard
Undead: Touch of Weakness, Devouring Plague
Could get Anathema/Benediction from Majordomo Executus, requiring completion of a very difficult questline.
Shadow priests used very valuable debuff slots with Shadow Word: Pain, Vampiric Embrace, Mind Flay, and Shadow Weaving. (Because of this the DoTs were rarely used in raids.)
After patch 1.7 when the debuff limit was raised to 16, it was common to bring exactly one shadow priest in a 40-man raid to maintain the Shadow Weaving debuff. They also had some good utility for heals.
Mind Blast had a big +threat modifier
Mind Flay had a 21-yard range
Shadow priests only returned health, not mana
Had class specific quests for the Anathema/Benediction weapon that started from Majordomo Executus' cache of the firelord / The Eye of Divinity
Didn't have Mass Dispel
http://vanilla-wow.wikia.com/wiki/Li...trollable_mobs
Were popular for PvP because Fear was a very powerful spell and the Blackout talent gave all spells a 10% chance to stun for 2 seconds. It also didn't hurt that priests had lots of health, high armor due to Inner Fire, Power Word: Shield prevented warriors from generating rage, Shadow Word: Pain could only be removed by Priests and Paladins, they had significant damage reduction from talents, several abilities that returned health, Mind Flay slowed, many powerful buffs and debuffs were Magic, which they could both remove from enemies and allies, and they could also heal themselves.
Shadow started off powerful in raids but scaled very poorly with gear due to DoTs being unable to crit and other factors
Warlock:
--Were the only way to summon someone.
--Did not have their closet yet, ritual of summoning was a spell. The warlock targeted the person they wanted to summon, then two additional people had to click (and not move) before the recipient would get the prompt.
--Their raid rotation was shadow bolt spam, and possibly maintaining a few curses.
--Had class-specific mounts after the end of a long quest chain.
--Had class-specific quests to learn how to summon some of their pets (Doom Guard, Imp, Void Walker, maybe succubus) as well as for the Enchanted Gold Bloodrobe
--(Post 174): All raid specs involved Ruin in the destruction tree and either Demonic Sacrifice or Shadow Mastery. The cookie-cutter raiding build used to be a hybrid affliction/destruction build.
--Soulstones allowed a player to rez but couldn't be used after the player dies like they can now.
--Soul shards were items that were stored in bags. Many abilities required them, but the only way to get them was to be casting drain soul on an enemy as it died. This meant for raid progression there was no way of getting them mid-raid, so it was important to farm them before raid. This had to be done on mobs that weren't gray to the player, so it was level 49+.
--Banish was very useful on Garr in Molten Core, and was the only ability that could specifically control elementals.
--Doomguards and infernals could be summoned I think out of combat, and summoning a doomguard randomly killed one of the players clicking the dais. Then enslave demon had to be cast on it once it appeared. There were quest chains to unlock both abilities.
--I believe only one spec was viable, the 16-debuff limit was extremely punishing to warlocks. Some bosses were immune to fire and/or shadow.
--Had some curse of doom ability that did no damage for one minute but then delivered a massive hit.
--You could have multiple healthstones in your bag if the warlocks had different levels of the talent that buffed how much health they gave.
--(Post 174): All raid specs involved Ruin in the destruction tree and either Demonic Sacrifice or Shadow Mastery. The cookie-cutter raiding build used to be a hybrid affliction/destruction build.
--Warlocks were used as a ranged tank on the twins emperor in AQ. (Arguably one of the hardest encounters WoW ever had when you factor in the logistics + mechanics.)
--Every rank of every pet ability was a separate grimoire that had to be purchased in SW or Org
--Initially Death Coil had no CC aspect but just leeched health
--Had the mana drain spell
--Page 34 has a discussion of how annoying / not annoying soul shards are.
Mage:
--Was most affected by boss immunities, especially because Molten Core and Blackwing Lair were both fire-themed.
--Conjuring food was useful, but there no feasts.
--Would constantly be asked for both food in raids and portals when in town.
--Could dispel curses (and back then actually needed to on a few fights)
--The recipe for the highest level of conjured water was a drop, not trainable
--Had class quests for a wand and their highest level of food (?) from Hydrospawn in Dire Maul
--(Verification needed): Evocate worked off the Spirit stat, so mages wanted a spirit stave to swap to during evocate and then swap back out when it was over.
--(Edit: This isn't quite right.) Spell damage on DoTs didn't update dynamically like it does now. So Ignite was a DoT that stacked to 5 that came from crits, but the damage it did was a percentage of the original spellcast. So it did more damage if the crits came from fireball instead of scorch. Whichever mage got the first crit got credit for the debuff, but other mages' crits would refresh it. This could cause problems for threat though because that original mage would keep getting tons of threat.
--Had a number of their current spells, such as blink, arcane missiles, frost nova, blizzard, and arcane explosion. Frostfire bolt, mirror images, spellsteal, and invisibility were added later.
