Are Elemental Shaman weak?

[Durtnasty]

I am leveling an Ele shaman right now, and I feel quite weak while questing or dungeoning. I use the suggested spell rotation and everything... I just feel like it takes me forever to kill things.

[Treebloom]

Are you leveling sans heirlooms? If so, that might be the case. If you're using Heirlooms and stuff isn't dying as fast as you like, you may just be unfamiliar with the class. More practice should net you some speedy kills.

[KCguy]

I honestly could not tell you as I haven't leveled an elemental shaman since late BC, but from what I understand pretty much any class is a complete joke to level now. I assume elemental is no different.

But what level are you? What is your rotation? Give us some more info so we can see.

[mrinvisable2]

questing as ele is so annoying and it take longer than enh in most cases and in end game enh is way stronger than ele but i play as ele os bwcause main is resto for shared gear sake . for mor fast pace yse enh fod larger puls ele and cain ligtening them. gl

[Durtnasty]

for those wondering, I am level 43, doing Lightning bolt, flame shock, lava burst, lightning bolt until i have another lava burst or fulmination proc

---------- Post added 2012-12-26 at 06:58 AM ----------

also, this may be a little OT but, what are your opinions on Enh right now?

[Deleted]

if you want to level as a caster, any other caster kills stuff faster. especially mage or warlock (I'm leveling both right now and it's ridiculously easy compared to elemental).
if you really want to play shaman, it's probably best to level as enhancement, or as resto doing dungeons.

[Ryuukon]

for those wondering, I am level 43, doing Lightning bolt, flame shock, lava burst, lightning bolt until i have another lava burst or fulmination proc

Always start with Flame Shock, then Lava Burst, and maintain Flame Shock on the target unless it's not going to live for more than a few seconds. You want to do this because of your passive Lava Surge ability, which can reset the CD on Lava Burst, which is always a crit when it hits a target with Flame Shock. After that just Lightning Bolt spam until your Lightning Shield builds up to 5 or more charges of Lightning Shield, then Earth Shock UNLESS Flame Shock is going to wear off in the next few seconds. Just don't let your Lightning Shield build to above 7 charges or you will waste Rolling Thunder procs.

[Durtnasty]

Always start with Flame Shock, then Lava Burst, and maintain Flame Shock on the target unless it's not going to live for more than a few seconds. You want to do this because of your passive Lava Surge ability, which can reset the CD on Lava Burst, which is always a crit when it hits a target with Flame Shock. After that just Lightning Bolt spam until your Lightning Shield builds up to 5 or more charges of Lightning Shield, then Earth Shock UNLESS Flame Shock is going to wear off in the next few seconds. Just don't let your Lightning Shield build to above 7 charges or you will waste Rolling Thunder procs.

what about Fulmination? And shouldnt i cast a lightning bolt directly followed by flame shock as my opener?

[Deleted]

what about Fulmination? And shouldnt i cast a lightning bolt directly followed by flame shock as my opener?

Yes you should. Don't listen to the person above you. If you have the opportunity to pre-cast a spell, you should, even when raiding (as long as you don't pull stupidly). IF you have fulmination you should only really hit it at 7 stacks unless you know the current stack size will allow you to kill whatever it is your killing.

[Bethan]

once level 45, don't forget searing totem, and take the "teleport totem" talent and keep teleporting it each new pull (you don't have to waste a gcd each time, but you still have to think about it). It doesn't hit for a lot but it's totally worth beeing used as long as you don't "forget" it. You'll also be able to take significantly larger pack and kite them more effectively once you can tp grounding totem.

But elemental is definitely a weak caster to level nevertheless :/ (it does get better at higher level, especially once you get fire/earth elementals and ascendance)

[Terminal Lance]

Leveling an Elemental Shaman right now as well, just hit Lv75 and got my healing tier talent I might have to disagree with you though, OP. I only have 2 pieces of heirloom and since I learned LvB at 34 it's been a breeze. Drop Searing Totem, LB + FS pull, then LvB would normally kill a mob. When there are more than 3 mobs but are all seperate, I FS one of them, then pull the rest via LB until I can clump them all together and start zapping with CL, dropping Healing Stream Totem if my health starts dropping. I save my 5+ stack of Fulmination on a fresh mob, so I can just LB + ES = instant kill.
Leveling gets even better once you learn Lava Surge.

[Laurean]

Until you hit 85, everything should be quite easy; mostly because of the lowered exp requirements.
Once you hit 85 I strongly recommend buying some blue gear. If you have enough gold you can buy an itemlevel 442 mainhand requiring level 84, maybe you have the 463 archeology offhand for level 85.
With some blue gear it should not take too long to get to level 88, that's when you will hit a wall - even with decent gear. LB hits for almost nothing, you can only hope for lots and lots of Lavasurge procs.
As said before, try leveling as Enhancement and maybe resto in dungeons.

[Austilias]

I frequently see them pushing over 100k DPS, and that's just in raid finder.

A mighty future lies ahead of your mediocre present.

[the kins man]

Flame shock, lava burst with lightning bolt filler should kill everything fairly quickly.

[Endus]

People claiming Elemental is "weak" in leveling aren't playing it properly, or something. Leveling 85-90, before I had a main at 90 to farm up some crazy good blues and such, it was just as easy to go Elemental as Enhancement, easier for AoE packs, slightly more challenging for beefy elites but not so much it was ever an issue. Kill speed was pretty much the same either way.

Elemental is just fine for leveling, once you get Rolling Thunder to keep the mana flowing.

Having leveled multiple toons to 90, the "wall" people are mentioning at ~88 or so is entirely due to the increased stats on the enemies relative to you, and it's the same for everyone. I experienced the same thing on my monk and my druid. If anything, my Shaman as Elemental was easier than either.

[Mormolyce]

I recently leveled my Ele Shaman from 85 to 90 and did buttloads of damage. If there were enough mobs that CL was useable for any length of time, faces got melted.

[Volitar]

Elemetal's main damage (Lava Burst crits) are tied to Flame Shock which shares a cooldown with your ranged slow (Frost Shock) making it a very poor leveling spec. My Shaman has been my most geared toon going into Wotlk leveling, Cata leveling, and MOP leveling and it has been the hardest every time.

You just kinda have to shrug it off or level as Enhance.

[draykorinee]

I'm switching mains right now, I levelled as boom and it was horrible. as elemental I regularly drop mobs before they get to me, the burst damage I do without cooldowns can be insane when you get procs, which is very often. pack pulling is easy too, some times I just round up 10 mobs pop earth elemental and healing totem and just spam aoe. one of my favourite specs for levelling ever.

[Laurean]

Having leveled multiple toons to 90, the "wall" people are mentioning at ~88 or so is entirely due to the increased stats on the enemies relative to you, and it's the same for everyone. I experienced the same thing on my monk and my druid. If anything, my Shaman as Elemental was easier than either.

Maybe you aren't playing your monk and druid not properly, or something

But seriously: The wall I was talking about, you hit mostly in Townlong Steppes and Dread Wastes where you kinda had to level up your first char. Most alts now have enough rested bonus that they hit 90 in Kun Lai Summit. Mobs in Kun Lai only have ~60% hp compared to those in Dread Wastes and don't hit as hard. So I guess every toon feels easier to level up than the first char.

@Endus: Still, leveling an Affli Lock was just crazy. Killing everything (non-Elites) with just hitting one button once till 88 feels easier. Spriest and Boomkin were not as faceroll as Affli.

[Deleted]

Try leveling a mage as fire then Endus.
Insta cast Pyroblast on most mobs, critting for 80% of the mob's health or more (and pyroblast's dot kills the mob while you pull the next).
Elemental just doesn't compare.