After the shaman Buff, they still do not have a single competitive deck. They are unviable at any level, and their top deck is just a horrible aggro deck that is uninteresting and has none of the cards that blizzard supposedly buffed.
Shaman lack draw, and cannot keep up, yada yada yada… Blizz needs a “animal house” class that just represents wacky garbage and that class has been shaman. It gets the worst mechanics, it gets the worst reworks, it has the worst punishment for opponent mistakes and still has some of the worst core card synergy, even after blizz promised us a “Enhancement” rework (garbage) and a core card rework (garbage).
Side note I just played a mage, who misplayed the entire game and not only WRECKED ME while I played on curve, but opened the game with a pre-emptive Well-Played.
Since it is impossible for the mini set to have 5 different draw cards for shaman, they will give them maybe one or two cards. There will probably be an elemental that has “Draw a card, If you played an elemental last turn draw 2 cards”.
But in that lies the issue. The other classes have many different ways to draw, from spell damage based draw cards, or secret based draw cards, to secret passage that draws 4 for nothing. These shaman adjustments cannot suffice for the draw cards that the other classes have accumulated.
And since blizz failed to see this when they made the core set, it may be too late for anything to be done. Unless they are going to introduce ANOTHER shaman rework, where they remove all of the useless overload mechanics, shaman might as well just be retired as a class. Period.
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Overload cards need to be buffed to above the power level of cards that are currently as powerful but that carry no penalty. Otherwise, what’s the point? That or throw out the mechanic for good.
We’re likely to see some more elemental support come the miniset. I just hope it’s enough, combined with added draw, to give us shaman lovers a viable deck.
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No surprise.
I warned about shaman lacking win conditions and draw.
Neither of the buffs addressed that, so the result is shaman is in the exact same state it was: Garbage
Devs are lost. There’s no hope for this game until the team is changed
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I think you are playing shaman wrong, have you taken a look at Brian kiblers elemental shaman? He is ripping things up at high legend with this deck, try it out.
I’m slowly plodding along to 1,000 Shaman wins (985 and painfully counting) and it’s been really rough. There’s nothing a Shaman can do that another class doesn’t do better and sometimes -way- better. Card draw, as noted, we’re awful. Powerhouse cards like an 8 mana heal that produces an 8/8 w/ DS/T or an 8 mana 8/8 that can rush and then pound the opponents face in the same turn, or an 8 mana 6/6 that burns 5 of the opponents cards…nothing. Best we can throw out is an 8 man 3/6 with charge/DS/T. The deck plays so slow and can usually only play about two or three cards per turn while other classes play 6 or more quite commonly. The power level between Shaman and everything else is just monstrous.
IMO, they either need to seriously enhance the elementals to make them viable, bring back overload removal cards, or have some cards that seriously reward being overloaded. (Like if you are overloaded, deal 8 damage to an enemy or cast 8 elemental spells without penalty or draw 5 cards or this turn only your overload spells don’t overload…I don’t know, someone can probably do it better, but something that answers the obscene power difference between everyone else and this class.) Or let us choose what totem we want. No other class in the game has a hero power that is dependant on RNG, why on earth does this one have to deal with it? Just some ideas…
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It’s worth noting that the meta at which Kibler plays is very different than that which most of us experience. He may be better able to win against the classes and decks he finds there. Also, it’s Kibler. The guy’s amazing. 
Just like with Paladin and Librams Shaman is getting close to a perfect storm that will push the Elemental archtype over the top making it totaly busted.
Just 1 more push with the mini set and it might just be enouth.
There are similarities, but I think examining the differences may helpreveal what shamans are lacking.
Paladin mainly got to where it is today thanks to outland and scholo giving them a solid early curve. Core/barrens added even more options.
So what about shaman? It’s not like they didn’t get early drops, but one big difference is that shaman early minions are split into themes.
-Murlocs
-Elementals
-Spell related synergies (zapper which also has overload synergy, notetaker, pheonix)
-even a couple totem cards
Unlike paladin minions that are more generic and straight forward (and then pally have buffs to improve them), shaman lacks the same buffs and need those minion synergies to work, but different synergy groups do not work well together, so while on paper shaman has a fair number of early drops, in practice they can only run a subset them at any time.
This leads to card draw. Without the draw, they can’t reliably draw into their synergies to make those things work.
Then finally, card gen. Again, it’s not like shamans don’t have card gen, but card gen is mostly in spells… with the shaman spell pool having a rather large variance on what you can get. Sometimes you high roll and get the exact spell for the job, other times you only get dead cards. Pallies in contrast have very consistent generation mechanics in librams and first day (and the occasional murloc from angling rod). Heck, you can even compare the always consistent recruit vs the choice of 4 basic totems.
I think the theme here is lack of consistency. Maybe it’s part of class identity (as above, shaman hero power is like the only basic hero power with RNG, something something the elements are fickle). This may be why shamans have frequently been a feast or famine class. When things are good the randomness pushes them even better. When things are bad RNG makes it worse.
3 Likes
Why do we need predictions about things that are already happening
Certainly he is good, I’ve only bumped into him at legend once long ago somewhere near the top end of legend. This was a long time ago when legend was relatively hard to get to. I managed to squeeze out a win in an unfavorable match up vs him and I was actually surprised to see that he actually genuinely said gg as opposed to the usual BM I’ve grown accustomed to in this game.
Ever since then I started following the guy, not because of his skill, but his actual composure and clear love for the strategic element of the game.
Anyways, he’s definitely good, but I respect his deck building, some of the best in the game. To claim it is niche is to do the guy a disservice, his decks are not niche, they are legitimately good if you know how to play them.
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It can go in two ways: the miniset will release a shudderwock 2 and shaman will be tier1; or the miniset will have Moorabi 2 and shaman will be tierS.
Note: S in tierS stands for shaman
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I know people complain about Shaman card draw, but it’s Blizz that’s shot itself in the foot with their “class identity”:
Shaman: Shamans wield the power of the elements along with their trusty totems. While they may not be able to generate resources as quickly as a Mage, they are able to overload their Mana Crystals with lightning, allowing them to ramp up for a burst of power faster than other classes. Shamans are thus rewarded for planning a few turns ahead by tuning their mana curve. Shamans also have strong tools to adapt to many situations. Although they are not as versatile as a Druid’s Choose One cards, they are able to extend their capabilities in ways other classes might not be able to.
- Strengths: Minion swarms, damage spells, Totems, Elementals, Murlocs
- Weaknesses : Card draw, card generation
They went through the checklist this expansion - they printed some murlocs, printed some elementals, printed some spells, and made absolutely sure there was no card draw. Unfortunately, they didn’t print anything that wins games. Very frustrating.
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Ikr, I don’t understand why they do that. I’m pretty sure ppl wouldn’t mind a change for the class. There is no doubt the the class needs more draw. There are a lot of quick fix for this with the present content. For exemple, make refreshing spring water a dual class spell. They should exploit more of the old key words instead of forcing new one with an insane power creep.
How are “totems, elementals, murlocs” an inherent strength?
those are minion types, that have no synergy with each other to boot. Only as strong as the cards they print. At all times, Blizz needs to print full Elemental, Murloc and Totem packages in order for any of Shaman’s archetypes to be viable.
They are expected to simply swarm the board with one of three minion types, and hand dump face spells, all without draw or generation. So basically high roll or bust is literally their identity. And they wonder why Shaman is always dumpster or S tier.
Their weaknesses OTOH, are game mechanics.
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Kibler is a professional MTG and HS player/streamer who makes money playing the game. He has played as a top tier shaman in most metas that i have followed him. Also, he said the buff was “perfect” but elemental shaman winrate at diamond-legend is 45%. So theres that…
As much as I like drawing inspiration for new deck lists from streamers, it always appears they are playing on EZ mode during their showcase videos.
They just don’t show you the games where they got blown out by token or clown druid, faced a perfect paladin curve, had a rogue, mage or DH slam them with 22 damage from hand in a single turn.
That stuff seems to be the norm for me at diamond 10-5, like 9/10 games, whereas these guys playing at “legend” seem to be facing silver level aggression. Very convenient to show off their brilliant “off-meta” creations.
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My idea to a slightly buff shaman, make the 1/1 useless totem that spawns from hero power to give +1 spell power.
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To be fair, the deck is a glass cannon. The second people start building against it, it’s going to fall to pieces.
