[MOP](Shaman) What talents will you pick?

[zylya]

This is my "default" set, i.e. what I'll be using if there's no special mechanics or anything that I need to take into account:

PVE Elemental

1: Astral Shift (not sure if Nature's Guardian has to be a direct attack on you, or whether boss AoEs will proc it)
2: Earthgrab
3: Call of the Elements
4: DPS talent so whichever is highest for the fight - for farm content where it doesn't matter so much, probably Echo of the Elements so I can be lazy
5: Healing Tide Totem (big healing cooldown which I can reset with CotE without being as "intrusive" to my rotation as Conductivity, if I switch to Enhance or Resto though Conductivity becomes my talent of choice)
6: Again it's a DPS choice, so whichever is highest, but by default it'll be Elementals, because I've always liked those guys

[Endus]

I thought it would be interesting to tally up people's comments and see how widespread the interest is in our talent options, since quite a few people have thrown around the idea that "Talent X is borked and nobody will take it". If people mention two situational choices, I'm counting both. If they mention multiple profiles for PvP/PvE, I'm counting each of them. Someone saying "unsure" doesn't add anything.

Tier 1	(NG) 2	(SBT) 11	(AS) 15
Tier 2	(FP) 6	(EgT) 16	(WWT) 11
Tier 3	(CotE) 13	(TR) 6	(TP) 8
Tier 4	(EM) 14	(AnS) 7	(EotE) 9
Tier 5	(HTT) 14	(AG) 12	(Cond) 5
Tier 6	(UF) 17	(PE) 7	(EB) 8

While there's some clear trends there, it's pretty widely spread, too. I would say this shows some pretty decent success with the talent design for Shaman; while certain talents might seem really good for specific playstyles, it's pretty clear that a lot of players are seeing value to pretty much every talent in there.

The one stand-out exception that I think is more of a legacy effect is that only 2 people voted for Nature's Guardian. It's not like the current talent, folks. It adds the same amount to current AND max health, so it bumps you from sub-30% health to over 50%, it can trigger as often as every 30 seconds, and that current health counts as a heal meaning that it's critting. I'm not trying to say it's OMG the bestest talent there, but I definitely think it's a strong contender.

[Teriz]

I thought it would be interesting to tally up people's comments and see how widespread the interest is in our talent options, since quite a few people have thrown around the idea that "Talent X is borked and nobody will take it". If people mention two situational choices, I'm counting both. If they mention multiple profiles for PvP/PvE, I'm counting each of them. Someone saying "unsure" doesn't add anything.

Tier 1	(NG) 2	(SBT) 11	(AS) 15
Tier 2	(FP) 6	(EgT) 16	(WWT) 11
Tier 3	(CotE) 13	(TR) 6	(TP) 8
Tier 4	(EM) 14	(AnS) 7	(EotE) 9
Tier 5	(HTT) 14	(AG) 12	(Cond) 5
Tier 6	(UF) 17	(PE) 7	(EB) 8

While there's some clear trends there, it's pretty widely spread, too. I would say this shows some pretty decent success with the talent design for Shaman; while certain talents might seem really good for specific playstyles, it's pretty clear that a lot of players are seeing value to pretty much every talent in there.

The one stand-out exception that I think is more of a legacy effect is that only 2 people voted for Nature's Guardian. It's not like the current talent, folks. It adds the same amount to current AND max health, so it bumps you from sub-30% health to over 50%, it can trigger as often as every 30 seconds, and that current health counts as a heal meaning that it's critting. I'm not trying to say it's OMG the bestest talent there, but I definitely think it's a strong contender.

From your chart, it also appears that Conductivity is also pretty unpopular.

UF's dominance of tier 6 says a lot about that tier's drawbacks.

[TenDance]

It's an automatic LMS on a rather short cooldown. The point is: to understand how you would benefit in a PvE-environment is really important in order to assess it's usefulness.

How does LMS help Tanks? Two ways:

- it bumps your healthpool to a number large enough to survive the next big boom (and following melee/AoE-stuff)
- it makes use of overhealing

The first point is pretty clear to see. For the usefulness of NG, there are two problems: our healthpool isn't as big as that of a tank, which makes the percentual gain not that big when looked at the actual numbers. And NG triggers AFTER damage is done. I haven't experienced anything which indicates this talent works like Ardent Defender. So, it won't help you to survive the big blast, because it won't trigger when you're dead.

The overhealing stuff seems to be rather complex since a lot of tanks and healers don't get it and therefore misuse LMS. Point is, that in rather tight situations, healers will pull the stops and dish out the big numbers in order to deliver high HPS. But there you have a problem, especially when several healers do that. You can't absorb endless healing. It fills your HP-bar which serves as a vessel. With several healers pumping greater heals into a tank, a lot of this healing is bound to land in short time intervals. Since the vessel has a cap, there are HPS bound to be lost. LMS helps to make use of these heals. In essence, it's a way to boost the effective HPS of your healers.
Now have a look at NG. Most shaman won't tank, therefore hat hits us the most in PvE are AoE-spells. Those are mostly healed through BY AoE-spells. I simply can't see the "tanklike" healingpattern happening in PvE with a shaman as its target.

So, regarding the first tier, during AoE-damage, the other options will be superior most of the times. For short but heavy damage bursts, take the shieldwall. For longlasting, aura-like AoE, take the totem. The totem might be of interest for enhancement-shaman since it could work better in conjunction with shamanistic rage than our shieldwall does.
NG is great if you're "tanking", but most people will only tank whilst PvPing.

P.S.: Wouldn't be a poll an easier option to measure the appeal of these talents?

From your chart, it also appears that Conductivity is also pretty unpopular.

Conductivity is VERY situational. And its usefulness for each specc varies widely. It SEEMS to be useful for elemental, especially in 10s, when you need just that extra tick of healing to last through. For enhancement, it's rather lackluster. For restoration... if you're forced to heal your ES-target you can dig out some huge numbers and therefore conductivity would be a great tool. But with current raiding, I can't see this happening. Spamming your tank Wrath-style hasn't been THAT necessary and most of the time, your manabar won't forgive you for it. And if you stop healing your tank, conductivity won't help you at all. Add some healing during telluric-phases? To be effective, they need to bump the LB-damage for restoration. But most important is: if your tanks and those near him need healing... CH will do the job.

[Endus]

From your chart, it also appears that Conductivity is also pretty unpopular.

Only about as "unpopular" as Frozen Power or Totemic Restoration. It's fine.

P.S.: Wouldn't be a poll an easier option to measure the appeal of these talents?

Probably, but I wasn't the one who started the thread, and you can't add a poll after a thread's been created without one, that's a limitation in the forum code.

[Radux]

[snip -- regarding NG stuff]

I'd say NG's power is very situational pending on the encounter, though, admittedly it will probably be quite more powerful in PvP than PvE, since it's not too often that someone can drop you from 30%+ to 0 in 1 GCD.

In PvE, take something like Chimaeron for example.
I think NG will be up everytime you drop to 1 health. This effectively loosens up a little bit of stress on the healers since you're sitting at least at 25% health.

You can also look at it as a nice fail-safe while progressing. Stand in bad stuff for too long? Oh it's ok. NG made up for my mistake by healing myself up, thus not further stressing the healers.

In no way is it designed to save you from death like Argent Defender, but rather give you a nice boost/buffer when you're low and need that little bit of extra.

[Barky]

I thought it would be interesting to tally up people's comments and see how widespread the interest is in our talent options, since quite a few people have thrown around the idea that "Talent X is borked and nobody will take it"

I haven't seen many 'Talent X is borked' more 'Totem X is borked' complaints about mechanics rather than talents.

The only 2 shaman talents I really don't like personally are Totemic Projection and Primal Elementalist.

PE I find is a bit lackluster considering the CD you get with it, while EB and ULF are around much more often and I think overall, EB and ULF will provide more damage than PE. (speaking from purely a dps standpoint, no idea how it would be for resto).

TP I just think shouldn't be a talent at all. It should be baseline for all shamans and have something more interesting added. That's not to say it isn't good though, just we should all get it! :P

again, this is all my opinion so don't start quoting me thinking it's facts.

[Ask]

15 : Astral Shift
30 : Earthgrab
45 : Call of the Elements
60 : Elemental Mastery
75 : Ancestral Guidance
90 : Unleashed Fury

Depending on fights or environment, I can see myself switching a talent or two around, but overall this feels like the new cookie cutter.

Some of the new talents are very weak, I hope they'll change sometime, before release.

[N30]

It adds the same amount to current AND max health, so it bumps you from sub-30% health to over 50%, it can trigger as often as every 30 seconds, and that current health counts as a heal meaning that it's critting. I'm not trying to say it's OMG the bestest talent there, but I definitely think it's a strong contender.

fast question....

u say it count as an heal so it could be able to trigger the effect of AG and get the buff from clearcasting status??
cause if it can it would be quite insane OO eaven if hard to accomplished but not impossible

[PizzaSHARK]

http://mop.wowhead.com/mists-of-pand...calculator#s\J

Enhancement PvP, focused more on helping my team than helping myself.

- Nature's Guardian is automatic, low cooldown, and doesn't cost resources. There's no other choice, really. Stone Bulwark Totem uses up an Earth totem, and Astral Shift honestly just sucks for PvP; tiny duration for a pretty standard cooldown, and can't be used while CC'd.

- Windwalk Totem because I'm focused on helping my team. I can still use it to help myself, but with a 40 yd range, it'll help my teammates more than Earthgrab Totem or Frozen Power will.

- Totemic Restoration is really the only choice for PvP. Players aren't retarded like monsters are and will stomp your totems immediately; Totemic Restoration makes having a totem stomped hurt less.

- Echo of the Elements because I have enough buttons already. EM and NS are fantastic abilities, but I frankly think there are too many buttons for the class to begin with.

- Ancestral Guidance because it's just too damn good to skip, new button or not. Conductivity seems like a pretty worthless talent for Enhancement, Healing Tide Totem is a totem.

- Unleashed Fury makes the other two talents look like poop. Elemental Blast looks like it'll be useful, but it's no contest - allowing autoswings to proc Static Shock, Frostbrand Weapon providing even MORE of a movement speed advantage, and a Flametongue Weapon effect that will finally be relevant (well, with us being able to use MW5 on Lava Burst, it's already relevant now.) Prime Elementalist might be neat for PvE (in fact, it looks like it'll be pretty awesome for PvE and I'll probably take it for PvE simply because it looks fun), but I don't think anyone will use it for PvP unless the elementals and their totems inherit resilience and player HP.

[Radux]

(well, with us being able to use MW5 on Lava Burst, it's already relevant now.)

Huh?

MSW doesn't count Lava Burst. Only Nature spells. It hasn't been working with Lava Burst since Cata beta.

Unless you're talking about actually hard casting the LvB?

[rewn]

Elemental PvE spec :-

This is likely what I'll use the majority of the time though as ever, there will be situational changes such as :-

- Tier 1. I'll run with SBW most of the time but if the occasion pops up where I know and expect a bit hit (Think Festerguts Pungent Blight spell) then I'll probably take Astral Shift instead.

- Tier 2. Will run with Windwalk here (which will coincide with totemic projection). As nice as Earthgrab Totem is, other classes have roots available and stuns. Not many have an AoE immunity to snare effects.

- Tier 3. Totemic Projection here. With all of our totems really being utility totems now and some of them having a short range, I'm thinking this will be quite invaluable to any shaman wanting to provide his utility to a raid. If I ever come across a situation where I will definitely never need it (Ultraxion type fight) then I'll probably take Call of the Elements in it's place.

- Tier 4. EotE here as I prefer to have a talent that affects my output the majority of the time, rather than cooldown based. Having said that however, I would swap it out for Elemental Mastery if I know a fight is going to contain a burn phase (I.e. Tendons on Spine, Magmaw's exposed head etc).

- Tier 5. Healing Tide mainly here. The issue I have with Ancestral Guidence is that if you pop it at the wrong moment (think Sindragosa flying away) then you've wasted it, whereas HTT paired with TP pretty much guarantee's it's full effect will always occur. Again however, if the situation arises when a boss maybe has a vurnerable stage (think Magmaw's Head or Cataclysm on Madness) then I'd run with AG as the increased damage will increase the heals this can generate.

- Tier 6. Elemental Blast will be my choice the majority of the time. I like the spell, I like it's damage and I like the buff it gives. The only time I would not pick this spell is if I know I would have to move loads and would have to postpone casting it frequently, in which case I would take Primal Elementalist.

[Ravensword]

Huh?

MSW doesn't count Lava Burst. Only Nature spells. It hasn't been working with Lava Burst since Cata beta.

Unless you're talking about actually hard casting the LvB?

Even worse news I am afraid because I am pretty sure than Enhancement does not even get Lava Burst in MOP

[sigiel]

The all point of the new talent is to be able to change it depending on the fight, a bit like diablo3 so i'm sure it will not be static ...

[Protoman]

Even worse news I am afraid because I am pretty sure than Enhancement does not even get Lava Burst in MOP

The talent calculator is a little messed up but yea, Enh can't use LvB but Resto and Ele can. And I think only Enh get's FN, not available for Elem or Resto. I personally think Resto should still have FN, just can't spread it, because otherwise they have no aoe except for CL (on cd and expensive) and magma totem (totem)......even if its only 1 FN it would be convenient to have an aoe to help with aoe mobs as well as when solo for questing and stuff.

NG I hear has improved, will have to test it out to see how useful it really is. It would be cool if it had an extra effect like "phase out for 3 sec, all attacks miss" to give it some extra flavor then just an auto last stand.

AS I agree needs a little buff, add few sec to duration so like 8-10 sec long, as well as useable when stunned/silenced for PVP.

Frozen Power I am surprised to see Enhance say they won't use in PVP, cause without it you have no gap closer.

And I wish the totem tier was redesigned a bit, it seems lacking esp since enh/ele don't have many totem cds they can use with it.....and TP seems like something all shaman should have to fully utilize their totems, like trap launcher for hunters.

I agree that AS should include Lava Burst (and Lava Lash) to make it feel as useful for DPS specs as it will be for healers. Conduct should include SS and LL so it's not so gimp for Enh as it is for other 2 specs. And EM should reduce the cd of SS so Enh gets the same feeling of "use more abilities in a set duration" as the casters get with hasted casts.

And Primal Ele, I think since they removed pet bar from feral spirits that our elem totems should ALWAYS have a pet bar with pet stances like "assist", def, offensive.....but when you talent you also get access to their abilities. Just makes sense.

[zylya]

The one stand-out exception that I think is more of a legacy effect is that only 2 people voted for Nature's Guardian. It's not like the current talent, folks. It adds the same amount to current AND max health, so it bumps you from sub-30% health to over 50%, it can trigger as often as every 30 seconds, and that current health counts as a heal meaning that it's critting. I'm not trying to say it's OMG the bestest talent there, but I definitely think it's a strong contender.

The problem for me is that I just don't know for sure how it works. It says "When a damaging attack brings you below 30%" - does this include stuff from the floor? Is that a "damaging attack" or does that count as some form of residual damage. Do pulse AoEs count? I'll almost definitely be taking it for PVP (although I didn't actually specify a PVP build in my post) but until I know what it does and doesn't do for me on a boss, I can't know whether I want it or not.

[PizzaSHARK]

Huh?

MSW doesn't count Lava Burst. Only Nature spells. It hasn't been working with Lava Burst since Cata beta.

Unless you're talking about actually hard casting the LvB?

Bleh, I was reading that as "any Shaman spell" for some reason.

Never mind, Flametongue Weapon unleash will continue to be worthless for Enhancement.

[Radux]

Bleh, I was reading that as "any Shaman spell" for some reason.

Never mind, Flametongue Weapon unleash will continue to be worthless for Enhancement.

So it's about choosing (assuming you go UF) the passive 40% additional LL damage and damage-on-hit of FT

vs.

Utility of the FB snare + UE FB snare + UF sprint

seems like a decent choice if you ask me.

[shell]

It depends on too many factors for me especially considering that I may actually do arenas next season along with my usual rated bgs. And their plan for arenas is to allow us to see what team we're faced with before the match starts (but not allow us to see what talents they have) so suffice it to say myself and a lot of others will be carrying around a lot of Tomes to change out glyphs and talents between matches.

Really, for right now I can mostly only say which talents that I'm not likely to choose but even for those I may choose them some of the time. I'm not likely to choose Nature's Guardian, for me it just doesn't compare to the other two talents. If the most that other people can say about it is it's "not bad" that gives a pretty good indication that its really not that great either. If they added a Spark of Life effect to the talent so that our healing done was increased by x% and our healing received was increased by x% for the 10 sec duration, I might consider it a contender but as it is, no. For 30, 45, and 60 I could take any of them depending on the situation. I'm not likely to take Conductivity simply because there aren't enough spells involved otherwise I would consider it for certain rated bgs. And I'm not likely to take Elemental Blast because of the cast time. I don't mind the random proc, I don't really understand it, but I don't mind it...I don't even mind the long cooldown but the cast time is a deal breaker for me.

[PizzaSHARK]

So it's about choosing (assuming you go UF) the passive 40% additional LL damage and damage-on-hit of FT

vs.

Utility of the FB snare + UE FB snare + UF sprint

seems like a decent choice if you ask me.

Not particularly. Enhancement's damage outside of stacked Lava Lash hits is generally pretty poor compared to most other DPS' damage outputs - they're brought along because they can be effective off-healers as long as they have uptime (though not as good as Rets these days), because Wind Shear completely hoses Mages and Doomkins (effectively saving teammates and healers lots of health and mana), and because they're goddamned impossible to kill if they can kite. Add in the occasional instant Hex, utility abilities like Tremor Totem and Grounding Totem, and there you have it.

The problem is that, without Flametongue on the offhand (or Windfury on the main hand, depending on which you'd prefer to swap), Enhancement's damage is awful. You gain some control... but dicking Mages (nothing is more fun than ruining a Frost Mage's day simply by being within 30 yards of her) and/or Doomkins aside, Enhancement doesn't really have much control to begin with. By swapping in Frostbrand, you're giving yourself weak control and weak damage instead of awful control and decent damage - it's not a net gain, at least not when you're using Frostbrand exclusively and not twisting weapon enchants as needed.

I actually don't disagree with your assessment that it's a good choice, and it's something I like.

The problem is that other, similar classes don't have such choices - they get everything without having to make choices. Ret Paladins would be the closest comparison point, and both on live and from what I've seen in beta, they don't have any such choices to make.