This is my own personal way of setting up groups for our raids. We have had this discussion before but it wasn’t really focused towards raid composition. Now that we have been doing ssc/tk and hyjal/bt for awhile now, we get to see what works on certain fights and what doesn’t.
My mindset is to have a dps orientated raid group. The faster a mob dies, the easier it is on healers and tanks. And enrage timers aren't a problem than.
Usual raids are caster / range dps heavy, because of this I usually will group accordingly. On certain fights I will group for threat or avoidance for tanks, or for healers. Examples are:
Morogrim Tidewalker: Will group tanks towards avoidance and threat. Important part is that the tanks take as little damage as possible, easing the stress on healers. Melee dps will be threat capped since there focus is on boss alone with no interruptions. Caster dps focus on aoe and single target dps.
- 1 Warrior or Druid tank
- 1-2 Paladin tanks
- 1 Restoration shaman for grace of air and flame tongue
- 1 Warlock for imp
Fathom Lord: Will group tanks towards avoidance. Important part is that the tanks take as little damage as possible, easing the stress on healers. Very healer instensive fight.
- 1 Warrior or Druid tank
- 1-2 Paladin tanks
- 1 Restoration shaman for grace of air and flame tongue
- 1 Warlock for imp
Naj’entus: Will group towards giving healers best mana efficiency. Healing is by far one of the most healing intensive currently for us.
- 1 Warrior or Paladin tank
- 1 Restoration shaman for grace of air and flame tongue
- 1 Warlock for imp
- 1 (sometimes) BM hunter for threat
Our raids usually end up having certain amount of classes and specs. Usually end up looking like:
- 2 Protection Warriors
- 2 Protection Paladins
- 1 Feral Druid
- 1 Balance Druid
- 2 Mages, fire or frost
- 4 Warlocks, destruction and affliction(?)
- 2 BM Hunters
- 1 Survival Hunter
- 1 Shadow Priest
- 1 Rogue
- 1 Enhancement Shaman
- 1 Warrior, arms or fury
- 1 Retribution Paladin
- 1 Discipline Priest
- 1 Holy Priest
- 2 Holy Paladin
- 1 Restoration Shaman
- 1 Restoration Druid
Our raid usually will end up looking like this, 5 specific groups. Remember that this is the most ideal setup, and is usually not the case for every raid. Raids are done based on what we have and not what we want to have.
Group 1 – Tanks- Usually 3-4 Tanks
- 1 Warlock for imp
- 1 (Sometimes) Restoration shaman for grace of air and flame tongue (for avoidance)
- 1 (Sometimes) BM hunter (for threat)
Group 2 – Healers- Usually 2-3 healers, priest’s or paladins
- 1 Restoration druid for tree of life
- 1 Restoration shaman for mana tide and wrath of air
- 1 (If available) Shadow priest
Group 3a – Melee dps***this is a hard group to group for. Most raids we only have 3-4 melee dps, on occasion will have the 5th needed.- 1 Enchancement shaman weaving wind fury, grace of air, and strength of earth
- 1 (If available) Fury warrior for increase to melee attack power or reduction to mobs melee attack power
- 1-2 (If available) Rogues
- 1 (If available) Retribution paladin
- 1 (If available) Arms warrior for blood frenzy and increase to melee attack power
- 1 (Sometimes) Survival hunter
Group 3b – Caster dps (Mages)- 2-3 Mages
- 1-2 Warlocks
- 1 (If available) Shadow priest for mana regen
Group 4 – Caster dps (Warlocks)- 1 Boomkin druid for 5% bonus to spell crit
- 2-3 Warlocks
- 1-2 Mages
Group 5 – Hunter dps- 2-4 BM hunters for %3 bonus to damage
- 1 Feral druid for 5% bonus to crit
Warriors- Protection: Usually put in tank group, sometimes will put a bm hunter with one for extra threat. Thunder clap and demo shout.
- Fury / Arms: Usually put in a melee dps group. If no enhancement shaman or feral druid, will put in with bm hunters to offset dps loss. Battle shout and commanding shout buffs.
Paladins:- Protection: Put in tank group with warlock for imp. Judging wisdom or crusader.
- Holy: Put in with healing group for mana tide, tree of life and vampiric touch. If theres a retribution pally, judging light.
- Retribution: Put in with melee group for buffs from other classes.
Druids- Feral: Usually put in with hunter group for 5% crit bonus. Depending on fight, sometimes tank group with restoration shaman for grace of air.
- Boomkin: Usually put in with warlocks and mages, warlocks having precedence.
- Restoration: Put in healing group for tree of life, getting mana tide and vampiric touch buffs.
Priests:- Discipline / Holy: Put in healing group for buffs from druid, shaman and shadow priest.
- Shadow: If only 1, put in healing group for vampiric touch. If 2, 2nd one is put in with mages and warlocks, mages getting precedence.
Shaman:- Healing: If only 1, put in healing group for buffs from druid, and shadow priest. If 2, 2nd one is interchanged between tank group or hunter group. Tanks getting precedence for threat and avoidance.
- Enhancement: Put in melee group for wind fury and unleashed rage. Gets buffs from fury / arms warrior.
- Elemental: put in with mages and warlocks for totem of wrath. Mages getting precedence.
***Limited understanding here, rarely have one around to raid with.Rogues:- Combat / Assassination / Subtlety: Put in melee group. Gets buffs from shaman and warrior.
Mages:- Fire / Frost / Arcane: Put in caster group for mages. Gets buffs from shadow priest and or boomkin. Arcane would heavily need shadow priest for mana.
Warlocks:- Affliction / Demonology: Usually put in with tank group for imp buff.
***Limited understanding here, needs more info- Destruction: put in caster group for warlocks with boomkin and sometimes shadow priest.
Hunters:- Beast mastery: Usually put in hunter group with 2-3 other bm hunters. Sometimes put in with melee group when no enhancement shaman available. Sometimes put in with tank group for extra threat.
- Survival: Usually put in hunter group with bm hunters.
***Still trying to figure best place to put a survival hunter. I’d like to place one in with a shaman for grace of air, but is hard to do without hurting rest of raid. Benefits are that expose weakness will see a boost from expose weakness, which in turn will increase melee dps and tank threat. Current thinking is to place in melee group when enhancement shaman is available.- Marksman: Usually in hunter group with bm hunters. Group buff is lacking and doesn’t really help hunter or melee group. Does get benefit from other bm hunter’s 3% to damage.
I’m open for discussions, this is why I made the thread

There’s certain spec’s and classes I’m not well versed on. So any info would be helpful. Hopefully this will help others out in learning more about other classes a little.