Hybrids
Posted on July 6th, 2008 by Lithanial under Efficiency Tips, General Tips, World of Warcraft
Hybrid classes form the backbone of many an instance group or PvP team, acting as the essential supporting mesh that pure classes rely on - often being the unsung heroes within the group.
Playing as a hybrid requires a great deal of skill to master compared to a pure class, especially in PvP and as such can take a while to learn for new players; however if you are up to the challenge then a hybrid class can be far more powerful than their pure-bred brethren.
There are two main play styles within the World of Warcraft that each hybrid class fits within which can loosely be described as an offensive style or a defensive style, below is a description of each and pointers to help you get the most out of your hybrid.
Offensive Hybrids
An offensive hybrid is a damage dealing class primarily and a backup healer as its secondary role. Examples of classes that fall within this category are shadow priests, Moonkin and Shockadins.
The trick to mastering these classes is to know when your healing abilities are required. Far too many new players achieve a state of tunnel vision towards the damage dealing aspect of these classes; which is only a portion of your potential.
Nothing emphasizes the strength of an offensive hybrid more than arena play. At the start of a match an offensive hybrid is able to analyze the other team to assess just how pressured his own healers are going to be; and as such, how much he will need to support his own team as opposed to applying pure damage.
A simple example is the choice a Shockadin must make in 2v2 arena - if he should use avenging wrath or his defensive bubble. By analyzing the other teams’ damage output he can choose to either go all out on the attack with avenging wrath (should the other team lack damage) or play it defensively with his bubble against burst teams to try and simply outlast them.
Options like this simply are not available to pure classes but dramatically increase the range of team compositions with which you can effectively fight within the arena.
Similarly in PvE many late game encounters such as Archimonde can cause raid members to become separated from their healers while taking significant damage; nearby offensive hybrids can act as an emergency response if they are attentive.
Defensive Hybrids
A defensive hybrid is primarily a healer and offensive support is their secondary role. With the introduction of free spell damage on all healing kit each healing class fulfills this role - though some better than others.
Good examples of the most effective defensive hybrids are the Restokin build and holy paladins. In contrast to an offensive hybrid, the defensive hybrids’ challenge is knowing when to put its offensive potential into play.
While an offensive hybrid is more about assessing the overall situation and deciding if you need to play it safe, playing a defensive hybrid to its potential is much more about the timing and reactions needed to exploit a situation.
Similar to an offensive hybrid, many new players focus solely on the healing aspect of a defensive hybrid to the cost of all else, but when they become more comfortable with their class they can begin to bring the offensive aspects into play to push their class potential to the limit.
The arena is, once again, the place where bringing your offensive potential to full effect shines the most. A holy paladin who only focuses on healing may eventually succumb to crowd control or loss of mana when playing it safe; leading to a slow death.
However should that same paladin take to the offense at key times by using his hammer of justice to stun an enemy healer to prevent heals while unleashing supporting damage in the manner of a Shockadin; then he can at the very least put the other team on their back foot, if not force a kill.
By utilizing both the offensive and defensive aspects of your hybrid you ensure a level of unpredictability and adaptability in your actions, becoming much more of a threat to help ensure your domination of others.
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Thank you for posting this because i’m a ret paladin and I always get crap when trying to find a group even though we can kill just as fast as anyone else…
hehe i took a retadin and a feral drood at the same time on my warrior. retadins do damage, but are ultimately useless imo.
also, im gonna have to disagree on the offensive hybrid trying to play defense. the time it takes for them to heal (considering they dont have reduced cast time heals) will end them. paladins with their CD shields, maybe, but with the lack of intellect most retadins/protadins have their mana is completely drained by the time they finish their heals. everytime i duel a retadin he takes me down to about 50 percent at the same time i take him down to about 15, they blow the shield, waste all their mana and then come out useless. i hit mortal, WW, execute. byby.
with s4 now a few weeks into play, arenas are pretty much dead except for hard core pvp players who already have their strategies fine tuned. most casual gamers who know their person rating will never be high enough for the arena gear have seemingly given up leaving the few remaining players who do arenas for fun to wait in queue for 2.5 minutes only to fight a team so far above them that they are smashed within seconds and no points are gained or lost. as a moonkin who back-up heals i appreciate the recognition, but anything pertaining to arenas for me is pretty much moot.
What about the Hybrids like Hunters? I have a Hybrid hunter. I am 23 BM/ 21 MM / 17 SM Hunter. While this is not a great build for PvP, I find it an Excellent build for instances/raids due to dmg output with my pet and shots, and being able to trap as well, yet people don’t see the benefits of a Hunter specced as I am. If I am not running with my Guild, I find it incredibly hard to find a PUG willing to take a hunter specced like this. Am I wrong in this assessment?
The real problem I see with speccing a hunter like that is that you are missing out on some serious DPS. Since most groups bring a hunter for DPS with CC, it’s no wonder people aren’t giving your spec the REspec it probably doesn’t deserve.
In order to be really good at DPS as a hunter you almost have to go 21/40 in two trees. If you do 0/21/40 you can have good traps for CC, but your DPS will drop by a good bit. If you choose 21/40/0 you will do great DPS and have very few mana issues. It’s hard to beat 40/21/0 for DPS though if you train your pet properly.
For those who would flame: I realize this is seriously short and not nearly good enough, just an example for Kieoti. We cover all of this in our hunter guide along with more than 48 individual builds. Unfortunately you’re all just going to have to wait until we release it to take a peek!
Past that, hunters are not really hybrids. They are DPS role players who can either do tremendous DPS or good DPS with tremendous CC. But that can also be said of the mage class, so no points for trying to squeeze hunters into a hybrid slot.
A true hybrid is not a mixed spec from a talent tree perspective, but a class that can perform at least two of the major group role functions = DPS, Healing, Protection (tanking). If you try to tell me hunters heal OK with their bandages I will slap you; and hunters can’t tank a murloc without a world-class healer - so they are stuck with DPS only.
Why were Shaman’s not mentioned in here, they are hybrid’s aswell, and capable of healing and high damage output. I myself am a Shaman, and get heck because I am not a ‘pure’ elemental spec
sigh….do not sit here and comment on how the offensive hybrids blow mana…obviously you dont understand what a hybrid is if you think they blow mana too fast…you are going off the full out spec prot or full out spec ret or hybrid prot/ret….this is going as ret/holy or prot/holy…theres a bit more added to them if they spec it correctly…also…if you are going to make an article about hybrid classes next maybe you should actually include more hybrid types….you brought up the healing hybrids and failed to bring in any other hybrid classes….giving lack of help to a majority of players….
they blow mana too fast. too fast meaning, before i take them out. they simply cannot outlast a warrior, u just dont do enough damage. it doesnt help that most retadins dont stack a little intellect but either way.. no.
u DO do good damge.. for 10 seconds.
note that i only give examples, not a complete listing of all the hybrids for each type. If your class is not specifically mentioned then im sure you should be able to determine by comparison where exactly they fit into the grand scheme of things; Eg, elemental shaman is similar to a moonkin.
hyporcite : An offensive hybrid WILL allways consume far more mana than a pure healer for example, its a common fact and common sense. Even if you dont dps as an offensive hybrid and just healed you will end up using more mana simply as your heals will not be as powerfull. Can you mitigate the loss of mana by speccing correctly? Absolutely! But you can in no way completely compensate for the general ineffeciency compared to a defensive hybrid.
Healing hybrids make up the majority of hybrids, sure there are a few tanking hybrids but more often than not they fall under the catagory of a role switcher due to equipment limits. For instance, while it is theoretically possible for a feral druid to be both a tank and DPS, while he is tanking he cannot actually be utilising his DPS role.
Equally should he switch to a DPS role he will be woefully inefficient due to being in tanking kit instead of DPS kit.
Also i am limited to a certain amount of words per article, so covering every single detail of each individual hybrid one by one would cause me to go many times over my word limit.
Kieoti : Unfortunatly, while you can spec across your trees in that manner for the armoury to consider it a “hybrid” spec; a hunters role will allways be DPS no matter how he is specced.
Great post Lithanial. I, personally, liked it. Shows people that you can change things up a bit and not always have to be full heals/DPS. As for some of the comments above, a Ret pally is not a hybrid spec. It is Ret spec and it depends on what you mean by killing things just as fast.
If you far out-gear the people around you in an instance/raid, and all of the ranged DPS are asleep at the keyboard, then yes, you might come out on top of the DPS report. I love leveling with my ret pally but let’s be honest, respec to a defensive hybrid or a pure tank/healer if you’re trying to look for groups/raids.
As for your mana conservation as an offensive hybrid, if you take up talents that reduce casting time and mana cost, how do you make up for the lack of +healing on the gear compared to a full healing class? So yes, you’ll end up blowing your mana much, much faster b/c you’ll have to cast more heals to bring the target’s health up than you would in a full healing build.
If I’m not mistaken in what Lithanial is really trying to say, is that you can be efficient and, on occasion, more valuable in a group (more specifically a raid group) b/c of your capabilities which will inevitably include, but are not limited to: reduced casting time and mana cost on both damage AND healing/melee spells/abilities, minimal increase in overall damage and healing, etc. As posted above, Archimonde is a great example of when a few hybrid classes would be considered more valuable than all pure classes. The raid is constantly moving and spread away from each other, making it nearly impossible to always be in LOS of healers.
But it doesn’t need to be taken out of proportion. Some classes are not made to be possible hybrids, i.e. mage, hunter, warlock, etc., and at times, turning a class that is into one is not appropriate. Don’t be surprised if a group won’t take you into a 5-man or a Kara run as a hybrid spec. You need pure specs to do things like that more quickly and efficiently. But a raiding guild into T5+ content, it would be wise for them to at least have one person in a hybrid spec for emergency situations. So keep that pure spec until you get some decent gear, then feel free to try out a hybrid. All-in-all, it’s your $15/month so do with it as you please. Just trying to provide my opinion
While I respect those that play hybrids there should also be a mention for those of us that play classes considered hybrid (personally I’m a SP) but play them as optimised single role characters
I appreciate that my SP has a healing page in the spellbook. 99.9% of the time it is utterly useless to me as a PvEer where it’s all about min/maxing. My renew ticks for 1/3 of a holy priess renew and I spend a bucketload more mana casting it. I have no cast time reductions or threat reductions on my heals. My equipment is set up to max shadow damage - not simply damage / healing and as such I have well under half the +heal available to me than our healers in raids do
There is a place for good hybrids and times when you can make the difference, but geenrally if you have to rely on shadow priests or boomkins healing your main tank then you’re doomed already and should just wipe, res up and start again.
You put pallys and not shammys? we own anyday coz of our totems, which are not just great tools, but have distractinmg ablitiies…sort of!
what lvl is ur shammy rofl.
distracting abilities?
where have u been owning? desolace?
Good point, but you missed the class that really uses all of the strats you suggested: Shamans.
Examples:
2v2 Arena (My Shaman is elemental, 441 Res, 940 Spell Damage) and I play with a frost mage. I have to be aware of both of our HP as well as the other team, I have to be able to decide if I should use my NS on a heal or a chain lightning to finish an enemy. Plus if I end up 1v1ing, healing is essential, I will not win without it.
Resto Shaman/Warrior: This is an amazing team because it slaughters priests. (I also have a 70 priest). Purge the crap out of a priest, and let your warrior beat on him with windfury while shocking his heals, game over.
Just saying you missed probably the most relevant class in the game to this article.