Salted

Trying to find some info on the benefit an elemental shammy has for a caster group vs melee.
Resto is obvious, but what about elemental?

the other 4 in the caster group would be something like shadow priest, moonkin druid, mage, mage.

Melee we'll assume warrior warrior rogue ret pally.


I searched for like half an hour, so if anyone has a thread link that would help as well.

 

Suazo

Enhancement Shaman in a melee group
Elemental Shaman in a caster group
Resto Shaman can fill in groups where needed

Shadow Priest, Mage, Mage, Mage (or Moonkin) for caster groups
Warrior, Rogue, Rogue, Druid for melee group

 

◊ Binkenstein

I think the question is: would the melee group get more DSP from WF/SoE than the Caster group getting WoA/ToW?

<Sporks> quote of the day: "it's like the vague leading the blind directing the clueless guiding the stupid around here"
Yahtzee In short, no. In long, noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
Nite_Moogle The correct answer here is to blame Asgorath.
Nemesis This is the BB, temporal constraints are for lesser forums.

 

Salted

Thats basically the question, but one thing not taken into account normally is the 5th dps caster, the shaman.

 

Megaera

I think I understand the question correctly...is this right:

"We have exactly one Shaman, and that Shaman is Elemental. Ought I put him in the melee group or the DPS caster group."

Have I got ya?

If I do, then I think the answer depends on group composition. To give an extreme example, if your melee DPS group consists of four Warriors, then the Shaman is going to belong in that group regardless of spec and gear level (see the WF v. GoA debate threads for details on just how astronomical a DPS increase Warriors see from having a rack of totems in their group). For anything less than a concocted theoretically-compelling example, the factors involved are myriad (gear, composition, relative skill of the players you have, reliability of the Shaman (i.e. may the casters re-gem their gear knowing that they'll always have the hit from ToW)).

The easiest way to tell, to be honest, is to run one week's raids with the Shaman in question in one group, log everything with WWS, then repeat the next week with the Shaman in the other group. You'll have to do some work to filter out the noise from things that vary from week to week, but it should be reasonably informative.

Also, the less-useful suggestion would just be to recruit a second Shaman. If your current Shaman is married to the Elemental tree, then leave him with the casters and recruit an Enhancement Shaman to feed your melee (the buffing difference between Enh and other specs is sizable, and detailed in other threads).

If I've totally misconstrued your question please rephrase it, and maybe we can be more helpful.

 

Northerner

If you only have one shaman and he is elemental, throw him in with the casters. It's not so much that he benefits them more than he might melee (I'd eyeball it as very close but increasing VT is always great) but that he really will want a shadow priest for his own use.

Reliability is a key indeed though. I'm still sitting at 13% hit even though I don't see my elemental shaman all the time anymore. I've got a couple of pieces I swap in and out but I'd certainly change up some if I could reliably get one again.

 

◊ Embar

Short answer: it depends.

Long answer:

For a melee group, the shaman provides Strength of Earth and Windfury. He can still give himself mana spring and Totem of Wrath. As mentioned, Windfury scales and is a big DPS increase for warriors and probably ret paladins, less so (but still a big increase) for rogues.
For a caster group, the shaman provides Wrath of Air, Totem of Wrath, and mana spring.

So in the most basic sense, the answer to your question is that the buff comparison is 86str (86ap for rogues, 172ap for warriors/ret pala/druids, not counting BoK) and WF vs 3% spellhit, 3% spellcrit, 12mp2(30mp5) and 121 (with T4 bonus) spelldmg.

My guild only had the 1 raiding elemental shaman (me) initially, and I raided that way from our first days in Karazhan through to VR before respeccing. From WWSes, giving the warriors/WF would always result in a bigger DPS increase than when I was with 3 mages and a shadowpriest. Offhand, the last time I had to stick one of my guild's DPS warriors outside of a shaman group for VR/Gruul, he did ~550dps instead of his usual ~700+dps (unfortunately, I cannot link you to the WWS since they have since expired - will try to link one if we face this situation again). So on benefit to group alone, I would stick the shaman in a melee group.

The tradeoff while buffing a melee group is of course the shaman's own efficiency. He loses a shadowpriest and the +121dmg from WoA, however this should be (anecdotally) sustainable if he chain-chugs super mana potions. An optimally-specced PvE elemental shaman with Totem of Wrath should have the mana regen from Unrelenting Storm to help regen issues as well, and there are a few other tricks that can help, such as equipping -cost to LB totems. If your shaman is willing to do this, then by all means put him in the melee group.

Looking at your suggested group setups, other things you would need to consider would be if you have any other classes that could fit in these groups, e.g. if you have a mage or destruction warlock out of a spriest group, you could put the mage in the caster group instead of the shaman. Or perhaps even a BM-specced hunter. If you have a feral druid, he might fit in the melee group.

If I had a choice of shaman specs, I would prioritize them this way in general:
Melee/Tank group - Enhancement > Restoration > Elemental
Caster - Elemental > Restoration

 

Salted

Thanks for the input from everyone.

 

• Starbucks

Honestly it would depend on the Shaman, WF/SoE even untalented is a bigger DPS increase to a melee DPS group that they can get, so if you have a melee DPS group then putting a shaman in there would increase DPS a lot.

However, that would depend on the shaman being sustainable without VT which is pretty possible with heavy potting but if the Shaman cannot sustain the DPS without potting it is best he is put in a group with a Shadow Priest.

In Summary:
Can the Shaman complete the encounter without VT?
If yes, and you have a melee group without a shaman put the shaman in the melee group
If no, then the DPS decrease of the shaman not being able to do damage would mean he would be better off in a Shadow Priest Group.

Although, with the group composition you posted Windfury would probably give a sufficient boost to allow for the compensation of less elemental shaman DPS, though that group composition is not ideal by any stretch of the imagination.

The benefactors bar has no threads as such, just multiple discussions in multiple threads. If you find a thread which is completely on topic then something is wrong

 

◊ Malan

One thing to consider is the spec of the warrior - if he's Arms, than putting the shaman (no matter what spec he is) into his group for WF totem will be a huge DPS increase, much larger than any caster will get from having the elemental shaman in his group.

Vyktianity already has over 75 billion followers. The first verse in his book "Gift of the Wild" is "In the beginning Vyk cast lifebloom and then maul."

 

tedv

This is definitely true. In that case, the shaman would be best off casting downranked Lightning Bolts for mana conservation reasons to make sure he always had enough mana to refresh totems. Bloodlust on the melee group will also be more damage than bloodlust in the caster group. His DPS will be terrible but it's the biggest net gain for the raid.

 

Avin

What? 30% haste on melee, ranged and spells means that melee will do roughly 30% more white damage during those 40 secs, while casters will cast 30% more spells which means all of their damage goes up by around 30% (DoTers don't gain as much even though the GCD is lowered too, but it's close to it with time for more direct damage). Warriors are a small exception in that they get more rage, which increases our DPS a bit more above 20% when we can only dump it in Heroic Strike, the only really noticable difference is when used in Execute range for a much more frequent rage inflow.

I don't disagree on any other point though, WF in a melee group with at least one Warrior, Fury or Arms, in it is very valuable.

 

Vandermonde

Well rogues are something like 2/3 white damage and have combat potency making it not just a white damage increase. Also, isn't haste additive, such that if you have one haste effect running, a second will reduce your swing time by x% of the base and not x% of the modified? I'm not too up on haste since I play what is perhaps the least haste-friendly dps role in the game, but assuming it does work like that it is much more than 30% thanks to s&d.

This is all a bit off-topic though since you can just bloodlust whatever group you want at 20% regardless of where the shaman started with a fairly trivial bit of work.

 

Aett

Melee DPS is a lot more complex than caster dps. You did a good job explaining warriors but missed the extra benefit rogues get through combat potency.

Melee dps is for the most part proc based, where as caster dps is much more flat. Correct me if I'm wrong but shadow priests and affliction locks both get less than a 30% increase in damage from Heroism because they're heavily reliant on DoTs and they don't tick any faster. This leaves elemental shamans, mages, and destruction locks as getting more or less a flat 30% increase in dps from heroism.

Pretty much every melee class, except maybe feral druids, get more than a 30% DPS increase from heroism.

 

Avin

It's too much math to really work out for sure, but yes I guess you two are right. Rogues do insane white damage and I certainly don't mind getting BL once in Execute range anyway

 

• Starbucks

Bloodlust will also mean more windfury procs which means a lot more rage, generally if the shaman can cope without a shadow priest (around 35% crit should be okay) and there is a melee DPS group (Warrior, Rogue, Rogue, Feral Druid/Rogue, <free spot>) that free spot should be a shaman if at all possible.

The benefactors bar has no threads as such, just multiple discussions in multiple threads. If you find a thread which is completely on topic then something is wrong

 

• sedrikk

This is a hotly debated topic in my guild currently. 9 times out of 10 we bring an enh shaman and stack a melee group with 1 or 2 warriors and the rest of the spots with rogues to take advantage of the enh shaman buffs. When possible I try to bring 3 shaman total, the other two are resto and go in a caster group and a healer group. Sometimes we bring 3 resto shaman and sit our enh shaman. But my #1 priority is always having a shaman in our melee group. Our casters and some other officers are wondering when we will start bringing an ele shaman to give casters the same synergy that the melee get with an enh shaman.

My first big concern is, does the ele shaman give the same overall dps increase to the casters as a enh shaman does to melee? Would i just be dropping our dps overall if i swapped an ele shaman for our enh shaman. Second if i brought both who else do i sit without gimping the raid.

Our usual raid makeup looks something like this
8 healers
3 pally
2 shaman
1 priest
1 druid
1 extra

2 tanks both warriors

8 ranged dps
2 mages
2 locks
2 hunter
2 shadow priest

7 melee
2 druids
2 warrior
2 rogue
1 enh shaman

Melee group will have the rogues, warriors and enh shaman
Caster group will have 2 mages, shadow priest, lock, resto shaman
Healing group will have 2 pally, 1 healing priest, 1 shadow priest, 1 resto shaman
The tank group will have warlock, 2 tanks, resto druid, pally
last group will have everyone thats left. 2 hunters, 2 druids, extra healer

Who do i sit to get the ele shaman in the raid? and am i making good use of the shaman buffs right now?

 

Plea

Topic mostly agrees on giving the melee the first shaman, even if he is elemental; so no, an elemental shaman wouldnt give your casters what an enchancement shaman gives to your melee.

Your elemental shaman would most likely replace that "1 extra" healer. That way you would group the resto shaman of the caster group with the animals to supply some support; and your elemental shaman would then replace his spot.

7 healers, or you may cut down one hunter too!

 

• Snowy

I love my WoA and mana spring and tide if it's a resto shaman, but WF/SOE/lust benefit melee a lot more I think. If we only had one shaman to bring to a 25 man raid (God forbid) I have a hunch he'd end up with the melee group.

Others touched on the points of how lust benefits melee more than casters too -- Combat Potency for rogues, and the fact that more hits = more rage for warriors.

Benefactors' Bar, where you get free English lessons:

 

tedv

Not remotely, but it's still an increase (if the shaman is reasonably geared), so still worth taking.

Yes, you would lose DPS. As others have said, cut the 8th healer. When you can give your healers a shadow priest, 7 or even 6 is enough for most fights. Killing the boss faster also means less healing needs to be done.

 

Mordinm

Every Melee class without exception will get less then 30% extra dps from bloodlust. The only possible exception is a warrior while the mob is in excitue range. Bloodlust will increase all white damage for melee by 30%. It will increase yellow damage by less then 30% in all cases. A warrior will get 30% more rage but all his cooldown will be unaffected so he has to use that rage in increasingly inefficent skills. A rogue may get more energy from combat potency but it's not close to 30% more energy then his total unbloodlusted energy so his yellow damage will go up by less then 30%. Same deal with druids as rogues. Mages and elemental shaman are just about the only classes that get a straight 30% dps buff.

 

◊ Malan

Call me crazy, but those 2 statements contradict.

Vyktianity already has over 75 billion followers. The first verse in his book "Gift of the Wild" is "In the beginning Vyk cast lifebloom and then maul."

 

Mordinm

Just acknowleging the possiblity that I may be wrong. It's happened before and it may just happen again.

 

Kegsta

We had this discussion a while back. In short I think it's a waste putting a single ele with the melle.

Shaman in caster group is buffing 5 people with 3 buffs. (4 if your ally)

Shaman in melle group is buffing 4 people with 2 buffs, these people are also losing 5% crit and self heal from LOTP. The druid who missed out on that group is now missing battleshout also.

Shaman loses his own group synergy lowering his damage a lot. Shadow priest restores less mana to his group without the shaman also.