How are Shamans fairing? Worth leveling one as an alt?

[Koojix]

Hey all,
Looking to level an alt for legion just to fiddle around on when I've done all my mythic and such on my druid. Warlock, Monk and Shaman have caught my eye so I was just wondering how Shamans are doing so far. Haven't really seen any in the mythics I've done, don't think I've actually an elemental shaman yet. Anyone able to give me a insight to how their specs are doing, whats fun and if they're worth it at the moment? Any information on the other two classes is also appreciated. Cheers

[Eej]

Resto Shamans are very good healers but not too exciting to play. Ele and Enh are both fun to play but Ele is a little bit lacking in damage until you're geared out and you have a good idea of what talents to take for a fight. Ele still needs some love so hopefully the tuning hotfix will make it feel more viable. Enhancement itself is perfectly fine aside from having poorly balanced talents leading to one (still decent) spec.

[Trollfat]

There is a reason you haven't seen any ele shaman. They're in a terrible place. Probably the worst dungeon spec in the game. They will get hotfixed in two weeks and still be the worst relative to other specs. Blizzard has confirmed they wont be shaking up the DPS rankings this expansion because of artifact investment so Ele will be stuck at the bottom. And then we have stormkeeper, our artifact ability which basically says ''If you don't press your lowest priority spell three times in the next 15 seconds, you'll lose DPS''. Not fun at all.

Enhancement is in a better spot, but not great. Middle of the road DPS which has a litany of issues (addressed in the enhancement thread). Worth a try because of Doomhammer but most likely won't blow your dick off.

Resto is pretty awesome though. If you're looking for an alt healer that heals and does nothing else then you've come to the right place.

[Deleted]

Elemental is fun as fuck, but can be frustrating when leveling/doing suramar. WQ's are a blast, since you rush through them with Rehgar as your companion.
Can't say how we will fair in raids, I think many people on this forum exagerate when talking about ele being bad. We aren't the best class, but we are far from the worst.
Imo if they just fix our movement and rework Stormbringer to do more damage/give moving LB/garanty an overload, I'd be fine with it. Mastery rework would also be great, as it feels weird to priorityse virsatility, the most boring stat in the game, over it.

Can't say much about enh and resto, heard those are at a better spot tho. Especially resto sounds like it will be a save raid spot with it's utility and raw output.

[Menubrea]

Resto Shamans are very good healers but not too exciting to play. Ele and Enh are both fun to play but Ele is a little bit lacking in damage until you're geared out and you have a good idea of what talents to take for a fight. Ele still needs some love so hopefully the tuning hotfix will make it feel more viable. Enhancement itself is perfectly fine aside from having poorly balanced talents leading to one (still decent) spec.

I keep hearing that Resto Shamans are excellent healers, and I agree to some extent. Resto Shamans are absolutely terrific for raid healing, for dungeons however, they are too reliant on stacking/high density of players to really shine, and as a result they can be rather hit or miss. Most, if not all AoE healing tools relies on people being stacked together, HTT does not get an increase similarly to other healers main CD, as well as having no dedicated tank CD.

Obviously, a lot of those shortcomings can be overcome with a well coordinated group.

As far as the other two specs goes, Enhancement is one of the best priority target DPS specs in the game, and also have the option to AoE with minimal loss to single target DPS. Their overall AoE damage contribution, however, is pretty low. Talent diversity is also rather poor.

Elemental is probably one of the weakest soloing specs in the game, and there are a few key reasons for that. 1) It's a bit under-tuned currently, 2) A lot of it's damage is tied to long cooldowns, 3) Flame Shock costs Maelstrom to increase duration, for the most part during soloing the increased duration goes to waste and only really goes to reduce your ability to use Earth Shock.

Where the spec shines is burst damage, but even with a 3 point talent investment, it doesn't significantly outperform other burst specs with lower talent investment. Also, by taking those talents, your sustained and AoE damage suffer even more than those same burst specs.

Mobility leaves something to be desired, and the DPS impacted greatly if you are forced to move at inconvenient times. Our only personal mobility tool is also directly competing with raid utility.

[Odintdk]

No.

10Char

[Arachnofiend]

Resto and Enhancement are in a good spot right now in terms of both design and numbers. Ele has a good design but is tuned poorly.

[7empest]

Hovering consistently at 210k dps in mythic dungeons as Elemental at 150 constant ms (due to geographic location) with an ilvl of 840. I press button, target dies, and I bring more utility than any class. Mini-stuns for life literally locking mythic packs in place and disabling their casts? That's me dog, enabling runs as smooth as baby butts. Sheet I'd play this spec for the sound effects alone.

MMOC forum posters probably compare the size of their car with their neighbors as well every time they go outside. Play the damn Shaman class and have fun with it, because a lack of fun is not what ails it.

No need to specifically mention Enhance and Resto, both are well good.

[Deleted]

Elemental is in its usual spot.

Resto/Enh are doing fine.

[Aurora]

Ele is the most inflexible spec you could imagine and very frustrating as a result. It's not mobile, it can't cleave or AoE effectively, it has a ramp up to do any damage, can't heal effectively, feels very squishy and when the stars align and you can construct the dream scenario for ele of a 2 minute single target fight where you can stand perfectly still for the duration and pop all cds you'll still only be able to match the mages, hunters and rogues. It's a great choice if you want to play a spec on your alt that will give you greater appreciation for your main.

Resto is still really good though, I don't agree that it's boring to play. The toolkit is amazing and it's hitting huge dps numbers of 100k+ single target for whatever reason.

[Synadrasa]

I heard elemental shamans are amazing in pvp. It's been quite awhile since I've seen a spec fall on its face so elegantly.

[Riistov]

There is a reason you haven't seen any ele shaman. They're in a terrible place. Probably the worst dungeon spec in the game.

Don't listen to this garbage. 847 Ele right now, have been competing for the top spot in every Mythic group I've been in since I hit 840.

As far as I can tell, there are too many people that tried it in crap gear like this guy did, did crap damage, and now dumps all over the spec.

Ele is a bit undertuned in it's current state, but it gets a lot better with gear. With good rng you'll be near the top.

- - - Updated - - -

Ele is the most inflexible spec you could imagine and very frustrating as a result. It's not mobile, it can't cleave or AoE effectively, it has a ramp up to do any damage

No, it's not.

Mobility is much less of an issue if you take gust of wind and icefury.

Cleave can be pretty good with Lightning Rod.

Many other classes have ramp ups as well.

Honestly, most of the negatives you listed sound as if you've been running with PE/Ascendance/EM for every fight. Try switching it up! I had a lot of the same complaints that you did until I switched to lightning rod/Icefury for Mythics. The spec could still use some numbers love, but we have a lot more choice in terms of talents than we ever have.

[Sylfaine]

I heard elemental shamans are amazing in pvp. It's been quite awhile since I've seen a spec fall on its face so elegantly.

do people really play ele on pvp ?

[Oneirophobia]

I heard elemental shamans are amazing in pvp. It's been quite awhile since I've seen a spec fall on its face so elegantly.

Yeah especially if the ele shaman is attacking someone afk at a flight path, they almost reach 60% win rate there.

[prinnybomb167]

Don't listen to this garbage. 847 Ele right now, have been competing for the top spot in every Mythic group I've been in since I hit 840.

As far as I can tell, there are too many people that tried it in crap gear like this guy did, did crap damage, and now dumps all over the spec.

Ele is a bit undertuned in it's current state, but it gets a lot better with gear. With good rng you'll be near the top.

- - - Updated - - -



No, it's not.

Mobility is much less of an issue if you take gust of wind and icefury.

Cleave can be pretty good with Lightning Rod.

Many other classes have ramp ups as well.

Honestly, most of the negatives you listed sound as if you've been running with PE/Ascendance/EM for every fight. Try switching it up! I had a lot of the same complaints that you did until I switched to lightning rod/Icefury for Mythics. The spec could still use some numbers love, but we have a lot more choice in terms of talents than we ever have.

This guy is full of shit, or runs with complete scrub dookers. Icefury is shit, lightning rod is at most a 10% increase to sustain damage, 10% of shit still equals shit +10%. I'm at 845, damage is mediocre at best when you get good procs going your way, and god awful when not.

[Wolfman31]

I like how Enhancement plays but I feel so squishy in the new zones that I've given up. Spending more Maelstrom on heals instead of Stormstrike is not fun. Might as well play Resto at that point.

[prinnybomb167]

This guy is full of shit, or runs with complete scrub dookers. Icefury is shit, lightning rod is at most a 10% increase to sustain damage, 10% of shit still equals shit +10%. I'm at 845, damage is mediocre at best when you get good procs going your way, and god awful when not.

Just looking at it again, 10% is going high its more like 7-8% and that is w/o icefury. If you take that talent you are casting less lightning, LR will amount to jack shit, and jack just left the building.

[pkm]

Don't listen to this garbage. 847 Ele right now, have been competing for the top spot in every Mythic group I've been in since I hit 840.

As far as I can tell, there are too many people that tried it in crap gear like this guy did, did crap damage, and now dumps all over the spec.

Ele is a bit undertuned in it's current state, but it gets a lot better with gear. With good rng you'll be near the top.

- - - Updated - - -



No, it's not.

Mobility is much less of an issue if you take gust of wind and icefury.

Cleave can be pretty good with Lightning Rod.

Many other classes have ramp ups as well.

Honestly, most of the negatives you listed sound as if you've been running with PE/Ascendance/EM for every fight. Try switching it up! I had a lot of the same complaints that you did until I switched to lightning rod/Icefury for Mythics. The spec could still use some numbers love, but we have a lot more choice in terms of talents than we ever have.

Oh boy top damage in dungeons. Everything must be fine. Oh wait there are millions of variables here that can sway your opinion up to the fucking halls of valor.

You're competing for top spot? Against who? Warlocks, druids? Cause you are full of shit if you mean classes like DH, ww monk, fire mage, bm hunter.

[Riistov]

Oh boy top damage in dungeons. Everything must be fine. Oh wait there are millions of variables here that can sway your opinion up to the fucking halls of valor.
.

Never said that chief. I also never said everything is fine.

There are plenty of issues with Ele right now, as I have said numerous times, but the narrative that we're not viable for Mythic + or progression raiding is completely false.

[pkm]

Never said that chief. I also never said everything is fine.

There are plenty of issues with Ele right now, as I have said numerous times, but the narrative that we're not viable for Mythic + or progression raiding is completely false.

Nice work there broseph, quoting half of my reply. Why don't you answer the other half as well? Oh that's right you can't. Cause you know it's not true. Being a one trick pony does not make you viable for progression or mythic+. Anyone that brings an elemental shaman in their current state to their progression raid is clueless.