Shaman PvP Fixes! - Wish List [Ele]

[Riplin]

Okay this is really just a wishlist of changes that would make the Shaman far less clunky and more effective in PvP.


Three totem talents made baseline; replaced with a new talent set for that tier, perhaps mobility-based

Totemic Vigor made baseline

Totemic Projection reworked to function the same as Trap Launcher; also now only checks range and los, no longer checks elevation; conversely, totems are no longer a valid target for abilities like shadowstep or charge

Totems can once again be dropped while under the effects of silence


The active totem is now placed at the center of the target area, dummy totems are placed accordingly to that position.


Capacitor totem now detonates immediately when dropped creating an aura within 5 yards of the totem for 5 seconds; anyone within the aura or who enters the aura is stunned for 5 seconds (3s PvP). This is somewhat an inverse of the Hunter ability Binding Shot. glyph removed

Frost Shock no longer shares CD with other shocks; damage removed

Ghost Wolf cannot be reduced below 130% run speed (up from 100%) but does not remove snares - possibly a new talent in a mobility tier

Unleashed Fury debuff is now a curse

Flame Shock glyph: If your Flame Shock is dispelled the cooldown is immediately reset. This cannot occur more than once every 4 seconds

Hex now also includes a snare component reducing movement speed by 60%

Earthquake mana cost reduced by 50% and cast time reduced by .5 seconds

Thoughts?

[seasawl0l]

Totem talents dont really need to be removed, just fixed so that there isnt only 1 to choose from and the others situational. I like call of elements, the other two are just meh. Totemic vigor should be a talent with a bag of chips ( maybe totems last 15% longer)

Dont know how i feel about using totems when silenced, it was pretty powerful. They did it to nerf resto, so if this does go back Im sure we will see weaker effects of totems to compensate.

Ghost wolf with glyph is already good


Everything else I would consider

[Riplin]

I could agree with improving the totem tier so there are 3 decent choices.

I'm not aware of how totems while silenced made Resto too strong as I've only played Enh and Ele. I'm willing to let that one go.

In the beginning Shaman mobility was 2nd to Druid. Yes GW had a cast time but could be talented to insta. Since then our mobility has remained exactly the same other than moving at normal speed (reduced to 100%) while snared. At the same time pretty much every other class has been handed a plethora of movement abilities and we've been left behind all based on the idea that we can't infringe upon Druid superiority. The way I see it, GW is a silence. We are silencing ourselves and taking ourselves out of combat. Using a talent to make us run at normal GW speed (130%) without breaking snares would in no way infringe upon Druid dominance imo. Especially if we cannot cast LB on the move anymore, and must re-position to be able to get a hard cast off which is impossible these days with 4,000 interrupts and cc (yes I know some are being removed).

[Blithe]

Okay this is really just a wishlist of changes that would make the Shaman far less clunky and more effective in PvP.


Three totem talents made baseline; replaced with a new talent set for that tier, perhaps mobility-based

Totemic Vigor made baseline

Totemic Projection reworked to function the same as Trap Launcher; also now only checks range and los, no longer checks elevation; conversely, totems are no longer a valid target for abilities like shadowstep or charge

Totems can once again be dropped while under the effects of silence


The active totem is now placed at the center of the target area, dummy totems are placed accordingly to that position.


Capacitor totem now detonates immediately when dropped creating an aura within 5 yards of the totem for 5 seconds; anyone within the aura or who enters the aura is stunned for 5 seconds (3s PvP). This is somewhat an inverse of the Hunter ability Binding Shot. glyph removed

Frost Shock no longer shares CD with other shocks; damage removed

Ghost Wolf cannot be reduced below 130% run speed (up from 100%) but does not remove snares - possibly a new talent in a mobility tier

Unleashed Fury debuff is now a curse

Flame Shock glyph: If your Flame Shock is dispelled the cooldown is immediately reset. This cannot occur more than once every 4 seconds

Hex now also includes a snare component reducing movement speed by 60%

Earthquake mana cost reduced by 50% and cast time reduced by .5 seconds

Thoughts?

1. I agree, these talents have been a far cry from even being called talents since the beginning of Mists.

2. This would be helpful, 5 to 10% extra health for our totems (excluding totems which already have higher health) is definitely needed.

3. I couldn't agree more.

4. This change bothered me when it first came to our class because of how reactive totems are, and then everybody adjusted to it. In Warlords, I'm quite sure silences are being removed (along with disarms), so this really wouldn't make a difference.

5. That'd be interesting, but an 'Ursol's Vortex'-like totem would be much more appreciated.

6. The reason Frost Shock didn't make it through was because of its damage component, and the fact that it lasts 8 seconds, being able to kite almost two people for a large amount of time. Remove the damage component, and reduce its duration and I think it'd pass.

7. I don't agree with this at all, our Glyph makes Ghost Wolf strong enough without adding more to it. All we need is for the Glyph to become baseline.

8. Unleashed Fury debuff shouldn't change debuff-type, it should just be placed on the casting Shaman so we don't have to further reduce our effectiveness in target-switch-heavy encounters (a la Flame Shock).

9. Interesting. You'd have to see it play out, but I have no idea if it'd make it to live if our old Flame Shock dispel protection got removed.

10. This would be a welcomed change. The fact that it's one of the few 'crowd control' where you can basically adjust your location is kind of ridiculous. It's basically an 8 second silence/disarm.

11. Agree with the cast time reduction. I think it'd be used much more if it were comparable to Healing Rain. I disagree with the mana cost reduction, though.

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I could agree with improving the totem tier so there are 3 decent choices.

I'm not aware of how totems while silenced made Resto too strong as I've only played Enh and Ele. I'm willing to let that one go.

In the beginning Shaman mobility was 2nd to Druid. Yes GW had a cast time but could be talented to insta. Since then our mobility has remained exactly the same other than moving at normal speed (reduced to 100%) while snared. At the same time pretty much every other class has been handed a plethora of movement abilities and we've been left behind all based on the idea that we can't infringe upon Druid superiority. The way I see it, GW is a silence. We are silencing ourselves and taking ourselves out of combat. Using a talent to make us run at normal GW speed (130%) without breaking snares would in no way infringe upon Druid dominance imo. Especially if we cannot cast LB on the move anymore, and must re-position to be able to get a hard cast off which is impossible these days with 4,000 interrupts and cc (yes I know some are being removed).

Because when you were silenced, you were still able to drop them. That was pretty potent, and I can understand why the change was made, but the fact that they didn't compensate us is what bothered me the most.

[seasawl0l]

I could agree with improving the totem tier so there are 3 decent choices.

I'm not aware of how totems while silenced made Resto too strong as I've only played Enh and Ele. I'm willing to let that one go.

In the beginning Shaman mobility was 2nd to Druid. Yes GW had a cast time but could be talented to insta. Since then our mobility has remained exactly the same other than moving at normal speed (reduced to 100%) while snared. At the same time pretty much every other class has been handed a plethora of movement abilities and we've been left behind all based on the idea that we can't infringe upon Druid superiority. The way I see it, GW is a silence. We are silencing ourselves and taking ourselves out of combat. Using a talent to make us run at normal GW speed (130%) without breaking snares would in no way infringe upon Druid dominance imo. Especially if we cannot cast LB on the move anymore, and must re-position to be able to get a hard cast off which is impossible these days with 4,000 interrupts and cc (yes I know some are being removed).

First off I dont know where you are getting your perspective points from: arena matches? world pvp? RBG/BGs?

The game has changed quite dramatically since the days of casted ghostwolf, I dont want to argue about how things used to be; nostalgia opens up a door on how things used to be, why things are bad, I miss this, ect. Its a different game in a sense of how things work now. It has been stated a many times by top pvpers that this is one of the most balanced seasons in the game. Not saying everything is perfect

To say class "x" needs this because class "Y" has this and we need it is stubborn. Different classes specs have different perks and play styles. Druids also silence themselves as well when they go into travel form, dunno why you you would mention that, But they are immune to poly which is good. Druid is a druid and shaman is a shaman. Since "superior" is subjective Im going to base my facts on 3v3 arena(which is considered baseline arena). Ele blows boomkin out of the water in high end pvp representation. Shammy also beats druid in resto. Enhance beats out feral as well. If you mean superior in terms of a better shapeshift, my apologies.

You can still cast lightning bolt on the as of now. They are taking it out in WoD, which is still in testing. Anything can an will be changed. You are drawing conclusions when WoD beta hasnt been released yet, and hardly any testing has been done by players. The sky has yet to fall

[Riplin]

My perspective is BGs. Arena is glorified dueling and should never have been the point of focus for PvP in any respect. BUT, it's not my game. Blizzard wanted WoW to become an E-sport so they decided the "war" part of Warcraft wasn't really necessary anymore. But that's neither here nor there. Ghost Wolf, even at 130%, is still inferior to the druid in every way. It would also still be inferior to what has been given to Hunters, Mages, Warlocks, Monks, Priests, Rogues, Warriors...see where I'm going with this? Why should only one class be left behind in a world of mobility to become the sitting duck? Tell me how that makes sense. The current glyph should be baseline, and replaced with a new glyph (or talent) that allows normal run speed. It's still no burst of speed, blazing speed, teleport, or flying serpent kick by any means.

As for lowering the mana cost on Earthquake, if you try to use it at all in BGs you'll be going OOM fairly quickly. Well unless you only cast it when there's a large group of enemies guaranteed to stay in one area (flag). But forget trying to use it to flush out a rogue. I guess we can always drop magma for that right? lol

[Mithgroth]

I'll try to be gentle but your list looks like Polyanna's.

Three totem talents made baseline; replaced with a new talent set for that tier, perhaps mobility-based

I guess most of the community has raised their voices for how disappointing our T45 is, Blizzard claims it's "fine" and we have to "deal with it".

Totemic Vigor made baseline

Agreed, actually it should even be more than 10%.

Totemic Projection reworked to function the same as Trap Launcher; also now only checks range and los, no longer checks elevation; conversely, totems are no longer a valid target for abilities like shadowstep or charge

Same as T45 stuff, we have asked for this for many times, developers mostly choose to dodge this when asked on Twitter, and answer something which had already been answered / declared before. Don't get your hopes high.

Totems can once again be dropped while under the effects of silence

Blizzard believes this is OP and I'm afraid I'll be mad with them for eternity for this unjust nerf.
"Oooh, Mages cast spells too right? And casting spells is their stuff, you'know. They can't do that while silenced, why would shamans do their thing?!"

It's not going to happen.

The active totem is now placed at the center of the target area, dummy totems are placed accordingly to that position.

You can have more than one active totem, so I'm not sure what your point is.
Still, totem placement after Projection is absolutely annoying.

Capacitor totem now detonates immediately when dropped creating an aura within 5 yards of the totem for 5 seconds; anyone within the aura or who enters the aura is stunned for 5 seconds (3s PvP). This is somewhat an inverse of the Hunter ability Binding Shot. glyph removed

Good thinking. I would rather see it gone completely instead of trying to patch a bleeding wound.
I would love us to get something unique with shamanish feel. Kinetic Field would be interesting.
For those who don't play Dota, it creates a field where enemies can't pass but allies can. Enemies caught inside can't get out, enemies outside can't get in for the duration.

Frost Shock no longer shares CD with other shocks; damage removed

Even Blizzard has no clue what to do with it. It's probably more of a "wait and see" situation.

Ghost Wolf cannot be reduced below 130% run speed (up from 100%) but does not remove snares - possibly a new talent in a mobility tier

Ghost Wolf requires some hugs, but what I understand from front page tweets, "it's fine as it is" too.

Unleashed Fury debuff is now a curse

Why? Lore wise or game mechanics wise, why?

Flame Shock glyph: If your Flame Shock is dispelled the cooldown is immediately reset. This cannot occur more than once every 4 seconds

No, then it would be impossible to dispel it.

Hex now also includes a snare component reducing movement speed by 60%

Why? Hex should cause a loss of control instead.

Earthquake mana cost reduced by 50% and cast time reduced by .5 seconds

They declared that they are not going to do that already. They want you to "cast".

[Nebria]

Blizzard believes this is OP and I'm afraid I'll be mad with them for eternity for this unjust nerf.
"Oooh, Mages cast spells too right? And casting spells is their stuff, you'know. They can't do that while silenced, why would shamans do their thing?!"

it was a nerf straight for resto pvp. if you got silenced and had focus on you, you were still able to use spririt link and htt. also you could still you hst. so the silence was not such a huge impact as for other healers.
that ele got a big slap in the face with this didn't mattered
I mean a large part of our defense system are totems and I guess in the past we were designed with this in mind.

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5. That'd be interesting, but an 'Ursol's Vortex'-like totem would be much more appreciated.

I don't know why somebody really would want a vortex like totem. the big problem is you get moved to the center of the vortex and there is the totem and you can just kill it.
if you cast it on the person he will also be able to just kill it. vortex works because you can't dispell it/remove it by any means.

the stun totem is much better imo. if you have projection you can stun someone far away without that he has a reaction time (it is clunky to use I know)
and if you get tunneled in pvp and be able to cast the stun totem, and the other people ignoring it, they get stuned and you can get out.
a vortex like spell won't work because you can't get off from them and they would still be near you.
it works for druides because they are very mobile.

or what do you think in what situation would it provide good utility/better utility hat the stun totem or the root totem we already have.

[Riplin]

Good responses Mith.

On the Unleashed Fury debuff...I'm assuming it's Magic no? Seems there are less people spamming curse dispels as opposed to magic dispels...just helps an Unleashed Elements Shaman do their job a little more. Even better would be the buff goes on the Shaman, so long as it's protected from retarded spellsteal and purge.

If the Flame Shock glyph idea is too strong, then perhaps something else. Since we are losing Healing Tide, and Healing Surge is HORRIBLE in PvP...seriously you can rattle off 10-15 and not even get to half health but you'll certainly be oom (yes I know, use with Clearcasting but that's only 2 casts) perhaps the current glyph for flame shock could be buffed from 30% healing to 50%. Get that on multiple targets..might be worth it. Dunno.

I suggested the snare on Hex because Blizzard will never make it a true Poly, but at least we wouldn't have to follow Hex up by spending a global on Frost Shock just so they "sorta" stay put instead of running LOS or simply going the direction they were already going.

Earthquake baseline is 2.5s right? 2.0s wouldn't be game-breaking but in PvP it would help. I'm more concerned about the mana cost however.

[Nebria]

I would love us to get something unique with shamanish feel. Kinetic Field would be interesting.
For those who don't play Dota, it creates a field where enemies can't pass but allies can. Enemies caught inside can't get out, enemies outside can't get in for the duration.

this sounds interesting

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I'm more concerned about the mana cost however.

well I don't think it was made for spamming. I guess you want to use it to protect flags in rbgs
if you use the clearcasting proc you will have the mana cost reduced by 25%

[Mithgroth]

this sounds interesting

That is why, my fellow shaman friend, we are probably never ever going to see anything close to it.

If the Flame Shock glyph idea is too strong, then perhaps something else. Since we are losing Healing Tide, and Healing Surge is HORRIBLE in PvP...seriously you can rattle off 10-15 and not even get to half health but you'll certainly be oom (yes I know, use with Clearcasting but that's only 2 casts) perhaps the current glyph for flame shock could be buffed from 30% healing to 50%. Get that on multiple targets..might be worth it. Dunno.

I don't know man, but I'm sure you'll have many more problems in WoD except flame shock.
We are returning to the turret, and almost all of us seen that movie. Compared to that problem, I would be less worried if they even nerfed flame shock to the ground.

I suggested the snare on Hex because Blizzard will never make it a true Poly, but at least we wouldn't have to follow Hex up by spending a global on Frost Shock just so they "sorta" stay put instead of running LOS or simply going the direction they were already going.

The problem actually lies in Frost Shock. If Blizzard can actually make their up and make it do no damage, it will be a huge buff for us. Losing damage is a buff, welcome to shaman class.

Earthquake baseline is 2.5s right? 2.0s wouldn't be game-breaking but in PvP it would help. I'm more concerned about the mana cost however.

EQ will remain as a terrible choice for PvP unless it's made instant and it's not going to happen.
It's only good for popping sneaky rogues and kitties out of stealth when you have a good guess, that's all. At least for arena.

In an ideal world where we get the respect we deserve from Blizzard, we would be discussing a model to somehow buff EQ to be an instant by some proc, so we would have something not so OP but threatening in our arsenal.

-----

Forgive me for my Blizzard bashing, it might be disturbing.
But, I'm an old wolf, loyally following the path of shamanism for years without considering to reroll. I've provided feedback, given some thought to make the class more interesting and contributed to the community (both in here and official) for quite a long time. Probably I'm the reason they fixed Maelstrom Weapon not used to proc on absorb shields, it was changed right after my big topic which even got other class players' support in EU forums. I'm still very proud of that.

I'm just sick of waiting expension over expension for simple fixes and some attention. Just like Paladins having the spotlight during Wrath of the Lich King, I kept expecting the day we would get some huge love. Deathwing tore Azeroth apart and shamans fixed it, Cataclysm was supposed to be our thunder. It didn't. MoP was even more terrifying for us. And now we are venturing to a place and time where Shamanism for us is born. This is more than huge.

Alpha is alpha, right. And I've seen many Alphas. I really don't recall Blizzard taking a huge steer from their Alpha plans. WoD comes out 7 months from now. I really have no faith seeing Blizzard turning back from their huge mistakes, admiting them and redoing them in a way that it makes sense. Again, for the 5th time I suppose, I really hope I would be the one wrong.

And I believe I'm not the only one feeling this way:

I firmly agree. It's at the point where they're just blatantly disregarding our spec and ignoring any concern we have with it. Comparable to the treatment Paladins received in Classic, it's disgusting.

[Nebria]

That is why, my fellow shaman friend, we are probably never ever going to see anything close to it.

at least not for shamans^^

[seasawl0l]

My perspective is BGs. Arena is glorified dueling and should never have been the point of focus for PvP in any respect. BUT, it's not my game. Blizzard wanted WoW to become an E-sport so they decided the "war" part of Warcraft wasn't really necessary anymore. But that's neither here nor there. Ghost Wolf, even at 130%, is still inferior to the druid in every way. It would also still be inferior to what has been given to Hunters, Mages, Warlocks, Monks, Priests, Rogues, Warriors...see where I'm going with this? Why should only one class be left behind in a world of mobility to become the sitting duck? Tell me how that makes sense. The current glyph should be baseline, and replaced with a new glyph (or talent) that allows normal run speed. It's still no burst of speed, blazing speed, teleport, or flying serpent kick by any means.

Right your perspective is from a BG. Ranked play is where elemental shines. LSD is a nightmare for arena teams. Random BGs are not a place to draw conclusions; we both can agree that blizzard doesnt really give a shit about it.

I dont know what you mean by left in the dark either. We have had many changes. Not too long ago ago elemental got sham rage and healing tide totem baseline; which doesnt solve every problem but blizzard still makes changes to elemental. That is not leaving a class in the dark imo. I don't blame you for making the argument "class X needs this because classes Y and Z have it, so X should have it too." Its easy to look on what you don't have rather than what you do have I can agree that we get trained hard when in a random BG, but thats not to say I have seen elemental rocking BGs. The potential of elemental is there; its definitely not the class. Maybe you are under geared, or possibly you just need some practice. I hate to be that guy who said re-role, but thats all you can do. Or learn to live with the class and better yourself on it

[Blithe]

it was a nerf straight for resto pvp. if you got silenced and had focus on you, you were still able to use spririt link and htt. also you could still you hst. so the silence was not such a huge impact as for other healers.
that ele got a big slap in the face with this didn't mattered
I mean a large part of our defense system are totems and I guess in the past we were designed with this in mind.

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I don't know why somebody really would want a vortex like totem. the big problem is you get moved to the center of the vortex and there is the totem and you can just kill it.
if you cast it on the person he will also be able to just kill it. vortex works because you can't dispell it/remove it by any means.

the stun totem is much better imo. if you have projection you can stun someone far away without that he has a reaction time (it is clunky to use I know)
and if you get tunneled in pvp and be able to cast the stun totem, and the other people ignoring it, they get stuned and you can get out.
a vortex like spell won't work because you can't get off from them and they would still be near you.
it works for druides because they are very mobile.

or what do you think in what situation would it provide good utility/better utility hat the stun totem or the root totem we already have.

Anything could provide more utility and be more useful than Capacitor Totem.