I’ve finally decided on playing a Shaman during classic, as I never played Horde during vanilla and played a rogue. (Yay)
I’m curious as to how efficient they were leveling. Things like soloing the tougher quests, downtime, how fast I kill things. Things of such nature. Obviously i’ve gathered Enhancement as the way to go. Oh 1h and Shield probably the best for survivability on those tough solo quests i’d Imagine… but was it usually better to dual wield or 2h?? Or did someone find it easier over all to go 1h and shield on the journey?
Another thing is, as mentioned before, I only played Vanilla as alliance, how common was it to have Shaman tanks in dungeons while leveling?? Was it less common than having a Paladin tank(for those that played both) and was it actually viable pre-60 to have a Shaman tank with Rockbiter and Earth Shock?
Thanks in advance, very excited to start.
Any other tips/tricks/things I would need to know for Shaman leveling specifically would be great!
Shaman tanks sorta die out after about WC, not saying it’s undoable but just much less common, they can just heal in any spec so that helps.
As for leveling, depends honestly. 2h spec, has a lot less down time then ele does and is much better you’re gonna white hitting a lot, and remember you actually got spec into 2h axe and 2hmace.
Ele takes a ton of time for leveling, but if you play on a PVP server you’re much more dangerous, though be ready to drink more often, remember that lightning shield is your friend, and expect more to heal and dps then ever tank.
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I had a shaman tank for BRD back in vanilla.
They are perfectly fine up until BRD, as long as the shaman player is specing/gearing for it…
I never had one for dire maul, but apparently it can be done fairly easily.
Having a shaman tank for RFC is quite popular… I think I had a shaman tank for that dungeon more than a warrior in my history of playing wow… Idk if my vanilla server was unusual or what, but that’s what happened.
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I leveled this guy as Elemental in Vanilla, it was slow, but I had a good time, then my friends got me into healing, about when I hit RFK level. It was a hoot.
They’re the other Hybrid class. Less survivability than Paladins (you still won’t die unless you really mess up), but more damage than Paladins.
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Keeping a shield equipped by default, even as enhancement, is how I leveled. You take much less damage with a shield and output from 1 hand weapon is efficient if not as high.
Don’t want rogue to open up on you without a shield.
And yes do switch to two-handed weapon opportunistically!
This ^^
Efficient totem use is key too. Possibly contrary to others I did drop totems a lot, but would plan multiple nearby pulls.
My two cents. Others may disagree.
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Enhancement is REALLY good and quite underrated for leveling.
The only possible problem is swapping to resto at the end and not having much to show for it, unless you decide to stay enhancement and go full pvp.
Grab a fast dagger, put up flametongue and it doesn’t really matter the spec it’s a fairly slow class to level regardless. Not as slow as warrior or rogue can be but it’s not top tier either.
-Sinclaire -Torch-
I was under the impression to have slower weapons as dual-wielding Shaman… I could be mistaken though.
Shamans can’t dual wield in classic, that was tbc.
-Sinclaire -Torch-
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I’ve only levelled ~half the way as 1h + shield recently but it seems more efficient than anything else tbh. I love 2h Windfurys as much as the next Shaman but not a fan waiting on a slow weapon + proc with the amount of times I remember swings not connecting. Stormstrike also chews through mana.
You can pick up Shield Spec + imp lightning shield and go to town killing mobs with passive damage (FS, Searing, Flametongue weapon, LS).
It makes better use of int/spirit though so you’re more suited to heal a dungeon than tanking one.
I believe the build goes into elemental (Fire totem +dmg, clearcasting) after points in Weapon Mastery, though I don’t know how effective WM is when you’re running with a fast weapon.
Thanks for the help, everyone!!
During leveling, expect to do some kiting for tougher pulls. As Enchancement and Elemental. With slows, totems you can take on tough stuff.
Shamans didn’t duel wield. It’s either 1h and shield or 2h, so you’ll want to go 2h for DPS.
I remember seeing a couple capable shaman “tanks” while leveling in dungeons. Because they had a really good healer, either higher level than needed, or on voice with the “tank” shaman. They certainly weren’t ideal, just if you couldn’t find a real tank. Pretty much never heard of at higher levels.
Tips
Totems: Learn to use them as frequently as possible. Knowing all the right situations to use them, cause they do each trigger the global cooldown. I’d say every pull should have at least 2-3 totems.
Reagents: Ankhs! Don’t forget to buy plenty, having a self revive 10 minutes away from a graveyard is handy.
shamans have so many tools readily available I actually think they’re a cake walk to level. You do good damage, have easy kiting abilities, all kinds of totems to work with and you can heal yourself/ghost wolf the F*** out of places. It’s a great time.
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Why exactly? It made them a competitive dps. And windufry still hit hard as a tree smacking you.
-Sinclaire -Torch-
If I play man it’ll be tough not picking alliance as they honestly have better low level zones.
But if I go horde, multibox a BM Hunter/Elem. Shaman and melt everything at ranged.
Kargoz makes pretty damn amazing leveling guides for every class complete with Math-letes and graphs and numbers
Basically level enhance 2 hand while earth bind kiting…
1h/shield flame tongue before 30, then windfury weapon after 30 if you’re lazy and don’t want to earth bind kite.
After 40, elemental has the fastest time to kill of any spec in the game, and ele is an option as well, but the lack of mana efficiency should still have 2h/earth bind kiting ahead overall.
Biggest thing is making good usage of the 5 second rule for your mana regen.
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Ghost wolf helps a bit, and as others have said, enh isn’t too bad.
Enjoy your water totem quest though…
The most important thing about leveling shaman is totem efficiency.
Create your totem nest in a place where you can pull enemies to it, but won’t get blindsided by pats. That way you can use the totems for their full duration. Totems are incredibly mana-efficient when lasing for their full duration, but incredibly mana-inefficient if you drop a new set of totems for every mob.
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