Totems and you

[Angarin]

Ok so I've got a few questions regarding totems & party buffs

As shamans most of you know that we are buff fillers. I mean if you think otherwise...I guess you really should think otherwise (tongue twister?)


An example of my question

We have a pally tank
and a hunter with agi/str buff

I usually place down strength of earth if not stoneskin. both of these buffs are present without me

Basically what I'm asking. Is that, should I ever not place a totem down? Or is it ok to leave a totem or 2 out if the buff is already present?

I find myself not placing totems down alot conserving mana

[LyskaWF]

Ok so I've got a few questions regarding totems & party buffs

As shamans most of you know that we are buff fillers. I mean if you think otherwise...I guess you really should think otherwise (tongue twister?)


An example of my question

We have a pally tank
and a hunter with agi/str buff

I usually place down strength of earth if not stoneskin. both of these buffs are present without me

Basically what I'm asking. Is that, should I ever not place a totem down? Or is it ok to leave a totem or 2 out if the buff is already present?

I find myself not placing totems down alot conserving mana

What spec are you? If you're resto or elemental I might not bother if you've got the buffs covered and backed up by someone else (in case of range issues or death). If you're enhancement then just drop them since mana is a non-issue for you.

[Frolk]

Ill assume u raid, u can use Stoneclaw and glyph it, its rather effective, or have the pally use ret/conc aura and u use stoneskin, i personally use Stoneclaw (when its alot of raid dmg )

[Angarin]

I dont raid, not yet with my shaman at least.

My specs are elemental & resto

I'm mainly asking about resto but when I'm elemental I always place down a fire totem. No reason not to, its a loss of dps. As resto I find myself asking this question alot which is why I'm posting here

I'll consider the stoneclaw thing though, I think I have a spare glyph spot in both for it

[grandpab]

If a class brings those buffs then you really don't need to drop the totem.

In a lot of raids earth totems will be useless, same with air, somebody is probably already bringing those buffs especially if it's a 25 man.

Lately I've been using Tranquil Mind totem for water, we've always got like 4 shamans with healing stream glyphed, we have pallys for might, and not a lot of people use tranquil mind or the pally aura equiv. I guess as resto you'd want to stick to healing stream though.

If you have a mage, or demo lock, or elem sham then you don't need to drop flametongue either.

So really you don't even have to drop any totems as long as someone else is bringing that buff, and chances are it's more reliable, like a 100 yard range instead of the 30-40 that totems have and 100% uptime without them having to do anything (not that either of those are usually an issue anyway)

[Angarin]

should I be using mana spring if theres no mana regen buff? Or should I always use healing stream?

[Agallochh]

I always use Healing Stream Totem. I don't have mana issues so Mana Stream is worthless to me. I'd much rather have the Elemental Resistance provided by Glyph of HST and the "fire-and-forget" heal of HST ticking over time.

That being said, I'm in a similar position while raiding. Our pally uses Concentration Aura, I use Stoneskin, our DK provides Strength of Earth, mage provides Flametongue Totem, hunter provides Windfury totem , Shadow priest provides Wrath of Air totem.

In this case, I get rid of my Air totem, Fire totem, and Earth totem, keeping only my HST out and popping Stoneclaw for the absorption. There's no point wasting the mana when I need to re-drop totems. However, I like to start the fight with all 4 totems out, so that I may use Totemic Recall for regen, and then pop my Stoneskin/HS totems.

[Kesandri]

should I be using mana spring if theres no mana regen buff? Or should I always use healing stream?

Does your raid have a mana regen buff? If not ask your healers if they need it or not. If not as the post above says, use healing stream always ideally with the resis glyph if possible. Also in relation to your earlier post, I always run all 4 totems as either resto or ele (SoE / ST / HS or MS / WS) just in case a buff drops or someone dies etc. Mana is not an issue anyway so why not.

[Dedalus]

Ok so I've got a few questions regarding totems & party buffs
As shamans most of you know that we are buff fillers. I mean if you think otherwise...I guess you really should think otherwise (tongue twister?)
An example of my question
We have a pally tank
and a hunter with agi/str buff
I usually place down strength of earth if not stoneskin. both of these buffs are present without me
Basically what I'm asking. Is that, should I ever not place a totem down? Or is it ok to leave a totem or 2 out if the buff is already present?
I find myself not placing totems down alot conserving mana

I dont raid, not yet with my shaman at least.
My specs are elemental & resto
I'm mainly asking about resto but when I'm elemental I always place down a fire totem. No reason not to, its a loss of dps. As resto I find myself asking this question alot which is why I'm posting here
I'll consider the stoneclaw thing though, I think I have a spare glyph spot in both for it

You are already at level 85? I'm still levelling my Resto shaman (66) and I have to say that also if there are two classes which give the same buff is not that big issue in normal dungeons (don't know about Heroics). Anyway in your scenario I will simply not drop any Earth totem and leave the "spot" free for the Tremor totem in case of necessity. Same goes for the air totems where usually I drop windfury or the spell haste totem (depending on how much melee/caster are in the party), but I'm ready to drop the Grounding totem when i know or learn that mob/boss require that kind of totem.

If I write something wrong, feel free to correct me ^^.