Nennx

With totems and raid buffs, you'll be hitting 1200+ around the Kael killing level, I think. Getting 1200 without those though, requires the absolute best gear possible (assuming LC and Sextant).

 

BestCowEvar

That sounds about right, I've heard reports of anywhere from that number to (a generous) .8

Sorry to hijack this a little bit, but I've been really curious as to whether Dual Wielding Elemental is thought of as a better build than raw Elemental in 2.3. From what I've been looking through I've been thinking it is, at least if said Shaman can get his/her hand on The Maelstrom's Fury.

The basic build I've been toying with is 30/31/0. My big concern with this build is it seems to go against -everything- Shamans have been really advocating. It lacks 6% Spell Hit (when compared to the 41/0/20 build), and stacks Spell Damage instead of Spell Crit.

Crazy, but here's what I've been looking at. I will assume the .789 coefficient from the poster above me.

+6% Spell Crit from Talents
+6% Spell Hit from Talents

2/5 Lightning Mastery ( 2.3 second LB's )

Basic +1200 Spell Damage post normal buffs.

Alright, from the start of that it looks pretty ugly.

But, because of Dual Wielding we go from using Antonidas's Aegies of Rapt Concentration in our offhand to The Maelstrom's Fury. With +40 Spell Damage enchant, and a Brilliant Wizard Oil we gain 16 Spell Crit and 270 Spell Damage.

My Elemental Shaman has a basic ~330 Attack Power before any buffs. Assuming a Strength of Earth Totem (+15% with Talents), Blessing of Might, Kings, and a Battle Shout (being generous here) 330 + 198 + 220 + 305 + Kings (200 strength * 1.10 for another 40 AP ) = ~1100 AP. With Mental Quickness this converts to ~+365 Spell Damage. So, we go from 1200 Spell Damage to ~1835 Spell Damage at the sacrifice of 6% Spell Hit, .3 seconds on our Lightning Bolt, and 7.5% Spell Crit (You gaian .5 from Maelstrom offhand).

Additionally, we gain the ability to cast Searing Totem again because we are not casting Totem of Wrath anymore. Searing Totem with ~1850 Spell Damage is the equiv. of about 150 DPS.

Without throwing out hard numbers I believe this could still be a very viable build, no? Just a thought.

 

Kasi

Even though LB is a level 67 spell, it gains damage as you gain to 70. Thus the average damage of LB at 70 with no spell damage gear is not what wowhead said, like you figured out.

So if old coefficient was .857 and new one is .789, we can work out some stuff.

Lets say 1250 spell damage buffed to the gills, which is definitely possible with just top of the line T5 gear.

2.2: (611 base damage + .857 x Spell Damage)x1.05 (from concussion)x1.05(from LO) should give you the damage of LB.

(611+.857xA)x1.1025 will give you the average damage of a LB including LO.

Thus 1250 damage would give a LB of 1766 (seems about right since I'm at this level) and with LO an average of 1855.

2.3: (611 base damage + .789 x Spell Damage)x1.05x1.10 (can just model new LO as a 10% chance to get full damage, which is same as 20% chance to get 50% damage)

(611+.789xA)x1.155

For here 1250 spell damage would give an average LB of 1677 and with LO an average of 1844 damage. So at 1250 spell damage a loss of 11 damage on LB.

If we equate the 2 equations and solve for Spell damage we should get the magic number.

(611+.857A)1.1025 = (611+.789A)1.155
611+.857A = (611+.789A)1.048

611+.857A = 640 + .826A
.0304A = 29

Solving for this gives a break point of 954, which seems odd. But I double checked my math with the first part calculations and it works out. 954 spell damage gives you an average LB in both cases of 1575 damage. But when I went to 1250 spell damage, there was an 11 damage difference. Trying with 1500 spell damage (pretty much impossible right now with current gear, but maybe with Sunwell gear) gives me 2091 damage for 2.2 and 2072 for 2.3. So while it is true that the break even point might be lower than we thought, it seems the scaling is not too far off. It seems for moving 250 spell damage past the break even point you lose 8-9 more damage. Probably because LO is a scalar on everything, not just spell damage, so it help counteracts the scaling nerf.

 

Daidalos

loosing .3 secs of LB will result in a dps loss about 150ish dps in good gear alone the loss of LO would be another 70 or so dps not to mention the wrath of air totem is the main reason to bring a ele sham to a raid. Basically I don't see it being higher dps but with slow LB and no totem of wrath.

 

Antoine

Last I checked, Maelstrom's Fury was main hand only.

 

BestCowEvar

2.3 Sec Bolt w/ 1800 Spell Damage and 32% Spell Crit:

1800 * .79 = 1422 + 603 = 2025

2025 * .68 + 4050 * .32 = 1377 + 1296 = 2673

2673 / 2.3 = 1162 DPS

Searing Totem: +~150 DPS


2.0 Sec Bolt w/ 1200 Spell Damage and 41% Spell Crit:

1200 * .79 = 948 + 603 = 1551

1551 * .59 + 3102 *.41 = 915 + 1271 = 2186

2186 / 2 = 1093 DPS

Totem of Wrath: +12% Spell Crit/Hit to group.

They seem comparable to me. +200 DPS to yourself vs 12% Spell Crit/Hit to a group.

Not quite as huge as I would like to see, but it is also "possible" to get 2 second LB's with the first spec, you just lose Elemental Precision.

 

BestCowEvar

The Maelstrom's Fury
Binds when picked up
One-Hand Dagger
37 - 111 Damage Speed 1.80
(41.3 damage per second)
+33 Stamina
+21 Intellect
Durability 75 / 75
Requires Level 70
Equip: Improves spell critical strike rating by 22.
Equip: Increases damage and healing done by magical spells and effects by up to 236.

Only 1h caster weapon in the game that's one handed.

 

Antoine

Hrm, looks like you're right. If it's the only one handed caster weapon in the game, that means they changed the old items like the SMV quest reward that were one handed. What makes you think they won't do the same with Maelstrom's Fury?

 

BestCowEvar

I'm under the belief that it is just an oversight for the time being. In.. (2.1)? they patched basically all caster weapons that they had missed to be main hand only. I had that SMV one handed caster weapon when it was one handed, but this seems to have at least survived the push to 2.3. Might as well try and have some fun with it while the oversight is out there.

I don't feel that it would be a viable option in 2.2, but with the change to Mental Quickness it opens up possibilities. This is probably why it hasn't been noticed yet.

 

Kasi

That is very odd that the Maelstrom weapon is the only 1h in the game with spell damage. However you'd not want to go with the talents that lose you casting time on LB. Thats the biggest scalar we have. One can deal with losing spell hit because our gear is loaded with it and you can gem for it. And even threat. But casting time? Nope.

I don't think we'd be able to get a battle shout. But lets say we have 3 paladins. We'd probably want now to get Salv, Might and Wisdom. If we get in a group with a warrior, we would have to lose our Shadow Priest and likely drop a different air totem. So 330 AP + 198 + 220 + gift ~= 800. Multiply that by 0.3 and you get 240 spell damage.

You also get another 270 spell damage from the weapon. So basically this is a 510 spell damage upgrade and you lose any threat reduction and LO and of course spell hit. I'd say you lose a good 50 spell damage from gems and gear choices you need to socket towards hit where you used to not. So 460 spell damage now.

With the numbers I had in last post lets say you were at 1250 spell damage. You are now at 1710 spell damage and 7% less spell crit. (lose 8 from talents, gain 1 from gear) Lets say you're at my level of gear and drop from 36% spell crit to 29% spell crit.

Your average LB hits for (611+.789x1710)x1.05 = 2058. Which is pretty damn nice. A crit at 29% spell crit rate will give you an average damage of 2655.

The other LB would like I showed previously give an average damage of 1844 damage. Mutliply this by 1.36 for the spell crit and you get 2507.

Thus given a 2 second cast, you gain 74 dps. This is nice for your personal damage, but I'm guessing Totem of Wrath as underwhelming at it is gives more than 74 dps to your group. Now if you are an elemental shaman being one of only 1-2 in the raid and they keep sticking you in tank groups and making you drop WF, then this spec might be handy, because buffs from the melee group would make up for losing wrath of air. It also might be an option for pvp, because there are plenty of talents in enhancement that can be pretty damn handy for it. Your survivability goes up, less cooldown on grounding totem, etc

 

Moshne

I do not want my .789 becoming gospel, as I said, it is a preliminary testing number. I am doing some more testing on it as well. I also need to make sure my methodology is sound. I would prefer that some others confirm/deny my numbers before we start making judgements on them.

EDIT:

After a few more tests off the average, minimum, and maximum bolts, I have come to .790 being as close to accurate as I can find. I am comfortable with the finding at this point, and will do my theorycrafting with it till I find otherwise. I wish Blizzard would just come out and tell us the new coefficient, this cloak and dagger shit is obnoxious.

 

Yakout

Actually, it's not the only one. There're 2 others: 1H caster weapons

However, I'm inclined to agree that it was an oversight. Two of the three weapons were introduced in 2.1 at the same time all the other 1H caster weapons were changed to MH, and the third was a sword from HFP. (Were there other 1H caster swords pre-2.1? I can't recall.) One is tempted to assume that this was the result of different development teams and poor coordination. This has not stopped me from running around with a Terokk's Gavel of the Prophet with +81 heal for my enhancement shaman's healing set, however. I suspect this is an oversight that will be addressed (alas), but it's nice to actually have a bit more synergy between some of the trees, sorta. Makes me feel more hybridy.

 

Moshne

Using the same formula on Chain Lightning, and further testing on Lightning Bolt I came up with:

Chain Lightning (rank 6) = 0.640
Lightning Bolt (rank 12) = 0.794

I used the same tests on Earth Shock, just to make sure the method worked, and got

Earth Shock = 0.385 (expected 0.386, well within standard error)

 

• Binkenstein

RED was behaving the same way, and then reduced to a 3% flat addition. Thus I assumed that CSD would be the same. At this point I'm going to assume that the 9% seen is not "working as intended".
The higher the better. I'm assuming 0.05 will be the minimum, but a 0.075 increase that you've seen is pretty good.

A dual wield elemental build is a bit... silly tbh.
Cast time reduction, LO, ToW. All useful talents. Not having 3% hit & 5% crit from resto, not so good.
Spending 30 talent points so you can offhand a spell damage weapon is a bit of a waste.

 

Antoine

Yes, but it's survived through numerous PTR patches in its current form. You should at least change it for the moment.

 

• Binkenstein

If it makes it to live in that state, then yes I will change it.

 

Kasi

It is silly, but there are some elemental shamans out there who are not in ideal caster groups or who are told by their raid leader to get in the tank/melee group because the buffs help the group better. Regardless of how good shamans are at buffing casters, its been said windfury does more for a group if they have one warrior than all ele buffs do for a shaman group. So if you have the weapon and are in such a situation (or are a former 25 man raider just raiding 10 mans) it could be useful, because the personal dps is signifigantly higher and funny enough you actually get symmetry as a caster with a melee group. In such a situation a battle shout gives as much dmg to the shaman as his wrath of air would.

 

Argrax

So if these are in fact the new coefficients, what % change are we looking at going to 2.3 from 2.2, assuming 1200 spellpower? And would that % value be assuming a LO proc rate of 20%, has there been any more word on the ~14% proc rate people were seeing on test?

 

Kasi

We'll have to see on the LO proc chance on live. We should definitely do testing, but despite all I've heard of that issue, no one has conclusively proved it.

And I assume you mean 1200 buffed? I don't think many shamans yet are running around with 1200 unbuffed, not even sure it is possible. (well unless you're dw'ing with the Naj dagger :p )

For 1200 buffed though:

2.2: (611 + .857x1200)x1.05x1.05 = 1808 average LB
2.3: (611 + .794x1200)x1.05x1.10 = 1806 average LB

Put that to 1500, which maybe we'll get to in sunwell and it would be:
2.2: (611 + .857x1500)x1.05x1.05 = 2091
2.3: (611 + .794x1500)x1.05x1.10 = 2081

This really not that big a difference and I'm fine with it given the threat/mana efficiency buffs we gained.

 

Argrax

Here's hoping that LO has a chance to proc off itself (as some are showing in the other thread) which would put the last modifier in the equation at 1.125 and yield values of 1847 and 2129 respectively.

 

Moshne

I've had a hellish time getting reliable data to parse LO proc unfortunately, so I don't want to say anything I've come with on it. As to the coefficients, I am confident they are correct within +/- .01.

I really want to get away from talking about the changes in terms of 1200 spell damage. That number was given out by the developers as a baseline, and it doesn't appear to mean anything. I double checked by increasing my spell damage and lowering, and I can say conclusively there is no variability in the coefficient based on gear. (While this is obvious to most of us, I saw a hysteria thread on the Blizz forums suggesting it worked this way.) The amount that this "nerf" is will vary based on how good your gear is, but from what I am seeing, I have a very hard time seeing how it will amount to a nerf in the long run.

Bear in mind exactly what the coefficient means, we went from having a .857 coefficient to a .71 pre-"buff." This means we were getting "credit" for basically 86 of every hundred spell damage to 71, a net loss of 15 spell damage on your bolts for every hundred spell damage you had. We will now get 79 per 100, meaning everyone loses ~7 damage off each bolt for every 100 spell damage.

However, with the LO added in, assuming the 20% is accurate, this should more than make up the difference. We went from a 5% chance to get a 100% LB to a 20% chance to get a 50% bolt. The total LO damage is essentially doubled (a bit more when procs off procs are considered.)

I realize this was a very wordy post, but I have seen far too many suggestions getting thrown around that we might consider gearing to 1200 spell damage and then suddenly change and start stacking spell haste or crit to get "maximum" damage, when this is not how the change works, at all.

-----

Now, that said. To your question, if you raid with 1200 spell damage, your Lightning bolts will be doing 84 less damage than on Live. The total DPS change is not that simple, as until we have solidly modeled LO damage (which also went up slightly due to the coefficient buff), we can't really give definitive DPS numbers.

 

• Binkenstein

Since when did I say anything about group buffs?

If you want to buff a melee group, go full Enhancement.

 

Kasi

That's fine if you are inclined to do so or have the gear. But many raid leaders like sticking a shaman in with the MT group and many like giving the healers shadow priests over dps. In such a situation where you might be stuck with a 2 warrior tank, 1 paladin, 1 warlock MT group then this would definitely give you more dps than being full elemental.

Plus in 10 mans group synergy often gets screwed up due to weird combos. Like being one of two elemental shamans in a raid but having to go in the non caster group because the MT needed Grace of Air to survive Prince. I agree with you that its not ideal. But due to higher personal dps and stronger melee buffs you can give it opens up some interesting possibilities.

Heck there is a thread on the first page here asking about putting an elemental shaman in the physical or MT group. I know as an elemental that is the LAST thing I want to see. I don't want to have to drop buffs that don't help me at all. This weird spec validated by a single weapon really opens up the possibility that an elemental shaman might want to be in a physical group. At least til they nerf the weapon back to MH only.

 

pickles133

Edit: I made a major mistake in this post which refutes my argument. I'm leaving it up as a laugh for others but I apologize for my mistake.


elehancement is pretty interesting to think about. You do something like 33/28/0. You only lose .1 off your LB cast time (if you choose to pick up EM...) and still have all the lower tier elem talents. Basically it comes down to....

Lightning Overload, 3% hit, 5% crit (less due to the crit from Maelstrom Fury), and ToW (which has always been subjected to criticism)

vs.

All the Spell Dmg you'd gain from using Maelstrom's fury on the off hand and the AP->Spell Dmg conversion.

and you can bring up ToW vs Searing Totem again...with all that extra spell dmg, Searing Totem would hit pretty hard.

It'd be interesting to do some calculations on this....I'll do some number crunching in a bit.

 

• Juice

Want it or not, elementals are in melee groups just like restos are when enhancement shaman aren't available. Providing windfury to warriors and rogues is more valuable than providing elemental buffs to other casters. I'm elemental, and I put myself in the melee group when no other shaman are available for the task in my raids. Frankly, it's more bottom line damage.