Talent Builds - Grouped 5 box

[Greythan]

Call me crazy, but I'm committed at this stage to leveling my group (pally, priest, shaman, mage x2). Their 15'ish atm.

What's crazy is that I've never played any of the four classes. So, I'm wresting with how to best talent spec each one. The research I've done so far doesn't seem to fit as most class specific talent advice is based on a toon solo-grinding. That won't be my scenario. I'm actually using my 70 'lock to run four toons (all but the pally) through low level instances. Then I swap in my pally and group her through quests only sharing kill quests, etc. that are easily groupable. The quests that aren't I do solo on the pally.

So, considering that when being boosted by the necro the build doesn't matter (at this point at least), I want to focus on the best talent build for the four classes for when they are on their own. Any thoughts on any/all of the classes and a good talent progression would be most appreciated.

Thanks.

[Maz]

Well if you were soloing them, the builds for the Paladin, Priest and Shaman would be Retribution, Shadow and Enhancement respectively. In a group, I'd be tempted not to have two melee characters as I suspect this would be harder to 'box but I have little experience so I'm just guessing. I'd suggest Retribution, Shadow and Elemental. You'll still have enough healing in your group even if healing is always the off-spec.

It's a long time since I played mages and the talent trees have undergone significant change since I did. I'd be tempted to level the mages on different specs though, mainly for shits and giggles.

[Negative1]

Seeing as your group is obviously PVE based I would suggest you spec your characters however you plan to have them end game. EG. if you plan to have priest healing spec him holy and macro him to heal so that you can learn to tank dps and heal while leveling up.... that way you dont have to relearn everything at endgame. My suggestion:
Prot Pally, 2x arc fire mages, shadow priest, resto shaman
Pros:
arc fire is mana effcient damage
shadow priest will regen mana for your 5x mana using classes (THE OWN)
resto shaman is a fairly easy to box healer as they are fairly direct with their heals.
Mana tide totem
Cons:
Priest is a easier healer for boxers
3x damage casters fighting over cloth gear

Alternate:
Prot Pally, 2x arc fire mages, Elemental shaman, holy priest
Pros:
elemental shaman gains totem of wrath at lvl 50 for +3% crit and hit with spells for the group
shaman can use mail and leather that would be otherwise wasted drops
Holy priest can use up the +heal cloth that will be wasted otherwise
Cons:
No mana tide totem
No mana regen from shadow priest
healer is more squishy (doesn't matter much in heroics heals drops fast regardless)


Well thats my 2 copper.

[Knytestorme]

I'd suggest doing an armory for Five Fingers of Fury on proudmoore and look at my specs. I'm runing PvE with prot pal, holy priest, elemental shaman (backup healer to spread agro betwen him and priest) and 2 x arcane fire mages and think I have got them all specced pretty much as efficiently for their jobs as I can (there will be some debate about paladin being 51/10 rather than 49/12 and shaman having 5 points in increased mana rather than moved to resto tree, but meh). Put them into talent calculators to see what they end up giving you and compare to the class guides on the official forums and come up with what works best for you from there :)

[Djarid]

Paladin... defo Protection... you need it to hold aggro effectively

for the rest, assuming the priest is the healer, then Holy is a given

and I imagine the shaman and 2x mage are your DPS so Elemental and whatever for the mages

[David]

Isn`t arcane terrible mana inefficient? Personally I would go for fire. Since when your questing (not instances) youw ill mostlikey nearly oneshot mobs so big damage is usefull. I think fire helps in that.
I`m pretty convinced that frost isn`t a way to go tho. No need to slow things.

But personally I allways say people should spec the way they like to play. Eventually you can make it work.

[Mak]

I'd suggest doing an armory for Five Fingers of Fury on proudmoore and look at my specs. I'm runing PvE with prot pal, holy priest, elemental shaman (backup healer to spread agro betwen him and priest) and 2 x arcane fire mages and think I have got them all specced pretty much as efficiently for their jobs as I can (there will be some debate about paladin being 51/10 rather than 49/12 and shaman having 5 points in increased mana rather than moved to resto tree, but meh). Put them into talent calculators to see what they end up giving you and compare to the class guides on the official forums and come up with what works best for you from there :)
I'm definitely going to check your crew out Kny. I have the exact same crew, with the exact same planned specs. I'm very curious as to where you put the points and your gear. =P

So Grey, my answer is the same as Kny.

[Greythan]

Great responses and I really appreciate the input.

I do like the idea of a shadow priest, but I think the "money play" is to spec the priest for healing and the shaman for dps, not the reverse. I don't know that there will be that much down time either way. (Mana returns from shadow spec and mana totem are tempting, however.)

Nothing saying I can't respec. ;) So, I'm going holy priest, elemental shaman, and arcane/fire mages. (Prot pally is a given.)

Thanks again for the input.

[Knytestorme]

Isn`t arcane terrible mana inefficient? Personally I would go for fire. Since when your questing (not instances) youw ill mostlikey nearly oneshot mobs so big damage is usefull. I think fire helps in that.
I`m pretty convinced that frost isn`t a way to go tho. No need to slow things.

But personally I allways say people should spec the way they like to play. Eventually you can make it work.

Yeah it is, thus my main mage casts are fireball, fireblast and icebolt for fire immune mobs. The benefit to going deep in the arcane tree is essentially for PoM, arcane mind (+15% int), arcane power (+30% damage for 15 seconds at +30% mana cost) and the big one, mind mastery (increase spell damage by 25% of int). Yeah you miss out on some of the higher fire talents, and I may respec once I get into heroic gear, but the increase in damage output from arcane mind + mind mastery certainly adds enough +sd to my bread and butter fire spells to make it worth it at this stage.

As an example, your mage has 400int and +600 SD so a cast of fireball could hit for say 1000. Add those two talents and your int goes up to 460, your SD goes up to +715 and your fireball is now upped by an average of 11.5% damage per cast for no extra mana or gear upgrades. That too me is pretty mana efficient :)