Shaman Talent Feedback - Comprehensive

Classes Shaman
1

General Feedback:

  1. Many of the talent revamps for the various classes and specs are moving away from 2-point talents. Shaman still have a bloat of 2-point talents in their various trees.
  2. Many of the talent revamps for the various classes are moving more things baseline. Shaman has quite a few abilities (like Capacitor Totem) that would make sense to do this with.
  3. I still have hope that a significant talent revisit can occur for the Shaman class (see the latest major monk reworks as an example)

Quality of Life Feedback

  1. Buffs we maintain shouldn’t require active maintenance if there isn’t any real choice in what gets used (see elemental weapons). Buffs that offer meaningful choices (see elemental shields) are fine to remain as things we have to regularly upkeep.
  2. Consider reworking Totemic Projection as a passive baseline shaman ability that affects all totem spells. An example:

Totemic Projection - 15 sec cooldown
While a totem is active, you can use its ability again to move the totem to a different location. Totemic Projection is not restricted by the global cooldown, though each totem ability has its own unique cooldown associated with totemic projection.

  1. Consider providing baseline game accessibility options for players in regards to abilities that are cast at a target location:
    • (Current) Abilities must always be cast at the target location of the reticle.
    • Abilities now must be cast on the current target, bypassing the need to confirm the target location with an additional click.
    • Controlled behavior while the reticle is present: (1) Confirming the action with a keybind casts it at the location of your current (relevant) target regardless of where the reticle is positioned. (2) Confirming the action with a mouse click casts it at the location of your reticle.
    • Smart Cast: The game will try to determine an appropriate location to cast the spell for you, bypassing the need to confirm the target location with an additional click.
  2. Revisit class mechanics that don't mesh well with the new action targeting system (such as needing to use Lava Burst on a target that has Flame Shock, though Frost Mages experience similar issues). Engaging with an accessibility option should not make it harder to perform well with certain classes.

Class Tree Feedback

  1. I like all the utility options, and its okay that not all of them are necessary in every situation.
  2. There are way too many 2-point talents which clog up talent pathing and acquisition. The middle tier of the tree feels particularly bad to move through.
  3. Maelstrom Weapon and Flurry should be removed and instead made baseline for all Enhancement shamans.
  4. It’s nice that so many of the talents have different ways to express themselves (such as Thunderstorm vs. Thundershock), but the sheer quantity of them feels taxing on the design of the talent tree and in the number of talents required. It would feel much better to have them condensed into a single choice node that grants different versions of the same ability (Thunderstorm/Thundershock, Call of the Elements/Creation Core, Voodoo Mastery/Enfeeblement, etc). “Purge/Greater Purge” is a great example of a node that already does this.
  5. Replace Nature’s Swiftness with Ancestral Swiftness. I don’t know if that would help with it get picked any more than it currently does, but it would at least feel better.
  6. Nature’s Fury shouldn’t just affect nature spells. Rename it Primal Fury or something and have it affect elemental spells.
  7. If you do decide to engage in a massive overhaul of the Shaman class tree, keep the door open to support a tank spec in the future. Defensive nodes like Ancestral Defense could be reworked to look more like the paladin’s Sanctified Plates class tree talent.
  8. I kind of like that Shaman doesn’t really have a major “DPS cooldown” ability associated with it. But if it ever did, it would make sense for Ascendance to take that spot (and update the model/visuals associated with it, while you’re at it). That ability could go on the class tree as a talent choice as well.
  9. Add Disease Cleansing Totem as an option competing with Poison Cleansing Totem. Or just bring back the original Cleansing Totem which did both. There are a ton of really damaging Diseases in this game that Shaman simply can’t assist with.
  10. Swirling Currents should be baked baseline into Healing Stream Totem.

Elemental Tree Feedback

  1. There are way too many 2-point talents. A significant trimming is needed.
  2. Move Icefury onto a choice node with Elemental Blast, have Icefury replace Earth Shock, and boost it’s effects/power to be really exciting for those that want to lean that direction. Adjust or remove Electrified Shocks accordingly.
    • Alternatively, Have Icefury replace Lava Burst and otherwise inherit many of its benefits and work off of Frost Shock instead of Flame Shock. I dunno, there’s just a lot of different directions you could go with this, I just don’t like Icefury’s current iteration.
  3. Combine Swelling Maelstrom and Flowing Power into a single talent. This mimics other talents on other classes that do more than just a flat max resource increase.
  4. The Primordial Fury/Focused Insight node shouldn’t be “blocking” any other talent nodes. Adjust pathing/positioning as needed. In fact, maybe it should be relocated onto the class tree, since it much more of a utility talent node anyway.
  5. There’s not nearly enough talent options which promote weaving multiple elements together throughout the elemental shaman’s general rotation.
  6. More abilities should probably proc off of spending Maelstrom (Earth Shock, Earthquake, etc) instead of Lava Burst. It feels like half the tree is locked behind the frequent use of this one ability.

Enhancement Tree Feedback

  1. In TWW calculator currently shown on Wowhead, the “Refreshing Waters/Focused Insight” talent node should absolutely not be blocking other talents in its pathing.
  2. Thank you for finally making Windfury baseline (in TWW).
  3. Too many 2-point nodes, the most egregious being the Lava Lash oriented nodes. Dedicating 7 or so talents into a tiny area of the tree just feels bad.
  4. Introduce a new talent to compete with Doomwinds which allows Enhancement Shamans to wield 2-handed weapons, and using Stormstrike with a 2-handed weapon has a 100% chance to trigger Windfury off that attack. So many Enhancement shaman players would be all over that, and it’d flow beautifully with the Stormbringer hero tree.
  5. Consider addressing button bloat, or at least providing options to reduce it (such as a talent that allows Maelstrom Weapon charges to be used to empower Stormstrike or Crash Lightning instead of needing to have Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning on your bars).

Restoration Tree Feedback

  1. Too many 2-point talent nodes, especially toward the top of the tree. It really clogs up tree pathing.
  2. I really appreciate Acid Rain, I just wish Healing Rain were instant cast (the new Totemic talent might address some of this issue, but it might create new frustrations in the process).
  3. I like Stormkeeper. To be honest, I like any healer talents that allow me to focus on my damage contribution (both for group content and leveling). I don’t particularly care for bloating the number of buttons I have, but more damage is always nice.
  4. Riptide is a great ability. It’s fun and easy to use and it’s decently powerful.
  5. I don’t care for how many talents simply increase the casting speed of my next heal after doing a thing. I’ve got Riptide, so why are so many talents trying to encourage me to use healing spells I’d prefer to avoid using unless I really have to?
  6. I wish Earthshield didn’t require so much upkeep and maintenance. Dungeons and solo content is easy enough to remember it between pulls, but longer fights (like in raids) is more annoying to manage it due to its limited/low charge count.
  7. There’s got to be a better version of Primordial Wave. This goes for all 3 specs, for that matter. Something like the following might be more interesting (example for Resto):

Primordial Wave
Whenever you use Riptide while at max charges, your next healing spell that isn’t Riptide will be duplicated onto all other targets affected by your Riptide.

Passive: Riptide gains 1 additional charge, and its cooldown is reduced by 2 seconds for each unspent charge of Riptide you have.

Farseer Hero Tree Feedback

  1. Ancestral Swiftness is super lackluster.
  2. The Ancestors (last I read) don’t actually duplicate the exact spell that you cast, which feel really lame.
  3. The talents seem to favor summoning more ancestors, not keeping them longer or making them more effective while they’re active.
  4. Missed opportunity to introduce new utility through a modification to the Far Sight ability. Here are some ideas:

Veiling Insight
Far Sight now has a maximum range of 100 yards, lasts for 30 seconds without needing to be channeled. Far Sight also reveals all hidden enemies in the area and suppresses enemy stealth detection. You and your allies are also significantly more difficult to detect while moving through the area.

Astral Traveler
Astral Recall transforms into Astral Traveler while channeling Far Sight. When you finish casting Astral Traveler, you and your allies are prompted to be teleported to the target location of your Far Sight. Far Sight has a maximum range of 60 yards while in an instance.

Part the Veil
Replaces Far Sight. Designate a location which allows you and your allies’ ancestors to freely come to your aid. Any actions you and your allies perform within the area or damage that you and your allies receive has a chance to prompt an ancestor to intervene on your behalf.

Part the Veil has a 20 yard radius and lasts for 30 seconds, on a 2 minute cooldown.

Stormbringer Hero Talent Tree

  1. I think the talent tree is generally fine. No significant feedback at this time.

Totemic Hero Talent Tree

  1. I love what totemic seems to be trying to do. The reduction of button bloat in the first talent node alone makes it a very attractive hero talent tree option.
  2. I’m a tad worried about how taxing min/maxing the benefits of this talent tree would be, both in the class and spec trees for each of the specs that have access to it. Fixing underlying issues with the class and spec talent trees would go a long way in helping to better support this tree, as it’s more reliant upon existing talent choices than perhaps any other hero talent tree in the game.
  3. I kind of want to see a talent which has a chance to randomly spawn any other talents that you know (similar to Enhancement’s version of the “Lively Totem” talent, but not limited to a searing totem).
2 Likes
2

Surging Totem replaces Windfury Totem so you don’t lose a button. It also goes from needing to hit it maybe every 40ish seconds or every 2 minutes if you macroed Totemic Project into your melee abilities to now needing to hit it every 30 seconds and if Searing Totem doesn’t do crazy damage, you’re going to play the Earthsurge choice node which combined with the CDR effect from the Earth Mote, you’ll also be needing to hit Sundering for the extra surge. We now have 2 buttons which in the past had some flexibility to when you need to press them now required and need to be hit regularly about every 30 seconds. So button bloat and action bloat.

How does this even work though? Stormstrike is a generator for the very resource you want to use to empower it. The vast majority of the MSW you generate in Storm Build is from Stormstrike given the amount of talents you take to be able to machine gun it. And Elementalist only cares about Stormstrike as a MSW generator and it’s counterintuitive to have Stormstrike eat your MSW when you want it to spend it on other things. The only option is that you have to put in a new button that when you press it, Stormstrike consumes your MSW stacks for added damage. It would probably need to have additional effects though since it can’t just be a flat damage increase because even Storm Build doesn’t care for the actual damage Stormstrike does, it’s the effects that are tied to hitting it. So basically you’d have to make Primoridal Wave but for Stormstrike.

cracks knuckles I need you to go and scroll the shaman forums for a good while and find all the threads talking about 2 hand enhancement returning to retail in just the last week. And then I need you to actually read the discussions about the pros and cons and how this would theoretically play out gameplay-wise and its impact on other systems in the game such as gearing. Then come back and revisit this because this would be a dead-on-arrival not worth making loot acquisition more nightmarish.

You can have a hero talent set that utilizes a lot of existing talents, they just need to make sense. This doesn’t lean into any of the strengths of either build: For Storm, it’s trying to incentivize you to hit Lava Lash and Sundering for other reasons besides Stormstrike isn’t up and you don’t/didn’t have enough MSW to reset it or you are in Doomwinds and Stormstrike is CD. It doesn’t fit Elementalist because it’s asking you to take Ascendance and loads so much on physical damage despite the build focusing on magical damage, not to mention adding two more buttons in our already busy rotation. These changes you suggest would do nothing unless you’re suggesting just straight-up deleting either Strom Build or Elementalist build.

1 Like
3

The biggest problem with Stormbringer is that Tempest replaces Lightning Bolt but doesn’t gain any of the buffs that Lightning Bolt does from talents like Surge of Power, Stormkeeper, etc. Unless they change things Tempest is just weaker than Lightning Bolt.

Also, Blizzard said Stormbringer is “emphasizing the uniqueness of being the sole lightning caster as much as possible,” it just doesn’t really do that. At least for elemental where the only lightning spell you’re casting is Lightning Bolt in ST and Chain Lightning in AoE. It doesn’t even manage to do what they said it’s supposed to do.

2 Likes