I can think of ONE in particular where that’s not the case, at all.
And then there are the ones that fearbomb you when the CC is over. (If they didn’t trinket it in the first place)
And that one that instants into 40% travel form breaking all roots/slows at the same time
And the one that Vanishes. (And reopens on your if they’ve been dotted, or just escapes if they haven’t in order to reengage you on their terms)
And the one that blinks out of a stun and frost novas if you get close again…
And the one whose pet stuns and eats you
Hunter DPS ramps up from a rune called Raptor’s Fury with a stacking self-buff that Blizzard purposefully made unrefreshable.
If a Hunter is coming at you fresh with no stacks of Raptor’s Fury vs. an Enhancement Shaman coming at you fresh, the shaman is doing far more burst damage.
Add in to the fact that the shaman has runes for being unslowable, a better ranged gap closer with no deadzone (and damage! it’s part of the burst, and the slow lasts longer than the CD), etc. vs. a melee hunter having only concussive shot (no damage, long CD vs. slow duration (shorter than frost shock) and maybe a 1 min CD pet stun that can’t be used as a real interrupt since it’s got janky cast stuff going on…
But really, I’m talking about PvP in general, not imagined 1v1 scenarios that would need to take into account who was mounted, who got the jump, etc. And furthermore 60% chance to hit means the shaman still hits more often than not to get those Maelstrom stacks.
Resto Druids could win 1v1s against Hunters and Warriors easily in a true 1v1 in Classic era, but they are by no means a good PvP class in era for BGs outside of a specific flag running spec and a straight up joke when fighting a warlock ten levels below them in greens.
I like my opponents involving very real risk. (Shamans are pure aggression, and have to be aggressive to survive. There are no CCs to fall back on if things go sideways.)
There’s no official data for PvP because what would anybody even track? But Enh is certainly stronger overall than ret, it’s alliance counterpart, which skews things in Horde favor. Which is why there has been nonstop complaining about it online.
Enh has very good burst, very good sustained damage, and very good healing. It has decent mobility with ghostwolf and decoy totem, and amazing utility with totems, purges, and offhealing.
It’s weakness is stuns and hard cc, as it lacks any defensive tools outside of sham rage (which most enh aren’t running in pvp outside of pants swapping for mana regen) or way of earth, which requires a shield and rockbiter. 1h + shield rockbiter would basically be an auto attack bot, so nobody is running that outside of maybe dueling a rogue, and even then it probably wont work. Enh also has no hard cc of it’s own, which is a weakness as well.
With how oppressive burst damage is in SoD, and how hard damage is scaling vs damage mitigation and hp, DW Enh has proven to be a very oppressive spec, and with it restricted to one faction, has caused a lot of angst in the game.
TL;DR DW Enh is pretty much the strongest, most idiot-proof pvp spec in the game with only one hard counter, mutilate rogue.
They have to be in melee and doing damage in order to self heal, otherwise they’re just sitting there hardcasting a heal. (better known as interrupt bait)
They cannot do that when
Out of range
Stunned
Feared.
Incapped.
etc…
We just melt. (We don’t have any CC to use if we survive the CC used to cook us.)
This isn’t to say Enhance isn’t strong- when we’re in our element (har har) and uninterrupted…we’re bullies. Just wish people would stop pretending we’re always in that state.
Paladin Stun/Incap or bubble if the stun gets resisted by an orc. No MSW stacks/MD
Shadow Priest kiting is pretty well doom if we don’t break contact. No MSW stacks/MD
BM Hunter with stuns into the rest of their CC kit. (And pulling their pet back after the stun so I can’t farm it for MSW procs) No MSW Stacks/MD
Warlock Lock Seduction (Then Horrify after trinket into a forever fear dot fest)
Only have about 3k health in r7 gear out in the world. That’s 2 Priest dots without crits lol
Mages are kinda screwed
Warriors are pretty screwed if they don’t burst us down pretty quickly after the stun. (But warriors are screwed against pretty much everyone in SoD)
Druids are a bit more screwed if the Shaman has r7 Ele boots
Context - I have been playing shaman since P1 and prefer PVP. I have ~5000hk’s and am exalted in WSG and AB. I regularly lead pug teams in STV to 15+coins.
The only real tool shaman had to close the gap and stay alive was the HP pool from WOE/RB. The real issue was the additional 20%hp on top of BGs that made you a terminator. Even then - very good and skilled players EASILY would kite and CC.
Enhance and Elemental both feel really bad to play right now. In any team fight scenario you are targeted first and killed within 3 globals. So, a healer is a must. You are easily CC’ed and kited. Your only real chance of winning a 1v1 is having pvp trinket available. Anybody dying to an enhance shaman right now is asleep at they keyboard. Elemental shaman has to hard cast everything. Yes, you can 2/3 global others but again, they have to be sleeping to let you cast.
Melee hunter is very good in PVE where they can ramp up their damage by spamming RS but are middle of the pack in PVP, where ranged hunter is actually stronger.