Currently lvl44, there are definitely more aspects that I miss rather than ones I’m glad are gone.
Firstly is resource management. I like how back then the resource management system was more strategic than tactical. A mage and a warlock both use mana but it eventually runs out. How they want to go about clearing their mana for a fight is up to them. A mage can use Evocation but that has a cooldown so they have to watch their expenditure and sure a warlock has life tap but you have to manage your health correctly or a mechanic might dip you lower than you should be and if you use hellfire you are taxing your healer further, which might cause more downtime in the future as he gets his mana back. Obivously the game is nowhere near as hard as it is today but philosophies like this could make for more compelling gameplay in retail WoW rather than having just about every DPS class (but arcane mages, if I’m not mistaken) be based on the same built-and-spent system.
Additionally there is grace in simplicity. As an example, I can glance at my buffs in classic without questioning where a buff came from, or I can proc clearcasting and know very well that I have it. In Retail the moment a boss gets pulled I have 30+ buffs on my character coming from gear, essences, azerite, trinkets, etc. and it’s like, do we really need all this extraneous stuff? Couldn’t all these buffs be inherently funneled into the base damage of our abilities instead of having our damage have so much dependency on the random procs we get? Weakauras is practically mandatory because of this.
On shamans specifically, I know a lot of people fall to reductive arguments when it comes to totems since, admittedly, they kinda are just 3 or 4 obligatory, fire-and-forget button presses every pull but for me I never felt like an ability/buff/etc has to be “ludological” for me to feel satisfaction in using it. I think Preach said something similar in his Classic Blizzcon beta video: some people are just fine seeing their friends get better through your support buffs and shamans used to hit that niche very well. Sure, some people don’t want to be brought or hampered by the fact that they have unique buffs… but it doesn’t seem like priests, mages, warriors, monks, and demon hunters are negatively affected by any of this currently.
There’s probably more I could ramble about but it’s what came to my mind first. Ultimately, my enjoyment of classic is very different from my enjoyment of retail. I liken classic to Baldur’s Gate 2 while retail is Diablo 2. They’re both medieval fantasy RPGs but the moment-to-moment gameplay is very different and hit different taste buds. I don’t necessarily want retail to just be classic with modern features but Blizzard should certainly consider looking back and studying their old design documents.
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Well thought out post, and an interesting read.
Id like to second the idea that i dont need yo 543371 buffs on my character.
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While I do miss 2h enhancement, the numerous totems and talent trees. Shamans can be pretty bad in classic and I’d say they are even worse than warriors or rogues (probably even paladins as well) in lvling. Resting every 2-3 fights is normal for a shaman and it gets old fast.
The main issue for shamans in classic/vanilla is their mana regen is garbage and with most abilities costing 8%-13% of your mana, it gets rough fast. Then the 2nd issue is RB at times can be waaaaay better than WF…which is a let down.
Shamans are in no way worse levelers than Warriors or even rogues. Heals help a lot and make them better at leveling than most classes, not to mention Ghost Wolf making 20-40 faster than most classes.
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What Wrexial said.
I’ll ad that, for me, doing lower end yellow or green quests actually speeds up my leveling time - no downtime beteen mobs lets me run through them pretty quickly.
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frostbrand and Flametongue should never be attacks that waste a gcd like on retail that was a pretty dumb change.
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they did that to replace shock, hopefully they put them back as a weapon buff and bring back shocks.
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lets hope and fix windfury to do damage instead uf a maelstrom generator and enhancement mite be good again.
buff windfury.
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I successfully tanked rfc 7 times so far, even managed to hold threat on 3 mobs with rockbiter earth shock. Happy that i finally tanked using a shaman, ill even be happier if retail wow decides to implement a shaman tank spec.
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Shaman in Classic is basically a squishier version of everything I wanted my Paladin to be.
Dem Windfury procs doe! Feels good man.
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You cant come in a classic shaman discussion and mention paladin 
The extra 40% movement speed means nothing when your TTK is slower than everyone except a priest and druid might have worse TTK than a shaman. As for warriors, they are actually one of the best lvlers cause not only are the only main tanks in the game, getting into a dungeon is 1000000x easier and quicker than a shaman. Then when they get their WWA their TTK is at a all time high, combine that with MS at lvl 40 if they go Arms.
At lvl 30 Shamans get WF which isn’t even that great till 60, RB is better till you get those nice lvl 60 2hers. So their TTK really never improves and it actually gets worse as you lvl cause after lvl 40, that’s when Ele becomes better for lvling which ironically Ele is pretty bad at 60.
Warriors and rogues are always gonna be welcomed in dungeons and raids, shaman outside of healing really aren’t gonna have a place even if you bring improve WF/STR totems, they are still gonna take another dps rogue, war or even mage over a dps shaman. As for dungeons, ever since the stupid aoe farm became a thing it’s almost impossible to get into a group that just wants a spellcleave through dungeons (which is funny cause a war/rogue/shaman could be just as good).
Don’t get me wrong I love vanilla shamans, they are easily my fav class in the game but over hyping them when they got soooooooo many flaws is just wrong.
im leveling fine i can solo mobs 4 lvls higher then me.
People saying that classic shaman is too much stuff to handle are just crazy. I’m having a blast like never before playing shaman in classic.
Like people above said I can bring a reasonable dps, I can bring some wonderful group utility, off-tank/tank, off-heal when needed while doing all of what I mentioned before.
Taking a look on classic and retail shaman it’s just sad how many good stuff we lost to specializations focus and prunning. I do hope blizz acomplish what they promissed on the last interview for class design, game direction in general actually, because I’d love to be able to do this in retail without getting locked in a single aspect like I am now.
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Does dual wielding with two different ranks of windfury work in this version or was that fixed in an earlier patch?
Dual wield for shaman didn’t come in until Burning Crusade.
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wait until you get windfury at 30.back to back windfuries is to much fun.
Shaman is amazing. It’s also a tough class to play as one must calculate the costs of each move before risking going oom. Just a great dynamic feeling playing one.
Current dungeon design is all about damage… they put timers on dungeons…
This game is no longer about cc and utility and thoughtful play its about dps and speed.
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This is only true in trivial dungeons.