Other specs not viable

[Mixae]

Everytime I say something about wanting to play a shaman people say every time "well play shaman if you like healing" basically saying the DPS specs suck. But I really dont want to heal 24/7 so I'm scared to play my shaman. They can't suck that bad I mean jeez.

[Lana]

interesting first post.

enhance seems to be decently competitive atm, so no, they don't "suck that bad". elemental isn't as competitive with other specs, and in general the dps specs don't get as much attention from blizz as they should (in my opinion).

i've been called crazy to stick with elemental, but i just don't have the time or sharpness to quickly adapt and master a new class and keep up with the gear of my raid.

[Razecog]

Enha and Ele just need an OH SHI- button and maybe 10-15% passive dmg reduction and they'll be fine. Their DMG in PvP is fine but Ele needs a single target dps increase in PvE.

[PaintOnASign]

Everytime I say something about wanting to play a shaman people say every time "well play shaman if you like healing" basically saying the DPS specs suck. But I really dont want to heal 24/7 so I'm scared to play my shaman. They can't suck that bad I mean jeez.

Don't really know if you're referring to PvP, PvE, or both.

As for PvE, Enhancement is more than fine when it comes to competing against other melee. Their single target is good, although they lack any effective cleave. Enhancement AoE is a hot mess though. Some people find it fun and engaging. I agree, its engaging, but I don't find it fun. I think its tedious and frustrating, and ultimately, it punishes you as you kill stuff. It's only most effective when you have a lot of targets and they're still alive.

Elemental has it tougher on single target, though they have great cleave and AoE. However, in light of some recent blue posts, it does looks like Elemental is in Blizzard's cross-hairs to make some fixes. They've acknowledged that Elemental is still not performing as well as they want it to, so we'll probably see some more changes before 5.2 goes live.

Unless your guild decides they only want a healer, you should be fine playing any of the other 2 specs. In the end, its your Shaman. Do whats going to make you happy.

[mjolnrir]

Even if their dps isnt the best, they are still pretty fun to play. They bring some nice utility, hero / stormlash. I know mages and hunters can bring hero but I dont think any other class has an ability quite like stormlash totem. Stormlash is a temporary incredible raid wide increase to dps. In a 10man guild it can do atleast 1mill in those 10seconds.
Enhancement dps is also pretty good, its only elemental thats one of the lowest in the pack. So if you want to play a shaman and want to dps competively go enhancement. but if you want to have fun or dont mind being maybe 5-10% lower in dps to some classes then play whatever spec you want. They are also more fun than just hitting 3 buttons to hit high dps, and have awesome off healing to help out wen the raid is in need.

[Dekadez]

Even if their dps isnt the best, they are still pretty fun to play.

I've never been invited to a raid because the RL thought I was having fun.

Still, things aren't as bad as everyone claims. Enhancement output is competitive, but (in my opinion) a tad clunky. Elemental is behind the curve, but we're a WIP it seems. We've got some decent utility, but let's not pretend that we're a Swiss army knife of amazing gamechangers.

Shamans, be they Enhancement or Elemental, are not being benched en masse, so we're not on suicide watch yet.

[Mixae]

Thank you guys for the very kind and informative posts. Everyone's always complaining about their class so much it confuses me.

[PaintOnASign]

I've never been invited to a raid because the RL thought I was having fun.

I'm trying really hard to see the point in that sentence. Nothing wrong with playing a class or spec you enjoy even if its under-performing, we all have different definitions of fun. And not all raid leader's are the same. It would be one thing if it were literally impossible to find a raid as Elemental, but that just isn't the case, for any class/spec.

[winterbark]

I don't understand where this idea that Elemental is bad DPS comes from o_o if you can respond quick to procs and keep your totem and flame shock up you are good for some good DPS. My only complaint with Elemental is in PvP, PvE we are good. Not bad at all >_>


Mind you, this comes after the horrificness that was Cataclysm. Ugh. Anything seems better after that for Ele.

[Socialhealer]

Mind you, this comes after the horrificness that was Cataclysm. Ugh. Anything seems better after that for Ele.

dunno what cata you played, but i played one with a legendary staff like other casters and pulled pretty sick dps with excellent mobility, maybe we wasn't great at some fights like ultraxion but whatever...dragon soul was just a shit instance designed around healing rain and chain heal for resto shamans, stack and roll dem faces.

and if you mean pvp...i had way better survival in pvp in cata than i do in mop, i could actually beat a fair few warriors, now they use infinite gap closers and just stomp me into the dirt.

[Acidbaron]

If you know your spec and class, you'll still do better than majority out there. Comparing classes and specs on a top % level is pointless if you aren't in the top 100 or even 50.

Back in cataclysm i did much more than such said "OP DPS" classes and specs, so i wouldn't care about it. Idem in PvP even if you have more holes in your toolset than other classes won't mean you can't get 2K2 and such.

[PaintOnASign]

Mind you, this comes after the horrificness that was Cataclysm. Ugh. Anything seems better after that for Ele.

Firelands was quite awesome as Elemental. Set bonuses pretty much band-aid fixed our DPS with full uptime on Fire Elemental.

[JuicedawgYO]

I don't understand where this idea that Elemental is bad DPS comes from o_o if you can respond quick to procs and keep your totem and flame shock up you are good for some good DPS. My only complaint with Elemental is in PvP, PvE we are good. Not bad at all >_>


Mind you, this comes after the horrificness that was Cataclysm. Ugh. Anything seems better after that for Ele.

Please show us your logs that proves that in "PvE we are good", because you are sooo very wrong about that buddy. The other classes/people you play with must suck if you are anywhere near topping the meters.
Elemental is not good in pve, specially on single target, we don't even have a frigging decent aoe, only chainlightning which is a cleave not an aoe attack.

---------- Post added 2013-02-13 at 09:54 AM ----------

I'm trying really hard to see the point in that sentence. Nothing wrong with playing a class or spec you enjoy even if its under-performing, we all have different definitions of fun. And not all raid leader's are the same. It would be one thing if it were literally impossible to find a raid as Elemental, but that just isn't the case, for any class/spec.

Haha you cute casual you. You know that in decent raiding guilds (hardcore raiding guilds) they usually bring the class not the player right?

[Sorbus]

Haha you cute casual you. You know that in decent raiding guilds (hardcore raiding guilds) they usually bring the class not the player right?

Yup. And the majority of WoW players are members of "decent" raiding guilds, right?

[Hyttis]

I don't understand where this idea that Elemental is bad DPS comes from o_o if you can respond quick to procs and keep your totem and flame shock up you are good for some good DPS. My only complaint with Elemental is in PvP, PvE we are good. Not bad at all >_>


Mind you, this comes after the horrificness that was Cataclysm. Ugh. Anything seems better after that for Ele.

If everyone in your raid are playing at max. potential, you just can not win anything in single target dps (math fact! ) If you manage to top meters in your guild, it is because you can manage your class, and other raiders can't.

[winterbark]

Lol! You say something positive about a spec and people bite your head off now I remember why I usually stay away from class performance threads
I never said anywhere I was topping meters, so don't know where you got that from tbh I said we do good dps, not the best dps.

I will Have to take your word for Firelands ele performance. I just came back to the game not long before dragon soul stuff (where I felt a lot better being elemental)
But early cata was.... Hmmmm is say that for pvp too. All casters are having problems in mop with constant cc and stuns, not pure ele issue really.

[Hyve]

Our Enhancement Shaman seems to be doing great ...

[stomination]

Our Enhancement Shaman seems to be doing great ...

Enhancement is quite strong in raid. At the moment the elemental shamans are the ones talking about their lack of dps. Even with that said our Ele Shaman is doing just fine.

[PaintOnASign]

Please show us your logs that proves that in "PvE we are good", because you are sooo very wrong about that buddy. The other classes/people you play with must suck if you are anywhere near topping the meters.
Elemental is not good in pve, specially on single target, we don't even have a frigging decent aoe, only chainlightning which is a cleave not an aoe attack.

---------- Post added 2013-02-13 at 09:54 AM ----------


Haha you cute casual you. You know that in decent raiding guilds (hardcore raiding guilds) they usually bring the class not the player right?

Ah, I get it, I mentioned the word fun, so I must be whatever you define as "casual". Very original.

The only time you worry about bringing the class over the player is if you're going for world firsts (arguably server firsts as well, though that depends entirely on how competitive the server is). It's the only time stacking classes trumps everything else. If certain classes literally meant not being able to overcome an encounter, we would be having a very different discussion, and frankly, that isn't the case with Elemental. Besides, in the context of this thread, do you really think we're discussing which class to pick to get into a top 100 guild? I'm not even going to touch what a "decent raiding guild" actually means to you.

It may not be optimal or have perfect efficiency, but its entirely viable to play Elemental in a PvE setting. And Ele's AoE is pretty good, and gonna be even better in 5.2, to say its nonexistent is just a flatout lie. However, I do think Earthquake needs to either be completely redesigned, or buffed incredibly.

[Dekadez]

I'm trying really hard to see the point in that sentence. Nothing wrong with playing a class or spec you enjoy even if its under-performing, we all have different definitions of fun.

No idea how you decided that was the point I made. I meant to say that subjective fun to the player playing the class is not going to get him to be invited to a raid. What gets people invited is performance. This thread was about the OP saying Shamans are basically only asked to heal because presumably the other specs suck (which they don't), while delaxes followed up with a 'Even if DPS sucks, we're fun to play!'. We get invited to raid because our DPS doesn't suck and we provide some utility. All in all our DPS specs are more than fine (Enhancement) and relatively fine (Elemental).

But yea, look harder.

I don't understand where this idea that Elemental is bad DPS comes from o_o if you can respond quick to procs and keep your totem and flame shock up you are good for some good DPS. My only complaint with Elemental is in PvP, PvE we are good. Not bad at all >_>

Analysis disagrees. But hey, anecdotal evidence trumps data analysis every time, right?

We're one of the lowest DPS specs that are actually being actively played (and thus bring somewhat reliable data strings). The difference with the top is rather huge, but that's because Arcane and Affliction are outliers. The difference with the middle of the pack isn't that big, but it's there and it's systematical. We're getting an upwards number tweak, and apparently some QoL mechanic changes, which was all Elemental really needed aside from a total overhaul in 6.0.