The Warrior
Where to even begin? As many of you know, this is the class I play and have played for the past 5 years in Everquest. Comparing the two Warrior classes, Everquest versus the World of Warcraft, is like comparing your skinny cousin with the bad acne to Superman. World of Warcraft has a definitive advantage over Everquest, in that the classes are not as watered down and diluted, allowing for much more power to be allotted to individual classes. Sure there is another Tank class (The Paladin and to a lesser degree the Shaman and Druids can do some light tanking, but I digress) but he does not totally usurp the Warrior class, and in Warcraft our friend the Warrior is pissed off and packing something I like to call 'the pain.'
The Warrior is a class with depth. Aside from being a master of weaponry and armor, they are able to fight in three distinct stances (I was told that this may very well change, either reducing the number of stances or increasing them - it's in Alpha still people!). Additionally, a warriors special abilities come from two pools.
First are the abilities the warrior may draw upon from becoming enraged, known as gaining 'Rage.' Gaining Rage is essentially the reverse of the Spellcaster's mana bar which exists in Everquest and other MMORGs. A warrior starts at zero Rage and gains Rage totally dependant upon the stance they are in and the actions they take while in the stance (more on this to come). Rage decays when the Warrior is not in battle, resetting to zero when the Warrior is at peace (think Hulk).
The second pool with which they draw their power from are their shouts. As a warrior levels and gains power, they also gain the ability to perform shouts. Shouts can have various effects on the warrior, their group, or on the enemies they fight. One shout may increase the overall damage of your party, bolstering their spirits and weapon speed, while another shout may cause the warrior's targets to flee (something that could be very useful to the soloing warrior who gets more than he can handle while adventuring). No, you will not be able to 'twist' shouts - these are not Everquest Bards.
Naturally the warrior gets a taunt ability. Taunt in the World of Warcraft requires the use of Rage, has no effective Cooldown or refresh, and adds/builds up hate towards the Warrior instead of the train wreck which is taunt in Everquest. Speaking of Everquest, EQ Warriors should pay close attention here, if you're playing World of Warcraft, you will encounter a strange and new sensation while playing the Warrior. Once the initial shock wears off, you will realize that when you press 'Taunt' it actually taunts your opponent – it does not fail and end up doing absolutely nothing – it is always building up hate, so long as you have the necessary amount of Rage built up to make use of the ability. It's like reinventing the wheel, or as I like to call it, COMMON SENSE. Certainly high DPS classes can overaggro if they are not careful, but the World of Warcraft warrior is well equipped to deal with the absent minded mages and rogues of the gameworld. Hallelujah!
Stances
The Battle Stance: When taking a Battle Stance, the warrior is a balanced fighting machine. In this stance, the warrior gains Rage from taking damage/hits and dishing out damage. As the Rage bar builds up, the warrior is able to perform special moves and abilities which cost a certain amount of Rage. Intrigued? You should be. These abilities are many, and can range from a simple extra attack at early levels, such as kick, to as Tigole said, 'AE Whoopass' which is the Whirlwind ability, gained later on in the Warrior's life. A side note here, in Warcraft you won't ever have 5 mobs messed/crowd controlled in your camp in a normal adventure group. The warrior is meant to dish out the AE damage, taunts, shouts; trying to keep some control of the chaos which will inevitably find you and your friends. Which stance you use will be totally dependant on the situation. With all that said, the Battle Stance is something Warriors will probably use most often when soloing.
The Defensive Stance: If you're going to be tanking in your group or raid, you're going to want to be in this stance. While in the Defensive Stance, the Warrior gains Rage from taking hits. With that built up Rage, they are able to perform various abilities that bolster their defenses. Some of these abilities substantially reduce the damage taken by the Warrior, while others empower the Warrior's shield with various attacks and strikes that can cripple their enemies.
The Berserker Stance: My personal favorite and one that probably most closely resembles my style of play. In the Berserker Stance, the Warrior gains Rage from dishing out damage. As the Rage builds up, the warrior is able to unleash devastating attacks upon his opponents. The aforementioned Whirlwind being one of those abilities, Cleave being another, which allows the warrior to exert such force upon their enemy that their weapon hits and damages the poor bastard standing next to the recipient of the Cleave. The saying, "I'm gonna hit you so hard your baby's mamma gonna feel it," comes to mind... To the Warrior in a Berserker Stance that's not an empty threat, that's a promise. Believe it...
With all of these abilities and powers, and from what was shown to me in gameplay, the Warrior will be an amazing and fun class to play. Definitely another class which I will use to kill you with...
I've only barely scratched the surface of what the Warrior can do in World of Warcraft, but I am quite certain it's more than 'press 'a' to attack, 'taunt,' and '/disc defensive,' for their 3 minutes of glory.
Sound like thats going to be my first character choice. The Rogue sounded pretty appealling too. Seems like they're actually giving pure melee some depth, and not just press "A" and go to sleep.
He gives more descriptions at http://www.fohguild.org . You might have to look at the archives to find all the descriptions. It's the best info i've found yet as far as WoW gameplay. Blizzard's really being hush hush about a lot of stuff. Any way I can't wait and hope to see a lot of you in WoW, and pray for me to get that beta acceptance e-mail :D
