Here's a completely arbitrary ranking of various classes in the game in tiers I made up and based on nothing other than my opinions. Assume that guardians are tarot users and wiccans are hex users. Also, the warriors are placed by weapon spec instead of by guild since that's the real difference (there are a few minor differences - I'd call commune warriors slightly better due to the stat bonuses from drawdown/nightkiss, but weapon spec matters more). I'm also discounting artiwhore warriors like Lisarel and general freaks like Forren in this, who would probably otherwise cause their class to be higher than it is.

Top Tier: Shadowdancers, Moondancers, Blacktalon.

High Tier: Celestines, Hartstone, Bonecrushers.

High-Middle Tier: Nihilists, Aquamancers.

Middle Tier: Blademasters, Pureblades, Geomancers.

Low-Middle Tier: Axelords, Cantors.

Low Tier: Spiritsingers, Cacophones.

Ninth Circle of Hell: Harbingers.

Post your own opinions! (or debate mine, if you're so inclined)

what is the assumption for hartstone and Blacktalon?

Probably Dreamweaving or maybe Runes for a Blacktalon, but really any of theirs can work quite well so it's not that important (as opposed to guardians, who only really work with tarot, and wiccans, who only really work with hexes).

is this like 1v1 views right?

I dunno about Hartstone. Unless you're using Sleepmists or really know how to work with Runes, they're really weak. Especially in comparison to Blacktalon. Their demesne can kick tush without much help. :S

Though, yay, my guild's avoided the Ninth Circle of Hell. Go us!

Yes, this is all on a 1v1 basis. Obviously the whole thing changes if you're debating how well a role they can play in teams (ie. mages and blademasters jump to top tier and guardians fall to the bottom).

Also, upon further consideration I dropped Aquamancers from High to High-Mid.

Well, fighting as a druid basically revolves around sticking sap... which really isn't that hard to do, if you know what you're doing. Blacktalon are definitely more powerful than Hartstone but I think Hartstone are really up there as well (especially with stuff like stagstomp which REALLY helps to solidify a saplock once you've got it).

Nihilists, when done well, > Celestines.

You nailed it dead on, Sham. That's how I've always tiered that classes.

I'm not sure. Thoros is definitely very scary, but I have a feeling that most of the times I've died to him have just been because I suck at curing. I also think that most systems would fare better against him and his eventual ilk if Nihilists as good as him had been around since the beginning of Lusternia so people'd got more used to balancelocks and crucify being used effectively (since he's definitely the best person I've ever seen with the class, and if it weren't for him obliterating me with it several times in a row they'd probably be in mid or low-mid). Celestines, on the other hand, have inquisition/soulless which is difficult to avoid with any amount of curing so I'd rank them marginally higher than Nihilists.

Incorrect. If I chose classes by combat ability instead of following Thoros' Rp, I'd definitely be Celestine.

MUCH tankier, much scarier, much easier to perform instakills.

Absolve > Wrack.

Inquisition > Sacrifice.

Soulless w/ Inquisition > Soulless w/ . . .crucify??

Wow, looks like I'm not so lucky... Kaervas manages to make us look alright. He did alright in the last wargames with a partner who died early and no health vials.

That's because he's:
1. a demigod
2. Kaervas.

Hey, he still makes the Harbingers looks semi-decent. That's a feat for anyone, even the great and lauded Kaervas.

That looks pretty accurate. Although I would've swapped Celestines and Blacktalon around.

Almost nailed it Sham, that's how I see the tiers too with one change.

BM should absolutely be swapped with AL. You have to consider greatrunes as all of them suck significantly more without them. The advent of gripping runes and void of heavy/crit arm wounds is devastating to BMs, alongside many other significant failings as a class. Thoros probably agreed as is because he hasn't learned how to deal effectively with pinleg yet.

Man... I gave him a health vial, so he had that. And honestly Harbingers are pretty clearly the lowest of the bard guilds, because bleeding and the insta is all they have. If I'd been ready for the insta me and Sojiro would have won easily but I wasn't thinking and just sat there while he did it. This isn't a jab at Kaervas at all, the Harbingers are just bad. He does well but there's no getting around it, if you can tank the damage, you don't have anything to worry about.

If you want sub-tiers for the low tier I'd say Cacophony > Spiritsingers, because at least we have hunger. We have to strip an assload of defs to get it to work, and it's lame, but it's better than the sleep stuff. There's also soulless which is one of the few decent tarot skills we can use 1v1.

As far as Nihilists and Celestines, Celestines come out on top. Nihilists can be okay in groups because of crucify and the amount of afflictions, but when you compare the skills, Celestines are considerably better.

Nice list though!

I agree on Axelords - they're much better than appear in your list.

And on Thoros not knowing how to pinleg - he has the best illusion protection setup I've ever seen, and you think he can't writhe out of pinleg?

Actually it's by his own admission. His pinleg curing isn't that great. My experience has confirmed this by beheading him when he was a celestine with champion pet 1v1 then pinlegging him to death.

I think you'd also have to assume that Aquas or Geos took Telepathy. Dreamweaver mages are a little tricky to pull off (not impossible, but a little tricky) and I actually haven't seen a runic mage in combat ever. Telepathy afflicts are slow, though, not on par with Hexes. Wiccans > Mages. Though I'm not sure why you'd rank Geos lower than Aquas. Want to explain that one?

EDIT: Though I think I'd understand if you take into account that an Imperian Merian's 18 INT is better than Master Viscanti's 15. But not every Aqua is Merian and not every Geo is a Viscanti *coughRevancough*