Patch 3.3 - Shaman notes

Lots of potential, definitely interesting.


Also this could be worth some attention considering how much we like haste at the moment.

Indeed a possible new ability to weave into the priorities. Fire Nova - 10 sec CD does damage as long as you have a fire totem down.

To add to this, it can be brought down to a 6 second cooldown with 2/2 Improved fire nova talent and further reduced to 3(!) second cool down with the glyph. I can see that being extremely useful in any PvE fight with adds, however the 1073 mana cost is rather daunting.

Edit: Sorry, being clear this is from an enhance perspective, not elemental...I don't know enough about elemental to have an opinion on that.

I'm not sure honestly how this fits into our rotations given what we already have. As it is, I really don't have any spare GCDs floating around, ever...and Fire nova is going to do comperable dmg to the totem, so we're talking an instant cast 1400-2k dmg at most.

My opinion is that it's completely useless in single-target dps fights because any/all our other abilities will be prioritized above it (I'd even refresh lightning shield before casting this honestly, particularly with 2-piece T9). On the off change I have a spare GCD, sure, I'd hit the button, but I don't think that'll really ever happen.

It IS kinda cool for AoE fights, granted, and gives enhance shaman some much needed AoE boosting in that departement.

Since I know people are going to ask about it and I was curious myself, Fire nova math:

945 average base damage, coefficient will be 42.86%

My gear is less than perfect, but using it as a baseline because it's essentially tier gear with ulduar stuff. 2153 total spellpower with raid buffs, or 922.7756 extra damage for nova. 45% spell crit raid buffed.

If it doesn't get Call of Fire and no talents/glyph:

(945+922.7758)*1.13=2110.59 with 45% crit = 3060/10(cooldown) = 306 dps
with glyph 3060/7 = 437.1 dps

With Call of Fire:

(945*1.15+922.7758)*1.13=2241.88 with 45% crit = 3251/10 = 325.1 dps
with glyph: 3251/7 = 464.4 dps

With just Imp Fire Nova:

(945*1.2+922.7758)*1.13=2324.16 with 45% crit = 3370/6(cooldown) = 561.7 dps
with glyph = 3370/3 = 1123.3 dps

With Call of Fire and Imp Fire Nova:

(945*1.15*1.2+922.7758)*1.13=2516.37 with 45% crit = 3648/6 = 608.1 dps
with glyph = 3648/3 = 1216 dps

All of those values assume you use it on cooldown, of course. Also this is single target.

Raid buffed and in combat I'm floating around 3000 spellpower which means it should do about 2100 non-crit and 2520 with 2/2 Imp Fire Nova Totem. 5k crits makes it seem like it would be a button worth pressing, especially if there was more then one thing getting hit. Doubt it would be worth using the glyph because we are already so GCD heavy and the mana consumption would be incredible but I definitely see this becoming a part of our rotation if it goes live like that.

When everything is up I use LL as a filler point. Replacing something like LL that crits for like 2-3k with something that could crit for 5-6k and for multiple target damage would probably be a valid investment. As far as being gcd starved i wouldnt imagine it being so bad when you factor out LL when you already have the QE buff.

Also, when it said that it triggers a 1.5 second gcd does that mean haste doesn't affect the gcd shrinkage?

Except you're assuming you also keep a fire totem down all the time...so now you HAVE to keep magma totem up all the time (most of the time I do, but there are occasions where GCD makes that dicey depending on how bursty my crits are with maelstrom). My shocks hit that hard, the math for lava lash with the totem I believe will be higher than that (I'll have to do the math to double check) and my CL for sure hits harder than that, and SS is important for mana retention.

So again, it does hit fine, granted, but I'm still unsure how high a priority it really becomes.

You could perhaps use searing instead of magma at a relatively minor dps loss there to then free up a frequent GCD for the nova spell...that could work. It also then to make it that effective requires you to get imp fire nova totem though, which is now giving up two points elsewhere...not sure where you could effectively pull those points from to get it.

More math...gotta check imp shields with T9 bonus vs. imp nova totem...it SOUNDS like imp nova may edge it out, not sure though...and while mana isn't an issue now...spamming fire nova on a shorter cooldown might make it an issue.

Hopefully they will change the glyph to give it back the stun instead of reducing the cooldown since I'm not sure if any spec of shaman can maintain Fire Nova totem on a 3 second cooldown or even if they would want to. Meaning the glyph really doesn't have any value as just a cooldown reduction unless people were willing to reglyph for specific fights with heavy AoE components.

Are you not using the LL totem? After the 400AP buff it got it's BiS I believe.
If you are, then LL becomes important to keep that buff up 100% since it doesn't proc every LL you have to prioritize LL higher to keep the buff from falling off.

1.5s GCD as opposed to the 1s GCD for totems I assume.

Lava lash still nets you an extra flametongue hit. People are also under the assumption that talent multipliers affect the end result of the spell, but they affect the base. Look at fire nova totem for example, the tooltip reads 893-997, factor in the 15% from call of flame and you get 1026.95-1146.55. Look familiar to your ingame tooltip of 1026-1147? Same deal with concussion and the spells that it affects. The average damage for Fire Nova with the talent will be ~3370 and the average damage of a Lava Lash with the FT hit is ~3170. Yes, Fire Nova is better, but it isn't thousands of damage better per cast like you're making it sound.

If you're GCDs are getting crowded so you can't keep magma up you probably wouldn't be using fire nova. Also, SS is NOT important for mana retention (notice how imp SS is not specced into in the BiS thread). All of this aside, 1) this is not set in stone for 3.3 and 2) we know nothing about t10 gear (not the biggest impact, but it could change the numbers a bit).

The BiS talent build is only BiS when you have 4-piece T9, so I should have qualified...I only have 2-piece so far, not 4-piece so BiS talent doesn't yet include the reduced shock cooldowns (there's discussion I think in the last 5/6 pages of that thread about it) which means I get more benefit from mana return from imp SS than reduced mana of my shocks. Once 4-piece T9 happens then it shifts over.

I'm not quite sure what your current gear has to do with using fire nova (nothing), but I'll go ahead and respond.

I am well aware that the BiS setup is only BiS with that (or comparable) gear. Notice how I'm not gemming haste right now. It's not based on T9 2pc vs 4pc (BTW you will probably find that 4pc t9> 2pc/pc). I personally ran with 0/2 imp SS even in 5/5 t8.5 and had no issues with mana. In a perfect tank and spank encounter it would be better, but there are a number of encounters where you don't need it (read: it's personal preference).

If this is indeed a solid DPS boost it may also bring back Imp SS or Elem Focus as helpful talents to offset the 1k mana burn.

If you take a look at the mail crafted items posted on MMO-Champion, you will notice that none of the pieces have any Int on them. A preview of things to come? Will shamans be getting their 'ret paladin mana system' and hunter focus in 3.3?

Do we have any data yet on the haste value from Black Magic?

Links on MMO are placeholders, the leatherworking items have the same stats as [Proto-Hide Leggings] and [Footpads of Silence].

Further clarification of spell changes from MMO-Champion.com this is produced by datamining changes between live and ptr.

I'm assuming that the "Improved Fire Nova now Increases the damage done by your Fire Nova by 20% and reduces the cooldown by 2/4 sec." should be 10/20% damage increase otherwise the 1 pt spent would be probably sufficient for Enhancement Shaman.

Re: Black Magic

Oh and you hordies get new totems

I'm really interested to see the number crunching on Black Magic, if it stacks etc. Or will Berserker/BM be the new preferred combo?

I like the nova changes, I'll have to start looking into making a single button macro to cast magma totem or if it's down cast fire nova.

Such a macro isn't possible the game cannot make decisions based on whether a previous spell has been cast. You must make that decision. Of course what is and will be possible is for an addon like ShockAndAwe to display FN icon as available and the highest priority to use. We shall of course need some testing to know where if anywhere in the priority list this should go but I shall add FN to ShockAndAwe in the meantime.

The closest you could probably get would be a cast sequence with Magma totem as first in sequence and then as many Fire Novas as you can fit inside the magma timer. The quantity obviously varying depending on whether you talent and/or glyph fire nova.