This is written from the perspective of an Enhancement shaman, as that is where most of my experience in the game has been. The viewpoints of this thread are said through the lens of Enhancement mostly. There is no TL;DR because I feel if you care about this class you should actually take the time to read so you can comment appropriately.
Over the course of WoW’s lifespan, few classes have seen the ups and downs and balancing issues that the shaman class has seen. Originally designed as a utility/support/buffing spec via the totem mechanic, the class has changed drastically with totems in their current form being near non-existent for some of the specs.
At original launch, the melee spec of Shaman was designed as a 2-hand spec. This was later changed due to the issue of balancing the burst behind windfury, instead opting for a more streamlined sustain dps design with the introduction of dual-wielding.
During WotLK, we saw the first issue with totems arise. With the introduction of Death Knights to the game, Shaman originally proved to be a hard counter to the class, something that I think was unintended by the prompt removing of the cleansing totems (set and forget dispels for poison and disease, the latter of which a core mechanic to Death Knight specs).
The game continued to change and adapt, with Shaman dispels changing entirely from poison and disease removal to magic and curse removal. Balancing issues continued, specifically for the Enhancement class who saw gimmick times during WotLK utilizing spellpower weapons and double flametongue due to the inability to properly balance agi to spellpower conversion and the overall toolkit of the spec. But shaman were still fun, utilizing new abilities in spirit wolves as well as interesting glyphs that served as a basis for future abilities (Stoneclaw Totem shield glyph being the predecessor to Ancestral Bulwark). It even got a fun pseudo-resource in Maelstrom Weapons, serving as an intermediate system somewhere between the Paladin’s Holy Power, and the Rogue’s combo point system.
But eventually, the class started to lag behind, and players wanted more control over the damage they did. Searing Totem was now considered to be a nuisance, being too slow or attacking the wrong targets, along with buffs that were intended to offset the damage displacement being an issue for hard swaps due to existing on the enemy targets rather than the player. And eventually, for reasons still unknown, Blizzard decided to reinvent the wheel.
The battlecaster aspect that we had started to fade away, as our shocks disappeared in favor of redesigning static weapon imbues of Rockbiter, Flametongue, and Frostbrand into active abilities. Shaman even moved away from the proc-based pseudo-resource system into a build/spender system that dramatically changed the feel of the class. Totems continued to disappear, despite Blizzard’s claim that they would be made into cooldown like abilities. Some that had been baseline for years, now became pvp talents only…limiting their usefulness from the quest and world experience.
In the modern day game, on the verge of Shadowlands, we see Blizzard reverting back to a previous playstyle and the mechanics that existed during MoP. However, there are some blaring issues. With the reintroduction of Maelstrom Weapons, we saw a fierce nerf to our baseline healing which hurts our survivability. We continue to be one of the only specs in the game that has to exchange dps for survivability by using Maelstrom Weapons to heal ourselves instead of continuing dps. The similar system of Paladin Holy Power can be compared, but Paladins have more defensive baseline abilities.
Lastly, the reintroduction of Fire Nova shows a lack of understanding of what made Enhance work in the first place. With no synergy to extend or spread flame shock, this talent is incredibly lackluster compared to the rest of its row, given the duration and cooldown of Flame Shock, having to tab target since you can’t easily spread Flame Shock, and generally having issues with ramp up time vs. enemies dying.
The original Fire Nova worked because of the stacking duration of Flame Shock, which proved to be a boon for group based PvP, allowing Enhance to have the unique ability to stack Flame Shock for ridiculous amounts of time and use Fire Nova for some serious AoE pressure. With Crash Lightning synergy with the reintroduced chain lightning, I foresee no one taking Fire Nova.
Which brings me to class identity? What does Blizzard even want for shaman anymore? They tried to reintroduce searing totem, but it was promptly removed because its garbage in its original iteration. Blizzard seem locked to the outdated and antiquated idea that totems need to have 5 health and a short radius. Totems are the identity of shaman…Totems and communing with the elements. Blizzard needs to lean into this heavier, and redesign totems so that they are meaningful and work. But they don’t seem to want to, which really bothers me because other classes already have “Totems” that work just fine.
I recently started playing a monk and realized that Ox Statue is just a Stoneclaw Totem that actual does what it was intended to do.
The Ox Statue serves as a tank, pulling aggro from nearby creatures and eating damage. It has a good amount of health and serves as a way to pick up AoE threat nearby or pull pressure off the Monk when its needed to clear stacks….
But this is exactly what Stoneclaw Totem was designed to do. Stoneclaw Totem was a totem with an aoe taunt mechanic that pulled creatures off of you. However, it had minimal health and died in 2 or 3 hits. So why is it that a monk gets a working version of a totem that was part of the class defining mechanic for shaman, while Stoneclaw gets removed from the class?
Similar cases can be made for things like the Jade Serpent Statue vs. Healing Totem, classes that have cooldown pets/defensives that if they had 5 hp, would be doing the same thing as original totems.
Examples:
Death Knight Gargoyle - The gargoyle ability was a mechanic that summoned a gargoyle down for a short duration and dealt range damage. It had didn’t have health and was untargetable, but I believe you could outrange its damage.
Why is this just a better version of Searing Totem? If Searing Totem is that iconic that Blizzard tried to bring it back, why not use this as a model and turn it into a DPS cooldown that does meaningful damage for a short duration, instead of trying to do an outdated concept of a set and forget low dmg maintenance stick?
The same things could be said for other totems! Time and time again we see Shaman in game doing unique things with totems that players don’t get.
In the scenario to break Talanji out of stormwind, we see Rokhan giving his group the rogue ability camouflage with a totem…yet this unique option which drive straight into the utility column is absent from Shaman.
And this doesn’t stop there…as here is a list of totem abilities that NPCs use in the game, that could all serve as ideas for totemic cooldowns that could be given to Shaman as talents to maintain identity, rather than abilities that fix what should be our core rotation (looking at you Echo of the Elements for Elemental!).
NPC TOTEM ABILITIES
Blazing Totem - Summon a Blazing Wind Totem at the feet of the caster for 10 sec. The Blazing Wind Totem increases allies’ attack speed by 75%.
This sounds a lot like bloodlust! Just add a totem graphic to the current Bloodlust ability and BOOM you are already thematically moving into the reason many people picked shaman
Bubble Totem - Drop a Bubble Totem at a targeted location for 15 sec. Enemies that step near the Bubble Totem are incapacitated until the Bubble Totem is destroyed. Only useable in Island Expeditions.
HOLY MOLY?!?!? A water totem that isn’t healing or mana?!?! Sign me up!
Crystalfire Totem - Summons a totem of crystalline origin that periodically lobs gouts of energy at nearby locations, inflicting firestorm damage to all enemies within 2 yards and knocks them back.
Elemental Protection Totem - Summons an elemental protection totem at the caster’s feet. Totem lasts for 30 sec, and increases nearby party member’s resistance to harmful magic.
Endless Hunger Totem - summon a totem that repeat pulls in the farthest enemy, then channels a spell that inflicts 25 shadow damage.
Frost Totem - Summons a Frost Totem for 30 sec that repeatedly inflicts Frost damage upon enemies within 20 yards.
Glacial Freeze Totem - summons a glacial freeze totem at the caster’s feet that inflicts 20 frost damage and stuns all enemies within 10 yards for 2.5 sec after 6 sec.
Greater Serpent Totem - creates a greater serpent totem, which casts serpent’s breath at nearby enemies.
Grim Totem - summons a ward that last 15 sec, and periodically deals shadow damage to nearby enemies
Healing Flume Totem - heals a percentage of your maximum hitpoints every sec.
Inferno Totem - summons a fiery Inferno Totem.
Invigorating Totem - Increase haste and movement speed
Lightning Totem - summon a lightning totem for 30 seconds that periodically deals lightning damage to enemies
Monkey Island Totem - summon a monkey island totem with 5 health at your feet for 9 sec that repeatedly attacks an enemy within 20 yards for 10% of spell power fire damage.
Moonflare Totem - summons a Moonflare Totem at the caster’s feet. Totem lasts 5 sec and inflicts Arcane damage to nearby enemies every 4 sec.
Petrifying Totem - summons a Petrifying Totem at the feet of the enemy for 30 sec. The Petrifying Cloud inflicts 3 nature damage every 1 sec. Enemies that come into contact with the cloud will be petrified after 10 sec.
Rising Fire Totem - summons a fire totem that periodically increases the damage and maximum health of nearby players. The totem lasts 20 sec and its effect can stack up to x times.
Sinkhole Totem - summons a totem that collapses into the ground pulling all enemies within 20 yards to it, inflicting 52 Nature damage.
Solarshard Totem - summons a totem of crystalline origin that periodically creates a pillar of blinding light at nearby locations, silencing all targets within 2 yards.
Ice Totem - summons an Ice Totem that lasts 1 min and inflicts Frost damage to nearby enemies every 3 sec, slowing their attacks and movement.
Terror Totem - summon a terror totem which periodically fears nearby enemies
Totem of Concealment - Rokhan’s totem renders you nearly invisible to almost everything so long as you are close to it.
Voodoo Totem - Curses an enemy, rendering it unable to attack or cast spells for 5 sec.
Warding Totem - increases damage reduction of nearby allies
Zombie Dust Totem - creates a zombie dust totem, which will mind control up to two enemies until destroyed.
This post won’t even go into all the abilities that we see other npc shaman do as well (Earthen Ring, Thrall, etc.) If we are able to wield the doomhammer in a way Thrall never could, then why don’t we have that stupid stone hand grab ability he used on Garrosh yet?
As you can see from that list, there are a lot of totem ideas…and yes, some of them are overlap, and some of them are redundant, but even using previous totems as a base…Shaman could have utility and totems added back as the class defining mechanic, rather than feeling like 5 different specs.
Examples:
Baseline
Stoneskin Totem - a personal defensive cooldown that gives damage reduction to the shaman
Talent
Ancestral Bulwark Totem
Turns your stoneskin totem into an ancestral bulwark totem
Bringing back Totems as the identity of Shaman, instead of using talents to fix what should be core rotations and priority systems would go a long way towards giving shaman their identity back. Take the old Sentry totem and purpose it as Rokhan’s Concealment Totem. Add a water totem that has combat utility outside of HP/Mana regen. Give grounding totem baseline. Make a lightning totem that allows the elemental/resto shaman casting lightning bolt to originate the lightning bolt from the totem’s location for X seconds, etc.
Be creative. But most importantly, BRING TOTEMS BACK.
Thanks for reading.