Shaman expansion thoughts and desires - Page 3

Feer · 08/29/06, 10:04 AM

Originally Posted by Nite_Moogle

Gurgthock posted yesterday on my knee-jerk reaction that talents are about making choices, and I agree. However, ask any Shaman what they do most of the time on raids. No matter what their answer is, they use mana to do it. Shaman healing is not overly efficient outside of Chain Healing situations (especially without Healing Way), and Shaman DPS is heavily reliant on using mana hand over fist as well (Shocks + Lightning Bolt/Stormstrike).

What you have to take into consideration is boost we are getting in raiding situations having both Paladins and Shaman in same raid. Using lvl 60 skills caster will have 58/5 mana (untalented) from mana spring and BoW. Shaman chaincasting rank 10 Lightning Bolt would spend 441mana/5, while getting back another 49/5 mana from Judgement of Wisdom. Now assuming mana pool of 3k, it would take shaman about 45 seconds to run out of mana. And that is assuming no talents, no gear (and that my math is correct :) ).

I don't know actual numbers what kind of mana pool and mana/5 high end elemental shaman would have at lvl 60 (still stuck at lvl 30 something with mine) , but I don't think mana is going to be nearly as a big issue to DPS shamans casters as it is now.

berg · 08/29/06, 10:11 AM

Originally Posted by RK

Doing the same thing as I've been doing for 12 months but now with earth shield casts every 10-15 seconds or whatever does not strike me as either fun or creative.

I am in strong agreement here. It appears that the Shaman have been given distinct raid roles but that they will not be overly fun to perform.

Reapplying Earthen Shield every 15-20 seconds with 1-2 heals inbetween does not seem super fun.
Spamming Rank 9-11 lb does not seem super fun.
Standing next to a mob with autoattack on and spamming stormstrike does not seem super fun.

It would be nice if there was more interactivity to the dps side of our class. On the other side of that coin though having boring dps roles provides better opportunity to watch health meters to perform as a healer still so it will all work out.

Nite_Moogle · 08/29/06, 10:12 AM

Blessing of Wisdom is a wash since all Horde casters will get it that didn't have it previously, so it's really just a flat rate added to what we've been getting by with. Your point about JoW is quite valid however, I had not really taken into account the potential frenzy of mana from a JoW + Dual Wield + Flurry Shaman.

berg · 08/29/06, 10:15 AM

Originally Posted by Malan

Originally Posted by Nite_Moogle

Originally Posted by Malan

how could you possibly pass up Shamanistic Rage and a chance to regen mana at an accelerated rate while you melee?

Nature's Swiftness. :(

Depends on what you're going for I suppose. My shaman are looking at this from the viewpoint that healing will be priest/druid/paladin for the most part so the shamans will be DPSing and enhancing DPS in groups. When a healer dies we'll stop DPS and pick up the slack, or when a paly has to tank we'll swap gear for the encounter and heal. I'm willing to pass up NS for the incredible benefit we'll be bringing.

I think that if your shaman are not even considering healing that they will have little value to your raid. Stopping to heal someone who is going to die will result in much more dps raid wide than mindlessly spamming stormstrike while watching tv in the background. The only shaman that will ever dominate dps meters are the bad ones, I strongly believe this.

Malan · 08/29/06, 10:28 AM

Originally Posted by berg

I think that if your shaman are not even considering healing that they will have little value to your raid. Stopping to heal someone who is going to die will result in much more dps raid wide than mindlessly spamming stormstrike while watching tv in the background. The only shaman that will ever dominate dps meters are the bad ones, I strongly believe this.

But I said nowhere that we were expecting to dominate meters. Meters are for selfish people, damage is damage. Thats my take. And I never said we weren't considering healing at all - just that we are finally able to expand our role on a raid some. And yes, stopping to heal someone that's dying is exactly what we'd be doing.

• Relwin · 08/29/06, 10:31 AM

Shamanistic Rage will be worthless due to the presence of Blessing and Judgement of Wisdom. If you are still running out of mana in prolonged encounters that's what consumables are for.

berg · 08/29/06, 10:34 AM

Originally Posted by Malan

Originally Posted by berg

I think that if your shaman are not even considering healing that they will have little value to your raid. Stopping to heal someone who is going to die will result in much more dps raid wide than mindlessly spamming stormstrike while watching tv in the background. The only shaman that will ever dominate dps meters are the bad ones, I strongly believe this.

But I said nowhere that we were expecting to dominate meters. Meters are for selfish people, damage is damage. Thats my take. And I never said we weren't considering healing at all - just that we are finally able to expand our role on a raid some. And yes, stopping to heal someone that's dying is exactly what we'd be doing.

Well I think you need to avoid the mindset that Pri/Dru/Pal are healers and Shaman are dps support. Shaman are still healers even if they are not assigned the role. Just make sure you do not create an environment where the Shaman has little/no responsibility.

Argrax · 08/29/06, 10:39 AM

Elemental needs a talent prior to the 41 point talent that benefits the casters of the raid, at the very least something similar to the improved weapons totem found in enhancement.

Nite_Moogle · 08/29/06, 10:40 AM

Improved Wrath of Air totem would be pretty hot.

Durnitol · 08/29/06, 10:45 AM

Originally Posted by Malan

Originally Posted by berg

I think that if your shaman are not even considering healing that they will have little value to your raid. Stopping to heal someone who is going to die will result in much more dps raid wide than mindlessly spamming stormstrike while watching tv in the background. The only shaman that will ever dominate dps meters are the bad ones, I strongly believe this.

But I said nowhere that we were expecting to dominate meters. Meters are for selfish people, damage is damage. Thats my take. And I never said we weren't considering healing at all - just that we are finally able to expand our role on a raid some. And yes, stopping to heal someone that's dying is exactly what we'd be doing.

Meters may be for selfish people, but it is the most visible standard for judging effectiveness. All those min/max people will see a mage doing 1.3X or more damage than a shaman going full DPS and say "WTF, we should have another mage instead of his gimp ass!". At the same time, we can frequently top effective healing in full resto mode, but we have a LOT less mana than the other classes in a short time either way. The min/max crowd can't measure utility effectively and as such we have to use subjective and anecdotal evidence to suggest that a utility talent/ability + our healing or damage is better than adding X class instead. Since the heals stand out more, we are asked to heal.

I think a mixture of healing and damage is great fun, but raid leaders rarely seem to have justification for a non-specialist. What's your current warlock/mage ratio?

Malan · 08/29/06, 10:51 AM

Well ultimately it comes to individual guild choice, and when the shaman talents got leaked (along with Blizzard saying that their design movement for shamans was more DPS oriented now) my guild pretty readily accepted that they were going to lose a lot of resto shaman. We're still maintaining healing gear, nobody has any plans to remove our 3 heals from their action bars, but our casters and melee are very excited by what the enhance and elemental trees are going to bring to the fight.

Tiiki · 08/29/06, 10:53 AM

If you have a 25 man raid and you want, say 9 healers in that. I'd be happy for those to be 3 priests, 3 druids, 2 paladins and maybe a resto shaman. I'd also be happy to have 1-2 OTHER shaman with the 41 pt ele/enh talents as dps/dps buffers, NOT taking up 'healing' raid slots.

Yes, on the meters the shaman may only do 80% of a mage or rogues dps. But I don't doubt that they'll be contributing more than the 20% lost dps in terms of buffs to their group (wrath of air, bloodlust, etc. etc.). Plus the added advantage they can step in as emergency healers should a few go down.

If raids keep thinking of ALL shaman specs as primary healers, it won't be a good day. It's completely obvious Blizzard would love some NON-NS specced Shaman to be useful in raiding, so lets just hope they make the 41pt talents good enough to justify that.

Dromakis · 08/29/06, 11:10 AM

I really believe that our raid utility is being expanded with these talents. Keep in mind with smaller raid sizes you may not have the luxury of Fury Warrs doing mad dps and that dps loss will need to be added in somewhere. With three distintive air totems to buff different people we can be put in just about any group and still add value. Enhance is not nearly as self serving as it was before since we can buff the entire group with up to 10% increased AP + Bloodlust. The benefit is obvious for rogues and warriors in a group with a shaman.

My personal, unsubstantiated opionion is that a full restoration spec'd shaman (as I am now) isn't going to be adding nearly as much RAIDWIDE value as an enhance or even elemental shaman. Standing in one spot spamming LHW and CH in these fights may not be the best utility for our class in the expansion. And it's not as if our heals get taken away from us if we go enhance. I'll be VERY interested to see how the numbers play out once the beta goes up. Also, all of this will fly out the window if we find out that blizzard 'forgets' to itemize for enhance and/or elemental shaman at level 70. Here's to hoping!

On another note, time to start collecting melee 1h'rs. EoC, MSA, HoD, etc!

And finally: Any bets on whether we'll ever get to use 1h swords? ;)

berg · 08/29/06, 11:17 AM

I think I have to see the details of earthen shield before I can agree with you in a 25 man setting dromakis.

However I can say with strong confidence that in a 10 man setting resto shaman will be awesome. In smaller instances healers are always tanking. Putting earthen shield on self will essentially will give a resto shaman permanent bubble as far as healing interrupts goes. They will be amazing healers in the 5-10 man content.

Dromakis · 08/29/06, 11:21 AM

Originally Posted by berg

I think I have to see the details of earthen shield before I can agree with you in a 25 man setting dromakis.

Yes, don't get me wrong. I'm certainly not saying that there is no room for restoration shaman in raids anymore. Just that it would be a terrible waste to to have ONLY restoration shaman in raids.

As for 5-10 man content you are likely dead on. The value of a restoration shaman increases dramatically as the group size decreases. With the right spec and right gear a restoration shaman, as those of us who play that role know, can be exceptional.