The most popular opinion and most sensible on how to fix Elemental spec.

[Deleted]

After seeing what the majority of my followers would be interested in seeing and doing some extensive math myself(the majority would not understand the calculations here so will just say the results).


a flat increase of 20% to all damage spells would put Ele right in the position it should be.


the rest is up to your play style to capitalise on that.

[Alastian]

What? http://simulationcraft.org/reports/T22_Raid.html

As far I can tell, Shamans are okay right now damage-wise.

[DeusX]

What? http://simulationcraft.org/reports/T22_Raid.html

As far I can tell, Shamans are okay right now damage-wise.

I'd say we need a nerf.
Where's the famous nerfbat?

[shammypie]

After seeing what the majority of my followers would be interested in seeing and doing some extensive math myself(the majority would not understand the calculations here so will just say the results).


a flat increase of 20% to all damage spells would put Ele right in the position it should be.


the rest is up to your play style to capitalise on that.

i feel like i have been trolled. Or does everyone just want a bandaid?

[freddy090909]

i feel like i have been trolled. Or does everyone just want a bandaid?

I don't, I've played ele for many tiers where it was performing poorly. However, I'm not playing it now because it really just doesn't feel fun anymore. I'm hoping the currently posted 8.1 changes are just a start to what will be coming, but reality tells me that Blizzard thinks that it's all we need.

That's not to say I don't think ele needs a buff. The spec honestly needs about 8% to compete with the current "good specs", but again reality says we'll get either nothing or some tiny bandaid to keep stringing players along.

[Ahrean]

What? http://simulationcraft.org/reports/T22_Raid.html

As far I can tell, Shamans are okay right now damage-wise.

I'm not part of the "The sky is falling!" crowd, but specs that are immobile by design should probably be sitting on top of simulated Patchwerk fights, not middle of the pack. Elemental has issues, but that's more down to a rather bare-bones design, with very little cohesion and interactions. A flat 20% across-the-board damage increase would be over the top.

[Ragnarocket]

I'd say we need a nerf.
Where's the famous nerfbat?

I got sort of excited then realized that the tanks were still included in that DPS chart haha.

Really as has been said, based on what the devs themselves have said about our "low mobility/high damage/turret" gameplay then in any kind of simulation on a Patchwerk fight we should be sitting near the top. Now in practice? With movement that's going to reduce us down to the middle (I would assume) which is fine. But let us excel in those moments we really can just sit there and nuke away.

[Socialhealer]

I'm not part of the "The sky is falling!" crowd, but specs that are immobile by design should probably be sitting on top of simulated Patchwerk fights, not middle of the pack. Elemental has issues, but that's more down to a rather bare-bones design, with very little cohesion and interactions. A flat 20% across-the-board damage increase would be over the top.

20% would be fine, for a fight elemental moves very little it's top 3 dps.

a heavy movement fight it'll be bottom 5.

instead of now it's don't move? you're 10th-last.

moving? you're last.

[Ahrean]

20% would be fine, for a fight elemental moves very little it's top 3 dps.

a heavy movement fight it'll be bottom 5.

instead of now it's don't move? you're 10th-last.

moving? you're last.

A flat 20% increase would put us ahead of literally every other DPS spec by a decent margin, theoretically. Depending on the fight designs going forward this could be fine, but it would also not be a fix to Elemental's rotational issues, and would probably dissuade any further changes.

[Calfredd]

After seeing what the majority of my followers would be interested in seeing and doing some extensive math myself(the majority would not understand the calculations here so will just say the results).


a flat increase of 20% to all damage spells would put Ele right in the position it should be.


the rest is up to your play style to capitalise on that.

What followers? And you might want to recheck that math if you think 20% buff across all spells would be a good idea before being hit by the nerfbat all over again.

[Tikishock]

Everybody keeps talking about ele's "rotational issues" or "the spec feels clunky"--can somebody elaborate on this without saying something like "it was perfect in Legion" because quite a few classes lost a lot with the artifact purge so it's not like we are alone there.

I've played Holy Paladin, Arcane Mage and Ele/Resto Shaman so far in BFA and I find Ele/Resto to be the most interesting. Holy Paladin is a very powerful class for dungeons (way better than Resto) but it's honestly pretty boring outside of a few "oh crud" moments in which you have to use their awesome defensive cooldowns on yourself or your party.

Arcane mage is a much more simple rotation than Ele.

I guess I'm playing Ele shaman and I don't find it to be as awful as people say from a rotational standpoint. It seems like a pretty basic builder/spender with decent utility. It's not super complex and not every spell interacts with each other but it doesn't feel as horrible as people are saying. I've played much worse specs in this game before.

[Kralljin]

What? http://simulationcraft.org/reports/T22_Raid.html

As far I can tell, Shamans are okay right now damage-wise.

Specs with high mobility sitting at the top.
Specs with low mobility sitting in the middle / bottom.
It's sim dps, not actual logs, which obviously favours highly mobile specs.

If you now put a layer for defensive / buffs / utility on top of that, you realize how broken overall class balance in PvE is.

Everybody keeps talking about ele's "rotational issues" or "the spec feels clunky"--can somebody elaborate on this without saying something like "it was perfect in Legion" because quite a few classes lost a lot with the artifact purge so it's not like we are alone there.

A priority target appears while FS is on CD.

That has nothing to do the artifact, the Elemental artifact did not provide a lot of gameplay outside of Power of Maelstrom and Stormkeeper being baseline, but the FS CD is such a recurring negative moment for Elemental that you simply are not getting used to.

And it's just insane how deadset Blizzard is on that thing, it's actually fascinating how the devs only have a vision for Elementals weaknesses but cannot even come up with serious strengths.
Because Elemental being bad at target switch just makes no sense at all, Elemental is a direct damage caster, DoT specs such as Affliction or SP should be bad at target switch, because they deal over time, any damage of Elemental outside of FS is direct, but gets crippled by it due Lava burst.

[Tikishock]

Specs with high mobility sitting at the top.
Specs with low mobility sitting in the middle / bottom.
It's sim dps, not actual logs, which obviously highly mobile specs.

If you now put a layer for defensive / buffs / utility on top of that, you realize how broken overall class balance in PvE is.



A priority target appears while FS is on CD.

That has nothing to do the artifact, the Elemental artifact did not provide a lot of gameplay outside of Power of Maelstrom and Stormkeeper being baseline, but the FS CD is such a recurring negative moment for Elemental that you simply are not getting used to.

And it's just insane how deadset Blizzard is on that thing, it's actually fascinating how the devs only have a vision for Elementals weaknesses but cannot even come up with serious strengths.
Because Elemental being bad at target switch just makes no sense at all, Elemental is a direct damage caster, DoT specs such as Affliction or SP should be bad at target switch, because they deal over time, any damage of Elemental outside of FS is direct, but gets crippled by it due Lava burst.

Thanks for the response. While I am still enjoying Ele for the content I do (M+ up to 15s--not right now but that's my goal this xpac, and Heroic raiding) I do agree that Blizzard has stated our weakness of not being mobile and also not being a dot class (the reason they gave for FS cooldown) but haven't really clarified or given us a strength when compared to other classes.

Here would be my very minor and humble changes to the class that would maybe work out some of our issues...


- Lava Burst is now 2 charges baseline.
- Echo of the Elements is changed to have 2 charges of Flame Shock, 6 second recharge.

Or in a different scenario:

- Lava Burst auto crits all the time
- Flame Shock increases the crit amount of Lava Burst by X%

[Alastian]

+20% overall buff will not solve the mobility, utility and mechanical problems od the class. Thankfully Shaman's have the attention now.

[freddy090909]

Everybody keeps talking about ele's "rotational issues" or "the spec feels clunky"--can somebody elaborate on this without saying something like "it was perfect in Legion" because quite a few classes lost a lot with the artifact purge so it's not like we are alone there.

To me, I think Ele's single target is good, but our target swapping (as explained by Kralljin) and OE have gameplay problems.

For ST, the main thing that is missing is echo being baseline. It isn't horrible, because you can just always select the talent, but that means Blizzard has done exactly what they said they didn't want to and created a talent everyone will pick. A big QoL improvement should not have to compete for a spot in your kit. Either the talents are tuned well, and everyone would pick it, or the other talents are much better and everyone would feel they were missing out by not taking it.

For swapping, we have a problem because of FS and LvB. However, I don't consider the FS cooldown the problem. Blizzard clearly has some design decision made around it, be it because they want to forcibly limit us to 3 targets, or they don't want us to get flooded with LvS procs. What I think is the problem here is that flame shock is required for LvB; if they just made Lava Burst always crit, regardless of FS, we'd be able to swap without worry of some 6second CD. We'd be able to choose whether the target would actually live long enough for us to want the lava surge procs and damage from the DoT.

For AoE, I honestly just find it boring. The combination of reduced stats, lower frequency of EQ, and the removal of LR has made AoE unexciting. I think they should add some new mechanic to our core AoE rotation. It could be a new ability, or some new proc. Personally, I like the idea of adding LvB into the AoE rotation as a high priority filler, because that would introduce LvB, FS, and surge procs.

[Tikishock]

To me, I think Ele's single target is good, but our target swapping (as explained by Kralljin) and OE have gameplay problems.

For ST, the main thing that is missing is echo being baseline. It isn't horrible, because you can just always select the talent, but that means Blizzard has done exactly what they said they didn't want to and created a talent everyone will pick. A big QoL improvement should not have to compete for a spot in your kit. Either the talents are tuned well, and everyone would pick it, or the other talents are much better and everyone would feel they were missing out by not taking it.

For swapping, we have a problem because of FS and LvB. However, I don't consider the FS cooldown the problem. Blizzard clearly has some design decision made around it, be it because they want to forcibly limit us to 3 targets, or they don't want us to get flooded with LvS procs. What I think is the problem here is that flame shock is required for LvB; if they just made Lava Burst always crit, regardless of FS, we'd be able to swap without worry of some 6second CD. We'd be able to choose whether the target would actually live long enough for us to want the lava surge procs and damage from the DoT.

For AoE, I honestly just find it boring. The combination of reduced stats, lower frequency of EQ, and the removal of LR has made AoE unexciting. I think they should add some new mechanic to our core AoE rotation. It could be a new ability, or some new proc. Personally, I like the idea of adding LvB into the AoE rotation as a high priority filler, because that would introduce LvB, FS, and surge procs.

See, I totally get what you and Kralljin said. I also happen to agree--I was just confused because people keep saying "broken, clunky" and other buzzwords that you'd think we had a 1-button rotation that didn't work half the time.

I do like your suggestions. I would love for Echo to be baseline and for LvB to auto-crit. For AoE, I think it is what it is. Most AoE is boring for ranged. Honestly, I'm ok with a boring AoE rotation if it means making Echo baseline.

What I really wish is that Blizzard would make a video or blog post on ALL class spec design and what they see the class doing great and not so great. They do that in other games--I just don't get why they are so secret about what their "dream state" is for specs. You may never get there but then I think people can stop posting about "increasing ele mobility" when from Blizzards design decisions is NEVER going to happen.

- - - Updated - - -

Also I think it would be cool--and maybe this could replace Echo as a talent, would be to bring back the leggo pants that healed you for every second you stood still. This would make us more willingly immobile while also improving our survivability.

[bonewax]

flat damage increase to an already broken class fixes nothing. Shamans (im talking about pvp mostly) have no survivability, no mobility and few defensives. Blizzard thinks we want to stand around casting lighitning bold until we can earth shock someone for pathetic damage. The class at its core is broken. Take away or shorten our cast times, give us a mana bar similar to rogues energy bar so we can have upfront burst and just regen mana in the same way rogues regenerate energy.

[Futhark]

a flat increase of 20% to all damage spells would put Ele right in the position it should be.

Tell us more of the future Dankdruid!

• Shaman
• Elemental
• Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, and Earthquake damage increased by 15%.

[Deleted]

Tell us more of the future Dankdruid!

• Shaman
• Elemental
• Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, and Earthquake damage increased by 15%.

haha thanks for the recognition i will do the math again in a few weeks and let everyone know what needs to happen again.

[Deleted]

What? http://simulationcraft.org/reports/T22_Raid.html

As far I can tell, Shamans are okay right now damage-wise.

As if you just quoted sims as opposed to raid data..

Oh no you.. you actually did..

/facepalm