After reading about the class statistics on the US boards (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=102656816&sid=1&pageNo=1) I wanted to do the same for the EU guilds. The overview on the US boards was made more than a month ago, and well, maybe somethings changed. I decided to not go as far as the US board and collect all stats and talents, but i'd rather constrict myself to talent specs and how many players played a class.

In the following overview i have only taken into account players who are revered with the four outland factions you need for running heroics. Also, all players i've parsed through are in the top-250 EU guilds on http://www.bosskillers.com/. So lets see the first stats.

Total number of players in the top-250 guilds: 16411

Total number of players revered with all 4 factions: 11737



Popularity per class:

Rank    Class       #Players    %

1       Priest      1771        15.09%

2       Mage        1610        13.72%

3       Warrior     1586        13.51%

4       Warlock     1270        10.82%

5       Paladin     1257        10.71%

6       Rogue       1167        9.94%

7       Druid       1163        9.91%

8       Shaman      1031        8.78%

9       Hunter      882         7.51%

Next, lets take a look at the talent-point distribution. What tree's are popular, which arent.
The talentspec someone has is the tree they have put in more points than the other two trees combined. If no tree has more points than any other tree, he is considered a hybrid (ex. a 10/21/30 build).

Druid (Balance)         73      (6.28)%      

Druid (Feral Combat)    564     (48.5)%     

Druid (Restoration)     526     (45.23)%     



Hunter (Beast Mastery)  283     (32.09)%    

Hunter (Markmanship)    474     (53.74)%    

Hunter (Survival)       125     (14.17)%     



Mage (Arcane)           384     (23.85)%    

Mage (Fire)             1003    (62.3)%    

Mage (Frost)            222     (13.79)%    

Mage (Hybrid)           1       (0.06)%



Paladin (Holy)          1159    (92.2)%    

Paladin (Protection)    51      (4.06)%      

Paladin (Retribution)   47      (3.74)%       



Priest (Discipline)     61      (3.44)%      

Priest (Holy)           896     (50.59)%    

Priest (Shadow)         813     (45.91)%    

Priest (Hybrid)         1       (0.06)%



Rogue (Assassination)   107     (9.17)%     

Rogue (Combat)          992     (85)%       

Rogue (Subtlety)        60      (5.14)%      

Rogue (Hybrid)          8       (0.69)%



Shaman (Elemental)      167     (16.2)%     

Shaman (Enchancement)   211     (20.47)%    

Shaman (Restoration)    653     (63.34)%     



Warlock (Affliction)    815     (64.17)%    

Warlock (Demonology)    118     (9.29)%     

Warlock (Destruction)   320     (25.2)%     

Warlock (Hybrid)        17      (1.34)%



Warrior (Arms)          428     (26.99)%    

Warrior (Fury)          328     (20.68)%    

Warrior (Protection)    830     (52.33)%     

This list is based on where players put in the most points, but it doesnt say a lot about where the other points go. So lets see about point distribution next.
The most populair talentbuild is the spec that the highest percentage of players in that class have specced. I might one day calculate it for every different spec too.

Class Druid         1163 Players

Expected points     70943

Actual points       70887 (-56)

Most popular build  0/0/61  13.84%

Balance             5681    8.01%

Feral Combat        27930   39.40%

Restoration         37276   52.59%



Class Hunter        882 Players

Expected points     53802

Actual points       53774 (-28)

Most popular build  41/20/0 27.66%

Beast Mastery       14342   26.67%

Markmanship         29420   54.71%

Survival            10012   18.62%



Class Mage          1610 Players

Expected points     98210

Actual points       98187 (-23)

Most popular build  10/48/3 42.23%

Arcane              27567   28.08%

Fire                53716   54.71%

Frost               16904   17.22%



Class Paladin       1257 Players

Expected points     76677

Actual points       76660 (-8)

Most popular build  41/20/0 19.41%

Holy                51589   67.29%

Protection          19955   26.03%

Retribution         5125    6.68%



Class Priest        1771 Players

Expected points     108031

Actual points       108021 (-10)

Most popular build  23/38/0 23.55%

Discipline          33045   30.59%

Holy                35745   33.09%

Shadow              39231   36.32%



Class Rogue         1167 Players

Expected points     71187

Actual points       71175 (-12)

Most popular build  15/41/5 33.93%

Assassination       22711   31.91%

Combat              42952   60.35%

Subtlety            5512    7.74%



Class Shaman        1031 Players

Expected points     62891

Actual points       62849 (-42)

Most popular build  0/5/56  38.60%

Elemental           8122    12.92%

Enchancement        12436   19.79%

Restoration         42291   67.29%



Class Warlock       1270 Players

Expected points     77470

Actual points       77461 (-9)

Most popular build  0/21/40 17.80%

Affliction          36193   46.72%

Demonology          13223   17.07%

Destruction         28045   36.21%



Class Warrior       1586 Players

Expected points     96746

Actual points       96738 (-8)

Most popular build  8/5/48  15.76%

Arms                27279   28.20%

Fury                29100   30.08%

Protection          40359   41.72%

Conclusion:
Most popular class: Priest
Least popular class: Hunter

Most popular talent trees:
1. Restoration Shaman (67.29%)
-- Holy Paladin (67.29%)
3. Combat Rogue (60.35%)

Least popular talent trees:
25. Balance Druid (8.01%)
26. Subtlety Rogue (7.74%)
27. Retribution Paladin (6.68%)

Also, some players might want to check their talentpages, because im missing quite a few talentpoints here and there!

Interesting, thanks.

Funny thing, that's nothing new. I could've told you all those things without doing any calculations.

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Q u o t e:
Funny thing, that's nothing new. I could've told you all those things without doing any calculations.

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Yet calculations have some value and deliver a messege.

Didn't expect resto shamans to be so high up with all the elemental and enchancement ones running around.

Edit: Oh ye now i get it... i guess lots of elemental shamans specc a bit resto too for the pewpew things there.

Nice post, interesting even that its not big surprise :)

rolf at hunters numbers.
thanks for your time.

Nice work Trutje. Am I right in assuming that the stats only show the people who are actually revered with all major factions, i.e. who are successful in finding groups and actually running instances, and it excludes the gazillion PvP specced rogues and BM huntards who sit in Shattrath all day spamming "LF2M tanker and heeler plx!!!11!!"?

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Q u o t e:
Nice work Trutje. Am I right in assuming that the stats only show the people who are actually revered with all major factions, i.e. who are successful in finding groups and actually running instances, and it excludes the gazillion PvP specced rogues and BM huntards who sit in Shattrath all day spamming "LF2M tanker and heeler plx!!!11!!"?

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Yep, and i've excluded the players who arent in the top-250 guilds on bosskillers too. I wanted to see what specs players have in high-end pve :)

If i was to look for average specs of lvl 70 players i would have to get an average slice of guilds somehow

Curiously, this seems to blow the claim that priests are being left out of serious raid guilds for paladin stacking completely out of the water.

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Q u o t e:
Curiously, this seems to blow the claim that priests are being left out of serious raid guilds for paladin stacking completely out of the water.

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erm no it doesn't.

Holy priests in top-250 raiding guilds = 1771 * 50.59% ~= 896 priests
Holy paladins in top-250 raiding guilds = 1257 * 92.2% ~= 1159 paladins


edit: Not to mention that the values do *NOT* take into account who gets to raid every day.

For example in my guild (1/4 TK, 5/6 SSC so mid-range) there are 6 holy priests.

However, we never take more than two, sometimes only taking one, and we all take turns as to who raids.

What the statistics - while being all nice and presentable - don't tell you is the actual trends of holy priest usage, or indeed any other spec usage. Any number of those values listed could be well traversed alt's with revered in all factions, or members of the guild that while having revered all factions simply do not raid, and are social members who stick around for backup purposes, and cannot play as much due to real life or any other factor.

Simply looking at statistical values is completely pointless unless you're prepared to actually interpret the figures, and the general consensus of both the EU and US boards is that holy priests are under utilised in raiding compared to other healing classes - simply stating values does not prove this statement either way.

Wouldn't Violet Eye exalted not be a better measurement to get to the "mains" of the players in the top guilds than revered with 4 factions? I'm guessing you mean the TK instance attunement factions for that CE/LC/Sha'tar & Thrallmar/Honor Hold . A hardcore player can get revered with all these factions in less than a week after hitting 70. I don't think there will be many alts already at Violet Eye exalted.

Edit: Thanks for all the hard work though. At least real numbers rather than just speculation about what's wanted.

Wonder why huntards are the least played class =)

Need some more duels sometime Trutje ;)

-Bullzi

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Q u o t e:


erm no it doesn't.

Holy priests in top-250 raiding guilds = 1771 * 50.59% ~= 896 priests
Holy paladins in top-250 raiding guilds = 1257 * 92.2% ~= 1159 paladins

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All this statistic proves is that:

1.) Raiding guilds, on average, have one more healing paladin than healing priest.

2.) Priests have more than one "raid viable" spec, whereas Paladins are primarily healers and very rarely anything else.

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Q u o t e:
All this statistic proves is that:

1.) Raiding guilds, on average, have one more healing paladin than healing priest.

2.) Priests have more than one "raid viable" spec, whereas Paladins are primarily healers and very rarely anything else.

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I agree with both points.

However, the statistics do not show which of those people raid daily, and which is on a rotation system as there's only one available raid slot for them.

Assuming guilds run with 3 paladins and 1 holy priest, and only 250 guilds were sampled then you have 4.636 paladins competing for 3 raid spots per raid night per guild, and 3.584 priests competing for 1 raid spot per raid night per guild.

Of course making any kind of assumption is simply skewing figures to show what you want them to show. I could also assume that there's 3 priest slots and 1 paladin slot and skew the figures in favour of arguing that paladins are getting less raid spots than priests. :)

The figures are nice to look at but without actual interpretation, or more relevant figures to show, out of those top-250 guilds which raid slots go to which class on a nightly basis, relating to attendance of class by event, then it's not possible to use them to disprove the claim that priests are *not* having problems getting raid slots - which is what my original post was directed to.

edit: poor grammar.

Balance druid's will be going higher ^^

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Q u o t e:
well that basicly kills all mage complains I have seen in the past 6 months saying guilds take more locks then mages.

thank you OP.

how can 0/21/40 be the most popular build if most people are puting points into affliction? but hat build got no points in affliction O.o

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What i did there was just collect all the builds of any warlock, and select from that the one which the highest number of warlocks have. It is highly likely that 0/21/40 is a nice build, and 61/0/0 is a nice build too, lets say the first gets used by 100 warlocks, and the second by 90, than my stats program chooses 0/21/40 as most popular build, but the point distribution would be 61*90 / 21 * 100 / 40 * 100 - so there will be more in affliction than any other two trees.

So it is not 100% right to just point out the most popular spec, i should have pointed out the most popular spec per tree :) I might do that soon.

Something else to consider: while officially a talent point distribution of say, 23/38 for priests is considered "Holy", in my opinion any build with less than 41 points in one talent tree should be called a Hybrid.

Still, thanks for the list, it's interesting.