Hi everyone,
I boosted an Elemental Shaman last night. This is the first ranged class I have ever played with (tried Hunter with the class trial, but didn’t really like it) and I do like it.
I just wanted to see if I was doing something wrong, especially within a dungeon.
On my girlfriend’s account, when we boosted a Paladin for her to try out, we noticed that when we first queued for a dungeon at 110, the DPS was pretty insane due to the damage and level scaling (it was doing about 5k consistently).
After going into a dungeon with the Shaman, it seemed much different. After researching rotation and talents, I decided it would be best to go single target. I was able to do around 3k consistently. When I was AOEing, however, it was considerably much lower at about 800 to 1.5k.
Are Elemental Shamans struggling right now at early BFA levels, or is entirely gear dependent, and would I be better to talent into an AOE build?
I keep flame shock up at all times, use both elemental abilities on cooldown, lava burst on cooldown, earth shock when procced or with enough energy and lightning bolt (chain if AOEing).
Ele is extremely secondary dependent and leveling is so fast now that you just take whatever item is an upgrade. Besides at 120 you can pretty much farm 370 ilvl pieces from the pvp zones and weekly quests.
Ele at 120 have very strong single target dmg very mediocre 2-3 target dmg.
Ele has decent 4+
Ele shines at 5+
So this makes us look really all over the place and in dungeons will be dependent on your tank and heals.
If your tank/heals/affixes are allowing you to dps groups of 5+ you should be top dmg outside dk/dh/mage initial burst. Non stop chain pulling we should be on top because our dps CDs are short and CL+EQ are really strong.
However if the tank is playing it safe and only pulling 2-3 mobs then your dmg will suffer.
Be careful with CL. It has a sporadic jump when it OLs and can pull extra mobs in dungeons.
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Madalynn,
Thank you very much for this. Based on what you’ve said, it’ll pretty much be knowing when to single target vs. AOE according to what the tank is doing. While I’m not too concerned early level and pre-120, it was just kind of surprising seeing the difference between the Paladin and Shaman right off the bat.
Once I do reach 120, and work on gearing, would you recommend a stopping point where I should focus more on stats, such as haste over critical strike, or is item level still reigning, just like it is for other classes?
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At 120 its fine, but i would recommend doing enhance til then. It levels much faster and does more damage in leveling dungeons.
" >expletive deleted< chain lightning" is a frequent statement muttered in Waycrest Manor. Those OLs.
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Go back to your hunter before you’re too heavily invested in your Shaman…seriously.
I’m sorry, but Shaman are the most neglected class in the game. They are getting a little love right now, but for the most part, Blizz’s Shaman timeline has been:
Year 1 - shaman are good…year two shaman are great…year 3-11 shaman suck, year 14 shaman are ok after a 6 month promised rework that basically just turned into a buff…what does the future hold?
I predict non-mobile game play with long caste times, mediocre damage, and general unfun.
Don’t worry too much about dps in the early BFA levels. Once you start gearing in 120 and getting your stats right, you will see a huge gap in your performance. But it all comes down to what content are you doing and what talent set up are you using.
TL;DR: Shaman requires some dynamic thinking, your performance is up to context.
@Achritos. I would say 360 tentatively. However it will also depend on what you have available to you.
If you have friends that can pull you into m+ 8-10 and weekly heroics then I wouldn’t worry to much about stats. Try for crit/haste/Intel but if the item is 10+ ilvl higher then swap.
If you are having trouble getting gear then sim what youhave and work with what you have.
Earthquake whenever it will hit 2 or more mobs, otherwise Earthshock on single target. Lightning bolt for 1 to 2 targets, chain lightning for 3+. Flame Shock + Lava Burst for 1 to 3 targets. 5+ targets is where you will do absurd dps with earthquake and chain lightning as your generator.
Check out stormearthandlava (website) for more elemental info. Really good resource.
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