Classes that can shine for a year of vanilla?

[Tenagra]

What are some underrated classes of vanilla? Like the other topic about Mages I'm looking for what else might be extra-good for the first year. What about Wizards? My experience with them on progression servers was that they were very strong starting out because their spell damage was excellent compared to how under-geared everyone was. Would this be the time to live as one without the same struggles they currently have in an extremely twinked environment?

[Maker_Mayhem]

Wizards, while strong with spell damage, are only good while they have mana. Mages are able to continue to dish out damage via their pet 100% of the time while their pet is alive. That coupled with the fact that magicians have very respectable damage on their DDs and AoEs make the mage a superior choice for straight domination imo. A big draw for some to roll a wizard is for the planar ports, but consider this -- it will be months and months before Hate or Sky are open.

With that said, does that mean wizards get the complete shaft? No -- they will still be better than any melee class. And you may think "well I would love being able to travel around easily." And if that is the case, roll a druid. They are super OP in classic, like mages for the simple fact of their versatility. They suffer from the fact that, as content gets harder post classic - the gap widens between their damage / utility versus the stronger content. But classic content, a druid can do just fine and shine in any group. And to clarify, druids can still be powerhouses through all the expansions for sure -- but in terms of straight "meta" compositions or efficiency -- what they offer can be done better individually by other classes, however, no other class can do everything like a druid.

All in all, play whatever you want to play. If the allure of being a rare wizard is strong for you -- do it. Or if you don't mind being 1 of the 100s of mages or druids -- do that instead.

I wish you luck in choosing!

[Danth]

Paladin, Druid, Wizard, Magician are the classes that come to mind as being probably at their (relative) strongest during the pre-expansion period.

Danth

[Vizax_Xaziv]

Wizards will be great in Classic, yes!
PROS:

The low HP of Classic-era mobs makes Wizards a significantly more viable group-DPS class. A single Wizard nuke in Classic will take a solid 70+% HP off any exp mob. This works really nicely to burn mobs down when an overly large pull comes in. They can also function nicely as a backup-CC class w/ their large assortment of roots, snares and stuns.

Porting for plat (obviously). Ports up to Hate and Sky will be in high demand even after Kunark opens

NOBODY will be twinked making group wipes far more frequent. Additionally, NOBODY will have lvl 40+ Clerics to Rez the dead, giving some serious weight to the Wizard's ability to evac in an emergency.

CONS:

Wizards will be mana-starved w the lack of +INT gear. Quadding will be very difficult (likely even impossible) without constant Clarity buffage

The problem arises when grouping in Kunark-era content. Those nukes that were taking 70% HP off Classic era mobs are now only dropping a mob's HP by 25-35% whilst still draining an equivalent amount of the Wizard's Mana - to the point where a Wizard in Sebilis, for example, might not even be able to nuke once per mob.

[Lojik]

3 things really help a wizard in classic as far as grouping goes:

1) melee DPS is way down, so wizard DPS is relatively better
2) if groups struggle with content due to poor gear and need more time to rest/med, it doesn't really hinder a wizards DPS, where as melee average DPS goes down if they're not doing anything.
3) if green is crowded and you have to wait a long time between spawns, again a wizards DPS isn't affected as much.

Mages are clearly superior DPS grouping, but wizards might be more useful versus certain raid mobs. Conflagrate and ice comet have slight resist modifiers to help them land. Wizards stunning can help versus casters in a group too.

[Albanwr]

there are going to be so many Mages on Green. If I were you or anyone else, I would steer away from Mage. Wizards are brutal in Classic. And you can put up /lfg and teleport all over the place to get to that group. Unlike other classes who will need to beg for a port(from people who are exping) or running (possibly without SoW) for quite sometime.

[Vexenu]

There's actually a lot of fairly easily obtainable +INT gear in classic. Wizards have some of the easiest gearing in that regard. It's pretty easy to get a Wizard over 200 INT just in droppable gear, much less Planes items.