Spooncraft

Prepare for another rant, I’m in a mood today.

I like it when a topic is talked about so much by Blizzard that I get sick of it. That shows me deep down that Blizzard is trying their best to make sure they get it right. In an MMO, that is no easy task. We now have 4 possible tanks that can easily hit up 5-man content, heroics, main tank raids, and so forth. Trying to balance all four is going to be one hell of an accomplishment.

But the REAL issue here is how WE as players see the game. Right now we think like this: “What is the best tank for X encounter?” But Blizzard is changing the way the game works. It won’t MATTER which class is the best because there will not be a single best class. There will be different styles of tanking, but in the end it will all be the same. The types of tanks you bring won’t rely on “hey we NEED a Paladin to tank this” it will be “hey what is Bob-teh-Tank’s favorite tanking class to play and what’s his playstyle like?”

The emphasis is going to be shifted from the content, to the player. Anybody’s personal preference and desire will translate into something viable for end game content. So if Jimmy likes the rage system and warrior’s looks etc, then he can be a warrior, have fun, and be a greta tank. If Timmy on the other hand prefers Paladins and their looks, system, etc; he can still have his cake and eat it too. You follow what I’m saying? Here’s the full conversation. (src)

So if Warriors are the best tanks for “bosses who hit hard for physical damage” (i.e., with the exception of elementals [where druids/pallies have no edge] and casters [again, no edge, although DKs have one], pretty much every encounter where the tank matters much), why not choose a warrior for every difficult encounter?
We’ve talked about this a lot, and I’ll admit that it may not be the best way to go (designing tanks for certain bosses). Currently we are talking more about HOW classes tank, not WHAT they tank. Potential examples: The warrior tanks by having a shield, a lot of mitigation and avoidance. The druid tanks by having a huge health pool. The paladin tanks by using passive reactive abilities. That is a gross simplification, but perhaps you get the idea. This would naturally lead to some tanks being better at some fights, but it should leave more flexibility to the individual. Players won’t count up all the bosses and say “Only 4 hit for magic damage, so we don’t need a death knight.”

I don’t think this is too off topic, as it mainly concerns tanks - is there any thought going into rage generation (and to a lesser extent, heals = mana generation for paladins) through damage-mitigation shields (Power Word: Shield and so on)? I ask this because it seems like Discipline Priests are going to be one of the strongest single-target healers BECAUSE of all these shields, yet many tanks refuse or dislike to be shielded unless in an emergency situation because as said, they don’t gain rage through shield spells (and paladins getting shielded instead of healed don’t regen mana).
Yes, that is something we talk about. The design for the Discipline priest in PvE is using shields and similar damage prevention techniques and it sucks (and is unintuitive) that those are bad to use on warrior and bear tanks.

Given those niches, and this comment in your OP, “If nearly all guilds want the same class as their MT, we’ve failed. ” I think you are setting yourself up for failure. The problem is, niche number one, is not a niche, it is pretty much the definition of being an MT. Something you yourself somewhat admitted to by referring to that niche as being the majority of encounters in a post on the warrior forums. If the game is being designed that way, and even worse, blizzard posters are saying that, then why would the community choose a non warrior tank?
You shouldn’t feel like you need a warrior. I wrote some of those comments trying to reassure warriors that the changes they saw weren’t an attempt (on purpose or accidentally) to phase them out of being awesome tanks. But in retrospect I see my comments were a little misleading and just made non-warriors more concerned. Making all tanks viable needs to come first, and the flavor / niches (while still important) need to be second.