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Totem Talk: Elemental gearing for the new 80
Melee combat? Barbaric. Healing? How pedestrian. Let the elements do the talking. Totem Talk: Elemental. Brought to you by Mike Sacco. Last week I took you through Elemental 101, a crash course in playing your elemental shaman. Now that we've got the basics out of the way and you understand your talents and rotation, it seems as good a time as any to talk about gear. We addressed the main stats you're looking for on elemental gear last week, but here's a quick rundown again for those who missed it: Hit rating, spell power, haste, and crit. These are the only four stats we'll be looking for on elemental gear, besides the obvious intellect and stamina boosts that'll be on nearly every piece of caster gear anyway. If the above sounds like a pretty reasonable set of stats to look for, well, you're not wrong. So I've got good news and bad news for you. The good news? There's definitely elemental gear out there. The bad news? Good luck finding it. Elemental gearing has a lot of issues unique to both the shaman and this specific spec. And you're not gonna like them.
Totem Talk: Elemental 101
Melee combat? Barbaric. Healing? How pedestrian. Let the elements do the talking. Totem Talk: Elemental. Brought to you by Mike Sacco. If you're here and reading this, you've probably decided that elemental will be one of your shaman's two possible specs and you want to get a good grasp of how it all works before you dive in. The maiden voyage of Totem Talk's Elemental edition is intended to tell you everything you need to know to get started as one of the game's simplest specs, from mechanics to gearing to rotation. What it isn't intended to be the is be-all-end-all of Elemental theorycrafting. We'll delve into more complex stuff later on. Let's get started!
Hybrid Theory: Yet another spell power discussion
Welcome to Hybrid Theory, where we discuss all things hybrid in the World of Warcraft. Hybrid Theory is brought to you each week by columnist/blogger Alex Ziebart. Last week we talked a bit about gear and spell power, and various related things. I mostly approached it as supplying my personal experiences, but a lot of people wanted numbers. Specifically, how your current gear will translate into the new spell power mechanic.A kind fellow named Dan helped us out with a little bit of that in the comments section last week, so let's expand upon it somewhat. Again, this will focus mostly on the Healer and Caster aspects of the Hybrids. You Melee guys don't really need to worry about how spell power will change your gear.Alright, so the question is this: If you have a choice between taking +Damage gear or +Healing gear in the current game right now, which would be a better choice for taking with you into Wrath of the Lich King leveling? Let's make liberal use of Wowhead, shall we?
Elemental buffed
Hello, saga of Shamans in patch 2.3! We haven't had a post about you in, oh...a day or so. Time for an update, don't you think? And this one ought to be pleasant to most of you readers. But first, a recap. Blizz promised buffs for Elemental DPS in 2.3. It turned out to be a nerf on the PTR (for anyone over +200 damage). Shamans got very upset. ??? Blizz realized they'd made a mistake, and buffed Elemental DPS! Yes, it's true. Eyonix has recently made a post in the Shaman forum promising an imminent hotfix to the PTR, to the tune of a 5-6% increase to the damage coefficients of Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning. According to the whelp, this works out as follows: <1100 +damage: slight buff to DPS (as compared to 2.2) 1100-1200: no change >1220: slight nerf Well, it hardly seems to be the buffs that were promised back in the day, but hey, it beats a nerf! How about it, Shaman players? Are you pleased now, and ready to go back to your regular totem-dropping lives?
Patch 2.3 and you: Elemental Shaman edition
Earlier today, the up-close-and-personal Enhancement shammies got some boosts, and Elemental improvements were promised for patch 2.3 as well. And here they are! Eyonix delivers: Being a level 70 elemental shaman myself, I'm particularly excited as currently I feel the class is in good shape, but in need of a few minor tweaks. I'd say the one I'm most pleased with (especially after seeing the results of change on an internal build) concerns lightning overload. When 2.3 launches it will have a 4/8/12/16/20% chance to occur, though the additional spell will cause half damage, still ending up being a noticeable increase to overall dps Also, the additional spell will cause no threat whatsoever. [Regarding] the mana spring totem. Previously it restored 12 mana every two seconds at maximum rank, for your entire party. As of patch 2.3 it will restore your groups mana by 20 every 2 seconds.This equates to 50mana/5 for each member of your party without the talent points in restorative totems. The second change impacts water shield. This spell will no longer cost any mana to cast (which also means the five-[second] rule will not be affected) and the mana granted per globe has been substantially increased. Additionally, the spells duration has been shortened to one minute and at the end of its duration it now grants mana for any remaining globes. Elemental Focus will now reduce the mana cost of the next two damage spells by 40%. Now before theorycrafting begins, this is actually a buff except in cases where your chance to land a critical strike with spells was extremely high. Frostshock will no longer be subject to diminishing returns which I'm sure players will find useful, especially in pvp. Lastly, we are making a change that will cause a reduction in dps, however, the elemental shamans overall dps will still be improving with the change that we're making to lightning overload. We're reducing the casting time of Lightning Bolt to 2.5 seconds (from 3 seconds), and chain lightning to 2.0 (from 2.5 seconds), causing benefit from spell damage to be reduced appropriately. The mana cost for these two spells are being lowered as well.The lightning mastery talent's cast time will now be reduced by .1/.2/.3/.4/.5 seconds. So, casting time for the spells ends up being the same as before. (All of the above from this Eyonix post) We're increasing the additional mana granted by water shield for both the Tidefury Raiment and the Totem of the Thunderhead. (Eyonix) Now that is what I call a lot of changes. Well, my LB-loving friends, are you happy with this stuff? Not all of these changes are Elemental-specific, of course; the mana spring totem change, for instance, helps everyone, Shaman or not. How do you think these changes will interact to help or hurt Elemental shamans?In other Shaman news, Eyonix has said basically "no cc 4 u", at least until Wrath: If we give shaman a cc abillity it won't be until Wrath of the Lich King.
Build Shop: Shaman 40/0/21
Late again, dear readers, and without a good explanation this time. To compensate, I'll look at a build from the class everyone's been clamoring for: Shaman. Now Shaman is, without question, the class I know the least about in the game. I did some research before writing this, but it's still going to be a bit shaky, so you'll just have to excuse that. It'll also probably be shorter than your average Build Shop, simply because I won't be able to segue into extended discussions of individual talents or skills as often.I didn't get very many Shaman builds, despite the class's vociferousness in the comments. To be specific, I got three: two elemental, one enhancement. I know enhancement is undergoing some shakeups right now, what with the dual-Windfury nerf and all, so I'm going to avoid that and just do an elemental build. Without further ado, I give you: 40/0/21. Shaggyg on Destromath thinks this build, taking points in both Ele and Resto, should "increase crits and improve casting performance" once his up-and-coming shaman hits endgame. (Aside: props on the <My Little Pwnies> guild name; I've seen it on a few realms now and it always makes me chuckle.)
