how are shamans right now?

[AceofH]

ive got a choice to make with my next alt and i have a shaman (Enhance/Resto), and a mage. so just be honest, how are shamans doing right now overall? are tehy hard to level, easy to level? how is healing?

[Imnick]

Enhancement are on the squishier side when soloing, but have decent self-healing and if you use your capacitor totem you should do fine.
Endgame, Enhancement DPS is very competitive, in the comfortable position of being strong but not quite so strong that we really need to worry about being nerfed.
Restoration has a big toolkit and are very handy in mythic+ dungeons, but I'm not quite so sure what their current raiding position is.

[ryklin]

easiest healing class in raids, on the middle end in pvp due to mana costs not being as low or being as forgiving as pallies
also on the easier end for M+ because you have so many healing cds there's always one up when you need one

strong cooldowns for resto make them very strong as healers, probably around the 2nd or 3rd best healer for both raiding and M+ right now and having at least one for spirit link is really nice

leveling is easy (quick burst and instant heals), but it's not like most tank specs or locks/hunters where you can easily pull 10+mobs and aoe, but it's still pretty efficient

[Regalbeast]

I'm able to kill just about anything solo as Enhance. The burst is strong and self-healing is strong as well.

I'm switching over to Ele in 7.1.5 because I love the spec and it will finally be viable in raids.