Why is Enhance AoE so awful?!

[EarlyBird]

I'm an 844 enhance shaman and I've been trying to wrap my head around how enhance AoE can be so awful.

Unless I'm completely missing something I don't understand why they would make the enhance AoE so useless.

Crash Lightning does mediocre damage at best making it barely worth using. The real issue I have is with the cleave damage that SS and LL do after Crash Lightning is cast. Aside from always having to perfectly face yourself so the mobs are actually in a cone area in front of you, the cleave damage that SS and LL do is so low it's practically negligible. It would be one thing if the Crash Lightning buff would cause SS and LL to do half of their normal damage to all targets in the area, compared to the tickle of damage it does now. At that point enhance AoE might be even the slightest bit competitive.

I just can't understand why they would make enhance AoE so awful when classes like Demon Hunters, Rogues, Death Knights and Monks can all do insanely high AoE as well as super high single target burst/sustain.

I'm wondering if I should just reroll to a different class because Enhance doesn't seem to be able to compete with most of the other melee classes in AoE or single target. Even when I'm fighting a boss and getting insane SS procs I still lose to the other melee classes.

[Deleted]

I'm 833 now with rank 16 in my doomhammer, and I find myself slacking so much on aoe trash and kind of on bosses. The only time we do real aoe dmg is when we save spirit wolves with alpha wolves with crash lightning, but you don't want to waste that 2 min cooldown on trash when the boss is up next. And that little tickle of damage from crash lightning is shit really, the only reason I use it is because it makes lightning come down, and I get an increased stormstrike. I can burst 340k+ with all cd's and feel like a king when I get those lucky procs that give me 8 stormstrikes at pull, but then my dps crash like the lightning I bring down from the sky.

I've benn thinking of going ele to try atleast get a raid spot being ranged, but I'm thinking of just going another class really.

[Deleted]

well we cannot compete with dh rogue etc at aoe but as a 842 enhancer i can compete with every class on bosses ive met so far. We have rly high burst awesome Target Switch. The specc feels rly nice to play ( apart from not getting a single stormbringer proc during a bossfight *sigh ). i mean yeah its kinda stupid that DHs just have to press 2 buttons and get like 900k+ dps on trash but who cares for trash anyways. My 5 sec Aoe stun every 45 seconds Heroism windrush Totem etc are awesome for grp support.

im voting for some kind of AoE improvement but otherwise we are in a good spot for now.

[Mazzeric]

Doesn't help the discussion much, but you could be a caster (namely Shadow Priest) and be in a much worse situation. Or have your AoE be strictly cooldown dependant (Fire Mage).

I have a feeling the whole "my trash DPS is too low" topic we are seeing in many class forums is more of a "some specs doing way too much aoe" issue. Windwalker and Unholy are just absurd, especially the former with the Windwalker artifact ability.

Once Mythic+ is out the sustained aoe DPS classes and long ramp-up classes will be shining more.

[Seismic]

I'm confused by this. I have had no problem with AOE in dungeons so far as enhance. What are your talents and are you setting up the rotation correctly? I use Hailstorm setup before popping Doom Winds and then alpha/doom wolves with crashlightening seems amazing with all the stormstrikes and procs you get.

[WskyDK]

840ilvl and I really enjoy the cleave aspect of enhancement.
Flametongue + Hailstorm before crash lightning and SS/LL has me pretty competitive.
I'm ok with weaker cleave when I have nice sustain on boss fights.

[EarlyBird]

I'm using the standard build that every enhance shaman is using; Boulderfist, Feral Lunge/Wind Rush, Lighting Surge Totem, Hailstorm, Tempest, Crashing Storm and Landslide.

And my point is exactly what you just said. If you want to be even kinda of competitive in you have pop all your cds whereas the other melee classes can press 2-3 buttons, with no cds, and hit 1mill dps, while at the same time having just as good burst/sustain, if not better, than enhance.

- - - Updated - - -

People dropping metters at trash pulls getting you down? =)

Have you tried using wolves during aoe? They can help a bit. Otherwise just live with it I guess. We are more "cleave" than AoE really and even then we have a very limited kit imo. Its part of the game I guess, we cant all be "awesome" at everything. I, for one, still like how the spec plays out even though it changed soo much on legion.

I agree, though, that we could use some help on the AoE deppartment.

I get that not every class can be "awesome" at everything and I also really like the new play style which is why I chose to main enhance in the first place. I also get that enhance brings a lot more utility then other melee classes; cap totem, hero, wind rush tote. But it's still irritating that unless I pop all my cds I can't even compare to other classes on AoE.

[WskyDK]

I'm using the standard build that every enhance shaman is using; Boulderfist, Feral Lunge/Wind Rush, Lighting Surge Totem, Hailstorm, Tempest, Crashing Storm and Landslide.

And my point is exactly what you just said. If you want to be even kinda of competitive in you have pop all your cds whereas the other melee classes can press 2-3 buttons, with no cds, and hit 1mill dps, while at the same time having just as good burst/sustain, if not better, than enhance.

pop all my cds? I'll pop Doom Winds but that's about it unless it's irritating trash like the double archer packs in Black Rook (and even then it's just wolves).
Perhaps that's where we differ; I don't give a shit about being competitive on trash.

[Paleaura]

~500k single target burst is pretty cool. Our priority damage is great, along side some decent cleave. We just can't big dick air everything like we could with fire nova. RIP

[EarlyBird]

pop all my cds? I'll pop Doom Winds but that's about it unless it's irritating trash like the double archer packs in Black Rook (and even then it's just wolves).
Perhaps that's where we differ; I don't give a shit about being competitive on trash.

See, aside from raiding, I want to get really far into mythic+ and to do that you have to be competitive in AoE since trash is the most painful thing to deal with once you start getting into the high levels. Unless enhance gets some kind of buff or modification to their AoE they won't be useful in high levels of mythic+ because they'll be doing a fourth of the AoE dps everyone else is on trash.

[Espeonagetieler]

See, aside from raiding, I want to get really far into mythic+ and to do that you have to be competitive in AoE since trash is the most painful thing to deal with once you start getting into the high levels. Unless enhance gets some kind of buff or modification to their AoE they won't be useful in high levels of mythic+ because they'll be doing a fourth of the AoE dps everyone else is on trash.

see a class may be able to do 300k on aoe trash but as enhance I can easily do that to a single mob which is very important when there is a mob that needs to be killed before the rest

[WskyDK]

see a class may be able to do 300k on aoe trash but as enhance I can easily do that to a single mob which is very important when there is a mob that needs to be killed before the rest

Pretty much this, Enhance doesn't really have AoE, we have cleave. Being able to ST well, and then have decent cleave off that will keep enhance sitting pretty for a bit.

[nazrakin]

What I think they should do is just change Doom Vortex to a 100% proc with a 10yrd radius so that its useful for AE. This way Doom Vortex has a purpose and choosing to SS or LL after CL is a decision that matters - you SS if its basic cleave but you want to focus a priority target, LL if you're are spreading dmg across a larger group.

[Jakexe]

I've found positioning is key, to make sure your cleave is hitting the most targets. After improving this I've been able to keep up and out do most other specs (DH/Rogue are hardest). Of course if the mobs get spread out this goes to shit and I drop back down to the bottom.

[Hivey]

I would much rather have weak AOE and good ST than the opposite like in WoD.

[Hashcrypt]

We're not an AoE specialist. Enh is all about ST and Cleave damage.

[ehxy]

We're not an AoE specialist. Enh is all about ST and Cleave damage.

This, end of thread.

Close please.

[Ragnarocket]

See, aside from raiding, I want to get really far into mythic+ and to do that you have to be competitive in AoE since trash is the most painful thing to deal with once you start getting into the high levels. Unless enhance gets some kind of buff or modification to their AoE they won't be useful in high levels of mythic+ because they'll be doing a fourth of the AoE dps everyone else is on trash.

Kind of, but Mythic+ also introduces affixes which change the way you deal with trash. Going back to look at the affixes they tested, there is one that doubles a creature's damage once it is brought to low health. Bring a group of 4 bad guys down to that level all at once with AoE and suddenly your tank is going to go pop. Good ST damage (maybe some cleaving) will be required for something like that where as a class that brings good AoE and poor ST would be frowned upon. We don't know how that is going to shake up yet.

Classes will probably be desired sometimes and not so much other times. I dunno though, I feel like our AoE isn't THAT terrible. Sure I get beat by a couple of classes but I do hold my own in my groups.

[Tolian]

I was pulling 250k-400k on packs in Arcway last night, at ilvl low 440s in my Enh OS. I'll readily admit that it is indeed my OS so I don't have as much experience as people that main it, but I thought it was actually pretty good. Sure the DHs do 1M plus with their cooldowns (which is ridiculous IMO), but I think being in the high 200s-low 300s at this gear level is certainly not "awful."

[Fang7986]

I know it would be a big change but with how everyone seems to complain about AoE and lots of the balance problems seems to be balancing single-target and AoE and the "can't do Mythic cause my specs AoE isn't as good as ____" I'm starting to think maybe Blizz should just straight up remove all AoE damage spells from DPS classes. Let tanks keep AoE damage as a means to grab threat on adds, but everyone else just stuck with straight single target spells.