Is It Bad to Have Two DPS Specs?

[Roamingstorm]

Was something that crossed my mine since at the moment my OS is restoration, and thankfully our guild is full to the brim on healers with me healing no time soon. (Which I'm not complaining since I'm not huge on healing.)

Currently I'm Elemental and on my free time I mess with Enhancement, but at the moment our guild has no Enh shaman. My debate is whether or not I should build up an Enh set for an OS for fun since I rarely use my Resto spec.

Sorry if I made this sound confusing or anything, but any opinions would be great. Thanks.

[Buddahpal]

Im biased, but i say anyone who wants to work on an Enhance set should go ahead and do it. Specially if they never need you to heal. Im main enhance and debating dropping my resto offspec to build an elemental spec.

[Jax Omen]

Honestly, totally worth it. Lets you swap specs on a per-boss basis in LFR (depending on what gear you need), fulfill the same role, and fill out a caster set and a melee set.

[Rangar]

I do enh/ele because our guild doesn't want shaman healers in 10m and because there are fights where one is better than the other and you can switch back and forth as necessary.

[Yunalezka]

I am terrible at healing. I've tried countless times, and I still just fail. So I just play MS enhance and OS elemental. As long as you aren't needed as a backup healer I see no reason not to, and your guild shouldn't either.

I find that I do alot more dps as enhance, and I really love the play style of it. But every now and then a fight comes along where the ranged or the aoe is just too good to pass up. For instance, we're currently working on Horridon (we only just cleared Sha this week, have had many guild issues), and the first few tries I did as enhance, and I was just lacking compared to the rest. So I switched to my elemental, and proceeded to chain lightning the hell out of them, coming out as either #1 or #2 depending on the attempt.

As long as you know how to play them at least somewhat, then no, having two dps specs is not a bad thing.

[Seriss]

The only reasons why resto/ele is a more common combination than double-dps spec (or even resto/enhance - seriously, you see that combo soooo rarely!) is that gear can at least initially be shared between main and off-spec - and maybe that remaining at range is something that you get used to and comfortable with.

You can be a functional elemental shaman wearing a resto gear and vice versa, perhaps with a few adjustments... but for enhancement, you need an entirely different gear. And that can take a long time to acquire. But if you're already dabbling in that department and have a few pieces, why not flesh it out completely?

There's nothing immoral about not wanting to heal on a hybrid class

[moveth]

Double DPS is fine depending on the group. It does, however, lower your versatility for the raid.

[Deleted]

There's nothing immoral about not wanting to heal on a hybrid class

It's actually been proven that you are 90% more likely to go to hell unless one of your two specs is a healing spec. Why do you think warlocks are so evil?

@op, I think that having 2 dps specs is fine, as yunalezka and rangar said, having two dps specs can be really useful as you can change depending on what the fight demands from you.

[Schadow]

I have two resto specss. resto pvp and resto pve, you don't hear me complain. Why should you think different of two dps specs?

[TrollShaman]

If you're not needed to heal, why not go Ele/Enh? It's always less boring and fun raiding or doing dailies on different DPS specs of the same class, unless an encounter favors one spec or the other.

[lakhesis]

As a guild leader, I'd always be more interested in recruiting & bringing to raid a dps/healer or dps/tank hybrid. Every (10 man) raid needs at least one of both IMO... I used to prefer them in 25s too, they let you refocus your raid's resources much better (e.g. 4 healing one fight & 7-8 healing a later one).

If someone's dps as ele/enh was exceptional I'd be comfortable enough letting them focus on dps, but I'm more likely to need a good dps/resto toon than an even better dual dps toon.

The capacity to swap in an extra healer is much more significant than the ability to swap in a slightly more favourable spec for an extra 1-5k dps.

[nazrakin]

I've always tried to make my enh main, ele offspec work since there are a lot of fights where being range is a huge advantage. Unfortunately, my ele gear always falls significantly behind until everything is on farm so its never been too useful.

[asharia]

if they don't need your healing spec.. you can offspec whatever you want

[alucardtnuoc]

My pally is Holy/Holy

[PaintOnASign]

I'm currently Ele/Resto, but that's only because our 3rd healer left the guild. I was primarily Enh/Resto throughout 5.0 and 5.1, though I switched to Ele for 5.2. Odds are I'll probably go back to being Ele/Enh, though getting a second set of Resto gear will be much easier for me, my 10-man has a Hunter and a Monk, so I have to fight for both Agility mail and weapons. At least all the caster Mail pieces would default to me if I wanted them.

[Deleted]

Imho it is about time Blizz let ppl change specs as they change talents and glyphs. Then you won't need to make that decision. I have to make the same decision as you but I'll try to play all 3 specs, respecing when needed before raid to fulfill the roles that are needed for that raid.

[Deleted]

I have two resto specss. resto pvp and resto pve, you don't hear me complain. Why should you think different of two dps specs?

He's talking about PvE...

To OP: I hate resto shamans and I never will play one for my guild. I flat out refuse to play one for anything other than a quick queue in LFR. Enhancement I don't really like either, only Ascendance would make me want to play it. No, it's not bad to have two DPS specs...some fights heavily favor melee or ranged. Some people like me, hate playing healers in raids. I play shaman because I love elemental, that's it.

[Kazgrel]

Don't see how this is a problem. I say this even though I roll as ele main resto off spec. I like the flexibility it provides me, from being dps + heal to how there is gear synergy between the specs. I think I've been called on to heal for our group once in the past 6 months; it's not because I'm terrible at healing, but rather due to the fact we already have a resto shaman and wanted diversity amongst the healing duo/trio (depending on the fight). I could decide to go ele/enh starting today and my guild would be like "Ok, cool"...that, or they would LOL at the idea since I haven't been enhance in 6 years. :P

[hatchetman240]

ele/resto here. At this point melee is so heavily penalized in raid design on DPS I can't imagine an enhance spec out dpsing my ele spec, unless the enhance spec had 10-15 item levels over the ele set. If you're enhance I'd jump on an ele spec just to negate raid mechanics on some fights. If you're ele there's absolutely no point in grabbing enhance IMO. Also, resto spec lets me queue through weekly LFRs far more quickly, and all the gear drops while healing are the same as ele drops.

[Murderdoll]

Im Enhance main and very very reluctantly Ele OS.

I make it very clear to any guild that takes me, I am a horrible healer. I am shit. I am not bad at ele, but I despise it.