My mage/shaman dilemma

[SaifBT]

First of all, I'm not very sure If I should be posting this in the mage or the shaman section so I'm going to be posting in both and see both sides views on this topic(hopefully that's not against the rules)

So basically...I do not like the changes of the mage. It's been the class I have played ever since late MoP and the only class which I am "decent" at. I am still relatively new to the game as I started proper raiding only at the beggining of WoD and have no mythic experience(hopefully that changes in legion though), so for some of you serious raiders out there...this may sound really stupid but do try to help me out.

1)ROP. Never liked it, never will. It is "okay" for burst phases(since it lasts only 10 seconds) and you usually burst at specific moments where you're quite confident there will be barely any movement involved(EX: Gorefiend's feast of souls) but for the sustained DPS moments I do not like it all as a lot of the times you are required to move and you may have just dropped the ROP down and turns out to be an entire waste. The problem is, it gives you a 50%!!!! damage boost and it's the talent you MUST go with in every situation...

2)The changes made to the frost and arcane: I honestly never enjoyed arcane too much, but I did play it in BRF since it was the best for most encounters and I did not really give it a proper shot in the prepatch so far but I know ALOT of people who LOVE arcane and have complained about it all. Meanwhile, frost, my FAVORITE spec and the spec I raided with in HFC has got absouletly recked. Probably one of the easiest specs(3-5 button spec at most) ever in WoW, has got completely revamped and now has alot of extra buttons that contribute to the DPS of the spec and made it completely not fun for me(not because it got slightly more difficult) but I just didn't like channeling a spell and forming my own big icicle as part of my core rotation. Probably not going to even level as frost(it was usually the go to leveling spec for mage)

3)Fire mage: my god...what a beautiful spec to play. So much fun, such a great spec. Fire was always a fun spec to play and is absoultely recking the other two RN in pre-patch. I actually LIKE the changes(minus RoP)! What's the problem then? Fire is very crit reliant and will most likely not be viable at the beggining of the expansion seeing as crit levels will most likely be very low, forcing me to play one of the other two.

Here is where the shaman comes to play:

I have been reading/watching excellent reviews about the enhancement shaman especially the SignsofKelani vid where he shows how fast paced the class is and how there is always something to press especially when you get the artifact and it looked really fun. So I leveled a shaman to 100 and even without my artifact(which adds a lot of speed and fun) it is SO much fun! The animations look sick too and I don't think I have ever been "attracted" to a class this much before(with the exception of my mage). One problem though:

Since I pretty much just mained mage, I am only experienced as a ranged dps. Melee is very new to me and I know being melee is not more "dangerous" as there are many boss attacks that are aimed specifically at ranged camp(ex: Archi's shadowfel burst) but seeing as how I'm used to playing ranged...it just feels "safer" for me, and I'm afraid I won't be able to transition to a melee spec easily.(No I'm not currently looking into elemental, doesn't appeal me right now)


Originally, my plan was to get BOTH to 110, do some hc/mythic dungeons and look at how both perform/appeal to me and then make my decision. It looks like I do not have this luxury of time if I want to be raid ready. The reason being is I simply like to take my time to level, especially on the first character of a new expansion...I want to explore all the new content in my pace. It looks like the first raid of Legion will be in 2-2.5 weeks into legion and if I want to be prepared as much as I can, I won't have the luxury of trying both out and preparing a lot for the raid(as in doing the 11 world bosses and focusing on 1 character in hc/mythic dungeons). Compared to WoD(which I was really bad at preparing for highmaul for), I want to be fully prepared and give my best possible performance during the beggining which probably won't let me try out both properly as I've liked. In other words I'm stuck for a decision and I need your opinions on this matter

Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post.

[n0cks]

Fire is very crit reliant and will most likely not be viable at the beggining of the expansion seeing as crit levels will most likely be very low, forcing me to play one of the other two.

Not anymore 100% true.
While Fire will always be crit reliant, we have guaranteed crits with Fire Blast and the new Phoenix's Flames coming with the Artifact Weapon.
From what I've read, Fire is even better when Legion arrives than Frost/Arcane...

Also, a lot of the DPS from previous Fire came from a good Combustion setup, which you NEEDED high crit for, as you had to build it up. Since that's no longer the case, overall damage has spread around and although Combustion surely is still great for burst phases, it won't determine so much your outcome.

[Delath]

The initial crit levels even in pre raid gear are high enough to sustain fire without much of a problem.

[shammypie]

It depends on what you value as a player. Enhancement shamans flicker between OP, UP, and very UP. So with the next expansion being a lot longer their dps is expected to fall off and you don't have any room to change specs unless you want to change roles and be a healer. That said you will probably be go heals for q times and expect that to be very painful as it usually is ever for experienced players. But I will say that the shaman class is very enjoyable if not always competitive. I myself am making the opposite move as I think the mage class looks like a lot of fun to try out.

Therefore if you want a change of scenery and aren't worried about pushing harcore raiding go with shaman. You will enjoy the class but you won't be top dog.

[Deleted]

I am in the exact same position as you, I've played an Arcane mage for the entirety of WoD with some mythic experience. I've played some on the PTR with my 720 ilvl mage and you go OOM incredibly fast even with just doing the conserve rotation. Now I know this is tuned for 110, but from what I have gathered about it from other players in the beta, you still have some mana issues and are very dependant on the legendary legs that give mana back after ABarr. All of this combined make me shy away from the spec, and I really only like Arcane, so I'm not going to be playing the other specs.

A week ago I dusted of some random level 70 shammy I had and started levelling the old fashioned way, doing each dungeon once and only quests. And I have to say, Enhancement is amazingly fun, I am only level 88 as of now, but it just feels so intuitive and smooth, even with my crappy green items. Now my 2 biggest concerns are that firstly, my mage has been my main for a while and he has all the professions/achievements and so on and it would feel bad to leave all that behind. And secondly, I am afraid that Enhancement might either get nerfed or fall off during the later tiers, making me a burden to the raid, compared to if I was an Arcane mage, which are known to scale amazingly.

I've had this dilemma for about a month now, and I still haven't decided on anything, I'll try the invasions and current max level content on my shammy and if I still like it in a raid environment, I'll probably stick to it. Unless some major buffs/changes happen to Arcane before launch, I'll probably reduce my mage to an alt.

[Icathian]

Make the mage your main and have the shaman as an alt.

If you care about PvE and being decent at it, there is nothing more annoying than working 10x harder than everyone else so you can do a good job, only for blizzard to announce massive nerfs on the next patch. That's how it has always been with shamans and I really do not think it's gonna be any different from now on. There is nothing worse than feeling that you are a burden for your raid, trying as hard as you can but ending up giving a mediocre performance compared to the other guy with the same ilvl than you doing 10x better while pressing 2 buttons.

With mages you can -know- that at least 1 spec will always be in the top 3 best dps. That takes a lot of stress out of raiding.

[coldcell]

Make the mage your main and have the shaman as an alt.

If you care about PvE and being decent at it, there is nothing more annoying than working 10x harder than everyone else so you can do a good job, only for blizzard to announce massive nerfs on the next patch. That's how it has always been with shamans and I really do not think it's gonna be any different from now on. There is nothing worse than feeling that you are a burden for your raid, trying as hard as you can but ending up giving a mediocre performance compared to the other guy with the same ilvl than you doing 10x better while pressing 2 buttons.

With mages you can -know- that at least 1 spec will always be in the top 3 best dps. That takes a lot of stress out of raiding.

Follow this.

With Mage, you are safe because at least 1 spec will do great. With Shaman, not so much. Either you are underpowered for a long, long time or you spend more a lot more effort to do mediacore. If Shaman happens to be OP, a nerf bat will hit Shaman soon. That's how it works in the majority of Shaman's history. Play Shaman as your alt and raid as your Mage.