My vote for least skill would be warrior because they have so few tools. But mastering the warrior class is not so easy. Neither is it easy to master any class in this game. For example, some warriors will stupidly invest in heal procs rather than in aggro procs. Or they might invest in stat gear rather than ac gear - bad choice for a warrior unless the stats are ungodly. It's good to have those things sometimes for soloing, though. A good warrior will have a set of gear for soloing and another for grouping, and gear that's on-call.
I think that the question should not be: can this class solo?
I think the question should have been (in 1999): is it fun to play a class that does not have lots of different tools, and if not, should we make the class anyway, if a minority likes it that way?
Because the way I see it, a class can solo well, but that doesn't necessarily mean it will have lots of tools. For example, you could increase the offense/defense of a class so that it can kill up to 4 creatures at once. That will allow it to solo well, in most cases. But it won't have very many tools. It'll be very grindy. In my view, tools keep things interesting. It varies the gameplay. That's necessary, imho. This should be important.
I think they went too far with the group/solo extremes. If it were me, I think I would have given all classes a base skill cap of 50 for all skills in the game. Or something like that, making sure that specialized classes still are experts in their chosen field. But even a base amount of skill should have its uses. So this means every class could track, but not very well. They could all FD, but not well. They could all heal too, though they might fizzle a lot on higher level spells. I think it would have made things a lot more interesting.
The advantage I see to a class system is that it gives new players a path to follow. It's a convenient way to roleplay a class without having to worry too much about the details. It also allows you to search for group members of a particular specialization much quicker. So rather than "/shout Anybody: 100 alteration, 100 defense, 100 1h slashing, 100 meditation, uses shield, etc LFG?" you might instead say "Any paladins LFG?" So if you see someone on the road, a quick /who tells you their skillset. Very useful for communication.
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