A few questions reguarding Classes.
 

Okay. I know I want to play either a Shaman, Bard, or Shadowknight. I love having multiple roles I can accomplish. My main area of focus right now is damage. I know Shamans can buff and slow, and Bards can Mez, buff, Slow(though not as good), Pull, and Shadowknights can Pull and Tank.

My curiosity is which one of these can effectively take on the role of a damage dealer without being laughed at?

Frankly, none of them. Of course people will argue and cite examples of their own leet damage, but 99 out of 100 PUGs are never going to say "we need a shammie, bard or SK for DPS).

Having said that, there are a ton of shaman on this server who think they are melee dps, and refuse to do anything else in groups. I strongly advise you stay off that list of asshats. :P

Yeah. I figured solely DPS is gonna be hard to pull off. I will narrow my question down to "Which of these classes can DPS decently while fulfilling their roles? Would they all be pretty similiar in damage?

A shaman will never be DPS, though if you're not melee-ing as a shaman if you're not the MH in group then you're doing it wrong. You melee not to be the #1 DPS in the group, but you can certainly help. With a blight and around 160 dex, 200 str a pet i can put in my fair share of damage done to a mob.

The Sk will put in the most dps of those 3, unless you want to count a bard charming, in which case the bard will by far.

Thanks a lot Skope that really helped narrow it down. I definitely know a mage and wizard would destroy a hybrid. (which is why I love this game) I just like to get some damage in their as well. While helping the group in other ways.

You also say Melee as a Shaman. Do they generally not use there nukes?

/agree with Skope.

I would recommend bard based off the completely made-up statistic that SKs outnumber bards 4:1 on this server. At any rate, bards are playable now.

you better learn to twist real fast if you're gonna play a bard. or you can join the legion of bad bards out there that can't manage to do that.

Yeah, frankly, you're gonna probably get kicked out of groups if you're trying to DPS with any of those. Bard would be your best bet for the most DPS-like role. But you'll probably be pulling and twisting songs and crowd control in your average group before you're considered DPS. Though you will still be meleeing and throwing songs that will buff everyone's damage in the long run.

Highly mana inefficient. So are the DOTS, imho. Shaman had it rough in the early days.