My idea's for Enhancement Shaman overhaul.

[Raiju]

stormstriking a target below 20% resets the cooldown on ascendance

what? sounds fair to me

[Goradan]

A good way to make us better at fighting with both 2H and DW would be to for us to and passive that allow us to buff ourselves(I.E our fists) instead of our weapons twice so we wouldn't miss out on one weapon enhancement when we switch to 2H should it become viable to us again. and it would also lessen the effect of disarming us as well.

[Extremity]

Actually, totems are magically imbued objects, just like our imbued weapons. A totem is imbued with a spell before usage, and activated after dropping it, which is a physical act. Totems can not be dispelled, like spells, but can be attacked, like physical object => no spells.
Furthermore, totems were a huge lump of disadvantages even before the silence nerf:
-They are immobile. Except totems, few abilities in the game are immobile, and usually that's because they are aoe effects (aoe dmg or snare). Immobility is especially horrible when having your elemental pets out, but are forced to move a lot.
-They can be easily destroyed, which is far worse than being dispellable, because not everyone has offensive dispell, and those who have cannot usually chain spam it. Everyone can oneshot the majority of our utility, wether through autohit, ordering a pet, wanding, or a instant cast spell.
-They are restricted in that you can have only one active per element. Outside of totems, there are few abilities in the game that exclude each other. This makes synergy between totems very restricted, and feels like poor design.

-As if all of these drawbacks weren't enough, blizz decided to judge attackable sticks as to hard to counter, and made them unusable while silenced.

There is no class mechanic in the game worse than totems. Period.
If they were spells, like you say, the silence nerf would've followed the change to make them an effect on the character (which would mean they would be unattackable, but dispellable, mobile, and unrestricted by elements).

The three original drawbacks (plus totems working only in your 5-man group, even in raids (this was removed during wotlk beta, I think)) were implemented in vanilla with totems original design in mind: long duration effects and no cooldowns. Destroying a totem wasn't bad, because you could replant most of them. Elemental restriction was justified, because having like 15 long duration group buffs at the same time would be totally op, same with immobility.

None of these three restrictions were lifted or altered in any way since vanilla, despiute totems changing from long duration/no cd to short duration/cd abilities, in other word: utility cooldowns, just like a rogues.
Note that in comparisson to our utility, a rogues' is mobile, undispellable AND unattackable, unrestricted by elements (or a rogue-matching restriction) and usable while silenced, in other word: not a single disadvantage.

In short: Rogues have excellent utility, while ours is crappy.

Totems are the least convinient package for utility in game, and it was a kick in the shaman nuts (with run-up) by blizz that after 7 years or so of totems getting gradually weaker in comparisson with other stuff, to be nerfed some more, obviously with nothing so much as the slightest thought that totems were already in a bad spot. Talk about knowledge of a class.

Totems are NOT spells. They have a unique design, but the only thing unique about them nowadays are their misplaced, outdated disadvantages. Their advantages faded through homogenisation more and more in the betas.

One such advantage was grounding totem, which in its original form could continously eat an harmful enemy spell as long as it was not one dealing damage (in that regard it was superior to spellreflect, while not reflecting a spell back, as well as having totem disadvantages = balanced. now it is just a weaker spellreflect with crap on top). GT being attackable was justified in that you had to do that to avoid getting half your spells eaten (and you could totally faceroll noobs like this, as you should be able to, if they are to dumb to destroy a totem). I remember a mage in alterac back then who tried like 5 times to sheep me. 3-4 were eaten by GT, one I interrupted by Earth Shock...and then he died, as I pummeled him to death slowly .

Another two were old Tremor and Cleansing Totem. The latter was removed, the former turned into a cd though.

Another was old WF totem, which allowed ridiculous dmg increase on melee allies (like stormlash for melees only, but 100% uptime).

Totems would need new unique advantages like above over other, similar abilities of other classes to justify their drawbacks. Or they would need a serious tool-kit making totem-handling a rewarding feeling.
...Or they would have their drawbacks homogenisized to other, comparable abilities (obliterating totems as unique abilities).


(1)Because it can be destroyed, (2)because it has a cooldown, (3)because it is immobile and (4)requires line-of-sight for the entirety of it's duration, (5)because it prevents other water totems from being used while it is up?

They are spells. You can argue semantics as long as you want. You are casting a spell. If you want to argue some sort of lore based thing and the mechanics of it being a physical object you place, that's fine, but purely in terms of gameplay it is a spell you are casting. Totems are for flavor, not to be an advantage over other classes.

[Raiju]

They are spells. You can argue semantics as long as you want. You are casting a spell. If you want to argue some sort of lore based thing and the mechanics of it being a physical object you place, that's fine, but purely in terms of gameplay it is a spell you are casting. Totems are for flavor, not to be an advantage over other classes.

Then make totems unkillable.

[Noitatohtori]

Don't touch my favorite spec, please. There is nothing inherently wrong with the spec atm, except Ascendance burst which should be nerfed in PvP.
I use Frostbrand all the time and even Rockbiter every now and then, if I'm playing Unleashed Fury in PvP. Taking away Maelstorms like this would cripple Enha off-healing.

And now that I read further while typing this I see that you persevered the imbues in Maelstorm Weapon passive ^^ Thunderstorm for Enha would be worthless, in PvP, mostly. Only good in Dalaran/Blade's Edge for kiteing melee, I would definately take Sham Rage before that. I quess this suggestion was more in line for PvE upgrades, but the fact this there is still 2 sides in this game, try to keep PvP in mind aswell Otherwise the suggestions looked pretty good. More mobility,nomnomnom.

[Omanley]

The Melee-caster hybrid is one of the cool and iconic things of the spec, I hope they don't remove it.

As long as they implement more synergy with shocks (as enh), I dont mind them. I dislike the concept of having to be in melee to use ranged abilities though (MSW5xLB/CL).

Lost it at Earth shock. Far too iconic of an Enhancement Ability to get rid of. That's like removing 50% of what made Enhancement Enhancement back in the day. ...

I can sympaphise both with you and the op. The problem here lies though with the fact, that Earth Shock was iconic through it's function as a ranged interrupt back in the day. Not everyone could interruipt back then. Dks/Monks did not exist, ferals and rets could not interrupt, and warriors had to stance dance for pummel, which was not feasible. Hunters had to spec marksman (not that strong in pvp then, I think) and there was counterspell.So basically it came down to shamans (6 sec cd and ranged),rogues (10 sec cd and melee) and mages (ranged, dunno old counterspell cd). The situation has changed nowadays. interrupts were heaviliy homogenisized and ES gave away it's main function towards Wind Shear. As introduced in my response to Lavindar, shocks (in this case Earth Shock) would have to get a new, involving and synergizing role for enh to retain it's iconic status and deserve to keep it's place in our dps ability kit.

- - - Updated - - -

They are spells. You can argue semantics as long as you want. You are casting a spell. If you want to argue some sort of lore based thing and the mechanics of it being a physical object you place, that's fine, but purely in terms of gameplay it is a spell you are casting. Totems are for flavor, not to be an advantage over other classes.

No they're not. What about them makes them spells? They are not dispellable (like physical abilities), they started out as not being silenceable (like physical abilities) and them being destroyable makes them akin to pets/players, which are physical objects. They are also instant without exception (just like the abilities of a melee), so there is never a cast bar either.
I am not argueing semantics, I am argueing facts. You make baseless statements (totems are spells because I say so, you're wrong, your arguments are all semantics (?*)), I reason perfectly. The totems are casting the spells/their effects, not us shamans. if totems should be susceptible to silences, the enemy player would have to target the totem, and silence it to keep it from performing.
There is no visual indicator either that putting down a totem is a magical act. You put out your hand and the totem is on the ground. The magical visuals come from the totem itself, not the shaman.
Using totems is a physical act, hence it does not make sense that we couldn't put them down while silenced. The work the totems themselves do is magic, yes, but seperated from the player.
Blizz themselves stated in at least one comment that the point about totems is that they do their thing independant from the player.

Totems are for flavor, but not as an advantage? So basically you're talking about shitty flavor? Because if everyone has flavor, but it's a better one, I rather taste the good flavor. Totems are supposed to be iconic for shamans. If the most iconic thing for shamans is a pile of design-s***, that's saying something about a class.

There is no indicator what so ever that totems were something else than physical abilities at any one point ingame.

*Semantics:
1. The study or science of meaning in language.
2. The study of relationships between signs and symbols and what they represent. Also called semasiology.
3. The meaning or the interpretation of a word, sentence, or other language form

So if I'd be argueing semantics, first of all, I'd be argueing with you. Secondly, we'd argue about what defines a spell.
I brought several good points about what makes totems physical, and not spells. (attackable, immobile, unsilenceable (prior to nerf), totemic brackets, the spell originating from the totem, not the shaman (shamans would be spells as well, because they cast magic, like totems)).
You're free to do the same, until that I am basically not argueing anything, but stating facts against a brick wall.

Thunderstorm for Enha would be worthless, in PvP, mostly.

-Catapulting enemies of cliffs in eots/ab/av and other battlegrounds?
-Glyphed to no knockback as an additional aoe button in pve?
-For getting mana back while kited in areans?
-To get pesky melees of your case while chasing a caster?

And he's not suggesting that we lose SR either. He's saying that we get TS while keeping SR. Ele have both abilities also, so not really a prob in that regard.

[Advent]

Why does everybody want an overhaul all of a sudden?

[Scarakor]

Why does everybody want an overhaul all of a sudden?

Because the next expansion is approaching and Enhancement is still the mess that it was in vanilla.

Its just the shaman community trying to make a change.