How many teams have you tried out?

[Mercbeast]

I knew I was going to run 4 warriors and a priest, I briefly toyed with 4 mages and a priest. I chose priest because I thought leveling up, PvP would be far more prevalent than it turned out to be, and I wanted fear ward (I was alliance), rather than a paladin. In retrospect, I'd choose Paladin over priest all day every day for this group. I jumped in, and went full rere, with about 7-8 hours of sleep the first week, and not much more the 2nd week before I hit a wall and went full casual mode, logging in for 2-3 hours a day. I felt like I was too committed to back out, so I just kept plugging. Ended up being, I think, the first warrior group to 60 on these forums, but it was slow and arduous.

I honestly think that, Mages, Locks, Hunters, Shadow Priests, and Warriors (depending on how much work you're willing to put in regarding pug raiding) are probably going to be the most enjoyable and effective. Oh and Shamans.

I think Shadow Priests would work, either with a dedicated tank, a dedicated healer, or completely stand alone. We gotta remember that this is almost peak Shadow Priest from Classic. Where a single Shadow Priest could cock block entire raid groups in AV. They are not all that wanted in raids, but for farming out dungeons they'd work pretty well I think, and for world PvP they would be absolutely brutal.

Hunters I think could be a sleeper group, and I'd really like to see someone try to make a macro in ISboxer to approximate jump kiting. I'm not sure if it mechanically can work, whether or not a character will IWT while in the air from jumping, but if they do, then it should be possible to make an ISboxer macro to jump shoot. First step jump, second step IWT, third step follow. In theory it should allow it. Otherwise, I think this is probably one of the most dungeon plowy groups around, with or without a dedicated tank (I'd def take a dedicated healer through, Shaman or Paladin).

Locks are going to be, IMO, the go to open world PvP team. They have fragability with shadowbolt, and they have instant pressure/creeping death from dots. Soul Link makes them absolutely brutal to deal with. Death coil, fear, succubus, with good micro you're going to be absolutely brutal to deal with in group PvP, and in dungeons, we already know Void Walkers can be used to tank everything. Even without a healer this group works, and with a healer, PvE or PvP, even better.

Not much more needs to be said about mages. They are just good, if not the gold standard for face rolling regular mobs in instances, and with a little bit of planning, they seem to be able to blow through dungeon bosses as well with raw DPS.

Shamans are the OG 5 box. They were my first 5 box back at the end of original vanilla, I felt like a raid boss in open world PvP. Cheal is just the most efficient way to heal a 5 man group, and chain lightning is just such an efficient way to DPS in PvP. In PvE, they are perhaps a little bit behind warlocks and mages due to efficiency, but still, very workable. Grounding totem and tremor totem are just god tier levels of utility, and completely nullify many of the issues multiboxers face in PvP, not to mention PvE.

Warriors are fickle I think, in that, this is a group that REALLY requires gear in ways the other groups do not. However, if you have the setup/guild/determination to go out and farm your group raid gear, your group is going to be an absolute terror in PvP if properly supported, and in PvE, you might not blow up groups as large as mages can, but you will blow through 6 groups in the time it takes mages to blow up 1 (bigger) group and drink. This is a group, I think, where you really need to decide what your focus is going to be. Dungeon farming, or PvP. This is going to make a big difference in how the group is setup. If you are running it for PvP, you should REALLY consider running 2 healers. For alliance, 2 paladins are kind of a no brainer. For horde, at least 1 shaman. Unlike most groups we're talking about here, I think that warriors are the group where priests are possibly the worst healer for the team. Paladins are clearly the best healer for alliance, and for Horde, due to windfury, Shaman are clearly the best healer in that 5th slot, unless you're carrying an enhance shaman with 3 warriors.

I'll say this, I wouldn't recommend warriors as a first team. It's a very slow team to level, especially alliance side. I think boosting warriors up with a mage is a better choice.