You never die, but shit takes forever to die too. Obviously shadow is better, but apparently some people have issues playing the spec.
Personally what I hate with shadow is the aoe, what stupid idea it was to force to have sw: pain on a target to aoe and have to recast it every time that target dies.. this makes ridiculous things in low level stuff where sw one shots mobs.. when shadow crash is on cd those mobs live forever lol.
Personally I felt elemental shaman was the worst, stuff took forever to die.