Shaman Tanking Idea Draft 🌪️

The last time I was crit in a BG, my shaman exploded into dust. I had to wait for weeks before the particles could be found in order to rez me.

Even in classic, shaman are not great tanks. They have very little in the way of real tank talents. 5% dodge, 10% armor, and perry. Your dodge is still low, 10% armor doesn’t put you close to warrior or bear base damage reduction, and we get parry later in the tree because we are the only melee class that doesn’t have some kind of real avoidance, or way to deal with melee damage.

Shaman are Jack-of-all-trades characters. They are never going to be the best at most things. Group healing is their niche, along with group buffs. All tanks do it better. All damage dealers do it better.

1 Like

what enhance shamans whs known for windfury blizzard gutted for class fantasy in legion hen killed it even more in bfa.

its funny enhancement shaman has always been about the windfury for class identity and blizzard kill enhancement shamans class identity with class fantasy in legion…lol.

I would appreciate feedback other than “This idea is terrible” and “How many times is this dude gonna post this” (Even though I posted this one time a month ago) but you do you.

I have given feedback in every thread as to why shamans shouldnt be tanks. At this point the arbitrary “bump in favor for” will just be responded with my arbitrary “bump no thanks, never do it” response.

Why not also also ask your community to provide more feedback than what has already been posted instead of “bump” and necro every thread? But you do you.

Because while “bump in favor for” tells me that the idea is solid and doesn’t really need to be improved, “bump no thanks, never do it” tells me that the idea is bad without any idea on how to improve it. Except you’re just outright shutting down the idea with no argument except “shaman bad, too many tanks already.”

Also, this isn’t my community. I posted the idea, and people told me it was a good idea. Some of these people have given me ideas on how to improve it, which I have considered and applied. I don’t know these people, they aren’t my goons or whatever you think they are.

You are part of a community, whether small or large, like it or not. I am in the oppositions community, those that dont want shaman tanks.

If you really want to know why I dont agree with shaman tanks, scroll up, or look any other thread. While you feel its acceptable to just bump because you are for and unacceptable to bump because you are against, it is entirely true that the same people (person) is jump bumping each thread to necro it.

I have already explained why I am not in favor for a shaman tank on every thread, I do not feel the need to re-explain why for convenience to others. At this point, I am just countering every necro just for same reason that the thread was necro’d in the first place. Bump in favor it, ill bump in favor against it.

they wont listen i just tell them we will get shaman tanks when we get player housing…lmao.

1 Like

You would think with this much attention and even enough desire to entirely design the spec would make Blizzard perk up and listen.

I like a few of the ideas you’ve come up with in this post… I think another good idea would be to not only imbue the weapon but also the shield, increasing block chance (by expanding the physical size of the shield with earth) or something along those lines. Shamans actually had a taunt in Cata I believe. Use unleash elements with rockbiter would cast a taunt. That really felt like Blizzard was finally doing it - but then that was taken away long with every other threat ability and a nail was put in it once and for all.

I’ve scoured the forums over and over and cannot find any remotely recent comment from blizzard on this. Yet it comes up time and time again.
Seriously it makes so much sense!
Air = Enhance
Water = Resto
Fire = Elemental
Earth = Tank
Earth is strong and resilient… the element makes sense. Its the least represented element in the Shaman’s kit. It makes no sense that shamans are the only shield bearer that can’t use it to defend their allies. There are no Mail tanks yet (Shaman is the best candidate for this).

There are so many reasons why this should work and sjould be implemented… but Blizzard seem to just turn a blind eye to any suggestions on it. Hell, with the widespread desire and passion (shown in this post) for it, I guarantee that the community could do all the spells and balance work around the spec for nothing, making it even easier for blizz.
Classic also shows that they were viable tanks (certainly not optimal but definitely viable). People have reported shaman tanking up to naxx on private servers and I’ve seen videos of a Shaman main tanking Alextraza in BWL.

Originally alliance had Warriors, Druids and Paladins (to a smaller extent) as tanks. Horde had Warriors, Druids and Shamans (to a smaller extent). They fleshed out the idea of a paladin tank… why not shaman??? The concept behind it made just as much sense as the paladin!
It’s possible, It makes sense, it’s highly desired by the community… so why not?

From what I hear about Shadowlands, Blizzard is breaking the pattern of a new class every second xpac - so why not put a little work into this?

The Shaman community is screaming for it.

PLEAZE Blizzard… I emplore you to provide some sort of response to this matter that repetitively pops up in player discussion!

The Shaman community is not screaming for it. You are, the minority.

I am not a fire shaman, I am an Elemental Shaman. I command all the elements, not fire.

The original theme of Elemental shaman is nature damage, LB, CL, ES, while you envoke the original enhancement concepts to be taken under consideration, you completely disregard the original concepts of the other specs.

To you Blizzard, I say, good job. Good job in denying the minority the 4th spec of Shaman that is not overwhelmingly, just minorly by a few loud voices, wanted or even considered.

1 Like

But aren’t tanks in general a minority? It would then make sense for a minority to be screaming for it.
We may not be the majority, but this has been desired since vanilla (for 15 years). I can’t think of anything that’s been desired by a portion of the community for so long that hasn’t been addressed one way or another by Blizzard.
We are few (although desire is growing - particularly with the opportunities in classic), but the voices are loud and only getting louder, because of how long we’ve wanted this (not to mention that it makes sense).
Earth is one of the natural elements, and it certainly does show itself as an offensive element.

Also, if this was made as a 4th spec, how would that negatively impact you as an elemental shaman? It Wouldn’t… why dismiss something that others want when it wouldn’t negatively affect you? The change comes - you would still be an elemental shaman, the change doesnt come - you would still be an elemental shaman. See the point?

1 Like

role minority is irrelevant.

A small fraction want this, not the overwhelming majority. The majority are pleased with the roles they currently can play as shaman.

I have answered this before. Balancing is bad, has been and will continue to be so. We do not need a 4th spec that others are forced into in order to be viable. Focus needs to be the 3 current shaman specs that do exists in order to make them all viable, or as close as possible.

Adding baseline tanks abilities do affect me, the roles that shaman do affect me, forced into roles/specs i dont want to play does affect me, community perception of what is socially acceptable and viable does affect me. See the point?

Role minority is not irrelevant. It rationalises the reason for a smaller portion of the shaman community requsting the spec.

Also read through the forums, there are quite a number of people unhappy with the way the current specs play.

I agree that balancing Isn’t good - but without the addition of a new class in shadowlands, don’t you think that the resources usually spent on balancing a new class into the mix, could instead balance in 1 more spec for a class?

Those things do not affect you. Are death knights affected in unholy or frost by having a tank spec? No. Are hpals or ret pals affected by having a prot spec? No. Abilities for that spec are centralised around that spec… you wouldn’t have access to the kit that would make a shaman a tank if you were playing elemental. You don’t get told that you have to respec to resto when joining a pug. Your spec is acceptable as your choice and that will not change.

It is irrelevant if the role is intended to be a minority of the population base.

And yes, they are effected. Ask ENH shamans that have to play ranged DPS or Heals in order to be brought to groups. Ask Druids that are forced into Resto instead of feral, or Paladins that go into Holy instead of Ret etc. It absolutely affects everyone that plays the class when you add a spec to it.

I have outlined how it affects the other shaman specs clearly above in this thread and other shaman tank threads. Ill let you search those for further detail. I digress.

Im sorry if you and your druid and paladin friends are so weak willed that you can’t stick to the spec you want to play. If you want to play enhance, play it! Plenty of people do, despite it being the lesser dps spec. If You’re min/maxing then you wouldn’t be playing any lesser class anyway. You would go a fotm class and spec to get the most damage possible. Despite this… there are still many druid and DH tanks, even though they’re sub optimal at the moment.
Optimal does not always mean desirable… if you dont like a spec, dont play it… simple.

Ad Hominem attack, a logical fallacy.

Hardly. You said, “Ask ENH shamans that have to play ranged DPS or Heals in order to be brought to groups. Ask druids …”
The fact is that none of these people HAVE to change spec. The enh didnt have to change, he may have taken longer to find a group but he could. The feral is the same. The ret is the same.
If you Can’t stand by your class/spec choice, then you shouldnt play it, or at least not kick up a stink when changing.

The matter at hand is the shaman tanking… adding in a 4th spec is not unreasonable. They did the same for druids, when feral and bear were technically the same tree. Originally, the enhance and “tank” shaman were the same tree. There’s no reason this shouldn’t be possible.

ad hominem

You attacked your opponent’s character or personal traits in an attempt to undermine their argument.

Ad hominem attacks can take the form of overtly attacking somebody, or more subtly casting doubt on their character or personal attributes as a way to discredit their argument. The result of an ad hom attack can be to undermine someone’s case without actually having to engage with it.

Thanks for the english lesson but I was well aware. It’s obvious I’m not getting through to you, so I’ll leave it at that. Maybe read my post again, without singling out that one portion of a sentence, and adjust yourself.