Rift: The Newest MMO: Roles that Each "Calling" Can Play

As a semi-new Rift player, I am quite satisfied with the fact that even though there are only 4 classes, there are various souls and roles that each of those "callings" can play. For instance, one who played a game like World of Warcraft prior to Rift may believe that rogues are simply a melee dps; possibly a ranged. One would not thing that the rogue could also be support tanks and even healers. The roles that players can choose in Rift are much more complex, and spec trees, or "souls" are not nearly as cut and dry as other games tend to require cookie-cutter raid performance spec options.

Rift has four callings: Warrior, Cleric, Rogue, and Mage. Each of these four callings have various roles that they may play.

Warriors are great main tanks and melee dps. While the paragon and riftblade souls do give them the ability to do some ranged damage, they are primarily a melee damaging class and will do the most damage when mobs are in melee range of the warrior. The offensive warrior souls are Riftblade, Paragon, Beastmaster, and Champion. All four of the listed specs are quite feasible in many situations, however most players end up basing most of their points in Paragon or Champion; Champion for use of 2-handed weapons, and Paragon for dual-weilding. Both specs are viable, with Paragon using more ranged abilities, and Champion being quite heavy melee burst with very little ranged ability.
Warrior tank specs are Reaver, Paladin, Void Knight, and Warlord. Each of these specs have their different uses, but depending on the build, warrior tanks are generally the best in the game, and it is a warrior's main use in raids often times. Reavers rely on dots to build up threat and have great AoE threat because of this, as well as some pretty exceptional self-healing. Paladins are your typical tank - Lots of block, some self healing, and a few AoE abilities. Paladins also have the ability to fully heal theirselves, or place a damage absorb on the entire party. Void Knights are best for dealing with magical damage and destroying casters. Warlords are meant for debuffing enemies and buffing the raid, they are pretty sub-par for cut and dry tanking right now and will probably only be used as a utility.

Clerics are the main healing class in the game, but they are also capable of both melee and spellcasting damage, as well as tanking. The Cleric's offensive souls are shaman, druid, cabalist, and inquisitor. Shaman is a melee spec, while druids tend to rely on their pet. Cabalist is a spellcasting offensive soul and is quite powerful from what I can see so far. Inquisitors focus on weakening their foes and stealing their powers, and seems to be decent for PvP aside from the obvious PvP spec - With the one weakness being that they don't bring a lot of group buffs to the table. Justicar is the main tanking soul for the Cleric, and this soul focuses on both endurance and threat generation. While I'm not 100% certain that clerics will be used as endgame raid tanks, they are still very feasible for low level content and off-tanking. The healing clerics are sentinel, warden, and purifier. The sentinel soul is similar to holy paladins in World of Warcraft - They are mostly single target healers, great for keeping tanks alive. They suffer greatly during heavy raid damage, though. Warden are mostly heal over time healers, and they do take some ramp-up time, but they are very effective raid healers, and semi effective tank healers both endgame and early level. Purifiers are more of a support/dps healer, that focus on the healing power of fire.

Rogues are another hybrid class, and are not as one would expect if just coming from one of your more average MMO's. Assasin, Bladedancer, Marksman, Nightblade, Ranger, and Saboteur are the offensive souls for the rogue. While Assasin, bladedancer, and nightblade are all variations of melee or hybrid versions of melee and casting combined; Marks and Ranger are both ranged physical damage (like that of a hunter) and saboteur focuses on the rogue's pet. Bard is a pretty unique spec that focuses on party buffing, healing, some survivability, and mobility. Bard is unique and is a very good player to have assist the healer, as well as the damage in 5 mans, and will probably be necessary in raiding when it becomes popular. Riftstalker is the tanking spec for the rogue, however, many rogues do choose early talents in this tree for damage and survivability reasons. Riftstalker is a feasible tank for all content that I have experienced this far, however, they do seem to take more damage spikes than properly specced warrior tanks, and stress the healer more. In end-game raiding though, they may be just as or more feasible than warrior main tanks.

Mages are mostly a ranged damage class only. The only exception to this is the chloromancer soul, which does give the mage some self-healing, and a small amount of capability to heal others in the party - Chloro is more or less a support spec, not a healer. Other specs include archmage, Necromancer, Warlock, Dominator, Archon, Pyromancer, and Stormcaller. While some souls focus on increasing pet's damage, survivability, and threat, others focus on damage over time abilities, survival abilities, or burst damage. I do not know much about mage and a quick read through of the trees may be necessary before you make your choice.

Overall, the classes are rather balanced, it is more a function of your soul setup and player skill rather than one class being better than the next. I do not know which is most over-played, however, it seems that a lot of players are currently rogues and warriors on my server. This may not be universal, though. Play what you enjoy, and worry about the rest later. :)