Enhancement Bard

[ro9ue]

With Disc officially going half DPS, half heals, I would like to see Enhancement go this route honestly. One of the original draws to the class for me back in Vanilla was being able to provide all of the buffs via totems, and 'Totem twisting'. It was a little weird mechanically, but I felt like there was more identity there in that Enhancement provided really interesting shit to your group... Shamans overall even. Windfury Totem, Grace of Air, Strength of Earth, Stoneskin, Bloodlust, etc.

Since all of the class buffs are covered now, maybe having your attacks Rockbiter/Flametongue etc providing a group buff when used. And using a combo of them creates a bigger buff.

What I'm picturing is Enhancement utilizing the 4 elements: Air, Water, Earth and Fire with specific attacks:

Air (Windfury passive)
Water (Frost Shock active)
Earth (Rockbiter active)
Fire (Flametongue active)

When your Windfury procs you get a temporary buff that interacts with your next attack.

Air + Water/Ice - If you use Frost Shock it causes an Ice Storm at an enemy or if you use a heal it makes a Healing Rain.
Air + Earth - If you use Rockbiter it surrounds you and your allies with Stoneskin shields.
Air + Fire - Give you and your allies lightning strikes which is basically like an old Windfury totem or Stormlash

Those are just quick examples anyways.

[Yopparai]

I really liked being a buff bot in BC. But by the end of the expac our damage was nerfed to compensate (I may be wrong, it was so long ago)
I want to be able to compete damage wise, in raids and solo content. That being said, if they found a way for us to buff others without being at the lower end of Dps, I would be all for it.

The 'buffs themselves and allies' comment in the preview sounds like it's possible.

[Deleted]

1) Totem twisting wasn't a thing prior to tbc
2) No. Please dont. A support role means less damage to compensate. Alternatively, blizz would have to create special snowflake identities like that across the board to reachieve balance. I deem that impossible for them, and even if they could pull it off, I doubt many people would like losing what they grew so used to over the years.
3) Totem twisting wasn't a very engaging mechanic. You refreshed a buff every couple of seconds and were able to provide both agility and windfury buffs at the same time. You probably felt more support-like, but what gave me, personally, the most satisfaction in bc was in sunwell, where, after the release of 3.0, I was actually able to do very nice damage. Sadly, on lvl80, that was no longer so, and enhancement fell to the bottom of the melee barrel in wotlk. Being able to deal competitve damage is where it's at, imo.
4) Bad in pvp. Dealing lower damage because of being a supporter role means trouble in 3v3, and hell in 2v2.
Enh will be even more dependant on others.

[Alltat]

If the support role was actually interesting then maybe. If it's just dropping a bunch of totems every two minutes like in vanilla, no. Just doing a DPS-like rotation to maximize buff uptimes wouldn't be very exciting either. If it was to happen, it should be something where you have to actually communicate and work together with the players you're buffing for best results, like being able to cast a short mini-bloodlust every minute and having other people use abilities together with that for maximum damage.


If you're just playing a DPS rotation with your abilities adding damage via other players rather than yourself, what's the point? It might feel new for a few weeks, but after a couple of raid tiers you'd barely be aware that anything had changed.

Alternatively, blizz would have to create special snowflake identities like that across the board to reachieve balance. I deem that impossible for them, and even if they could pull it off, I doubt many people would like losing what they grew so used to over the years.

They already did that, eventually leading to every single spec having some kind of implausible way of buffing the raid. In the end, everyone ended up being a DPS/buff hybrid. Thankfully they did away with it, because it just lead to headaches for raid leaders while adding nothing to the specs.

[ro9ue]

Really, REALLY interesting info:

http://www.wowhead.com/news=250045/l...changes#shaman

Look at Stormlash

Stormlash: Whenever you attack with your weapons enhanced, you have a chance to enhance up to 2 allies or yourself, causing attacks and spellcasts to deal additional Nature damage.

[stomination]

People are stuck on Damage/healing amount is everything. They don't care about getting stuff that gives them a raid spot unless it involves big personal numbers.

[Rend Blackhand]

As soon as enhancement becomes half healer, we will always be healers forever. DPS would undoubtedly be shit (I mean, more so that it already has been since Classic) and everyone would demand their enhancement shamans be healers.

[stomination]

As soon as enhancement becomes half healer, we will always be healers forever. DPS would undoubtedly be shit (I mean, more so that it already has been since Classic) and everyone would demand their enhancement shamans be healers.

This thread is about supporting not healing. The support the op is suggesting is to buff everyone else which would make enhancement well enhancing its teammates to kill the boss. Something that would lock it in a raid.

[Deleted]

The problem is that it'd suffer from the resto problem where their great for progression but once the other healers have things covered the half/half role wouldn't be needed.

[stomination]

The problem is that it'd suffer from the resto problem where their great for progression but once the other healers have things covered the half/half role wouldn't be needed.

Support does not mean healer still.

[bloodmoth13]

With Disc officially going half DPS, half heals, I would like to see Enhancement go this route honestly. One of the original draws to the class for me back in Vanilla was being able to provide all of the buffs via totems, and 'Totem twisting'. It was a little weird mechanically, but I felt like there was more identity there in that Enhancement provided really interesting shit to your group... Shamans overall even. Windfury Totem, Grace of Air, Strength of Earth, Stoneskin, Bloodlust, etc.

Since all of the class buffs are covered now, maybe having your attacks Rockbiter/Flametongue etc providing a group buff when used. And using a combo of them creates a bigger buff.

What I'm picturing is Enhancement utilizing the 4 elements: Air, Water, Earth and Fire with specific attacks:

Air (Windfury passive)
Water (Frost Shock active)
Earth (Rockbiter active)
Fire (Flametongue active)

When your Windfury procs you get a temporary buff that interacts with your next attack.

Air + Water/Ice - If you use Frost Shock it causes an Ice Storm at an enemy or if you use a heal it makes a Healing Rain.
Air + Earth - If you use Rockbiter it surrounds you and your allies with Stoneskin shields.
Air + Fire - Give you and your allies lightning strikes which is basically like an old Windfury totem or Stormlash

Those are just quick examples anyways.

To be fair it was unique, but in all honesty? it sucked. HARD!

Buff roles feel like shit, if they are balanced, they feel weak and likely wont be picked because players cant see the buffers contribution. if they are picked, they are likely OP to the point of necessity, which means they either trivialize content (content not balanced with them in mind) or are required for every fight (meaning one sucker would have to get the short straw every raid)

It is VERY hard to make buffing other players feel good, they likely wont notice unless it changes their playstlye, which if it does can be disruptive and annoying and if not they wont notice.
Its also very hard for the buffer player to appreciate his contribution, how do you measure how well you play?

In short, i would absolutely HATE this change, even though it was its original intention, it felt awful and wasnt fun.

Basically, buffs that affect raw damage suck, blizzard moved away from them because they werent fun to the point that, now, they have been removed entirely!
Real support style buffs can be interesting, pure utility buffs like lifesteal granted or movespeed, both players feel the impact of those, but you cant create a real pve class with that in mind!

Disc isnt going to be a 50/50 dps/healer hybrid, they will be a pure healer whose gameplay plays out more like a buffer/dpser, this is something i think people keep getting wrong. their extra damage is all good and well, but i think players forget that blizzards intention for healers is for them to be able to pump out decent enough dps to level with, and to be able to make meaningful dps contributions to fights, likely as a reward for keen healing.

Enhancement has moved on from the 'enhancement' playstyle, they arent 'raidbuffs' any more, they are elementally enhanced warriors, and its a great hook that works! If we are to see a REAL 'buffer' playstyle, it will need to fill one of the primary roles in the game, something like either a dps or healer.

Actually, we have this now! in the form of demonology warlock, they summon demons and then buff them. this is the right way to do it, your skill as a buffer are directly reflected with your own dps, so your measure of skill is the DPS you do.

I could see this working with a healer though, something like pure heals, having no direct damage options but doing damage through proxy and buffing allies, actually this could be a unique niche for resto shamans! getting things like lightning shield and slapping them on the tanks and a caster buff that causes casters to also shoot bolts of lightning? As long as the damage is counted as the resto shamans though, that way it doesnt skew dps numbers

- - - Updated - - -

Really, REALLY interesting info:

http://www.wowhead.com/news=250045/l...changes#shaman

Look at Stormlash

Stormlash: Whenever you attack with your weapons enhanced, you have a chance to enhance up to 2 allies or yourself, causing attacks and spellcasts to deal additional Nature damage.

And what does it mean? more crap to pad out our dps budget, meaning less powerful active abilities, like the old passive crap we used to have. It sounds fun and unique, but in real gameplay terms, its boring and crappy.