[Elemental Shaman] - Wotlk Talents discussion

tufy · 06/13/08, 6:55 AM

After a short discussion within Binkie’s One Stop Elemental Shop, I’ve been convinced to open a new thread concerning Wotlk talents in F&F Alpha. In order to keep One Stop Elemental Shop clean, let’s discuss all current and future changes here. I’ll try to keep this post updated with new info as much as I can

UPDATE: 20.9.2008 - Updated with known build 8970 changes (latest changes in bold)

TALENTS:

http://www.mmo-champion.com/talent/?shaman

PATCH NOTES:

Shaman
* All totems have been changed to last 5 minutes instead of 2. (This only affects totems that previously had a 2 minute timer, obviously, totems with a shorter duration didn't get any increase)
* All totems are now considered on the "Physical" school, and no longer magical spells.
* Concussion (Elemental) now increases the damage of your Thunder and Lava Burst spells.
* Convection (Elemental) now also lowers the mana cost of Lava Burst.
* Call of Flame (Elemental): Now also increases the damage of your Lava Burst spell by 2/4/6%.
* Improved Fire Nova Totem (Tier 4) now has a 50/100% chance to stun targets hit by Fire Nova Totem for 2 secs.
* Call of Thunder (Elemental) now also increases the critical strike chance of your Thunder spell.
* Call of Thunder and Elemental Fury swapped in places. Elemental Fury now costs 5 talent points and Call of Thunder costs 1.
* Earth's Grasp (Elemental) is now a an enhancement talent.
* Elemental Devastation (Elemental) is now a tier-2 talent, up from tier-4.
* Eye of the Storm (Tier 4) changed to give you a 23/46/70% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage while casting Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Lava Burst and Hex spells.
* Elemental Precision (Elemental): Chance to hit reduced to 1/2/3% from 2/4/6%, but threat reduction increased to 10/20/30% up from 4/7/10%.
* Storm Reach (Elemental): Now also increases the radius of your Thunder spell by 10/20%.
* Elemental Shields (Elemental) now reduces all physical damage taken by 6%.
* Elemental Oath (Elemental): Your spell critical strikes grant your party or raid Elemental Oath, increasing critical strike chance by 3%. Lasts 15 seconds.
* Totem of Wrath (Elemental): Summons a Totem of Wrath with 5 health at the feet of the caster. The totem increases the damage done by spells and effects by 280 for all party and raid members, and increases the critical strike chance of spells and effects by 3% against all enemies within 40 yards. Lasts 2 min.
* Lava Flows (Tier 9): increases the range of your flame Shock spell by 5/10/15 yards, and increases the critical strike damage bonus of your Lava Burst spell by an additional 6/12/24%.
* Astral Shift (Elemental) reduces all damage taken by 30% while stunned, feared or silenced.
* Reduces the cooldown of your Chain Lightning spell by 2.5 sec., your Earth Shock's range is increased by 5 yards and the periodic damage done by your Flame Shock is increased by 50%.
* Totemic mastery (Restoration) removed, all totem ranges increased from 20 to 30 yards.
* Nature's Guidance (Restoration) removed.
* Healing Focus (Restoration) is now 3-point spell, down from 5-point.
* Totemic Focus (Restoration) moved to Tier-1, up from Tier-2.
* Tidal Focus (Restoration) moved to Tier-2, down from Tier-1.
* Enhancing (Enhancement) Totems is now a Tier 1 talent, up from Tier-2.
* Ancestral Knowledge (Enhancement): Now increases your Intellect by 2/4/6/8/10%, instead of increasing your total Mana by 2/4/6/8/10%.
* New Talent: Elemental Shields (Enhancement): Increases the damage done by your Lightning Shield orbs by 5/10/15%, increases the amount of mana gained from your Mana Shield orbs by 5/10/15% and increases the amount of healing done by your Earth Shield orbs by 5/10/15%.
* Thundering Strikes (Enhancement) now increase spell crit chance as well.
* Elemental Weapons moved from Tier 5 to Tier 3. Now Increases the damage caused by your Windfury Weapon effect by 13/27/40% increases the spell damage on your Flametongue Weapon by 10/20/30% and increases the bonus healing on your Earthliving Weapon by 10/20/30%.
* New Talent: Mental Dexterity (Enhancement) - Increases your Attack Power by 33/66/100% of your Intellect.
* Mental Dexterity moved from Tier 3 to Tier 5.
* Shamanistic Focus (Enhancement) now reduces mana cost of all shocks by 45% (previously reduced shock mana cost by 60% after melee crit)
* Wrath of Air Totem is now a flat 5% spell haste totem.
* Flametongue Totem is now a flat spell damage totem. All ranks have been modified. Top rank: 144 spellpower
* Flametongue Weapon now increases spell damage in addition to it's damage proc chance (currenty top rank is 211 spell damage)
* Frostbrand's snare effect has been increased to 50%, up from 25%.
* Ghost Wolf's mana cost is now 3% base mana.
* New ranks have been added of Water Shield, starting at level 20. (Level 20, 27, 34, 41, 48, 55, 62, 69)
* Shapeshifting will no longer cancel Water Walking.
* Stoneskin Totem now increases armor instead of reducing physical damage.
* Tranquil Air Totem has been removed. (Threat is being addressed by modifications to the base threat of players and/or "baked" into tanking abilities.)
* Windwall Totem has been removed.
* Bloodlust and Heroism affect whole raid and have been changed to add: After the completion of this effect, those affected will become Sated (Exhausted in Heroism's case) and unable to benefit from Bloodlust (Heroism) again for 5 min.

SPELL PUSHBACK CHANGE:

General
Spell casting and spell channelling pushback has been changed to the following:
When casting a spell:

* The first and second hit will add .5 secs each to the cast time.
* All hits after the second will have no effect.

When channelling a spell:

* The first and second hit reduces current duration by 25% of total duration each.
* All hits after the second will have no effect.

SPELL HIT RATING IN WOTLK

As confirmed by Roywyn, spell hit rating in WotLK remains unchanged at 17%.

GLYPHS:

* Glyph - Water Shield 01 (Shaman) - Your Water Shield has 3 additional charges.
* Glyph - Chain Heal 01 (Shaman) - Your Chain Heal heals 1 additional target.
* Glyph - Lesser Healing Wave 01 (Shaman) - Your Lesser Healing Wave heals for 20% more if the target is also affected by your Earth Shield.
* Glyph - Earthliving Weapon 01 (Shaman) - Increases the chance for your Earthliving weapon to trigger by 5%.
* Glyph - Healing Wave 01 (Shaman) - Your Healing Wave also heals you for 20% of the healing effect when you heal someone else.
* Glyph - Mana Tide 01 (Shaman) - Your Mana Tide Totem grants an additional 1% of each target's maximum mana each time it pulses.
* Glyph - Earth Shock 01 (Shaman) - Reduces the global cooldown triggered by your Earth Shock ability by 1 sec.
* Glyph - Frost Shock 01 (Shaman) - Increases the duration of your Frost Shock by 2 sec.
* Glyph - Strength of Earth 01 (Shaman) - Your Strength of Earth Totem also grants 1% melee and ranged critical strike chance.
* Glyph - Windfury Weapon 01 (Shaman) - The attack power bonus on the additional attacks granted by Windfury Weapon is increased by 40%.
* Glyph - Stormstrike 01 (Shaman) - Increases the nature damage bonus from your Stormstrike ability by an additional 8%.
* Glyph of Flame Shock (Shaman) - Increases the duration of your Flame Shock ability by 3 sec.
* Glyph - Lighnting Shield 01 (Shaman) - Increases the damage from Lightning Shield by 20%.
* Glyph - Chain Lightning 01 (Shaman) - Your Chain Lightning strikes 1 additional target.
* Glyph - Fire Nova Totem 01 (Shaman) - Increases the radius of Fire Nova Totem's effect by 2 yards.
* Glyph - Flametongue Weapon 01 (Shaman) - Increases spell critical strike chance by 2% while Flametongue Weapon is active.
* Glyph - Totem of Wrath 01 (Shaman) - Your Totem of Wrath also grants 1% spell haste.
* Glyph - Lightning Bolt 01 (Shaman) - Reduces the cost of your Lightning Bolt ability by -10%.
* Glyph - Earth Elemental Totem 01 (Shaman) - Reduces the cooldown of your Earth Elemental Totem by 3 min.
* Glyph - Fire Elemental Totem 01 (Shaman) - Reduces the cooldown of your Fire Elemental Totem by 3 min.
* Glyph - Healing Stream Totem 01 (Shaman) - Your Healing Stream Totem heals for an additional 20%.

NEW SPELLS:

Wind Shock
8% base mana
20 yd range
instant cast
7 sec cooldown
Instantly blasts the target with a gust of wind, causing no damage but lowering your threat, making the enemy less likely to attack you, and interrupts spellcasting and prevents any spell in that school from being cast for 2 sec.

Lava Burst (Rank 1)
10% Base Mana
30 yd range
2s cast time
8 sec cooldown
You hurl molten lava at the target, dealing 920 to 1172 Fire damage. If your Flame Shock is on the target, Lava Burst will consume the Flame Shock, causing Lava Burst to critically hit.

Hex (Rank 1)
3% Base Mana
20 yd range
1.5s cast time
45 sec cooldown
Transforms the enemy into a frog. While hexed, the target cannot attack or cast spells. Damage caused may interrupt the effect. Lasts 30 sec. Only one target can be hexed at a time. Only works on Humanoids and Beasts.

Thunderstorm (Rank 1)
Talented (tier 11)
0 Mana
Instant
45sec cooldown
You call down a bolt of lightning, energizing you and damaging nearby enemies within 10 yards. Restores 5% mana to you and deals 1450 to 1656 Nature damage to all nearby enemies, knocking them back 20 yards.

SPELL CHANGES

Wrath of Air Totem
320 mana
Air Totem
Summons a Wrath of Air Totem with 5 health at the feet of the caster. The totem provides 5% spell haste to all party members within 20 yards. Lasts 2 min.

Flametongue Totem
325 mana
Fire Totem
Summons a Flametongue Totem with 5 health at the feet of the caster. Party members within 30 yards of the totem have their spell damage and healing increased by up to 144. Lasts 2 min.

Stoneskin Totem (Rank 8)
295 mana
Earth Totem
Summons a Stoneskin Totem with 5 health at the feet of the caster. The totem protects party members within 20 yards, increasing armor by 860. Lasts 2 min.

Strength of Earth Totem (rank 6)
300 mana
Earth Totem
Summons a Strength of Earth Totem with 5 health at the feet of the caster. The totem increases the strength and agility by 86 to all party members within 20 yards. Lasts 2 min.

Sentry Totem
no change

According to Koraa, Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning have their special damage coefficients removed, this change being compensated by adding nature boost to Curse of Elements:

Lightning Bolt always had a higher coefficient than similar bolt spells. This was because there weren't as much/any nature damage debuffs. Now that they exist, we're restoring Lightning Bolt to it's intended coefficient. Your DPS in a raid setting will if anything be higher with these changes.

WoW Forums -> Lightning bolt coefficient nerf?

BUFF/DEBUFF CHANGES

With the release of upcoming content patch players will see a change in the way we allow buffs and debuffs to stack exclusively in a raid. For the most part, what this change means is that many buffs and debuffs that were previously allowed to stack together no longer can, and that many buffs and debuffs that only a single talent specialization could bring can now be brought by multiple different specializations. The philosophy behind this change shows up in many of the changes we have made in Wrath of The Lich King, such as when we made almost all buffs raid-wide. We want players to be able to form raids and parties based on who they want to play with, rather than who has the correct talents and abilities to min-max their raid performance.

Raid composition will still matter to some extent, but without this change, it would have overwhelmed every other aspect of raid planning (as we added new capabilities to each of 30 different talent trees). You no longer need to rigidly control the melee/spellcaster balance of your raid, or make sure every group has all the critical buffing classes, etc. This change has many class balance implications.

IMPORTANT! Before we are done, we will thoroughly test the performance of every class. It should not be assumed that one class' current performance relative to others in beta is final. Some classes (and specializations) will need to be reduced in power and some increased. Many may feel the change has more impact on class X than class Y. We will address all of those concerns via our internal testing and community feedback.

There are thirty or so different categories into which buffs and debuffs fit. Here you will find a comprehensive list of the changes made broken down by category and which spells/talents are in that category.

* Armor Debuff (Major): Acid Spit (exotic Hunter pet), Expose Armor, Sunder Armor
* Armor Debuff (Minor): Faerie Fire, Sting (Hunter pet), Curse of Recklessness
* Physical Vulnerability Debuff: Blood Frenzy, (2nd Talent Spec TBA)
* Melee Haste Buff: Improved Icy Talons, Windfury Totem
* Melee Critical Strike Chance Buff: Leader of the Pack, Rampage
* Attack Power Buff (Flat Add): Battle Shout, Blessing of Might
* Attack Power Buff (Multiplier): Abomination's Might, Trueshot Aura, Unleashed Rage
* Ranged Attack Power Buff: Hunter's Mark (only Hunters benefit, so no need to exclude against other class abilities)
* Bleed Damage Increase Debuff: Mangle, Trauma
* Spell Haste Buff: Wrath of Air Totem
* Spell Critical Strike Chance Buff: Moonkin Aura, Elemental Oath
* Spell Critical Strike Chance Debuff: Improved Scorch, Winter's Chill
* Increased Spell Damage Taken Debuff: Ebon Plaguebringer, Earth and Moon, Curse of the Elements
* Increased Spell Power Buff: Focus Magic, Improved Divine Spirit, Flametongue Totem, Totem of Wrath, Demonic Pact
* Increased Spell Hit Chance Taken Debuff: Improved Faerie Fire, Misery
* Percentage Haste Increase (All Types): Improved Moonkin Aura, Swift Retribution
* Percentage Damage Increase: Ferocious Inspiration, Sanctified Retribution
* Critical Strike Chance Taken Debuff (All types): Heart of the Crusader, Totem of Wrath
* Melee Attack Speed Slow Debuff: Icy Touch, Infected Wounds, Judgements of the Just, Thunderclap
* Melee Hit Chance Reduction Debuff: Insect Swarm, Scorpid Sting
* Healing Debuff: Wound Poison, Aimed Shot, Mortal Strike, Furious Attacks
* Attack Power Debuff: Demoralizing Roar, Curse of Weakness, Demoralizing Shout
* Stat Multiplier Buff: Blessing of Kings
* Stat Add Buff: Mark of the Wild
* Agility and Strength Buff: Strength of Earth Totem, Horn of Winter
* Stamina Buff: Power Word: Fortitude
* Health Buff: Commanding Shout, Blood Pact
* Intellect Buff: Arcane Intellect, Fel Intelligence
* Spirit Buff: Divine Spirit, Fel Intelligence
* Damage Reduction Percentage Buff: Grace, Blessing of Sanctuary
* Percentage Increase Healing Received Buff: Tree of Life, Improved Devotion Aura
* Armor Increase Percentage Buff: Inspiration, Ancestral Healing
* Cast Speed Slow: Curse of Tongues, Slow, Mind-numbing Poison.

In each category, you can only benefit from the most powerful spell granting that effect. For example, Fel Intelligence grants spirit and intellect, both weaker than Arcane Intellect and Divine Spirit. If a player has Fel Intelligence and receives a stronger Arcane Intellect buff, he will gain the intellect value from Arcane Intellect and the spirit value from Fel Intelligence.

In most cases, fully-talented players will have exactly equal power on the strength of these buffs and debuffs. Fel Intelligence is an example of where one ability is weaker than others. The buffs in the "Increased Spell Power Buff" category are also not all the same potency, as they scale and grow in radically different ways. In virtually every other case, however, the buffs are equal. This means, for example, that fully-talented Battle Shout and Blessing of Might now grant the exact same amount of attack power.

In addition to this change, we also needed to address the "mana battery" roles in a raid. The mana regeneration effect they grant is no longer limited to their own party, and it no longer depends on the amount of damage they deal. Each time they trigger the mana regeneration effect, 10 people in their raid group will receive a buff which causes them to regenerate 0.5% of their maximum mana each second. This buff, Replenishment, will be given preferentially to raid members with the lowest mana, but will re-evaluate which raid members receive it each time it is fired. Replenishment is provided by Shadow Priests, Survival Hunters, and Retribution Paladins.

Finally, we have modified Heroism and Bloodlust to affect the entire raid. However, all affected raid members will be unable to cast or benefit from Bloodlust/Heroism for 5 minutes.

Below you will find a list of the changes to abilities which exhibit new behavior regardless of the exclusive categories. The changes usually mean the old behavior was removed and replaced by the new behavior. Numbers listed are for maximally-talented versions. Here is that list of changes:

* Improved Scorch: Increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Winter's Chill: Also increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Elemental Oath: Grants 5% spell crital strike to raid members.
* Improved Moonkin Aura: Grants 3% haste of all types.
* Earth and Moon: Increases spell damage taken from all schools by 13% on the target.
* Misery: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit.
* Shadow Weaving: Buffs only self.
* Improved Shadow Bolt: Buffs only self.
* Expose Weakness: Buffs only self.
* Shadow Embrace: Buffs only self.
* Blood Pact: Grants health instead of Stamina.
* Fel Intelligence: Has replacement ranks that grant flat values of Intellect and Spirit.
* Frost Aura: Excludes properly against all other resistance buffs.
* Grace: Reduces damage taken by target by 3%.
* Rampage: Increases melee and ranged critical strike chance by 5% for the raid.
* Improved Faerie Fire: No longer benefits melee and ranged hit chance, only spell hit.
* Hunter's Mark: No longer increases attack power bonus from attacks against the target.
* Improved Hunter's Mark: No longer grants melee attack power.
* Sting (Hunter pet): Now acts as a minor armor debuff.
* Waylay: Attack speed reduction changed to 20%.
* Icy Touch: Only slows melee attack speed (not ranged or spell).
* Tree of Life: No longer grants healing based on spirit, grants 3% increased healing received to raid.
* Demonic Pact: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
* Focus Magic: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
* Totem of Wrath: Now grants a flat amount of spell damage, and all enemies in its radius have an increased chance of being struck by criticals.
* Heroism: Cannot be recast while caster has Exhausted debuff, and those with Exhausted debuff cannot be affected by it.
* Bloodlust: Cannot be recast while caster has Sated debuff, and those with Sated debuff cannot be affected by it.
* Vampiric Touch: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on dealing damage.
* Hunting Party: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on specified shots.
* Judgements of the Wise: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on Judging.

NOTE: this post is still under construction and will be updated as much as I can keep it.

tufy · 06/13/08, 7:17 AM

Obsolete discussion based on Alpha data:

Overall, the changes seem to be aimed in two directions:
1. making top elemental build viable in pvp and countering its biggest weaknesses
2. changing spell rotation by adding a fire nuke into the rotation. Actual dps and rotation will depend on Lava Burst's power.

I've ran a few fast numbers comparing Lava Burst and Lightning Bolt. Lava Burst gains 1.31 modifier for scaling, while Lightning spells have a 1.35 modifier. This leads me to believe that Lava Burst will be superior to Lightning Bolt spam or CL-3LB / CL-4LB rotation if we have Flame Shock on the target (assured crit and through it cheaper Flame Shock reapplication + CL or LB following it), while otherwise LB and CL will be superior. This leads me to believe we'll see either FS->CL-LB->Lava Burst or FS->LB-LB->Lava Burst rotation as our primary dps. Actual data on Lava Burst and additional theorycrafting should prove the best result. Downside? We'll be forced into 20 yard range due to Flame Shock's lesser range. This may prove to be a negative aspect.

The new Spellpower stat (+dmg) works differently than reported before, too - instead of giving a set bonus and then boosting that bonus within healing tree, ALL heals now get innate increased bonus from the stat. This means both Elemental and Enhancement Shamans will be good offspec healers, compareable to Elemental or Enhancement spec in Resto gear. However, what makes this change impressive is the fact that gear swapping isn’t needed - in other words, both specs will be capable of emergency offhealing if needed in the middle of the raid (same goes for all healer classes of course).

Throwing a fast look at the talent trees, I can see a real hybrid rising out of it - the gear may no longer be the issue.

I've personally ran a quick number comparison to see how this scales with a fire mage - the result is roughly 100 dps advantage for a fire mage at 2000 +dmg and 20% crit on gear for CL-3LB rotation (ignoring haste effect). No idea how this will be affected by Lava Burst, though, nor did I run any numbers for different stats and builds yet.

Graze · 06/13/08, 7:19 AM

I'm dissapointed.

So they want Elemental Dev. to be a hybrid talent? Fine, with the ratings change it might be usefull for our melee brothers.
Still a bunch of no good talents.

Other thoughts:
A 2 sec stun on fire nova? Ain't gonna help elemental to get away.

Lightning Mastery is still gimped, T6 talent for only -.5 cast time?

Elemental Oath seems pretty useless, you ought to be hit capped anyway, that occasional 1% (assuming it ignores the 1% "miss" cap") ain't gonna help anything much.

I don't know exactly how Astrall shift would work but to me it seems that you rarely get critted twice in a row (Yes I know it will probably ignore resilience, but still), thus making this a lackluster talent.

Storm Earth and Fire makes me cry a little on the inside, what did they smoke when they made this up? I don't see how anything of this is gonna help anywhere except the ES change when interupting spells in PvP, 30 yards (with pvp gloves) sure seems nice, but only a 25% chance to root, on a 6(5) second cooldown on such talent so high in the tree.

Thunders seems able to compete with NS (restoration 21 point) for PvP, so no complaints there, this can't possibly be our only means of restoring mana though, so for that it seems weak.

Other remarks:
Still no pushback resistance, nor AoE. I really hope to see Forked Lightning as a trainable spell.

Totems still needs an overhaul, and some talents needs improving.

Lightning Mastery could give Chain Lightning a X% chance to Daze the target for ~5 seconds. Giving Heroic Strike/Steady Shot a small boost in PvE, and giving us a PvP boost.

I also don't see how they could make Elemental Oath work, as the Clearcasting state already reduces the mana cost, it would perhaps give some haste?

Elemental Percision giving 30% -threat makes me think, does this mean we can actually pull aggro in wotlk? Because out threat scales very poorly at the moment thanks to our overall poor scaling, making this a feat in our current situtation, I have a good feeling about this.

Also I'm curious about Lava Burst, does it have a cast time? Does it have a cooldown? (I bet the answer isn't no on both), is this the new nuke, or some sort of "new shock". I don't see how throwing instants (with a short range) should improve dps, making me a little confused on how the Flame Shock consuming is supposed to be synergy between Elem and Enhance, the Lava Burst enhancing talents are way to far down to make it a spell primarly meant for enhancement.

EDIT: I was also expecting a little more synergy, some debuff or other buff uniqe to the Elemental tree, making our presence in raids more important. Yet nothing has happened here, the "new" Curse doesn't even include Nature damage.
EDIT2: Sorry if it seems I'm just complaining, I'm a tad angry, it hurts me seeing the class(and specc) I love so much receive so little love.

Lucitron · 06/13/08, 7:41 AM

Edit 3: Updated for Beta patch 8770

I must say that I'm very happy about these last changes. Actually, I would say that this is the best WotLK Elemental tree by far. However, there are still some changes that I would not mind seeing.

First we have Storm Reach. I feel that this talent is held back just due to its name. Better would be to call it Elemental Reach and allow it to affect the range of Lava Burst, Chain Lightning and Lightning Bolt, plus the radius of Thunder and Magma Totem.

Next we have Chain Lightning. It has been one of our bread'n'butter single target attacks just due to its superior dps, despite that it is obviously designed to be a limited version of AoE. With the much improved Storm, Earth and Fire talent, this should change to the degree that Lightning Bolt is our single target attack of choise. Chain Lightning might thus become more of a flavour spell. One option would of course to include Chain Lightning in the 'SEF' talent, but personally I would far rather see a 3 point talent around tier 7 or 8, which reduced the cooldown of Chain Lightning with 2 sec per talent point, to the final result of no cooldown when fully invested.

I feel the introduction of such talent would allow Elemental Shamans to deal AoE, like all other spell casters can do in WotLK, plus it would also create even more diverse talent specs where you've to choise if you wish to go for Mana regeneration or the 5% lightning bolt crit in resto tree or the improved version of Chain Lightning.

Finally we have the early tier talents in Restoration. I feel that currently there is not much synergy between those tiers and Elemental, hence I would love to see Improved Water Shield changed so it worked on any spell crit, heal as well as damage. I wager this change should also be welcomed by Restoration Shamans.

Edit 4: Updated for Beta patch 8885
One big radical change is the new buff-stacking policy, which changed Elemental Oath and Totem of Wrath so that they mirrored other class-talents. I must confess that I do not like this strict copy-paste approach, but had hoped that there was a bit of overlap that ensured that every talent was visible in some way. Currently if you raid with a Moonkin, then you can skip Elemental Oath, which is a bit of pity. Some nice changes was included though. Wind Shock is a welcomed spell.

Another point is that the talent tree currently is not that "bloated", which is apparently one of the wishes of the developers. This is of course both a curse and blessing, all depending if you want a "bloated" talent tree or not. Personally I would welcome a bit more flexibility that you gain with more talents, rather than having one single cookie-cutter build.

Edit 6: Updated for Beta patch 9014
Well, the wotlk-beta is a real roller'coaster. It is tempting to vent your frustration in a big emotional outburst, but that would not be that constructive.

Current issues are:
1) Scaling
It is acknowledged that level 80 epic geared Elemental Shamans are pushing out too low dps currently.

2) Initial DPS
It is acknowledged that solo Elemental Shamans are pushing out too low dps.

3) Group utility
This is not acknowledged, but I still feel it is an issue that you want only 2 Shamans to cover Heroism cycle and all totems. The 3rd Shaman doesn't bring anything extra, like crowd control or combat res. Our damage is single target only, meaning that it will fall behind at AoE encounters. Blizzard view AoE encounters as raid flavour and not the norm, but we have seen how a few single encounters with fear-spamming bosses could push all raiding guilds to go for Fear Ward Priests.

4) "Unwanted" Talents
This is a subjective point, but with the buff-stacking policy we get that Elemental Oath is not a wanted talent if you have a Moonkin in the raid. We have also many talents that add little 'bang for buck', making you skip boat at the first opportunity another better talent shows up, something that was shown when you could take Mental Quickness.

5) No bloated tree
Partly a side affect of point #4 and partly a stand alone issue, is the that it doesn't take an Einstein to figure out how to talent spec. There is a cookie cutter build, that leave you with plenty of points free to spend elsewhere. The only difference between players will be how they place those last free points, and there is even the option to not spend the talents points.

Dra · 06/13/08, 7:53 AM

First of, Elemental Oath strikes me as especially useless given the nature of spellhit. I can't imagine ever taking this talent in pvp or pve, not accounting for the possibility that we're missing important information about spellhit mechanics in WotLK.

Secondly, Thunder looks like a horrible PvE talent. Its mp5 seems to be comparable to watershield, for almost 3 times the GCD usage. The AoE effect will not find any use in most PvE encounters and seems only moderately useful for actual AoE purpose. There are numerous ways of making this talent useful in both PvE and PvP, for example they could make it targetable, they could give it a spellhaste/spellcrit/spelldamage/spellcrit-damage-modifier buff or they could swap it with Feral Sprit in the enhancement tree (where it would fit a lot better in it's current state), lets just hope the developers don't leave it like this.

Besides that I'm irked out about the fact that we are still missing some sort of group synergy that would make it desirable to put an elemental shaman in the caster group rather than a resto, since Totem of wrath just doesn't cut it. This brings me back to swapping Feral Spirit and Thunder, as the spirit wolves are rumoured (hearsay, dont shoot me for this one) to apply a raid damage increasing debuff.

Munorion · 06/13/08, 8:06 AM

As has been noted, at first glance it seems that the highest tiers of the new tree are aimed mostly at increasing PvP viability of elementals. However, Thunder fits in nicely with the "Give Hybrids more AoE abilities" trend, which most likely is Blizzard's way of addressing the 10/25 man raids - they still can design encounters that rely on AoE without having to assume that you have a given number of warlocks or mages in the raid. It doesn't mean that hybrids can replace those classes completely, but moonkins, shadow priests and elementals will be able to support a mage or a lock substantially.

That doesn't change the fact that it isn't a killer PvE talent, of course, and will probably see much more use in PvP.

As for Totem of Wrath not cutting it, don't forget that most classes that had +10% to hit from spells got those talents reduced to +3%, so ToW will be a lot more attractive to them now.

Oh, and Hibernate has always been usable on Dragonkin

tufy · 06/13/08, 8:10 AM

Originally Posted by Dra

First of, Elemental Oath strikes me as especially useless given the nature of spellhit. I can't imagine ever taking this talent in pvp or pve, not accounting for the possibility that we're missing important information about spellhit mechanics in WotLK.

hit mechanics

Spell and physical uses one stat now. That said, it almost looks to me as aimed specifically against CloS rogues. Can't find a use for in any other way either.

Also, I agree with you, Lucitron, 20 yard range is a big issue.

Dra · 06/13/08, 8:14 AM

If you had a choice between giving a caster group ToW and WoA, or giving a melee group 10% ap, GoA , SoE and windfury, you would always pick the latter, so no, Totem of Wrath does not cut it in terms of group buffs.

hit mechanics Spell and physical uses one stat now. That said, it almost looks to me as aimed specifically against CloS rogues. Can't find a use for in any other way either.

The talent description specifically mentions spell hit though :P. My guess was that it would be to counter CloS aswell, but it seems strange that you would have to spend 2 talent points to counter one specific ability of one specific class.

Graze · 06/13/08, 8:17 AM

Originally Posted by tufy

hit mechanics

Spell and physical uses one stat now. That said, it almost looks to me as aimed specifically against CloS rogues. Can't find a use for in any other way either.

Also, I agree with you, Lucitron, 20 yard range is a big issue.

I was thinking the same, would it work against CloS? Even then, it's a crap talent.

Again yes, why even have Storm's Reach if we're stuck at 20 yards? That's when I thought about Enh/Elem synergy, it would be like a second Stormstrike, boosting the elemental shamans damage at the "cost" of the Enhancement ones.

Dra · 06/13/08, 8:26 AM

I completely forgot to mention, no help with pushbacks either. How nice would it be if they changed Elemental Oath to 50/100% pushback resistance? One can only hope.

Graze · 06/13/08, 8:30 AM

Originally Posted by Dra

I completely forgot to mention, no help with pushbacks either. How nice would it be if they changed Elemental Oath to 50/100% pushback resistance? One can only hope.

35/70% and dump the recuirement for EF or EM to be active and it could work.

EDIT: But even then it's a weak talent compared to Burning Soul, could have it 35/70% while not active and another 15/30 % while they are? But then, why need Eye of the Storm? That's the talent that needs to stand for the spell pushback resistance imo. (even passive)

Pitbuller · 06/13/08, 8:40 AM

Warlock spell got almoust same wording. And immolate can be someones else.
Incinerate: Deals 444 to 514 Fire damage to your target and an additional 111 to 128.5 Fire damage if the target is affected by an Immolate spell.

Lava Burst: You hurl molten lava at the target, dealing $s1 Fire damage. If Flame Shock is on the target, Lava Burst will consume the Flame Shock, causing Lava Burst to critically hit.

Enhance would spam flame shock and elemental would eat it. I think this is great synergy.

Also 4ss charges in 8s. Without haste 83% uptime for +20% multiplier or 63% uptime when 33% haste. Pretty decent upgrade.

tufy · 06/13/08, 8:48 AM

Originally Posted by Pitbuller

Lava Burst: You hurl molten lava at the target, dealing $s1 Fire damage. If Flame Shock is on the target, Lava Burst will consume the Flame Shock, causing Lava Burst to critically hit.

This is actually something I didn't think of. But if Lava Burst is instant, Enhancement Shamans might use it themselves, they have loads of spare time between shocks anyway.

Stopokingme · 06/13/08, 8:53 AM

Not to mention the very nice synergy when coupled with elemental devastation if it is.

Lucitron · 06/13/08, 8:59 AM

Hmm... Just a pvp-thought. Thunder, Fire Nova Totem and a Tauren Shaman, might not this be a deadly combination?

Graze · 06/13/08, 9:01 AM

If Lava Burst is instant? Why does the deep elemental tree boost it so much?

In their current state, a twisting enhancement shaman will have basicly no gcd's left for a burst, however if they fix this exploit in wotlk(like they said), this spell does make a little sence, except what I wrote just above. I ponder though, why not another strike? Why a spell? What good comes of it?

The FS consuming part of the Lava Burst spell does make a little more sense as enhancement spell, disregarding the raid synergy part, I have a feeling our melee brothers will be able to outplay us in spellcasting aswell thanks to the rating and spell power changes.

Panoramixe · 06/13/08, 9:02 AM

If I understand the talents right they say flametongue weapon will give a spelldamage boost, this would be a nice buff and make the flametongue totem pretty awesome in caster groups.