I wish Blizzard would take more chances, though. Especially with a #SomeChanges on the table. I feel like the player-based could contribute to that, help “test” new changes to specs and give their feedback.
You want Shaman to be viable Tanks?
- They need a massive boost in base Armor
- They need some combination of Stamina and Damage Reduction to all sources, and a lot of it
- They need threat attached to more than Frost Shock and Rockbiter Weapon, and those abilities need beefing up further
- They need a Taunt
- They need AoE abilities that aren’t hard casts
- They need an entire set of gear at every tier level that includes heavy Defense/Dodge/Parry/Block ratings
- They need a form of in-combat mana longevity similar to Paladins
- They need differentiation between Spell Power and STR/AGI gear since their kit is currently a very weird amalgam of both
In short, they need basically an entire work-up from the ground up because they’re simply not designed to be Tanks.
They’re too squishy.
They’re too weak.
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they added a whole new spell to a class on the alliance… Asking for some tweaking of an existing spell should be more than feasible.
Making shaman work as tanks isn’t tweaking an existing spell. It’s rebuilding them from the ground up to actually function.
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A spell that already exists for paladins… on the other faction. Arguably this is a buff for Blood Elves as they STILL have way better racials, but now also have the better pvp and tanking seal to work with, making their alliance counter-parts even worse by comparison.
Oh boy, alliance ret paladins, one of if not the worst dps class specs got a marginally better seal that doesn’t synergize with their raciasl nearly as well as blood elves do. Woooowie. And now blood elves are the best prot paladins with seal of vengeance. So much for faction balance…
Talk about a weak argument.
Are they though?
Humans get 1% Expertise with maces and swords.
Dwarfs get 10% Armor and self-cleanse CD.
Draenei get party-wide 1% physical hit.
Blood Elves get Mana Tap/Arcane Torrent.
I can see Blood Elves having a slight edge on building threat/damage when OTing since they can Torrent back 225 Mana every 2 min, but honestly I don’t see them beating out the always-on threat bonuses of Humans/Draenei or the minor defensive CD of Dwarfs.
Allllll of this.
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Take points into Elemental up through Elemental Devastation and the rest into Enhancement, picking up all the key damage/mitigation points where possible but avoiding the parry one since it will kill your threat.
Problem with going for Elemental Devastation is that Shaman attempting to Tank are going to have no Spell Crit or Physical Crit depending on gear selection. The gear they need to remain uncrittable is all PvP gear so they either go for the Enhancement set for shorter Stormstrike CD and loads of Strength/Crit but no Intellect or Spell Crit, or they use the Elemental set for SP/Int/Spell Crit, but no melee stats of any kind and a useless 4pc bonus but slightly longer range on Shock spells.
They can’t do both without foregoing the Stormstrike CD benefit, and the Int on the Elemental set is pretty low as well.
Then there’s the fact that you’re going that deep into Elemental. You’d be likely stripping yourself of things like Flurry, Weapon Mastery, etc to get the next 6 points for Elemental Devastation. It could be worth it if the lion’s share of threat comes from Shocks, but I doubt that very much.
You’re not going to be raid tanking so you’re just going for being able to hold aggro while an overgeared healer keeps you up. You don’t lose flurry or weapon mastery. Frost Shock is your threat gen tool. Reverberation is going to be a huge TPS increase and then after that you get Elemental Devastation because it synergizes.
Trying to get defense capped while holding threat will be impossible, you can go for defense cap but then you’re useless at actually tanking for any competent DPS. What you want to do is go for a state where you can hold threat while stuff dies and you’ll just be squishier than a regular tank, that’s the actually useful incarnation of Shaman tanking. You’re going for hybrid gear that has decent melee capability but also some spell power/crit to pump up the DPS some to increase your TPS.
In all reality, a plain Enhancement DPS build is probably best for Shaman tanking, using some Frost Shocks to grag/hold threat better, as the -30% threat from the dual-wield/hit talents is probably made up for by the increased DPS you get there, unless 2H enhancement is actually good.
Then you aren’t Tanking and this whole exercise is pointless.
Why on earth would you subject yourself to a Shaman “Tank” who is taking Critical Hits while having less EH than an undergeared Warrior 2-3 tier behind the Shaman? If you’re trying to Tank in a Heroic and one of the many hard hitting mobs takes a swing at you, you’ll just die. You won’t be a bit squishier or a bit harder to heal, you’ll just die.
You have to lose something and if you’re dropping your utility in Improved Weapon Totems and Unleashed Rage, your threat in Elemental Weapons and Stormstrike, or your longevity in Shamanistic Focus or Mental Quickness, you only have defensive options to drop.
But none of this matters because:
Trying to min/max a way to jury rig a Shaman into somehow being able to do Heroic 5-mans is a pointless exercise.
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Earth Shock has no threat component in TBC. Its not going to happen.
Frost Shock gets the threat component instead, but it doesn’t change anything about them otherwise.
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I didn’t make the thread, I responded with the only real way a Shaman can tank stuff. You drop some longevity because you’re not going to be tanking any long fights. Your entire goal is to get enough burst threat to make stuff stick to you long enough to die.
Shamans trying to tank in a “viable” fashion isn’t going to happen because their ability to generate threat is very closely tied to their DPS. They don’t have parry without sacrificing a ton of threat and don’t have plate, nor do they have bear form to make up for the lack of those things. Their AoE tanking is non-existent. You’d honestly be better served by a Warlock.
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I’m just saying that dropping longevity on an already fragile class is just daring a door guard in Slave Pens to crit you from 100 to 0. Those things hurt the actual Tanks and can’t be CC’d and take a bit to drop, and there are plenty of those kinds of mobs in all of the Heroics.
Anyone trying to Tank anything has to first and foremost be able to actually withstand what’s coming long enough for any healing to matter, which is why I just don’t see any value in trying to race the dice rolls.
Almost certainly. Or a Rogue with Evasion.
Why would having less mana let a mob kill you? You’re also vastly overestimating the damage mobs do.
I read “longevity” as survival, not mana, sorry.
Not really no. Every Heroic dungeon has some set of mobs, often literally just a pair of door guards, that aren’t CC-able in any way, often have CC of their own, and hit like trucks. These mobs are rather known for dropping Warriors, Druids, and Paladins who are doing everything “right” but may be a bit undergeared for the Heroic.
Perhaps we were all just a bit worse than we will be in a few months, that’s entirely possible. It is also entirely possible that my deaths at these mobs weren’t due to my being squishy but due to my Healer being asleep at the wheel. I just know that my memory of the Sethekk Halls and Slave Pen guards and the Bog Giants in Underbog and Steam Vaults, etc, absolutely smashing Tanks, isn’t a unique experience.
If a Bear Tank is getting ground into dust for jumping into Heroics a tad too early, despite Bears having the easiest early EH jumps of any Tank, I just don’t have any reason to think a Shaman can even step up to the plate until everyone’s DPS is so high that the mob falls over before it can reach anyone.
You definitely are though, I did TBC when it came out dragging a level 68 tank through Shattered Halls. He literally was getting crush-crit and still we cleared.
I’m going to try something around this build when I go tanking. Notes about my build.
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DW isn’t necessary but it’s nice for a quick threat gen when the mitigation isn’t as required.
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I have no responsibility buffing the group to my max. I’m a tank, not a support so my totems aren’t maxed out. They’re still viable if there isn’t a shaman in the group.
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I don’t think lightning shield is that viable?
And for anyone saying that shaman tank doesn’t work… my guild had a shaman tank Mag in full S3 gear.
I don’t really remember Shattered Halls being death by heavy hits, but rather death by holy-crap the Mage didn’t sheep and OMG the trap broke early and now 5 mobs are on me and now I’m dead.
Also Heroic or Normal? Could you even be Revered to get the key by 68? Because I don’t give a hoot about normals.
So you’re reinforcing my point because Season 3 gear is comparable to Tier 6, not Tier 4. Also: D O U B T
- Reverberation is 1 sec off your Shocks, specifically Frost Shock, when you’re going to be getting the lion’s share of your threat from physical sources and weapon swings. You can probably drop those points.
- Guardian Totems is entirely wasted points. 43 flat reduction improved to 51 is simply not worth the points, not to mention the waste of a totem drop.
- Lightning Shield is more than suitable, especially when using S1 and S2 gloves.
- Spirit Weapons absolutely kills a huge chunk of your threat, especially when you consider all the efforts you put into improving autos in other talents, and all to get DW which… you won’t be doing while getting smashed in the face.
I have no points in that?
The group was garbage but we still did it.
Shaman could tank w/ s1 gear too. It’s just finding competent healers and willing dps. TBC isn’t hard, by any measure.
I’ll put $1400.00 that a shaman tanks Illidan before it’s all over. Good players are good players, and and easy game is an easy game.
It’s not though. As you’ve mentioned the build is going to favor physical damage gear. Lightning shield doesn’t hit hard at all and it’s scaling is poor too.
~17% cd reduction is pretty significant for one of the main threat generating spells. There’s also a handful of talents that benefit from spell crits so more cast usually equals more crits which equals more uptime on boofs.