[Enhancement] Cataclysm Beta Changes (updated 11/4/10)
 

This thread is intended for the discussion of the Shaman Enhancement tree in Cataclysm Beta. I will keep it updated as best I can with information on new talents, abilities and links to appropriate blue posts. Please post only relevant information. Try not to whine about changes, this is beta, and most of this information is likely to change constantly. Please PM Cochice if you notice any spelling errors or just feel like fact checking.


Beta Testers: There's a lot going on in Beta, and it's constantly in flux. Any new information, small or large, that relates to Enhancement Shamans is welcome.


--Mouse-overs show old versions of abilities, clicking on the link will take you to the cataclysm version. Where necessary, supplementary text has been added for clarification (highest rank only).



Primary Skills (Learned at Level 10 when Enhancement specialization is chosen):

• Dual Wield -- Now also allows you to parry.
• Mental Quickness -- Increased to 50% AP to SP (up from 30%). Now reduces the mana cost of your instant spells by 75%
• Dual Wield Specialization
• Lava Lash -- You charge your off-hand weapon with lava, instantly dealing 150% off-hand Weapon damage. Damage is increased by 40% if your off-hand weapon is enchanted with Flametongue.
• Primal Wisdom -- Your melee attacks have a 40% chance to immediately restore 5% of your base mana.

Talent Information:


Current Cataclysm Talent Calculator


New Talents:

• Focused Strikes -- Increases the damage dealt by your Primal Strike and Stormstrike abilities by 45%.
• Ancestral Swiftness -- Reduces the cast time of your Ghost Wolf spell by 2 sec and increases movement speed by 15%. This does not stack with other movement speed increasing effects.
• Primal Wisdom -- Your melee attacks have a 40% chance to immediately restore 5% of your base mana.
• Searing Flames -- Causes the Searing Bolts from your Searing Totem to have a 100% chance to set their targets aflame, dealing damage equal to the Searing Bolt's impact damage over 15 sec. Stacks up to 5 times.
• Improved Lava Lash -- Increases the damage of your Lava Lash ability by 30%, and by an additional 20% for each of your applications of Searing Flames on the target, consuming those applications in the process. (Now 2 points, down from 3)
• Acuity -- Increases your critical strike chance with all spells and attacks by 3%. (Replaced Ancestral Knowledge. Elemental Talent)
• Totemic Reach -- Increases the radius of your totems' effects by 15/30%.

Changed/Removed Talents (Changes listed in Green. Removals listed in Red.):

Elemental:

• Ancestral Knowledge -- Removed.
• Elemental Fury -- Now restricted to Elemental only. Effectively removed for Enhancement.
• Concussion -- Max rank up to 6% (from 5%.)
• Convection -- Now Reduces the mana cost of your damaging offensive spells. (Old: Shock, Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Lava Burst, and Wind Shear).
• Call of Flame -- Max rank up to 20%/10% (from 15%/6%).
• Elemental Precision -- Now also increases hit rating by 100% of your spirit. Moved up the tree and is accessible for Enhancement.
• Elemental Warding -- Now reduces magical damage instead of all damage.

Enhancement:

• Enhancing Totems -- Removed. All buffs exclusive with SoE now give equal benefit.
• Earth's Grasp -- Removed.
• Elemental Devestation -- Now a Tier 2 Enhancement Talent.
• Guardian Totems -- Removed.
• Thundering STrikes -- Removed.
• Improved Ghost Wolf -- Removed.
• Shamanistic Focus -- Removed.
• Anticipation -- Removed.
• Improved Windfury Totem -- Removed.
• Spirit Weapons -- Removed.
• Mental Dexterity -- Removed.
• Weapon Mastery -- Removed.
• Dual Wield -- Removed, now a primary skill.
• Dual Wield Specialization -- Removed, now a primary skill.
• Stormstrike -- Increased to 125% weapon damage (from 100%). Debuff duration increased to 15 sec (from 12). Now increases your chance to critical strike the enemy with Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Lightning Shield and Earth Shock spells by 25% instead of increasing nature damage by 20% on the target. No longer applies charges.
• Improved Stormstrike -- Removed.
• Lava Lash -- Removed, now a primary skill.
• Static Shock -- now procs from Primal Strike, Stormstrike, or Lava Lash (Old - All melee attacks and abilities). Chance to proc increased from 2/4/6% to 15/30/45%. Procs do not consume orb charges.
• Shamanistic Rage -- No longer returns mana. Now causes your skills, totems, and offensive spells to consume no mana for 15 sec.
• Mental Quickness -- Removed, now a primary skill.
• Earthen Power -- No longer increases the attack speed reduction of Earth Shock. Now rolled into base ability
• Maelstrom Weapon -- Maelstrom Weapon now also reduces the mana cost of the spell.
• Unleashed Rage -- Max Rank down to 8 expertise (from 9).
• Feral Spirit -- Now lasts 30 sec (down from 45). Cooldown changed to 2 min (down from 3).

.


Ability Information:

New Abilities:

• Unleash Elements -- Focuses the elemental force imbued in the Shaman's weaponry, with the concentrated effects depending on the enchantment unleashed.
  -Windfury - Unleashing this enchantment deals 125% of weapon damage to the target enemy and increases the Shaman's melee attack speed by 40%. Lasts 6 swings or 12 seconds.
  -Flametongue - Unleashing this enchantment deals 1022.97 to 1213.03 Fire damage to an enemy target and increases the damage dealt by the Shaman's next Fire spell by 20%.
  -Rockbiter - Unleashing this enchantment forces the target enemy to attack you for 5 sec.
  -Frostbrand - Unleash Weapon : Unleashing this enchantment deals 807.43 to 938.37 Frost damage to a target enemy and reduces their movement speed by 50% for 5 sec. Increased in effectiveness if the target is already afflicted by a movement-reducing Frost effect.
• Bind Elemental -- Binds the target hostile elemental for up to 50 sec. The bound unit is unable to move, attack or cast spells. Any damage caused will release the target. Only one target can be bound at a time.
• Spiritwalker's Grace -- Calls upon spiritual guidance, permitting movement while casting non-instant Shaman spells. This spell may be cast while casting other spells. Lasts 10 sec.

Changed/Removed Abilities (Changes listed in Green. Removals listed in Red.):

• Rockbiter Weapon -- Imbue the Shaman's weapon with the fury of the earth, increasing all threat generation by 30% and reducing damage taken by 5%.
• Windfury Totem -- Now increases the melee and ranged attack speed of all party and raid members within 40 yards by 10% (Down from 20%).
• Ghost Wolf -- Now Usable Indoors. Speed reduced from 40% to 30%
• Strength of Earth Totem -- Improved SoE rolled into base ability
• Earth Shock -- Attack seed reduction up to 20% from 10%. Now also reduces ranged attack speed.
• Cleanse Spirit -- Removes curses only, no longer resto specific
• Cure Toxins -- Removed.
• Cleansing Totem -- Removed.
• Lava Lash -- Damage increased to 150% weapon damage (from 100%) and to 40% bonus damage from flametongue weapon(from 25%).
• Fire Nova -- Now only usable with Fire Elemental, Flametongue or Magma totems.
• Hex -- Duration increased to 1 min (up from 30 sec).
• Searing Totem -- Now prefers to target enemies that are afflicted by your Flame Shock or Stormstrike effects.
• Lava Burst -- Damage has been increased by 25%.
• Magma Totem -- Now costs 18% of base mana, down from 27%.
• Stoneclaw Totem -- Deal and absorb effect reduced by 50%. Now has 6186 health (from 797). Shields your totems for up to 4143 damage (from 664).
• Chain Lightning -- Now has a 3 sec cooldown (down from 6 sec).
• Windfury Weapon -- Now deals damage equal to two extra attacks with 4430 extra attack power (Up from 1395 Attack Power).
• Flametongue Weapon -- Now increases total spell damage by 750, up from 235.
• Lightning Shield -- Can now crit.

Mastery:

• Increases all elemental damage done by 20%. Damage increased further by mastery rating.

Glyphs (New description in Green. Old description in Red):

• Glyph of Fire Nova -- Increases the radius of your Fire Nova spell by 5 yards. (Reduces the cooldown of your Fire Nova spell by 3 seconds.)
• Glyph of Ghost Wolf -- Your Ghost Wolf form grants an additional 10% 5% movement speed.
• Glyph of Healing Stream Totem -- Your Healing Stream Totem also increases the Fire, Frost, and Nature resistance of party and raid members within 30 yards by 150. (Your Healing Stream Totem heals for an additional 20%.)
• Glyph of Hex -- Reduces the cooldown of your Hex spell by 15 sec. (Increases the damage your Hex target can take before the Hex effect is removed by 20%.)
• Glyph of Lava Burst -- Your Lava Burst spell deals 10% more damage. (Your Lava Burst spell gains an additional 10% of your spellpower.)
• Glyph of Totemic Recall -- Causes your Totemic Recall ability to return an additional 50% of the mana cost of any recalled totems.
• Glyph of Lightning Shield -- Your Lightning Shield can no longer drop below 3 charges from dealing damage to attackers.
• Glyph of Grounding Totem -- When your Grounding Totem absorbs a spell, it attempts to reflect that spell on its caster, but the cooldown of your Grounding Totem is increased by 45 sec.
• Glyph of Arctic Wolf -- Alters the appearance of your Ghost Wolf transformation, causing it to resemble an arctic wolf.
• Glyph of Shamanistic Rage -- Activating your Shamanistic Rage ability also cleanses you of all dispellable Magic debuffs.
• Glyph of Water Shield -- Increases the passive mana regeneration of your Water Shield spell by 50%. (Up from 30%)
• Glyph of Stormstrike -- Now Additional 8% crit for nature spells. (changed from 8% damage).

Other Information:

• Maelstrom Weapon will include Lava Burst
• Complete List of Shaman Abilities
• All classes items in the relic slot now have stats.

Testing Needed:


To Be Added:

• PvE spec/rotation section
• Add healing spells (we are hybrids after all).

updates
--7/15/10 initial post
--7/16/10 added @beta testers. To Be Added section. Testing Needed section. Mastery fixed. Re-did talents/abilties sections.
--7/19/10 added Q&A info ("Mastry" and "Other Info" sections).
--7/21/10 changed talents link
--7/22/10 updated for new build
--7/23/10 updated for new build
--8/10/10 updated for 2 or 3 new builds (sorry about the lapse)
--9/21/10 updated for a lot of backed up data (again, sorry, moving). Added "Glyphs" section. New info in: Other Information, Talents, Abilities
--9/22/10 fixed GW glyph and incorrect Acuity value
--9/23/10 Updated for latest build
--9/25/10 Updated for MQ change
--11/3/10 Updated for UE - Windfury change
--11/4/10 clarified UE-wind change

Good summary, the only thing I saw missing was under New Abilities and the title misspelled Enhancement.

The new cast while running ability does help Enhance, so you can cast a Lightning Bolt or Healing Wave while running out of the fire.

If Ghost Wolf truly becomes usable indoors, I can definitely see Ancestral Swiftness becoming part of the cookie cutter PvE spec, not to mention saying goodbye to tuskar's. Looks like I need to find room for 2 more hotkeys (UE/GW) as well.

As for Spiritwalker's Grace; with UE, Shocks and MW5LB I still don't see it getting much use in a movement situation for us (useful but not much).

The new description of Fire Nova on MMO Champion seems to have changed from "active fire totem" to FlameTongue, Magma, or Fire Elemental, removing Searing from the totems that can use FN.

If this has been confirmed in Beta, it needs to be added to changed abilities.

This will also remove FN from our single target priority list (and make it slightly more complicated to switch between single target and AE on the fly).

According to this post by Zarhym the passive masteries (melee damage and melee haste) initially announced in the first mastery preview have been removed and the unique mastery (Nature Damage for enhancement shamans) is now a passive skill trained around level 75. The mastery skill remains effected by mastery rating on gear. It appears that you no longer get a starting benefit based on the number of talent points in your specialization tree to this skill. Quoted the specific section below for reference.

Note that they specifically state that mastery is only on high level items and further on in this same post they indicated that you should expect to see mastery show up on gear around level 78 (mostly likely from gear dropping in the new cataclysm zones).

Been there, I can confirm it. You cannot trigger FN with Searing Totem. The error it returns proves that it's a change that will most likely stay. It lists that you do not have the FT, Magma or FE totem active.

I've heard various things on this topic lately. However I misread Zarhym's post (I thought all three were still in game, just not tied to number of points spent). In response to the mastery bonus being a passive skill trained, on beta, I don't see any new passive ability in my spell book, nor do I see anything on the trainer. Though I also don't have any gear with mastery on it yet. I will do some digging and update accordingly.

Under the General tab in the new Character Panel it lists Mastery but the tab is NYI so it doesn't show anything more then how much mastery rating you have.

Swapping my gloves for a pair of blue gloves with 92 mastery but 12 less agility and 8 less AP (1873 spellpower to 1862) shows the following changes in spell tooltips.

Earth Shock
1605-1654 --> 1641-1691

Flame Shock
919 + 1962 over 18 seconds --> 917 + 1956 over 18 seconds

Lightning Bolt
2038-2139 --> 2080-2183

Lava Burst
2305-2645 --> 2298-2638

Looking at the general tab in the character panel shows the 92 mastery rating as equal to 0.99 mastery at level 82, whatever that means.

Edit - the talent tree bonuses though are definitely gone.

No talents or spec
587.6 dps
1293-1555 MH damage
2.42 attack speed

After specializing in enhancement but without any talent points spent
587.6 dps
1293-1555 MH damage
2.42 attack speed

After speccing 33 points in enhancement but avoiding unleashed rage
587.6 dps
1293-1555 MH damage
2.42 attack speed

Mastery is planned to be a level 75 learned skill (it makes since it doesn't show up on gear until the new 78-80 dungeon). I don't think Mastery is turned on in Beta though.

Looking at Rouncer's example, it seems that 1% mastery (from his 92 mastery rating) is giving 1% better nature damage spells.

It's not 1% mastery, it's 0.99 mastery and it seems to work similar to expertise. 92 mastery rating, at level 82, gives 0.99 mastery which appears to correspond to about a 2.5% increase in nature damage.

It also appears that you gain the base mastery bonus the moment you specialize (and are above the level that it activates, I guess) but mastery rating has no effect until you spend your first talent point in the tree. Which really doesn't affect anything but is sort of good to know.

Edit - just checked on my 23 goblin shaman and their is no base mastery bonus affecting her spells.

Naked with no spec - 34 spellpower
66-71 LB
66-69 ES
62-65 FrS

Naked specced enh - 68 spellpower
90-95 LB
79-82 ES
75-79 FrS

Notice that the increase in damage for ES and FrS is identical and corresponds directly to the increased spellpower from mental quickness. Spending that first talent point didn't change anything either.


Edit - just went back and checked things a bit more thoroughly using resto gear but then specializing in enhancement. There no longer seems to be a base mastery bonus. You get the nature damage bonus from mastery rating but there is no longer the 20% boost from being specced enhancement no matter what your level.

Makes sense since they haven't even started tuning damage around the 31 point trees in this build.

From the Twitter Q&A today comes the following:
So, hopefully, on fights like Saur or Fester we'd never need to pop SR but, on a fight like H Dreamwalker, we could pop it to quick fill if we got mana drained due to mechanics; potentially freeing up SR to be more of a pure defensive cooldown on a good percentage of fights.

Twitter Q&A Link

Nice to see that they are aware of the loss of the crit bonus and are planning to up our spell power to help offset the loss. I wonder if they are happy with how much damage SS and LL are doing now or plan to push more damage into those abilities to get us further away from passive damage.

Looks like the design intent for Enhancement is that we will sustain our rotation with only the primal wisdom talent and SR will be an emergency cooldown. I don't know how this will effect us in pvp where time on target might be to limited for an rng regen talent to work especially when we are likely to be doing more than just damage in those situations. JoW is gone (from the paladin part of the Q&A).

My comments on totems are in the elemental cataclysm topic. In short I am disappointed in the answer given.

I already posted my response in the beta forums. I'm fine with dropping totems all the time, it's a part of the class and it's not such a burden now that they gave us the totemic calls. The issue that I have is with the loss of utility when providing buffs that are associated with your specific spec. No other class has that burden anymore.

Take the buffs that are specific to each of the three specs and just make them part of our specializations. So enhancement's would be windfury and SoE. Elemental's would be WoA and ToW. Resto's would be WoA and mana spring. So then if an enhancer has any earth totem down, they will also be providing the SoE buff to anyone in range of the totem.

I'll stop there because this really is verging on wishlisting and belongs more on the official forums then here.

I've never been a fan of the buff from all my totems idea mainly because I think it brings up issues with coverage on the buffs. When the utility totem expires or is recalled it seems like the buff would fall off the raid. It might be that the amount of lost time is small enough to not matter and I can see how it's clearly better than having to use a utility totem and not getting the buffs at all for that totem's duration but it just feels lame to me that one of the benefits I bring to the raid would fall off at all. I really dislike the wrathful totems talent for this reason as well. It will take vigilant recasting to keep the spell power buff up and there will be times when the elemental shaman has to recall the searing totem, when that happens the shaman will have to twist out their flametongue totem.

Speaking of flametongue I am pretty worried that they managed to forget that enhancement ends up providing the spell power buff (even in its weaker form) to 10 man raids pretty often. That might end up being a significant dps loss with the new stacking dot effect from searing totem and the resulting LL damage increase. It all depends on your group but I don't think it's a stretch to see it being a bigger benefit to your group to have 6% more spell power than your personal damage totems for some comps. The full 10% buff needs more specs bringing it than just the two we have right now which would probably help with that issue.

I like some of the ideas Blizz come up with but i am still courious about the LavaBurst with MW5 as Enhanc.

Lightning Bolt is going to be better at higher levels and gear levels because of the Mastery Scaling and the SS Debuff. So either Blizz has to make SS also include our own Fire Dmg also or i see us using LB as always.

Or have i misread/overlooked something ?