Ideal Covenant per playstyle

[shammypie]

I haven't seen too much in the threads about what covenant we should be going for. So i figured i would get the discussion started and share a little of my research.

For Raiders
I believe the winner here is the Kyrian. The steward potion is a great oh crap button and will help a lot with dispel/debuff mechanics.
The vesper totem has huge returns (1800 %SP in healing, and 900 %SP in damage) that can be timed with a lot of mechanics and it's stationary nature is offset by tanks and predictable add spawn locations for easy setup.

For Mythic+
I believe Chain Harvest will be the winner. It has some of the weaker damage numbers at 225 %SP and 600%SP in healing. However the takeaway is the teleport which i think will add a lot to cheesing/skipping strategies. With higher levels of crit (50+) it's cd becomes even with vesper and heals the whole party. It has synergy with tidal flows so I see resto using this a lot.

For PvP
This is not my area of expertise but i believe the Night Fae may be the ones to go to. The Soulshape abilities movement and teleport abilities are clutch for escaping/chasing enemies. Fae Transfusion is extremely strong and has potential haste synergies for added damage. It comes in at a whopping 1200 %SP if you can hit the whole 8 and would be strong in battlegrounds. Even at 750% SP in 5s that puts some pressure on healers and gives you the same amount in healing. Between the added mobility and burst potential this is my choice for a pvp centered shaman.

Honorable Mention/Solo Content
At first I thought the Necrolord would be the dominate one with each ability customized for each spec. with the maelstrom rework it may still become the go to for enhancement depending on how hard lightning bolt hits and whether there will be synergy to ability. Primordial wave has some potential and while it only lists 1 charge my guess is that echo will add additional charges allowing for bigger burst windows. at the maximum targets Lava burst will hit for 664% SP on top of the damage from PW comes out to 974 %SP. It's healing variant is also extremely strong and I believe between the flesh shield and the targeted healing focus it is a real contender for Mythic+. Being able to get half your health as a shield after each boss or whenever you have a few seconds between pulls is huge.


Considerations
Vesper totem requires the longest to get it's potential with a GCD to place the totem (plus eyeballing location) and then getting 3 casts off.
Haste scaling on Fae Transfusion is unknown, best guess is 1 tick per second so 33% haste would add an extra 400 %SP damage and also healing boost to the maximum.
Primordial Wave requires the most amount of setup. To get maximum potential multidotting is required however if they bring back the old ways of flame shock spreading this becomes on of the highest damage potentials out there in AE. Similar if they brought back the old riptide glyph the potential is cray cray. However since it only hits riptide targets chances are that target is already back to full health by the time you can combo this off.


If anyone has answers to some of my unknowns or helpful input please share

[Saltysquidoon]

It's really too early to tell.

So far as I'm aware none of them a properly hooked up with maelstrom weapon yet. Further the issue with vesper and enhance raiding is taking advantage of it is a greater proportional loss of dps compared to Ele.

The issue with covenant abilities for Shammies, Pallies and druids is there is no way one spell will ever be equally useful for 1/1/1 specs.

[Kralljin]

Eh, as long as Venthyr Teleport remains strong, it will be the top choice as far as raiding / M+ is concerned.
Even with a 1.5sec cast time, a short ranged teleport is still insane.

Just imagine the utility it would have provided in BfA.

G'huun:
No need for some people to "climb" via Wild Charge / Monk or WL Teleport, just run up and teleport yourself.

Jaina:
Got cut off by some ice patches?
Teleport over there, done.

Azshara:
Don't mind me, i'm just teleporting over the lasers.

G'huun:
Psychosis is no longer an issue because you just set up Teleport rotation and thus any collusion is automatically avoided.

And those are just the Final bosses.

Defense is good, but unless it reaches immunity like levels, mobility is king.

If you want to limit it to shaman specific abilities:

Raiding:
At least for Ele (and possibly Enhance) Primordial Wave will rule, it's an ability made for multi target situation (not AoE), which are usually encounters where you just want to funnel or maximize overall dps, this ability will help you do that.

Kyrian is kinda problematic because *additional* AoE Dps is just so redundant, there are so many classes that are good at AoE'ing and you rarely need that much AoE dps.
On top of that, Elemental and Enhance have access to Stormkeeper.
Elemental can top this off with Echoing Shock on top of that.

Do you really want to further optimize your (burst) AoE Dps?

Same goes for Night Fae.
Like, is this ability even worth using on Single target? Barely, most likely.

Chain Harvest follows suit here.
It's an improved Chain Lightning / Chain Heal, but not improved enough to be worth using on Single target with the current numbers.
It needs a lot more to be a significant dps on Single target.

Kyrian, Night Fae & Chain Harvest are all AoE based abilities, which means that they won't be very good in non AoE situations, but AoE is ironically not an area where Enhancement or Elemental seriously struggles, especially considering that both specs have talents that already fill that niche.

For M+:
Again, unless Venthyr Door of Shadows get nerfed, it will be the choice, Chain harvest also works very well due to being an AoE ability with some added healing.
Probably anything but Necrolords will be decent there, Fleshcraft might be some valueable added defense, but due to being an absorb shield, you need to jump through additional hurdles to have a fully loaded shield active at the right moment.

PvP:
Let's get one thing out of the way: Fae Transfusion is shit.
Channeled abilities with a fixed AoE radius are garbage in PvP, you are left open to focus fire from the enemy (because you can't LoS without interrupt your spell), open for Interrupts AND enemies need to remain in the AoE.

As far as damage abilities are concerned in PvP, unless they help you burst down an opponent (which Fae Transfusion doesn't) or consistently deals high damage (which it doesn't because easily avoidable), they're not good.

Chain Harvest is also terrible (as if you had the time to cast a slightly better Chain Lightning in PvP).

Vesper Totem might be good because it's instant and thus could be used to burst down opponents.
Primordial wave could be good to apply consistent pressure onto the enemy.

As far as covenant racials are concerned, it depends on the matchup and Meta, issue with those mobility based ones is that Shaman has barely any mobility to begin with, so having that one ability is just a drop in the bucket, they're okay against low mobility classes like Ret or DK, but WW Monks and DH will laugh at you for even the attempt to kite them.


Can't comment on Resto, but abilities such as Chain Harvest and Vesper Totem aren't at least restricted to AoE encounters as Ele / Enhance, since AoE damage from a Healer PoV is much more common.

[shammypie]

@Krajin I see what you mean on the AE bloat. I was feeling the same thoughts going over the new abilities thinking our AE is just fine as is we don't need anymore and every ability is some kind of AE. It makes me think AE is going to be a lot more important so I was trying to consider the usefulness. I play Resto more than anything with Ele as a second and enhance for when i'm bored. I agree that short range teleport utility does more for the class than most of the damage abilities.

However of all the abilities it is the weakest in power and has one of the longest cast times. That's why i think it is more suited to M+ content since it's a short cd on what is a lot of AE of trash and helps stabilize your party. From a healer perspective though Primordial Wave (PW) gives you way better group healing. It gets pretty dam scary healing as resto in M+ and it's hard keeping everyone up when chain heal won't reach. PW allows your Healing Wave (HW) to hit 3 targets or more with echo stacking. If they both get stacks your healing your entire party for a lot more than chain harvest can provide with a lot more flexibilty for timing.

As far as PVP your right about channels, my idea was that if the range is large you use it for pressure and the mobility is really clutch. Vesper is too easy to avoid or turn and tap dead and like you said chain harvest is just laughable. Primordial Wave has some potential especially in arena and the necro shield is something you can put on before the fight giving you an extra 20% health effectively. The drawback i see though is dispels. You don't get a lot of damage out of it if healers are dispelling flame shock all the time, though bonus is extra flameshock applicator. Honestly I think it would be my choice if i was maining enhance because it is affected by maelstrom weapon (MW) so you can get instant casts out of it but i don't know how hard Lightning bolt (LB) is going to be hitting with the rework. As a caster though our lack of mobility kills and that vulpin move speed plus teleport is a game changer and as a healer without much offensive except FS/LvB procs you can use FAE early on when contesting flags/points and repress once shields start breaking.


TL/DR
I think Necrolord is going to be the jack of trades covenant with the other 3 having greater impact in specific situations

[Kralljin]

It makes me think AE is going to be a lot more important so I was trying to consider the usefulness.

To be fair, that's a rather big speculation.

Other classes do not necessarily display this focus on AoE as far as covenant abilities are concerned.

However of all the abilities it is the weakest in power and has one of the longest cast times.

Primordial Wave deals more damage than Chain harvest on Single target, has a 1.5 cast time (Chain Harvest has 2.5), has a 45 second CD and on top of that applies Flame shock.

Saying that it is the weakest is only true if the other can make use of their AoE potential.

The drawback i see though is dispels. You don't get a lot of damage out of it if healers are dispelling flame shock all the time,

People keep saying this is an issue since forever, yet the reality is that if you stay on your toes with applying Flame shock, you will stay ahead of the healer.
Especially in the current Meta with OP magic effects flying around (Obsidian Claw), dispelling on CD will lead to a dead team mate.

[shammypie]

To be fair, that's a rather big speculation.

Other classes do not necessarily display this focus on AoE as far as covenant abilities are concerned.

Primordial Wave deals more damage than Chain harvest on Single target, has a 1.5 cast time (Chain Harvest has 2.5), has a 45 second CD and on top of that applies Flame shock.

Saying that it is the weakest is only true if the other can make use of their AoE potential.

People keep saying this is an issue since forever, yet the reality is that if you stay on your toes with applying Flame shock, you will stay ahead of the healer.
Especially in the current Meta with OP magic effects flying around (Obsidian Claw), dispelling on CD will lead to a dead team mate.

fair on dispels i can't keep up with that crap anymore, you probably know more about arena than i do. I know in BGs though you tend to dispel the FC as often as possible but that's just to keep the dots from piling up too high.

I noticed i might have made a mistake in PW damage calculation, does the original target get hit twice by LvB/LB?
Otherwise i don't see it as the single target option it's just a more powerful flame shock with a net gain of 45.5 %SP.

Also i found more information on fae transfusion and radius isn't that big. it looks completely unuseable in pvp without significant buffs to its radius. potentially still useful in M+ for more cleave beyond double CL+EQ

[Kralljin]

I know in BGs though you tend to dispel the FC as often as possible but that's just to keep the dots from piling up too high.

FC is a single target and you often have multiple healers on top of that.
Now think about Arena where you also have to deal with the occassional HoJ / Fear.

Otherwise i don't see it as the single target option it's just a more powerful flame shock with a net gain of 45.5 %SP.

Chain Harvest has 45% SP, Primordial Wave has 65%.

Meaning due to its shorter cast time it beats out LB by a slight marigin as far as raw DPECT are concerned, now taking into account that you save a single GCD from FS every 45 seconds, it's a minor gain.

[shammypie]

FC is a single target and you often have multiple healers on top of that.
Now think about Arena where you also have to deal with the occassional HoJ / Fear.

Chain Harvest has 45% SP, Primordial Wave has 65%.

Meaning due to its shorter cast time it beats out LB by a slight marigin as far as raw DPECT are concerned, now taking into account that you save a single GCD from FS every 45 seconds, it's a minor gain.

i was able to watch some videos last night and found that PW does actually recast on the initial target. Furthermore with the recent changes to fire elemental, maelstrom, stormkeeper, and the new posted legendary abilities it's possible to massively spread flameshocks and riptides. Skybreaker's fiery demise is a must have with PW i just hope the new raids make it worth it because it's going to be so much cleave considering it also interacts with the ele mastery. Similar enhancement has fire nova back and stupid amounts of AE, sucks MSW isn't reducing the cast on it though.

personally though my favorite thing after learning about the changes was Resto. Primal Tidal Core is going to be strong and well see it line up with PW for full party HW. That's huge for M+ and really good for spread healing in raids which is our greatest weakness. I also like the return of mana tide totem and the new legendary ability to be able to spam 0 cost chain heals during is so good.

They really need to buff Chain harvest or replace it because only thing venthry has going on is the teleport. The fae isn't bad for PVE but i found that the vulpin competes with ghost wolf so i don't see any pvp use.

Kyrian is still a good choice all around and you get both the healing and damage portion of the totem and healing totem triggers it so it's really good for survivability, i see it being a good pvp choice with chain harvest being so lackluster