Hi there!
Spent some time thinking of a class I wanna play for my return to the game, and have gone with shaman.
I am curious if I shoukd focus on ele or enhance? I like primarily mythic +, as my old guild has long quit so if I raid it would be uncertain. Looking for which will be best long term.
I have no opinion on melee VS. Ranged, I love both. I simply pick what is better:)
Any advice appreciated!
Elemental feels better from a visually and audible appeal. It’s also likely easier to do well in m+.
However, Enhancement is currently one of the fun most (and somehow least rewarding at the same time) specs in the game.
We can pump single target, and do decent aoe damage, which is great for m+, but melee comps are rare, and there are generally better melee for m+. Our utility (Windfury Totem) pretty much only buffs us and the tank, because there’s likely no other melee in the group, so it’ll be tough getting in to high m+ groups as a result.
I would level as ele and play 60 as enh personally. Because although enh is probably quicker to level with, there’s not a lot to learn about the playstyle. You just hit stuff and until you’re concerned about doing as much damage as you can you can just hit whatever button is available and do ok.
Elemental on the other hand requires a little more thought to really play at all. If you don’t use your cc, cds, totems well as ele then you’ll probably die a lot, and learning to play ele well can help you out in torghast, m+, and even raid, even if you play enhance instead.
If you’re mainly interested in Mythic+ then both are perfectly viable in Mythic+. I think enhance might actually pull ahead of ele since our cleave damage is so consistent, but I believe ele is getting some AoE buffs in 9.0.5 so that might even out.
If you have any interest at all in raids, elemental is doing better. Enhance’s single target damage is only good in short bursts and is also kind of RNG dependent since so much of our damage comes from Windfury procs and Stromstrike resets. The upcoming patch will help our single target a bit with a buff to Lava Lash, and the buff to our other meta legendary (Legacy of the Frost Witch) is getting a small buff too, but it remains to be seen if that buff will allow it to out-perform Doomwinds. My guess is it won’t, but it will come close.
Thanks to you both so far. Appreciate the advice.
M+? Enhance. Covenant? Any besides Necrolord
Currently Enhance is slightly better then Ele in M+ largely due to having better burst AoE damage. However, later this month in patch 9.0.5 there are some shaman buffs coming to both Enhance and Ele. Ele is getting their AoE buffed through Earthquake and Chain Lightning damage. I think Enhance is also getting buffed with Stormkeeper buffing Chain Lightning damage to 300% or something, also a buff to Lava Lash and a base buff to Chain Lightning damage.
It’s tough to say which one will be better after 9.0.5 in M+, I would think Ele? but who knows.
Long story short just try both specs once you’re 60 and see which one feels better and is more fun to play.
The stormkeeper buff is essentially a nerf when you look at it in more depth. CL buff is nice though.
Necrolord is actually getting some buffs across the board, and primordial wave interacts with msw, is instant, and flows quite well in 9.0.5.
I’ve not done full testing yet, working on it, but so far it looks comparable to venthyr single target. I think night fae is going to pull ahead a little, but I’ll know more once i have some more renown for testing.
QFT
But to answer OP’s question… neither spec is meta, but both specs can do well in M+ I prefer to enh in M+ because enh has on-demand burst AoE through crash lighting into stormstrike into chain lightning, while I often find that ele takes so long to ramp up to AoE that packs are dying by the time I can AoE. (I usually run around 10-12 keys, I suspect that at higher keys you might not have this problem…).
And if you really wanna make everyone else look bad, just WFT > Sundering > Crash > SS > Ascendance > WS! It does sooooo much damage lol
Once you have some gear enhancement is great. I felt like starting out ele felt more impactful. Ele can look a bit better with a choice in 2h or 1h and shield but that’s really preference
Elemental is an absolute blast to play at a high level. Ceiling is very high though, And playing it decently in pvp usually isn’t good enough vs the current meta.
Once you get the hang of it though it’s more rewarding than enhance and less mind numbing
You will get more invites as elemental. And you will get even more invites as fire mage, lol. Elemental is getting some much needed AoE buffs. ST we are already strong, so they are very slightly nerfing that. Overall we should be in a good place. Enhance is fun but can be really spammy or have some not so fun down time if RNG isn’t good to you. With higher haste levels as patches come out that should normalize. I’ve played both. Enhance is quite mobile and can get instant dmg output, ele requires a little setup so it can be frustrating if you are in say a non-fortified M+ week and your group is strong- you’ll end up getting very little dmg out before other classes like rogues and balance druids blow up the meters and the mobs.
Try both- just know that each spec highly favors certain covenants. All top Enh players (that I know of) play Venthyr and all top Ele players go Necro. Necro’s ability let’s you send flame shock to an extra- and sometimes 2-3 extra on top of that if you get lucky. Then your next LvB will hit all targets with Flame shock on them leading to huge spikes in dmg.
I’ve always found elemental fun. Great visual effects, the frost/fire/nature them is exciting, and as a shaman you are extra valued for bloodlust which is always needed.
I echo above. I have moved past +10s and am currently doing +12 and up. I was never asked about spec before +10s. Every +11 and up I was asked ele vs enh. I have not been declined because I always answered Ele.
Enhance…but then Mythics+ are pretty unfriendly to Melee…so Ele?
Appreciate the advice by all. I find enhance more interesting, but not enough to warrant not getting into groups haha. I’m sure ele makes more sense gear wise if I’m going to resto at all too?
Go enhance or go home 