As strong as Elemental is looking on the beta, the gameplay is looking absolutely degenerate to the point where I’m 90% sure this isn’t what blizzard intended, I found the lava burst spam in the past few seasons and the beta more enjoyable than the current rotation, and that says quite a lot.
So because of the buffs to our lightning spells, storm elemental and the nerfs to our fire spells and the strength of talents like flash of lightning we pretty much spam as many lightning bolts as possible, we do not cast our instant lava burst procs, we do not cast our new frost shock talent, we pretty much try to not cast anything other than lightning bolt.
We cast lava burst on one occasion, to get as much haste out of Primordial wave as we can so we can cast more lightning bolts. We use our spenders as late as possible so we can stack our lightning bolts cdr as quickly as we can. Our entire rotation revolves around spamming 1 button and it’s boring, we’ve been doing this for a while now, spamming button 2 instead of 1 isn’t making it more interesting. We have this talent called master of the elements, which should incentivize us to use lava burst before our big hitting spells, but we don’t even do that.
AoE is a little more interesting, but not alot tbh, it’s very similar to our ST rotation except we spam chain lightning and earthquake instead of lightning bolt, I say more interesting because we still occasionally spread our dots and we use lava surge after pwave, but I found the previous playstyle with the fire build way more involved and fun. We also lost our niche with lava surge being so weak now, our spread AoE is alot weaker and I feel we’re just another class that pumps whenever all the mobs are stacked.
In my perfect world lava burst is a spell you weave in between big spells, so before earth shock/elemental blast to proc mote. IF procs off of both lightning bolt and lava burst, with a higher chance to proc from lava burst, so that even in lightning builds you still use frost spells every once in a while. Storm elemental cast time reduction slightly nerfed so that you’re incentivized to press other things than just lightning bolt, maybe compensate this by buffing the damage of storm elemental slightly and buff our fire spells again so they’re at least worth pressing when we get an instant cast proc.
One thing I’m tired of hearing about is how flash of lightning is “OP.”
Just stop with that part already. If you want me to take you serious, quit regurgitating that tired ole $h;t.
It’s based on us casting LB it’s far different than instant cast LvB. We had an entire expansion and I knew it was good but that was before we could actually get to it reasonably. Now all of a sudden people are noticing it. Just stop.
It promotes this “spam lighting bolt” playstyle in conjunction with other nerfs. If we reduced it to only providing .5 seconds of CDR per lightning bolt and chain lighting, performance would dramatically decrease. It’s the thing holding the house of cards up. IDK if that fits the definition of OP, but it’s problematic and responsible for the playstyle.
Like talent out of FoL and then slam a dummy for 5 minutes. Then, talent it again and see what the DPS difference is after another 5 min test. We’re not talking about a 3-5% difference here. It’s absolutely too powerful in its current state after they fixed it so it now reduces the CD of Pwave.
All they need to do is to buff Lava Burst and Earth Shock/Elemental Blast to make it worth actually spending. Not by a crazy amount but enough where you actually want to spend and not mindlessly Lighting Bolt.
Maybe I’m wrong, but to me is seems like lighting animations clip into other spells. I’ve spammed lightning, hit lava burst or earth shock but they didn’t cast so I’ve gotten use to spam lightning and panic spam another spell in between just to make sure the fire off.
Honestly, you’re going to spam one button no matter what they buff or nerf. As long as the spec is being treated as two specs in one with the fire/lightning split, nobody will be happy. Lava burst spam was the single dumbest thing they’ve ever done to ele, full stop. It was so braindead stupid, I actually don’t understand how people enjoyed it. At least lightning will be a mild change of pace for one season. Ele needs a complete revert to its SL build at least before it can be fixed. The dragonflight talent trees absolutely murdered any chance of this spec having a fleshed out rotation, since only 1 element can be meta at a time. The weaving build just doesn’t have the ability to even out the elements in the rotation.
Glue the damn spec back together and stop wasting my time trying to make half a spec work. Why is this a hill worth dying over?
Im playing cata ele and its a blast. More fun than current iterations. Just my take though. Same with enhance. I hate that they moved enh from meaty melee to what it is now. Bring back wf procs meaning something
Would it be too much to ask for a complete rework of Elemental in Season 2 of TWW? Or maybe in the next expansion, especially since they say expansions will come out annually?
Could we have 1 or 2 more buttons for a build to cast lightning spells? The Fire build, which I’ve never been fond of, is now dead, and I feel for the players who wanted that experience. I hope they do something to help them return—not to the top, because as Elemental, we’re never at the top, and when we accidentally are, nerfs come, leaving the spec half-mast.
Fulmination on Lightning Shield: Each charge empowers the Lasso, and when you reach 18 out of 20 charges, you have to use it.
Rethink Tempest: Make it a spell with a cooldown and cast time that replaces Lava Burst. I don’t want it to have all the interactions, just that it be interactive with the damage from Lightning Rod, with a percentage chance to activate Tempest (even if on cooldown) and make it instant, not critical.
Consider a true Fire mode: A different filler? A way to allow and reward more Lava Surges?
Weaver: It already exists and is thematically ready…
P.S. Don’t tell me that the Elemental Shaman needs to be a master of all elements just because it’s an Elementalist. The Shaman is an Elementalist as much in the Elemental spec as in Enhancement and Restoration. Blizzard’s lazy design has resulted in almost all specializations using 80-90% of the same Elemental spells, so it’s not true that the difference is just about using those elements as a caster or in melee. It would make sense to have a complete rework where each specialization focuses on at most one or two elements, so the Shaman is an Elementalist, and the specs specialize in a particular element. I repeat:
Caster: Lightning and Wind (Stormcaller)
Melee: Earth and Fire (Geomancer)
Healer: Water and Spirits (Tide Guardian)
This would allow for a much more consistent, unique, and coherent identity rather than a lazy one. Blizzard has created two specs, Elemental and Enhancement, and the entire DPS line of the healer, with just three ingredients. Even after 20 years, the Restoration Shaman still has the placeholder name of the Druid healer. This shows the level of attention the Shaman has received to this day.
I find myself using lightning bolt only mostly and then casting lava burst when i have a proc but it feels like hard casting is bad for my DPS and only has a chance to proc icefury. It seems to feel like a mess and punishing now not to cast lightning bolts.
I weave Lava Burst in for the buff from Master of Elements. Seems to work for me IDK if it’s the best way, but I like weaving them.
Speaking of PWave though, I wish they would change something about it. I know it’s been said but a Flame shock spread from it rather than reapplying the DoT and surge might be good, or if not that than, have it consume and apply all the remaining damage from any previous flame shock DoT and the apply the new DoT. Just wish the would do something more creative with it.
I mean after the rework, Fire builds were perma weaver builds and even though it was still mainly “fire”, it was functionally an Elementalist Build. This current Lightning Build is more degen that season 3/4 Fire builds.
100000%. They just need to make it so you want to press other buttons. Farseer Fire before the nerfs did this fine. If they buffed Lava Burst and Earth Shock/Elemental Blast enough that would go a longway to make the spec less degen.
This mentality is the exact reason we’re in this state. Enhance is in a better state and had a renaissance in DF because it didn’t adhere to these stupid headcannons of “IT CAN ONLY USE FIRE AND EARTH” that alot of players have for specs. Elemental is in this state because of these dumb “HUR DUR IT SHOULD ONLY USE LIGHTING, I DON’T WANT FIRE MAGE” takes made by LFR andys. We have to stop living in the past. Go play classic if you want to only cast lighting spells and nothing else.
Right now Lava Burst does such little damage vs the CDR you get from casting a Lighting Bolt that it is actually better to just natty send Earth Shock if you’re about to overcap on Maelstrom instead of doing Lava Burst > Earth Shock. Lighting Bolt is also just doing so much damage that it makes up for not having the additional 15% on your spender.
I haven’t played beta so I’m asking this from a place of ignorance so don’t beat me up…
How much if any will hero talents and season 1 tier lead to pressing other buttons in these lightning focused builds? 25% dmg increase to ES seems great. Plus tempest (replaces lightning so… yeah).
Is there something else? Or is it more of a double down on lightning?
It’s literally spam lighting bolt; press lava burst only if you need to consume Pwave, and you’re either doing that with Ancestral Swiftness playing Farseer since it will be macroed into Pwave, or just waiting until you get a Lava Surge proc playing Stormbringer, never hard casting it only insta casting it even in AoE with multiple Flameshocks out. You don’t even hit it to MotE Earth Shock or Earthquake, even if you have Lava Surge. You just send a naked Earth Shock/Earthquake if you’re going to overcap on Maelstrom and to do the Stormkeeper + SoP combo. Ele had piss poor Maelstrom generation so you’re casting like 5-6 lightning bolts to every Earth Shock. The tier set is worthless for these Lighting Builds in Single Target. That’s how detrimental it is not to cast Lighting Bolt or Chain Lighting 100% of the time. The only reason you’d consume a Lava Surge proc is just for movement tech, but FoL also reduces Spirit Walker’s grace to the point where it’s basically a 40 to 45-second CD so the chances you’d even need to do that are significantly lower.
All of this is due to the nerfs to Lava Burst and Earth Shock combined with Pwave’s CD being reduced by FoL. All of this falls apart the moment (and it will happen) they nerf FoL in any way because that’s how OP it is in beta. And at that point, you have a dead Lighting Build.
First of all, watch your language; no one here holds the absolute truth. Reading your posts, you can be as opposed to my vision as I am to yours. Considering how many people are talking about wanting a Lightning specialization, maybe it’s you who’s going the wrong way on the highway, not us. So instead of insulting others by calling them stupid or low-level players, you might want to do some self-reflection, Mr. Top Player. At this point, I actually hope we stick with the MVP (Minimum Viable Product) one-button Lightning build, and I hope they do some tuning on Fire, rather than becoming a Weaver. In any case, I wish you find peace in real life so you can be less bitter in these forums.
I am pretty peaceful. Don’t mistake passion with despair/rage. But again, you’d rather they just leave Ele in the dust until they rework it for Midnight? Gonna call it out for the crack pipe-influenced take it is. If you’re gonna be a rat, then be ready to be called a rat.
Not a top player at all. And you don’t have to be an RWF raider or M+ title holder to hate this playstyle or want a spec to be in a healthy spot. Or to see this is as degenerate as Season 3/4 Meatball spam. You just have to have more than 1 brain cell and not be amused by jangling keys. I respect not wanting to have to play a Fire build. It doesn’t mean we should be stuck with these dumb one-button spam builds that these dogmatic “Fire only” and “Lighting only” builds mandate.
You’re a “HUR DUR LIGHTING BOLT” player advocating Fire be a “HUR DUR LAVA BURST” build. Absolute rat behavior. I’ve never seen somebody be so vehemently against just buffing two abilities. And BTW, the only way they could make Pure Fire build is to buff the ever-loving hell out of Lava Burst, at which point this current Lighting Build becomes miles behind.