Manyak

^^ This is the absolute truth.

Hardest class to master - any tank. Right now most people would think "well shit all they do is sit and mash taunts and CAs"...but it takes alot, ALOT more than that to hold aggro and take hits properly. See the thing is, for all other classes, every fight is almost the same - joust, dps, heal, time cures with the abilities and AEs, maybe mezz, whatever. Nothing really changes that much on the surface. The people that have to adapt the most on every fight at every raid are the tanks Tanking requires alot more skill than you think - you gotta time ur burst damage with the raid's burst damage - u gotta time ur defensive shit with the mob's damage - and if anything changes in between u gotta adapt on the fly.

If a tank does not know everything thats going on in an encounter, from what each player is doing and what each mob he is tanking is doing, to what each player and mob is ABOUT to do, then there is no way that tank can tank properly. No other class in the game requires as much concentration and skill. And if i had to list tanks from easiest to hardest to play id say it would be Paladin-Zerker-Shadowknight-Guardian. Yes i know brawlers can tank, but why the fuck have a brawler tank when theres a plate class - so they dont count :P. And the reason i say guardian is the hardest is because they do require more attention than the others. I would say they are the easiest to play generally, but the hardest to master.

__________________

Morara

A Shadowknight is boatloads harder to play than a Guardian. They have to put a LOT more work into maintaining agro, and they still fall short of Guardians and Zerkers.

Manyak

yes, they do have to work hard to maintain aggro. but the thing with shadowknights is that they have fewer skills to help them on the defensive side. they lean more towards "do everything you can to hold aggro, and boost up that defense in an emergency" type of thing. not exactly like that, but alot more towards that than guardians. like i said they are the easiest to generally play, cuz any dumass can sit there and taunt and mash shit and theyll hold aggro just fine with buckler reversal and the aggro line of AAs. but the really exceptional guards can work around losing one of those lines and still holding aggro against the top DPSers. The point is....the SK is more about working to hold aggro (and yes you do work ur ass off for it), but the guardian (being that they have the widest selection of taunts and skills and temporary buffs to choose from) requires alot more coordination to get the job done well.

__________________

Grevious

True but the easiest classes are bards sadly the way they made them. Dirges may have it a bit tough to rez like crazy but other then that dont die to keep them buffs up and throw in your debuffs. Any damage is a bonus how many guilds out there have pocket bards to box on raids I know there are many.

__________________
Done with this god forsaken game

Jezia

A tank that can "lead" a raid along with doing his job well is a rare skill.

Dragonmoon

Ok, I'm not going to flame classes I haven't really played, but I tell you I have a 70 monk, 70 Coercer, 70 Conjuror and a 48 Fury and here is how I rank them from hardest to easiest.

1. Fury - I don't have the healer mentality. I like to kill stuff! So my lack of enjoyment of playing this toon makes it the hardest for me. Oh and everything is the healers fault!
2. Coercer - There are alot of reasons this is a very hard class to play but the two biggest is being with people who don't know how to maximize their mana usage and WORSE, Most people do not know how to play their toons when a mezzer is around. I'm willing to stick my neck out and say that at LEAST 95% of my mezzes are broken by someone other than the MT. There are a million things going on in a raid for the Coercer to worry about. And there is no Ninja AFK's allowed for us, people notice quickly when you are not paying attention.
3. Conjuror - This class shouldn't be that difficult to play. But thanks to Sony and some players it is made harder by things you can't control. Pets that won't attack on stairs without you jousting in, MT's on a 2 inch platform that won't let you pet attack, these are very irritating things. But what is the worst? One second into the fight some knuckhead starts screaming for a shard. They couldn't ask at the end of the last fight for reasons unknown.
4. Monk - guess this is the easiest because I've always been fortunate enough to work with good/great MT's. Peeling is your biggest concern and a MT can make or break your day.

Personally I think any class can be easy or hard for you depending on the amount of time you are willing to truely learn you class. All classes have a specific job to do, and to do it the best, it takes time, effort and a willingness to listen to others input. Unfortunately there aren't alot of other Coercer's out there will to share tactics and information, where as there are a ton of Conjuror's out there to share ideas with.

Finally I think ranking classes from easiest to hardest is all a personal view of your own playing style. If you aren't interested in that class, it will one of the hardest to play.

__________________
Count Staven 80 Coercer
Veeman 80 DIrge (Ex-Main)
Lord Dragonmoon 74 Conjuror (Call bitch to Chardok Queen)
Fenlend 73 Monk (Farmer)

Morara

I like when I'm passing out hearts and asking several times if anyone doesn't have one, and am greeted with silence, then the fight starts and I get spammed with tells.

Or before they changed it, people asking for hearts with one in their inventory, making me waste my cast.

Pylon

Easiest class to play? Anything I don't play.......danm newbs

Kyrsten

It really bothers me when I hear stuff like this about Dirges. Or when I hear dirges on eq2players whining about how all they really have to do is set their buffs and that they could go AFK /autofollow and no one would notice the difference.

Are the majority of Dirges really just that shitty? In a group setting, yeah, I put up my buffs, focus on doing as much dps as possible on every pull and usually dont touch buffs unless the tank is getting hammered and the healer can't keep up. Healer is struggling? Swap in some defensive buffs... I promise you stoneskin and +parry are immediately noticed.

In a raid setting - I'm debuffing, rezzing, cycling CoB, tossing out emergency HP transfers, changing buffs if needed and STILL busting my ass to make myself seen on the parse. What kills me are the ones that stay ranged and plink with thier bow, and then whine about not having any dps to offer the group besides buffs? Fuck that, get in there and hit the fucking mob. And don't whine about AoE's either. We're in chain, and there's no reason a bard shouldn't be able to eat an occasional AoE nearly as well, or just as well as any other scout class. If I don't parse well on a mob, you can bet your ass I had to joust AoEs, had to rez someone, had to self stifle to keep someone alive, or some combination of the three.

I'm not saying a dirge is OMGSOHARD, but I've spent a lot of time playing and learning this class, and I disagree - it takes work to really shine while playing this class. This class is capable of doing dps while providing amazing utility in any setting, you just have to know how to do it.

Maybe there's a stigma of Dirge being so easy to play because too many people are MAKING it seem easy by not doing a damned thing.

Aray

I honestly dont know how ppl can sit there and say brigs are easy, they have now been made even harder witht he removal of AR, yeh ya can solo heroics, but it requires skill and timing. And did ya know? debuffs cause aggro, a lot of it, lol.

__________________