What is the dealio?

[Evita]

First of all, I haven't played in 2 monthish, so I have no idea what is going on with the new patch, I have read everything I could find on MMO, and looked over the Talent Calculator, but it didn't really make me wiser.

It doesn't seem like anything good came our way, I mean it looks like everyone got cool new abilities, but what about shamans?

I mean the Elemental mastery, is basically a talent we've always had, Deep Healing is awesome I guess, and the Enhancement one is pretty decent aswell, but lets talk about the revamping of the talents, what is the point of Focused Insight and Telluric Currents, really useful huh, and everything is pretty much the same in Resto, no new abilities in the tree.

Now lets talk Elemental for a second, I personally refuse to go another expansion spamming the same two attacks, I don't get why Elemental didn't get something new and different, like Boomkins got, I know a lot of people whine about the Elemental burst, me personally, I've never really seen the point, it might be a little drastic in the rare situations, but it's not all that bad.

If Elemental shamans really didn't get anything because of the "insane damage", I have to laugh, trust me, the damage may be "good", but 5 minutes into a bossfight, spamming the same two keys, gets so boring, I don't care if they nerf Lava Burst, reduce the crit chance of Flame Shock, I don't care, give them more versatility, it really is boring in PvE, and in PvP, especially in 2v2, I know people don't care about that now, nor will they in the future for obvious reasons, but playing as Elemental back then, all you pretty much did, was stand still and spin around in circles, tanking when your Earthbind wasn't up, and even if it was, what do you face in 2s? That's right, priests and paladins, removing your only "CC" instantly.
Lack of versatility.

As much as I don't want this to be a "Shamans are so neglected boohoo" thread, I can't really help but to roll down that path a little, and for that I am sorry, but I have played since Vanilla, always been a competitive high-end player, and if you've played for that long, you know a thing or two about the situation of the Shaman throughout the last years.

I know that the Shaman is essentially a hybrid class, not top DPS, not top Healer, but the performance of a Resto Shaman in arena, has always been ridiculous, and I doubt that will change, seeing as Resto got no defensive CD of any kind, as was expected of Cataclysm, even though Blizzard acknowledged the problem.

Wow, look how this turned out, this was not my initial plan.
I was actually just curious about what the patch had to offer, and the results are quite disappointing so far, but as I said, I've only read what I could, I can't speak for what shamans have on the PTR, or at 85 for that matter, so feel free to tell if we got anything cool, besides Earthquake(lol).
- It just appears like we got nothing useful, in any of the specs.

[Kyy]

Elemental shaman is far more interesting to play now with Fulmination and Lava Flow which remove some of the static "lb spam for next 8sec" feeling.

Level 80 play is pretty easy at the moment due to how much current t10 bonus simplifies the rotation. Currently on live realms, you don't really need to care about Flame shock, long as you just keep casting Lava Burst soon as it's up. And you can just use Fulmination soon as you reach 9 stacks or need to move.

Level 85 gives you one more spell to your list of skills to use, Unleash Elements is something you wanna time up as often as possible with your Lava Burst. And you need to keep eye on your Flame Shock duration, so that you maximize it's uptime and still use your Lightning Shield stacks effectively

Obviously there is some flaws in elemental shaman still. Movement is still pretty heavy dps killer for us. I feel the new lvl85 ability Spiritwalker's Grace which allows us to cast while moving should have it's cool down reduced if you keep moving, similar to Elemental Mastery which has it's cd reduced by 3seconds every time you cast. Also our dps is still balanced on having Fire Elemental up for it's full duration. Seriously whats up with 10min base cd dps cool down??!?!

But the main point here was that elemental shaman feels a lot less boring and actually needs some knowledge and consideration while dps'ing on level 85



As I don't play resto that much myself currently. I can't give that much feedback on it. But theres few things...

Resto shaman wont be chancing that much when it comes to spells and healing style. Not in current beta build at least. The spec as _HUGE_ potential in it. Resto mastery can be extremely powerful if raid and tank dmg changes (and some op classes get nerf bat they deserve) towards a point where people aren't topped all the time. Telluric Currents is a really really cool mechanism for mana regen. If you ask me at least. It fits into shamans role lore wise and the stereotype I have for shamans. Focused Insight can be used for situations where you know that big hit is coming to tank or raid and you wanna boost your next cast. I do agree Focused Insight still needs to work on it. As it's currently something you leave out on your normal spec.

Healing Rain is pretty good ability as well, specially to spread Earthliving hot to raid.

The biggest issue with resto as ability and talent wise is slack of healing cool down. I cant really call Nature Switfness or Unleash Elements as healing cool down. Instant cast spell or 30% more healing on your next direct healing spell just doesn't really compare well with other healers.

All in all resto has some pretty nice kit of healing spells and fillers for times when spam healing isn't needed. But suffers due to current healer balance and encounter design. Also having no really cool down for times when healing is falling behind makes the spec look a bit incomplete.

What comes to pvp, 2on2 is never going to be balanced and I wont really give much thought for that. In 3s and 5s shaman is still going to be a powerful. Elemental has it's burst, cc, interrupt, offensive dispel, totems and ofc blood lust. Same goes for resto pretty much, all thou the healer balance needs to be fixed before it can be said for sure

[Evita]

Thank you for that informative reply man :)

"Currently on live realms, you don't really need to care about Flame shock, long as you just keep casting Lava Burst soon as it's up."
- Why is that? Does it somehow refresh the duration of Flame Shock? Is there something I missed?

I had totally forgotten about Fulmation, and I've never even heard about Unleash Elements

I also forgot about Spiritwalker's Grace, I didn't realize Elemental also gets that?

And Healing Rain I'm not so sure about, it's channeled is it not? It's probably extremely situational, and I'm sure 80% of the time, you're better off spamming Chain Heal.

Telluric Currents is ok I guess, initialliy I was like "WTF?", I couldn't really find it's place, like in PvE I doubt you're standing still, picking your nose, so you decide to toss some Lightning Bolts, but if you're OOM, I guess it could be useful, depending on the cost of the Lightning Bolt, and the mana you recieve.

But Focused Insight, I guess if you're.. not even, well, with the new talent system, you really don't have any points to dump into it, there are significantly better talents.
Or, I guess you could take some talents from the "Reduces magic damage taken while casting", or something.

As for Fire Elemental, I have no idea why it has such a long CD, I'm assuming it's because it's such a DPS boost, but really, it could be lower.

With all that aside, I would still love more versatility in Elemental PvP, and a defensive CD for Resto..

[Kyy]

1. 4 pieces: Your Lava Burst spell causes your Flame Shock effect on the target to deal at least two additional periodic damage ticks before expiring.

And now that the effective cool down on Lava Burst has gotten shorter it makes Flame Shock never drop in a single target fight. I've personally had over 2min duration on Flame Shock after few min into fight

2.Unleash Elements is our first new skill we get at level 81. It's usable for each spec as it gives it's benefit based on your weapon enchant. For elemental it's 30% fire dmg for next fire spell -> Flame Shock or Lava Burst

3. Spiritwalker's Grace is shamans new level 85 ability so every spec has it, obviously resto and elemental gain most out of it as enhancement has it ways of getting instant casts with maelstrom procs

4. Healing Rain is actualy casted spell which places this blue pool of Healing Rain to that position. It's has similar targeting mechanism as blizzard or hurricane etc. but it's actually just casted spell.

5. I'm pretty sure you ain't the only one having similar thoughts about Telluric Currents. But as your gear scales and you have more and more spell power and haste TC gets just stronger for regen. Obviously not every fight allows you free globals, but some do.

With my current bit gimp resto gear in beta my Lightning Bolt is hitting around 5.2k and has 1.4k mana cost so it's already pretty decent mana gain for single cast.

Only issue with that is the fact that for raid use it might need some talents from elemental tree for hit.

6. Like I said Focused Insight in it's current state is something you most likely wont be seeing in normal builds. And I feel it should be added as part of some other talent. But it would have it's use on some situations

7. Indeed. I wont be turning this into cry about Fire Elemental... All I say for now is that I _HATE_ it's design and lack of control.

8. I don't really know how Elemental shaman could be even more versatile without being op. If you leave them alone they turret you down and even if you go for them their instant burst can kill you. They can cc and interrupt well. They have tremor totem and grounding. And can back up healer pretty well. Not forgetting how much you can win games with good Thunder Storms

As for Resto, their survivability has been issue before and it's hard to tell how pvp will be at 85 after people start to be stacked with pvp gear. Missing that healing cool down is a big minus but they do have some pretty ok passive talents making their healing and dmg take bit better. It's just something we'll have to see later if it's becomes a issue

[arx]

This thread reminds me of Christmas lights!

[Kyy]

This thread reminds me of Christmas lights!

It felt like a good idea to color my wall of text a bit... But now that you said it and I tried to read it... Guess it's better as it is now