Is Ele tied down to 1H + Shield?

[Narfwak]

For encounters with physical raid damage or random add aggro a shield is pretty damn useful. There are almost none of these encounters anymore. Pretty much everyone used the Halfus off-hand item last tier instead of the shield from Atremedes because the shield was itemized poorly, but because there are literally zero situations in T11 content with unavoidable physical raid damage that is mitigated by armor it doesn't matter at all.

Staves are a bit trickier, as you can't have the reserve option of grabbing your shield out of your bags mid-fight (at the very least you should still have a shield, even if it's the crafted stormshield or a PvP shield) unless you also have a reserve main-hand weapon. As far as I can tell, though, there are still no encounters in T12 where the armor of a raid member that isn't a tank actually matters, so it's a moot point.

As far as raw stats are concerned I'm pretty sure that a 391 Eye of Purification/397 Kogun, Hammer of the Firelord + 391 Ward of the Red Widow are going to be superior to any staff as long as you can get them without a problem. If you can't, sure, get a staff. It's not the end of the world. As far as the legendary goes, well, it's a 397 orange with an obscenely powerful proc, so if your guild actually thinks its a good idea to give it to an elemental shaman then it's obviously best in slot.

[Deleted]

I blocked a Melee hit from Baleroc once, the second hit didn't go so well....Most of the AoE damage we take as DPS is magical and negates an armour bonus anyway.

[Namana]

Your math seems off. MH+shield+chant=385 int. Less than staff.

You're forgetting the gem slot in the shield. If you put a 40int gem in there it becomes: 40 (gem) + 40 (chant) + 170 (shield) + 175 (dagger) = 425int, which is better than the 408 int on the staff. Plus don't forget the staff is horribly itemized for ele. Also, if you get the shield off Beth, the MH/OH will be even better.

[msdos]

hell yeah, rock the staff. reminds me of the old days when they used to put +str on staves and make the top-end damage really high. used to own clothies in duels with them with that imba ass rockbiter.

(this was back when you had to spec into 2 handers)

[Deleted]

Getting the second legendary, just to defy the troll and tards who say that shaman can ONLY use shields. Nomnomnom

[Deleted]

I was told by my GM that Ele is 'tied down' to one handers and shields

Warning ! Total BS detected !

[Weerra]

There are offhands that are not shields BTW. (Not sure how to add Wowhead mouseover links in this forum =x)

You find the items in MMOChampion database and there will be a button that makes you code that you post in the forum for tooltipped link.