This won't surprise a lot of people but a check on maximizing FT weapon revealed even with The Lightning Capacitor pumping out over 100 DPS alone, it still deals less damage overall than slow weapons embued with Windfury. The problem is the scaling: Both Stormstrike and Windfury scale quite well which means any change needs to overcome quite a large gap in damage. Even with spell hit capped and doing 86-87% melee hit against a boss three levels higher, the number of hits required to overcome it is simply too high.

I had hoped that the 3 second cooldown on Windfury would provide enough of a gap that overwhelming numbers of FT strikes would overcome it. It's not the case. Two things came up:

1) If two FT procs occur simultaneously, only one FT proc actually fires. You can check this with Stormstrike. This means stormstrike becomes even more gimp.

2) The 2.5 sec cooldown on the Lightning Capacitor is a sizable nerf. Even firing every five seconds using crit stacking, it deals only 172 DPS. As demonstrated in this thread earlier, this isn't enough.

You are welcome to check my result as I've made mistakes before but I did a much better job this time.

For those who are unaware: The Lightning Capacitor has a 2.5 second cooldown after the releasing of charges. The tooltip is worded very poorly (it implies you only get a charge every 2.5 sec instead of waiting 2.5 sec after a discharge before it can recharge again)

I'm not stating 'our spec is dead'. That would only be true if they totally gimped our talents to favor fast weapons and still not fix WF CD problem ... Oh wait!!

You should try reading the Windfury Totem talent tooltip better though, it clearly states melee haste. With a Ferocity pet, any Hunter will gain more DPS from the 4% haste on his pet then he gets himself on his auto-shots. And a single DK can spec into both Ab. Might and Imp. Icy Talons btw, you don't require 2 different spec, only 2 different trees.

What you are also forgetting is that 30% haste is roughly 15% DPS increase for melee, considering half the DPS comes from instants. 20% damage is still 20% DPS increase though. And considering you will probably still be put in a melee group for non-raid buffs such as LotP, the ranged/spell haste is not such a big bonus as you make it out to be.

I'm not saying they are going to replace us, but IF someone is going to be replaced in favor of a DK, we are the first choice (or Rogues, as they bring no buffs at all).

Ah well, we'll see how it goes once lvl 80 content is implemented in beta and we have some actual data and examples.

Just a few points form what people have posted that I believe are incorrect or inaccurate

1) Where do you need 4 tanks in a 25 man raid? Most fights need 1-3 with 2 being the most common.
1a) What about 10 man's. I know most of us are focused on 25 man content, but I want to be viable for 10 man content as well.
2) When looking at DPS slots, all things being equal, if you have a war/bear/Pally tank you will probably have one less war/drood/pally dps spot. Thats not 100%, but alot of guilds will handle it that way.
3) Even if its true, and DPS DK's will be better at raid/party augmentation (and thats a BIG if), who cares. Roll another class, try another spec. Dont be so attached to your pixelated profession that you cant adapt. I know we all have time invested in these characters, and I am all for making sure Enh is at least viable, but it may just not be the case. The expansion is a reset, you can easily level another char and not be behind the curve.


This brings up a point I think alot of people are missing. There will ALWAYS be a 'best' setup for DPS/healing/tanking. The only way to avoid this is to make the classes so similar that there is no point in having seperate classes. The key to what Bliz is trying to do is make them close enough that skill is the deciding factor whether you get a raid spot. I question whether this is possible, this but we shall see.

Will the top guilds in the world do this? Of course not, they have the ability to pick up great players of any spec just by posting in their forums. But when you look at the guild beloew the top 100-150, most of them are going to have to choose between (as an example) a Enh shaman who they know plays at a high level consistantly and does all the right things to maximize his raid spot, and a DK who may be good, but is an unknown. for most of the high end guilds that actually have to make this choice, I am betting the better PLAYER will be the choice.

As someone said recently, the best way to secure your raid spot is to be good at your job. Its that simple.

If your in one of the guilds that has the luxary of sitting one good player just to get an extar 0.23% more DPS, well then you might want to talk about your role with your guild leaders and plan ahead in case you have to reroll DK.

Forgetting T4 & 5? Most fights required 4 tanks.

It's a bleedin' ten man. Everybody's viable for a ten man. There's groups leaving every thirty minutes!

Why would you post all this slippery slope crap and then claim it doesn't matter?

Look, all of you: play your class the way you like, find a guild that will let you raid and stop polluting this forum with speculations of viability. That's for the abyssmal "raid makeup optimization" threads. Whether or not we have a slot on SK's min-max roster will depend on raid leader perceptions and Actual Goddamn Parses. Outside of that, there will be hybrid enhancers with daggers and spell damage enchants who will still get to raid. Then there will be us, who will kick their asses because we're better at math.

Lets see, T4:

High King: 2 melee tanks
Grull: 2 Tanks?
Magtheridon: 3-4 tanks

T5:

Hydross: 3 tanks
Lurker: 2-3 tanks
Tidewalker: 2 tanks
Leotheras: 1 melee tank
Karathress: 3 tanks (we always had the first tank tank the main boss and the pet dude)
Vashj: 2 tanks

Alar: 3-4 tanks
Void Reaver: 3 tanks
Solarian: 1 Pally tank
Kael'thas: 3 tanks

So only on 2-3 fights do you possibly 'need' more than 3 tanks in T4-T5 content. But what about BT/MH?

Winterchill: 1 tank
Anetheron: 2 tanks
Kaz'rogal: 1 tank
Azgalor: 2-3 tanks
Archimonde: 1 tank

Najentus: 1 tank
Supremus: 2-3 tanks
Shade: 2 tanks
Teron Gorefiend: 1 tank
RoS: 1 warrior
Bloodboil: 3 tanks
Mother: 3 tanks
Illidari Council: 3 melee tanks
Illidan: 3 melee tanks

And what about SWP?

Kalecgos: 2-3 tanks
Brutallus: 2 tanks
Felmyst: 2 tanks
Twins: 2 melee tanks
M'uru: 3 tanks
Kil'jaeden: 2 tanks

3 tanks is THE trend throughout TBC, and I highly doubt you will need any more in WotLK.

As far as I know, the BETA server ability is just 4% extra haste. I can check for sure tonight if you like. Keep in mind they have not done the Shaman polish and talent tweaking. It has already been discussed here numerous times that a Death Knight will be GIMPING themselves damage output wise to put enough points in Blood AND Frost just to equal our raid utility. Why would you take someone who does less damage for the same job over someone who does more damage for the same job?

You obviously haven't played many other melee classes. Rogues alone generate 60-70% of their damage in the form of white auto attacks. Heck, 45-50% of a shamans damage is considered a normal melee hit. And with windfury TOTEM no longer being a 'yellow proc' attack and adding more white attack haste, you will see a large increase to overall 'white' damage done, especially our own since we never had that totem utility before, come Expansion time.

And once again I feel the need to point out that Enhancement Shamans normally get TWO spots reserved for them in high end content, not one. And at least you are correct with regards to a rogue being replaced: all melee damage is supposed to do 'comparable' damage to rogues. They are probably sweating silent/stealthy bullets as we speak for this very reason alone.

Lastly, you are presumably a long term raider with the Enhancement spec. If you get replaced by a DK its not because their class is better 'as outlined in dozens of posts above they never can be'. Its because YOU SUCK.

You're both shitting up the thread. Stop it.

Facts:

• Death Knights will be able to bring nearly the same buffs that you bring. Difference being their haste is not ranged, but only melee.
• Death Knights will need to severely gimp themselves to do so. Unless they drastically change their trees, no one will have Imp Icy Talons in a DPS spec.
• Death Knights will not steal your spot.
• Death Knights will be bringing the Atttack Power bonus (theirs works on ranged AP) and Shamans will bring Windfury and Strength of Earth, not to mention Lust.

Now stop the discussion. It's useless to debate.
OTOH, coming from a decently succesful PvE guild and been raiding as Enhancement for over a year now -- I'll be rolling a Death Knight only because of the simplicity of Shaman DPS in raids and the confirmed complexity of Death Knight rotations. If there would be one major concern you should adress is the lack of depth in the Shaman class; especially removing twisting simplified it even more. Maelstrom Weapon will make the rotation a bit more interesting, but it's not what I'm looking for. I want melee abilities. Not some instantcast spell.

Oh and by the way, most guilds only use one Enhance Shaman, why you think two is the standard, I have no idea. Sure, people do it, that doesn't mean its optimal .

On fights without too much AoE or other melee-unfriendly mechanics, you usually have 1 Shaman with WF in a group with a Fury War, Retridin and Rogues. The other guy is then in the Feral Druid & Hunters group for Agi, or in the tank group with whatever the tank requests for a specific fight.

I'm aware of how it works. I'm just saying that's not "what everyone does".

I think pretty few actually bring 2 ehnancement shaman. You are better off just having a resto shaman in the tank group to drop WF weapon for them.

Two is standard for most sunwell fights.

Brutallis, Twins, Muru, and KJ all benefit from having a second enhance shaman.

This wasn't really the case in BT/MH or any of the earlier raid zones, though.

Plus DKs have nothing equal in terms of heroism/BL or SS debuff

Meh, it's all spells, man. Hit a button, something happens, whether that something is Sinister Strike, Frostbolt or Earth Shock.

The touted depth and complexity of the death knight will quickly be reduced by theory. After all, the warlock is a pretty complex class; so's the hunter. Both are single button spammers in raids. Meanwhile, I have to hit 3, watch totem timers and mana and environmental effects...it's only easy because like you said, we've been doing it for more than a year.

At the same time, I have two suspicions about MW: first, it's not going to be more important than melee (duh). Second, real dps optimization is going to come from carefully balancing strikes, MW and shocks in a dynamic environment where you can never really tell when the next 5 stack is coming. Cast too early, you reset your swing timer. Cast too late, you might lose your FS debuff. Surely two abilities with 5s and 8s periods are going to interfere wildly, providing a lot of decision points.

Didn't a blue say MW was eventually not going to reset the swing timer? Did I miss something?

They did. Toots is referring to ensuring that a full 5 stacks of MW is up, rather than only having 4 and accidentally trying to cast a spell ( a half second LB or LvB) which really would mess your swing timer up.

Edit: and Toots, we may also be throwing in refreshing our lightning shield once or twice a minute if Static shock shapes up to be part of a raid build.

The problem is that neither FB nor FT scales to any greater extent. With just a 10% increase from spell damage, it is unlikely they will ever become viable.

As 1000 attack power currently only increases the FT dps with around 20 (1000x0.3x0.1)/1.5, with is almost the same as no scaling at all. For FB, it is even worse.

Also, Blizzard has stated that they do not want to add a new attack to enhancement and instead see Maelstrom as a new attack. While it is a good idea, at least in theory, that enhance are a true hybrid, allowing them to use both melee and spells, it feels like it has not been thought through properly.

Currently, in terms of itemization, 20 attack power is worth 12 spell power. Hence, in order for the spells to scale as well as the other classes with attack power, you would need to receive 12 spell power for every 20 attack power (a 0.6 ratio, instead of the 0.3 you get currently). As one gears up the spells become weaker and weaker in comparison. This is a problem with Blizzard continuing to make enhance rely on new spells, such as static shock and maelstrom.

As for Maelstrom, it's a good raiding talent but that is about it. Such small changes would be required to make it useful in solo and pvp as well. Enhance isn't exactly the power house of PvP at the moment and with all the excellent additions to other classes, it cannot afford to lose out on the new attack.

For solo, the duration of the buff would have to be increased to 30 seconds or so, as moving between mobs will otherwise almost always remove the buff and if you crit five times on the same mob, it will most definitely be dead already.

For PvP, it is hard to see it working out as an intended extra attack in its current form. If it worked on received crits, blocked crits from resilience and had a reduced or nullified mana cost, it could however work out as intended.

Right -- that's the trick with MW.

Cast at 5 stacks, it's instant, and there's no swing timer reset.

Cast at less than 5, it's a real cast. No attacks for the duration, plus your swing timer resets after the spell goes off.

Obviously, resetting the swing timer is a bad thing -- loss of all melee and windfury for the duration of your current attack speed. So the penalty for not waiting a full 5 stacks is almost guaranteed to be worse than the benefit of casting early.

Lightning Shield will be refreshed a minimum of once per minute; but why stop there? It's free to cast, use it when you have an open GCD and nothing else to do.

While I fully understand that my simulator has very little standing at this point, I must say that the results I'm seeing disagree with this.

Wielding Slow/Slow with Windfury/Flametongue is giving me the best results.

Yes, the proc frequency of WF is reduced, but the damage contribution of FT makes up for it, not to mention the minor increase of spell damage due to the spell-power bonus component of FT.

There are more passive melee haste effects in WotLK and more target debuffs affecting Nature and Fire damage. These also conspire to improve the effectiveness of OH FT.

Feel free to check out the SampleOutput wiki at the site referenced below.

Do we know that the new Flametongue has an increased proc-rate with hasted weapons?

Ok, so I have been checking this thread in particular hoping for some good ol' theorycrafting being done here so we could check in advance what is awaiting us at the other side of the expansion, even more considering I wasn't lucky enough to get a beta key :/

Being more and more dissapointed each time I checked this, I came to the point I couldn't go on without posting. So, sorry in advance for posting something that should already be in this thread:

One of the first thoughts and things said about Wrath, when they first started talking about it, was that they had a clear patamar and evidence to say that one of the biggest problems in TBC were tanks. From the very first beginning they talked about revamping tanking and how tanking and tanks in general would be adressed even more than they were already in TBC with paladins and feralz improving a lot in that direction.
If I remember, and I know people in here will correct me if I'm wrong, since the first presentations and discussions they knew from the start that the problem that tanks normally had a high demand with low offer, due to the "suckage" of using a tank specc to do anything besides tanking (less for feralz, but still true at some degree). They knew, as well, how a Fury or Arms warrior or a Ret or Holy paladin or a Balance or a Resto druid couldn't tank as well and as such, you were pidgeonholed to use your char for instances/raids and use alts or respecc to do anything else.

I'll say as well, that since I heard that Blizz was releasing a new class; since it's concept and presentation; since we firstly "WHOA" at it; it's being talked as a new tank class. It's been said to be introduced to help normalize the concern about the lack of tanks in the overall servers in WoW. It's been built to do so. Tank.

With their new concept of tanking speccs being able to farm and do other shit (even dps at instances or something alike, using DPS gear with tank specc) it really doesn't surprise me that DK trees are mixed with dps talents and tank talents along it. That's in line with Fury and Arms receiving tanking improvements and prot, as promissed by them, gonna receive some more dps boost.

Although we still have many "imbalances" inside the class mechanic and powers, I find that TBC was pretty good overall for the shaman class. We became one of the top dps hyrids out there, and my experience might be short, but besides a handfull few individuals scatered all over the world WWS parses I checked, I couldn't find arms/fury warrs, feral druids or retadins doing the same level of dps I output. And I have seen other enhancers doing a lot more damage than me, so I'm using my experience as a low ballmark.

I have been raiding for all TBC with a foreign speaking language to me and before I was accepted in there they didn't even allow people from my nationality in there, not for racism or whatever, but because of language barrier. I proved to them I was worth my trial and after more than a year at the guild, I proved many times I worth my salt. They yell at me when I miss raids.

So, could anyone in here, please, explain to me why we're even bothering to waste our times discussing if a TANK-oriented class will or will not replace our DPS-oriented role in raid? Could someone, as well, explain to me why would a guild trial someone they don't know, with a class they don't know, to do a job they don't know if they can do or not, to take the place of their enhance that they have know for quite some time and know that it's capable of doing it?

Seriously, even it's people inside the guild rerolling you're not suddenly playing with the DK as good as you play your old character at first day...

Seriously, I am already abusing your attention and patience with this damn long post, but if DKs DPS comes close to other hybrids, like enhancers, they will be nerfed somehow. Not because I don't think it's fair or that we should be top damage dealer hybrids. It's just that DK was created to solve a tank problem. Making your tank class go dps doesn't solve that problem. So they won't create a whole new class, with new mechanics, with new spells and powers to solve a problem and let it not do the job.

Death Knights - tank oriented
Enhance shammy - dps oriented
thanks.

_____________________________________________________________________________________ ________________________

What I really wanted to know, though, is if none is concerned to the fact that we have to pay so "much" to make int usable at our dps stats? Like, currently we have to pay talent points to make our tier sets suitable for us! Doesn't that get's reaaaaally weird to no one else?

If Flame tongue still have damage proc in 80lvl raid scene then slow/fast + wf/ft might look very promising.

Static shock dps figure is way more than 39dps with 600damage per orb.
Random WWSscoreboard link

Melee * 415
Windfury * 116
Stormstrike * 58
Flame shock * 20
Earth shock * 18
Total: 627 attacks
With 6% chance to proc there should be 37.62 procs and if using 600 damage per orb total static shock value is 22572 or 73.76dps.

In Wotlk we see 20% haste from wf totem and more stormstikes. Also factoring CoE + misery and Earth and moon.
This give minimum of 100dps aproximate for early raiding tiers in Wotlk.

Pitbuller, where the hell did you get those numbers? They aren't from the WWS you linked, man. Plus I think you got the period wrong; 415 melee attacks per minute would be a hasted speed of .3s