Hello, how are you guys?
this is my first time posting on the forum, I felt I needed to speak up. I started playing WotLK and my main character was always a warlock, although I played 99% of the time with my main character I always enjoyed leveling up the others to explore them. And so it went, at some point the warlock stopped providing me with the same enjoyment, and I believe it was in Pandaria when there were no more talents. But I remained faithful, “I am a warlock main and always will be.” When Dragonflight season 3 arrived, after stopping and returning to play a few times, I was leveling an Enhancement Shaman and I thought, “Why am I forcing myself to play something that hasn’t entertained me for years?” and I realized that the Enhancement Shaman was really cool, it was giving me that feeling I had when I leveled up my first character. And it was great at the end of Dragonflight in The War Within, it was incredible. Were there many buttons to press? Yes, but it was still incredibly fun because it allowed me to be creative in various situations. In season 2 of TWW, it was the first time I started doing Mythic+ and raiding more seriously with a character that wasn’t my warlock, which I had already abandoned by then. And I managed to get 3k Mythic+ and did heroic raids. And I felt good playing because it was a versatile class, everything I always wanted: healing, ranged damage, melee damage, it had utility, I could do some really cool combos like duplicating the Roots Totem on the adds of the last boss of the Hollowfall dungeon, I could control the mobs well when they needed to remove poison or fear. Of course, everything was pre-configured, but it was good to be able to do these things, after all, shaman enhancement is rarely one of the best DPS, so it’s good to have control and flexibility.
Season 3 was incredible, shaman was very cool, high stats made the class work much better, but it was no longer one of the top DPS. But the gameplay made people like having one in the group.
Then came Midnight, and they removed SO MANY abilities and changed so many others. You know, I don’t care about an ability that’s purely damage-based. But sometimes it seems like Blizzard is more concerned with keeping skills that have pretty animations than skills that actually work well. My main point is Thunderstorm, by far one of the most important skills of the >>SHAMAN<< (not the elemental one) in a general context! The game currently needs a lot of power to stop mob abilities, and Thunderstorm was the number one skill for that. The stun totem takes 2 seconds to activate, the hex doesn’t work in 80% of cases. The slow totem doesn’t interrupt anything, and the lightning whip was moved only to PvP. Thunderstorm is necessary.
Being able to modify it to use on allied targets, throwing them up or away, that was the icing on the cake. There were dungeons where it was on cooldown all the time. It’s highly and disproportionately punitive to remove this from the shaman enhancement because we no longer have a way to immediately stop a cast with a lock.
I should also mention others, the lightning whip and the totem that reset a totem, were excellent additions for the shaman, I used them a lot. I know you think “ah, most players don’t use them”
but then give the option for those who use them to use them, and for those who don’t use them not to use them. Don’t level things down.
I remember when I was a warlock and playing I thought, how I wish I could sometimes heal or give some assistance to help my group, but all I can do is place a healthstone and hope my companion uses it at the right time. In the shaman I found all the versatility I always wanted, but I’m getting sad to see that being lost with each expansion, you know.
Please Blizzard, listen to this plea from a player who, for a while, felt the passion for the game return. I know that nowadays people only want damage stats and rewards. But this is a player speaking who reads every quest, reads every NPC dialogue, does everything on a ground mount so they can look around, and I also value every skill of my character. Don’t take these things away from us.
When you want to change, allow the choice.
Sorry for my bad English.
I hope someone can relate to this. Thank you.