Ele Shaman and Mythic+

Classes Shaman
1

I’m trying to learn how to play elemental because my group already has 2 melee (not including the tank) and, frankly, 4 melee in the group was becoming problematic for about half the dungeons this rotation once we started pushing past 16. Neltharion lair was particularly bad on the bosses for that setup.

I suck - I mean really suck - compared to playing enhancement. Trash packs and AoE are not a problem - I’m pulling comparable damage to enhancement, though I’m not a big fan of having to drop earthquake constantly, but that’s just because I’m not use to it. Every now and then I some how accidentally get locked in mouse look which is annoying, but not a big deal.

Right now I’m using the lightning build. In single target it’s a big loss. I don’t have any set bonuses, and I don’t know how much of a difference that makes and I have loads more mastery than is ideal for ele but my big problem is I do the opener fine but as the fight goes on the damage gets progressively worse. I think I have to be missing some kind of interaction, though I’m trying to follow the priorities from the ele guide on wowhead. I’m also having a hard time deciding when it’s best to spirit walk on fights like the last boss in underrot.

I guess my question is, what’s you’re advice for improving with elemental?

2

There are a few main rules to keep in mind when doing ST with the lightning build:

  1. You want as much nature damage as possible to be buffed by electrified shocks. Elemental Blast in particular should always be cast under the ES buff if possible. Don’t let your icefury charges go to waste and try to maximize ES uptime.

  2. Every Surge of Power should be spent on lightning bolt. This means that in single target, 99% of the time you cast lightning bolt immediately after EB. This is especially true for Stormkeeper; if you use a Stormkeeper charge without SOP, you’re losing a ton of damage. Pool your maelstrom accordingly.

  3. Lava Burst exists in this build solely to provide Master of the Elements. In most cases you will want to use your MotE to buff Elemental Blast.

There’s more nuance than that, but those are the main things to practice and master.

7 Likes
3

Everything Skonse said is right. Also, as of May 16th, the 2 set bonus got nerfed from 25% to 9% damage increase, so you’re not losing as much by not having at least a 2 set.

Ele is notoriously bad in single target, and most groups don’t pull large enough to take advantage of earthquakes uncapped AoE which could put you at the top of the meters if you hit your spells fast enough.

If you want to improve with ele, have your tank pull bigger and get in your playstyle loop of Chain Lightning > Lava Surge proc > earthquake > repeat.

If you want to time more keys, play a stronger ranged class like evoker. It’s infinitely more tanky and will do more damage with less effort with the same amount of gear.

2 Likes
4

well said all great tips above.

It took me a while to get the muscle memory and the feel of it.

Get used to pressing the buttons in the following order
This should ideally start at 61 MS since FS will give you +14 to start EB

Frost Shock → Elemental Blast → Lightning Bolt in this order

That will ensure each EB and LBolt are buffed by Electrified Shocks, and every Surge of Power is spent on Lightning Bolt.

Once you master that, try adding in Lava Burst if it is available to buff EB.

Ideally start at 49MS

Frost Shock ->Lava Burst (+echo)-> Elemental Blast → Lightning Bolt.

Getting this down, took me some time. There are a lot of buffs that interact with each other. Stormkeeper adds more complexity but is critical to get right.

If Stormkeeper is available:

Pool your maelstrom. Wait until you have 95-100 before you case Elemental Blast

Around 80 maelstrom start

Frost Shock → LavaBurst (if up) → Elemental Blast → Stormkeeper → (1st sk) lightning bolt → frost shock → LavaBurst (if up) → Elemental blast → (2nd sk) lightning bolt

Before that would be a good time to pop any trinkets too.

It seems like a long chain, but it is just a composition of the first basic original chain of frost,eleblast,lb

Having both stormkeeper lightning bolts buffed by surge of power is important, and its a nice gameplay loop imo.

2 Likes
5

Thanks a bunch!

6

That’s super cool they dropped it because I just got my two piece expecting a nice bump over last seasons fire build and my dps dropped 3k peak and sustained.

Switching to enhance I guess.

7

Single target is super simple.

At the very very least it’s just

Lava Burst before Ele Blasts and Lightning Bolt after Ele Blast, especially with stormkeeper.

Stormkeeper, LvB, Ele Blast, Lightning Bolt is such huge burst.

2 Likes
8

I have a hard time keeping flameshock up, any tips? how do you fit it in?

is it okay to case lavaburst if flame shock is down?

9

In the lightning build, refreshing flame shock is about the same priority as casting a lightning bolt with no surge of power.

Basically whenever you’re outside of your main “combo” of FrS->LvB->EB->LB you can cast flame shock. It’s okay if it falls off for a few seconds.

As for casting lava burst, if you don’t have flame shock up it’ll almost always be worth to cast flame shock first. In a situation where you’re pressing lava burst, throwing out a FS right before isn’t going to mess up any buff sequencing or anything like that.

Just be aware that you no longer want to cast flame shock as lava burst is traveling, as it is now a nature spell and consumes MotE buff.

1 Like
10

Welcome to the club.

11

what this player said. Ele shaman has a very static single target rotation once you get past the maelstorm starved opener. ICe fury > frost shock > lava burst > elemental blast > lightning bolt, then lightning bolt while you have lightning rod debuff. rinse and repeat, keep frost shocking when the debuff is about to fall off

if all goes well you will never be maelstorm starved and never cap.