Shaman Build discussion

[Cyren]

Alright so I've seen this other places, but I'd like to hear from the Shaman's of this guild. I'm currently grinding with an Elemental/Enhance build. So if you'd like to talk about your build, pros and cons, that would be sweet.

Elemental/Enhance build-
30/21/0 22/29/0
High points: Elemental focus, Elemental fury, nice shock spells
Imp ghost wolf, thundering strikes, flurry, etc.

Enhancement is all out close combat effectiveness. What you really want with enhancement is imp. ghost wolf, imp. lightning shield, thundering strikes, flurry, parry, and improved windfury. This is a windfury build to be sure. If you like tanking or overall melee you can continue and take points in anticipation and toughness. Enhancement is the mana-efficient way to deal damage but in some degree depends on luck. You depend on those winfury procs to do the deed, and if they don't happen you lose.

Elemental well it makes your nukes more efficient and better.

[Valermos]

Cyren, and to other in the guild, i myself was a elemental enhance shaman, and sure, its great fun in pvp and solo, but instance and what not, it sucks, you'll notice urself up front getting hit by boss aoe, and most the time like myself, pulling agro with your high crit count spells, once a boss or mob hits you 2 or 3 times, ur in the red zone.

I love to pvp, but i have noticed myself often doing the "tanking" roll in pvp, i hate it, i die to fast and i dont have fast enough dps even with the ehnace build. sometimes, it just isnt enough.

I juist respec'd tonight, and i respec'd to 0 - 12 - 39 a huge turn around on my shaman pvp side, i like to win battle, like to successfully defeat instances, i feal there are enough melee classes specially in our guild, that i need to step aside and play healer roll for a while now. One thing i noticed that differenciates the alliance from horde is the hordes lack of heal's and team play. Everyone loves to solo or try to be king kong and 1v3 people.

I want to stay to the back and keep us alive rather watch us die and have nothing to do or say about it. I hope this respec works for me, and may change some shaman minds in the guild

[Faiten]

ull respec back to ur pvp build in 3 days

[Cyren]

I can't see myself with more than 21 points in resto.

In FFXI I didn't play a white mage cause I wanted to get in the thick of it. So is elemental/enhance selfish? Sure why not. But this is a game and I play to have fun. That being said I still end up healing a lot and I do heal in BG and instances. I guess its kind of a curse, having healing spells dooms me to that end. And shamans are the 3rd best healers anway.

What about lvl 60 priests that are shadow spec? Are they selfish because they aren't 100% devoted to healing? Another thing that irks me about resto is that your points aren't very well spent. 5 points for 5% less mana on healing spells? wow.

[Niin]

elemental tree allows most controlled burst dmg potential. Enhance is mana conserving and allows for greatest burst dmg potential but is based on luck. Restoration is about survivabilty. Each tree and spec you should go for diff equips.

I have tried and played with tons of spec combos and ill say what i think

29/22/0 this is pure frontloaded dmg, you get the control of elemental and the greater burst chance of enhance. If you want to kill something quick this is it, but your survivability is low. Can still deal good dps even after oom though not as controlled as EM build. i usually mix up my spell crit, melee crit atk power stamina for this build when i use it. An in your face , mana dumping build for pvp and can reach number one in those dps charts if you like(nova, chain, frost, windfury)

35/0/16 this is good for those zergfests like av. Reduced lightning casts, reduced mana cost, clearcasting, and elemntal mastery with lesser healing wave. With elemental mastery this is the best build for controlled burst dps. I play this style with tons of kiting in pvp, and stand back and nuke in instances.

31/0/20 or 30/0/21 ns or em basically. similar to above just not as fast castin with lightning but increased crit chance with lightning spells.

the two builds above really rely on mana and once oom well you might as well just die. Good survivabilty with shield and imp lesser healing wave but your dps and healing both rely on mana and no gw.

22/7/22 or 15/12/22 or somethit. elemental fury, imp gw and ns. A balanced build and a jack of all trades master of none type thing. Good build to do what is neede in grp but will miss out on the better stuff in elemental or enhance. Not a great build imo, too spread out.

0/30/21 obviously windfury is what you wil be relying on here. This build is played differntly then just shock spamming in pvp. I tend to use rank one shocks and strictly melee for dps and save my mana for healing grp members. imp gw is key in this build and also i focus on melee stats. Great for small grp pvp and in instances where you can dps with melee and conserve mana for heals, totems and utility shocks.

0/35/16 This build allows for biggest burst dmg potential and ive killed a lot of classes in 4 seconds or less with this build but its is purely luck based. Stormstrike still costs way too much mana for it to be better than elemental mastery or ns, and imp goa is nice for rges and hunters but imo this build sucks. Your better off 0/30/21

0/7/44 i think resto tree needs some work but atm this the best pve raiding/healing build for shaman. Stream talents suck, the reduced healing cost, totem cost are there in raid context. If you look at it by itself then yeah looks crappy but in the context of a 20 or 40 man raid lets say you have 5 resto specced shams 7 holy priests and 6 resto druids then thats when these 5%, mana tide, purification all comes in. Great for healing instances and in pvp its not bad. one on one i still beat a lot of classes, fighting casters its basically outlasting them now, melee just kite and chip away and in small grp pvp just lhw and chain heal, mana tide for you and your mages and earthbind and grounding with utility shock. This build i find has the highest survivability but horiible dps, almost like a pally.

14/0/37 current build atm, got rid of shit like imp reincrnation, combat endurance reduced Healing wave. Wanted to try out clearcasting and redued shocks but im gonna ditch this build as the 14 in elemental is just not worth it.

im at the point where i would jsut really raid with shaman so im gonna go back to 44 in resto. But i think depends on what kind of party your in and what you are doing to decide on spec. thats the good thing about shaman is that you can do what is needed and do it fairly well. But just like in every mmo, healers endgame are gonna be few and far between so shamans will be called upon to heal when it comes down to it.

[Cyren]

doesn't it cost you like 100g every time you respec? (since you've done it so many times)

[Gekha]

respec cost caps at 50g

[Valermos]

Cyren, you'll soon notice that when you get to these higher end instances where you fight bosses that kill you with 1 or 2 hits, that you dont want to be elem enhance whether you feal like u want to top the charts or not, pvp its great, but you'll soon make a name for yourself on the alliance side and it wont be a good one, they'll pick you out of a group of 10 people and nuke ur ass to the grass... they do it to me and they'll do it to you. Like i said, sure elem enhance is great fun, niin said it and ill say it, but it truely gets old, i've played my resto spec in about 4 instances now, 1 being zul gurub, i out heald a druid, and this druid mind you is decent. its not that this druid was bad, its just that i played my roll of a healer, it honestly isnt boring, cause think of it like this. These boss's drop items you want. You wont get these items with your healers having to worry about one more pvp spec shaman in the front getting down to half life when he gets hit once, or possibley dying. I told Wasted the other night, and im sure this has happened to niin, as i've recently noticed his more kiting buisness in instance. When you do pull agro, and you do die. You must remember there are 2 classes in this game that can rezurect people. 1 being you, and when you die, you look and feel like a dumb ass cause you've used ur anhks or your party has all survived but urself for pulling agro from the tank with yoru high end crits. I'll try to wrap this up, but what im trying to say is. When you get to these instanecs you wont want to be mass melee anymore, there are classes for that, like warrior rogue and mage. These guys top the chart, whether you crit every hit /spell you throw they'll still pass you on there worst days. These classes have things to protect themselves from dying in 2 swings, Mage = blink / mana shield. Warrior has lots of life and fear (if needed) and Rogues have vanish, gouge, and blind. Shaman have NOTHING, when a group comes for us, we run and we die. So i hope you see the resoning in my resto spec. This hasnt been a post to try to change your shaman ways, but mearly a post to open your eyes and not have you fall into that category everyone loves known as "Who got mose dmg that fight?"

[Cyren]

Okay so I've been kicking around the idea of an ELEMENTAL shaman. Okay so just listen and then tell me how dumb I am.

The best elemental talents come 25+ points in. Most people never get that far into it but it has so much to offer. Picture 15% more mana efficient lightning bolts that have +6% crit chance and take only 2 (not 3) seconds to cast! Or how about +6% crit chain lightnings that do 10% more damage and take only 1.5 sec to cast. On top of all of this are the BIG elemental crits and clearcasting procs, plus every 5 min you can juice up a spell to auto-crit using elemental mastery. So we are looking at say 39/7/5 build here. The idea is burst damage for pvp and for pve as well.

One benefit of this build is that you could also I feel be a decent healer. If you go enhance/resto you will be stacking up agi, str, and attack power to some degree. None of that is needed with this build. You can focus on 1) Int (and mana) 2) Stamina 3) Spirit. Thats pretty much it. Also look at the sets of gear for shaman, the elements, the earthfury, and the ten storms. ALL of which are geared toward elemental/resto and mostly I daresay elemental.

I don't think this would be permanent just something fun to try, lemme know how off I am.

[Niin]

ya that works cyren, nuke when enough healers, heal when enough nukers. Either way if ya got the gold mess around with some builds you'll find ones you like. But yeah all sham sets are focused on the elemental/resto sham.

[Cyren]

So now that I've been doing the 30/0/21 build its pretty good but idk sometimes very frustrating.

An enhancement build would need more stamina to make up for the lack of armor using a 2 hander. I think I saw valermos posted that he broke 4k hp unbuffed, that is pretty much what I am talking about. Right now I have like 210 stam, 275 int, and 200 spi, giving me a total of ~3200 hp and something like 5400 mana (I can't recall). For a caster build I am still on the LOW side of both of these, looking for 300+ intel and 6k mana, but with 6k mana I think I need something like 310 intel which would NOT be easy but is possible. I still have several pieces I wish to get (blue neck armor, Merciful Greaves (DM), Gift of the Elven Magi (Strat live), Coif of the Elements (scholomance).

The caster build also likes +crit and +damage/healing, which you get at a sacrifice to stats. (Unless you get earthfury shit that has awesome stats and also bonuses). Sadly the Elements set isn't all its cracked up to be IMO, maybe if you have all 8, otherwise just pick and choose the few pieces that are good, set bonuses aren't good until you have like 5 or more pieces and scholo/strat drops often surpass the quality of the pieces individually.

For an enhance/resto build finding the right gear would be diffucult I think. You need the following
1) at least 250 stamina, pref. 300
2) at least 150 intel, you'll need some mana
3) a good amount of agility to push your crit rate high
4) str/attack power to actually do dmg with your weapon.
Its a lot of demands on the gear you have. A lot of the PVP stuff for shaman has mostly STM on it, so that would be easy to get 300 stamina but at the cost of most other stats.

idk its kinda confusing. Even where to put 30 points in a 0/30/21 build is something to consider.

[Moklidar]

As of now, I'm 11/38/0 with 2 unspent points. I'm pretty much built like Cyrens requirements for his enhance/resto build. I was 0/38/13. My goal was to try to be a versitle melee/support shaman that supplemented damage with some spaced shocks for either damage or their utility component (ES for spell interrupt, FS for reduced speed on runners, etc.). I got the improved SoE and GoA totems so that when I'm with melees they get a little extra over other enhnace shaman. From memory my stats go as follows: str 188, agi 220-ish, sta 250-ish, int 160-ish, spirit 134-ish. When I toss those imp SoE and GoA totems I can beat things down hard so it's fun in PvP and PvE on top of giving a good buff to the people around me. My %crit is around 25% unbuffed and reaches almost 30% with imp GoA.

From my limited experience, I can out damage mages in one on one matches, but when the aoe factor comes in they beat me. Rogues I usually fall in the middle of the group with similarly geared people.

The way I look at the high end instances is that I'll be welcome in a melee group for that extra str and agi with imp totems, can do some spot healing on the melees, and then when mana is gone run in a melee till I either A) die or B)regen enough mana to cast another heal or shock.

I may respec again back to a heavy enhance/resto build. Clear casting is nice and the reduced mana on the shocks is great, but I really like throwing the totems and the 10% reduction in cost was nice. I'd say my current spec is better in PvP and my previous was better for PvE.

Overall, I think a shaman place is to fill the spot that most critical. If healers start going down, you heal. If dps starts dropping, get you ass in there and nuke/melee, if anything else comes up, deal with it (totems, purge, etc.).

[Crawlpappy]

i agree with valermos in a previous post, a meleeing shammy pulling aggro in MC especially will die fast, losing a healer and rezzer. also being in the front line now puts you in another gear bracket which means now you have to get sufficient FR gear to withstand alot of the fr based damage you will take, thus sacrificing stats. i know you absolutly hate healing Moklidar but trust me Dami, myself and other raid leaders wouldnt be to pleased watching a shamen die over and over in melee combat in MC..sometimes to get the things you want you have to understand what role you will play in certian instances. we have shamens geared and talented towards your spec and utility, but even they stay out of melee combat..

[Moklidar]

I see your point CP. My intention isn't to blindly run into a boss fray and start swinging and praying to god my WF goes off with a triple crit. My intention is to be there with the melees I want to support. In fact, I know that in a boss fray I should stay back and keep my boys in the game. I think I've pin pointed the problem and it's that everyone has the impression that I just want to run into a fight and start swinging. This is not true, I'm not a stupid player and I know when to stay back. While it's true I don't enjoy just playing a healer from the moment I log on to the moment I log off, i do understand that it's a necessary part of the game. Just a while ago I filled in as the healer for a LBRS run with Ithryn. Sure, we whiped a number of times, but we stayed in the game and pushed through till we were almost to wyrm and I had to log due to the time. Throughout the run I performed healing/totem support first and damage secondary.

I'd argue some of the points made in the other posts about a shaman being anything but a healer, but I'm not going to keep this debate going any longer. Everyone has there opinions/beliefs and it's not worth a long debate.

My point is, I'm trying to be someone the guild can count on and that's all.

[Crawlpappy]

like has been said already Moklidar, you have a place when all your requirements and Valermos can fit you into our raid rotation np, your current build is fine, you will be an asset and understand the need to heal when we ask, and thats all we want. so there isnt a need for anymore discussion, lets get you done with the requirements. 300 first aid, Ony keyed, sufficient blue gear and MC attuned and your good. btw you can attend ZG weekly np the requirements for our ZG open invite run dont apply. only thing i feel ppl need to have all our requirements for is MC/Ony/BWL...good luck man we will see you in mc soon..

[Moklidar]

All I need now is to talk to rexxar and do an ubrs run for the blood and I'm done.

[Cyren]

CP brings up valid points I figured you MIGHT want my 2 cents (this is an OLD thread). Basically I'm 0/14/37 now which is just enough enhancement for thundering strikes and 2 handed weapons.

Enhance/resto is a good build it kind of depends on what you are looking to do. I personally would recommend a slight respec, but that is ENTIRELY your choice and I would not force it on you. I personally am thinking about going 0/22/29. The reasons for this are you have thundering strikes, flurry, and imp. WF talents. The only other talents you get later that improve melee dps are stormstrike and the totem buffs. Which, if you notice the difference between having the talents and not having them, is about .9 dps and .5% critical strike. This is why I said 22 points.

29 points in resto can buy you imp lesser healing wave (vital if you are taking hits), Natures Swiftness (no explanation needed), tidal mastery (5% healing and lighning crits), and 4/5 purification, which significantly improves the healing you are able to do.

Now, as a melee shaman in MC, there are a few things you will quickly realize. (I know cause shhh don't tell anyone but I've taken some swings). One, many of the trash mobs have aoes, some even have knockdowns and knockbacks. The problem with this is, when I go in and melee I am unable to even heal the damage I have myself taken for up to 5 seconds. Second, shocks are not to be used. They are too much mana, and you aren't gonna be doing any spell interrupting or snaring. With that said, auto attack windfury, totems, and spot healing is an effective role to play in most scenarios. And if you aren't using shocks you should have a decent amount of mana for heals. Oh yes, and stormstrike is probably not gonna help you much for melee, it's kind of mana inefficient AND it encourages you to follow up with earth shock, which is a big no no. Lastly, lightning shield is NEVER to be used in pve situations. The reason is that if you draw aggro (oops) the lightning shield damage will build more aggro for you (double oops).

One other thing to keep in mind, even if you spec say 11/40/0 you should probably start working on a set that allows you to have 6000+ mana and perhaps some +healing and Mp/5 as well. These are kind of basic goals to be effective in a healing role.

Here's a melee-healing oriented 0/22/29 build

CP, I hope this is the kind of constructive post you are looking for.

[Crawlpappy]

exactly and ty Cyren, i dont have the knowledge of Shamen's to make any valid points unless im just "redneck" obvious like saying, dont melee, and come on heal someone please...Moklidar Cyren is offering a perspective from an awesome MC shamens persoective imo, Cyren is a excellent healer and knows his class well, and accepts his role in MC while understanding guild progression, first thing i suggest Moklidar is to take everyones opinion except our shamens and toss them out the window. idk if you have yet but it may be a good idea to join shamen text chat in game, you will robably learn alot.

we have spent time putting together our class core groups, and one vital class core is our Shamen, speak with them, they can tell you first hand what will work and what will not work in reguards to MC/ONY and ZG..trust me they will help alot, time to start thinking like an Exiled Raiding Shamen, and that means working as a team...good luck Moklidar we will see you in MC very soon, see you in ZG even sooner...

[Moklidar]

OK CP. Cyrens advice is duely noted and yours is duely ignored as per your suggestion. hahaha I've already talked to Val about my spec so he knows what I bring to the table.

Going the path I have I've managed to get a good set of melee gear. I do have a few pieces of casting/healing gear, but could definitely use more.

Cyren, already way ahead of you on the lightning shield and such. For lightning shield to work you have to be getting hit, which I don't like to happen. Thus, I rarely use it unless the situation calls for it. I try not to use shocks for the vary reason you stated, aggro magnet. The only one I use regularly is flame shock since the initial hit is low and it's a dot so much less aggro then the rest of the shocks. But obviously, not much use in MC. My biggest expendature of mana is on totems(which realyl aren't that much) and heals (which do add up).


In melee gear I'm pushing around 3800+ for mana and hp each, unbuffed. In casting gear I'm not sure what it is, but my mana goes up and my hp goes down.

As of now I'm pretty happy with my melee gear. Sure, better is out there and I'd like to get it eventually, but what I really need is some good casting gear.

[Crawlpappy]

omg im gonna be able to ask mok to heal, woohoo!!!