I'm not using Mageblood. On progression stuff I'll use a Flask instead (boost DPS and mana gain) and on farmed stuff I'll just spend less mana by shocking less. JoW is quite rare (our Paladins are new, alts, or just not interested in meleeing stuff) and sometimes I won't get BoW (Salv is more important). 350 mana is about what I get per SRproc (going higher with the trinket), but it's the two minutes in between that can be an issue.

Some back of the envelope maths for two minutes of combat (I realize due to shocks and SS cooling down at the same time, throwing off timers slightly that these figures will be slightly inflated).
Earth Shock every 12 seconds = 535*(120/12) = 5350
Flame Shock every 12 seconds = 500*(120/12) = 5000
Stormstrike every 10 seconds = 8% of base mana. From armoury, this is about 3300 mana = 3300*0.08*(120/10) = 3168

Which is about ~13k mana used every two minutes not including any other costs (Totems, heals, Bloodlust). From my WWSs, I gain around 3-4k per Shamanistic Rage cooldown or every two minutes (this is assuming no procs are wasted "overhealing" my mana pool). Given my 7k mana pool, that's a 2-3k worth of mana that I don't have, whilst going balls to the wall. With a Fel Mana Potion (3.2k mana per 2 minutes), that about covers my mana costs, but you can see, it's already cutting it close.

Edit: Just for comparison:
Talented BoW: 41*(120/5)*1.2 = 1180 mana every 2 minutes
Mageblood (16mp5): 16*(120/5) = 384 mana every 2 minutes (not sure where you got 1820m per minute from)

What I meant by trading melee damage for magic damage is that because you have more melee stats and less int, you run out of mana faster, therefore you can Shock less, spending your mana on more efficient attacks (Stormstrike), essentially trading magic damage for melee damage. I'm thinkng (out loud, I guess) about whether this is a good way to go, considering I like to leave a small buffer in my mana pool for things like Greater Elemental Totems, heals, and Bloodlust.

http://www.wowhead.com/?item=30039

boe pattern drop in SSC, boots are bop

Being tired and drunk while posting is never a good idea, and shows in my horrible math mistakes. I don't even know where I got that number from now, I'm going to have to include disclaimers in the future.

You might want to take some points out of healing focus and put them into mental quickness. I'm pretty sure they fixed it so that it works with all instant cast spells (totems, bloodlust, etc). That would save you (over 2 minutes) a little over 800 mana, not counting totem drops. Also, are you using mana spring as your water totem? 12mp2 is 720 mana over 2 minutes. Mental quickness + mana spring + mageblood should just about cover the 2-3k mana you need if you can't get JoW.

Even going full bore it's almost impossible to generate more than 10% of your damage from shocks, so I just don't use them past keeping a Flame Shock up, or using Lightning Shield on bosses that will trigger it (still the most mana efficient damage you've got). Keeping some mana for emergency heals or totems is much more important.

I wear almost entirely leather, and have trouble dropping my mana pool. In fact, SR gives me back so much mana that I usually drop a fire nova totem during the SR to get a little extra DPS in. If JOW is up, I find myself wishing I had a better mana dump as I spam shocks, stormstrike and fire nova totems (as cooldown allows).

If it's a fight where I do a lot of spot healing (Say.. .morogrim, where he does 5k damage to the entire raid, so I chainheal my party a few times)... then I tend to have just enough mana with SR, while keeping stormstrikes in my rotation but having dropped shocks.

Mana regeneration is not a problem once you get geared up

I am trying to decide on a glove slot and I would like some input on my theorycrafting.


I recently got my T4 chest, bringing me up to 3/5 for the set, and am now considering the 4-piece bonus (+30 damage to each weapon on Stormstrike). I am wearing Felfury Gauntlets (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=23531) and am thinking of switching to the Tier 4 gloves (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=29039).


Due to gem requirements for my meta slot, I would lose 4stam, 0.56% crit, and 12 AP. I would gain 1% hit, 5 mp5 (blah), and the +30 damage to Stormstrike, which comes out to 420 AP on SS, I believe.



So, I would like to hear what you guys think about this switch; I am thinking Teir 4 would win in this situation. Am I missing something? Is the SS buff worth it? Is this too lame to even consider?

I'd keep the original. More Stam, less Enchanting costs.

I thought 7str = 14 ap = 1 dps for shaman, so the 4p bonus is actually 84 AP.

If you can pick up the fiend slayer boots, you can keep your meta gem bonus and get the T4 gloves.

I love a haste build. I rarely see my smithing hammer slower than 1.5 speed with my haste items: Dragonspine, Hammer, Mongoose x2, Thundering Meta. I know my stats could be higher with the axe, different metas, etc. But it's the DPS we do, not the stats for our epeen.

I wear a mix of leather and mail, and just about any time I hit a trinketed SR (I usually try to save SR for during Heroism if I am going to use Heroism in a fight) I will have more mana than I know what to do with. Unless I am worried about missing an interrupt or I need my GCD clear for a SS to proc WF, I will be spamming shocks. Flame Shock -> Earth Shock -> Goto Flame Shock.

I generally do not have mana issues. The other thing, though, is I think some people 'save' Shamanic Rage for too long. SR is not an "Oh shit" ability. It's something that should be used frequently. On trash or what-have-you I'll pretty much always pop it when it's up. If it's a big fight, I will usually (like I said) time SR to Heroism, but I try to not dip below 30-40% mana unless it's a no-brainer fight. There's plenty of theory-bullshit about how, "Enhancement Shaman shouldn't heal! Your healers suck!" I think that's a crock. For 25-man raids (which I run few of right now) I can see how it would be almost entirely useless to try to heal, however, for Karazan and 5-mans, I have saved asses numerous times with a simple LHW or HW (I chose to spec it down to 2 sec instead of the 5% mana savings). Many times tossing a heal to a healer, or healing Garotte victims in the Moroes fight during Vanish, has made all the difference.

Longwinded reply ftl >.<
In any case, I find myself using SR at around 40% mana, because I simply don't want to be OOM in a fight. If you see your mana bar almost full, and you've still got SR time left...start dumping mana (well not stupidly). Earth Shock is fantastic for this

Just a note on the Thundering. I _very_ strongly think this is the wrong gem choice for Enh. The internal cooldown doesn't synergize with Windfury the way mongoose/dragonspine do. The hasted time is low, and it provides no passive benefit. It also provides a benefit that can be gained in other places (the haste effect).

I picked up the TSD and did some testing (pretty informal, admittedly, Disquette puts me to shame), but I found that, at least for my gear/build, the +12 agi +3% crit damage provides far more of a consistent benefit.

The reason is that this gem is, basically, a straight 3% damage increase to ~25-35% of your damage. It helps Windfury damage with both the additional crit, and crit damage. The short-duration of the haste gem makes it somewhat useless with improving time between WF proc cooldowns. The other thing about this gem is that it actually scales with haste better than the haste gem...seriously, think about it. As you stack haste, you will get faster white hits, which means more crits. As you stack haste with the TSD...you get no real benifit except for faster chances, outside of the 45s cooldown, to get some more haste for a very short duration.

I feel haste is very important for Enhancement, however I think that it's advantages lie in passive effects, and procs with no internal cooldown. Just my opinion, though. I drool over your trinket though

From some of the responses, it seems people aren't using their Shocks everytime their cooldown is up, which confuses me. Alternating ES and FS with Misery, CoE, SS debuff, and Imp. Scorch is ~156 DPS. Obviously, if you're mana constrained you should be forgoing Shocks in favour of Stormstrikes, but if you're talking about solely maximizing damage, there should be no reason for not shocking.

What I'm curious about is how Int (and mp5, I guess) translates to DPS. More back of the envelope maths to follow:

Compare Cyclone Shoulderplates to Bladed Shoulderpads of the Merciless. Ignoring set bonuses and gems, it's a comparison of +0.03% hit, 18 Int (270 mana) vs .23% crit, 6 AP. 270 mana is half an Earth Shock.

If you are ever mana-starved (and I think I've showed it's possible, please respond if you disagree), the mail gives some benefit the leather doesn't. Since some say 1 SR will fill their mana bar, we can equate this to half another ES per 2 minutes, which is 420 damage, which is 3.5 dps over 2 minutes. Factor in 14% resist rate for level 73 (assuming Nature's Guidance) is ~3dps. Forget the +1 hit rating the mail has for now.

Does .23% crit, 6 AP on the leather give that much DPS gain? I'm not sure, but I think it's close. Factor in extra melee DPS and the extra DPS from the mana gain from SR due to the AP and what do we get? I got about 700 dps on Gruul last week. factoring in the crit gives (.23% melee dps gain, about 90% of my DPS as melee) about 1.63 DPS gain. How much DPS does 6 AP give? (I don't know offhand, someone help me out). Factor in armour on a Sundered+FFed mob, and what do we get?

If we have Kings, the difference is 297 mana vs. 0.15% crit, 1 AP, which should be a no brainer for the mail. Is there a hole in my reasoning anywhere?

Unfortunately, Healing Focus isn't something I'm willing to spec less in, I love it for 5 man/heroics. You're right about Mana Spring, I forgot about that (and Water Shield). I maintain that mageblood is not as good as a Flask though.

I believe the 14 AP = 1 DPS is just auto-attack, no dual wield/flurry/SS/WF considered.

I wasn't able to pin down if this was discussed already but would it be better to enchant dual weild with Crusader or Potency?

Crusader has a +60 str bonus at level 70 while Potency delivers +40 at all times. Would it be better for sustained DPS to use Potency? Since I understand Mongoose speed buff overwrites Flurry and agi delivers a whole 0 AP I've pretty much decided against it and it's overpriced nature.

Mongoose > Crusader > Potency, generally. Tour results my vary slightly.

4.8% crit per proc is pretty nice though.

Also:

Pretty funny really.

Quick question: Does Stormstrike/Windfury contribute to the Darkmoon Crusade card AP stacks? Just considering the benefits of this card to spend the gold on the purchase.

I do not shock every time the cooldown is up. I have a little Windfury cooldown meter, and if I am approaching the end of a Windfury cooldown, and SS is going to be up, I delay shocking to hit SS as soon as the WF CD is up. It may be better to just shock, and hit SS if I still don't windfury after the GCD.

Does anyone know the mana regen to threat amount, On threat sensative fights or agro switching bosses, using SR for me atleast is very dangerous, i see my tps go from around 650-900 to as high 1100-1300. (this is when the SR ticks are between 400-500)

And a second question, when i'm full on mana do i continue to get threat when the mana is being wasted?

I know their are ways to avoid the threat, using it at oppertune moments etc.


10% of my dmg is from shocks, I doubt we would see a rogue or warrior stop using an ability that would gain them 10% more dmg, so why would a shaman?

Mana gain is 0.5x (so half of untalented damage basically), can't remember if 'wasted' mana gains cause threat.

Mana regen generates the same threat as healing, .5 of whatever the value is. I believe over-regen is just like over-heal, and does not generate any threat.

http://www.wowwiki.com/Formulas:Kencos_Research

Sometimes I throw down TA for my SR/Bloodlust/Trinket activation, just to be on the safe side. Threat meter has a tendency to be a little off sometimes, I've seen warriors in my group pull aggro when KTM said they were 30k below the MT.

My group would not appreciate getting TA when its no use to them.

And thanks for clearing that up.

Essentially my rotation is to Flame Shock when SS isn't on the mob with an extra FS for the dot/mana efficiency. ES only feels worth it to me when the +20% nature debuff is up. If I weren't the only shaman in the guild and we had an elemental I'd probably change that drastically.