I’m looking at Icy Veins Elemental Shaman DPS rotation and with respect to Echoing Shock it says, “Cast Echoing Shock if you have 60 Maelstrom or can cast a Lava Burst, with or without Lava Surge” followed by “Cast Earth Shock if…”
The way I’m interpreting this is that we should use Echoing Shock on EITHER Lava Burst OR Earth Shock. Basically, if you have 60 Maelstrom, use it on Earth Shock, if not, use it on Lava Burst. Am I understanding this correctly or not?
If yes, that leads to an additional question. Wouldn’t we always want to use Echoing Shock on Lava Burst since, at least according to the tooltips, a Lava Burst crit (assuming we’re never casting without flame shock) does more damage than a non-crit Earth Shock? I could see Earth Shock taking priority at some sufficiently high crit rating. Or is delaying the cast of Echoing Shock enough of a DPS loss that it’s better to use it with whichever hard hitting spell is up for immediate use?
use echo and follow with your highest dmg spell.
do some math, and it’ll all be very clear.
Doing some math is what made me question Icy Veins in the first place.
Using my tooltip numbers, the value of Echoing Shock used on Lava Burst is 709 x 2.5 = 1772.5. The value of Echoing Shock used on Earth Shock is, on average, 982 + (982 x 0.25 crit x 1.5) = 1350.25. Using the formula 982 + (982 x C x 1.5) for the average value of Echoing Shock used on Earth Shock, I’d need 54% critical strike chance for Echoing Shock to be better used on Earth Shock than Lava Burst.
Is my math off somewhere?
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Most of the time you want to use it on lava burst until your Crit is high enough. Don’t delay it for an ES. If you have ES up, you can use it with ES.
Echoing shock also copies the maelstrom generation of spells, so using it on icefury will get you almost a full ES or EQ also.
It’s great in pvp to use with storm keeper. Huge burst
ES = 210% SP.
Lvb = 108% SP * 2.5 * (let’s say 40% mastery bonus, 0.85 * 0.4 + 1 = 1.34) = 361%
361% / 210 = 1.722, which means if Crit bonus > 0. 722, then ES > Lvb.
Crit bonus = C% * 1.5, so C = 48%.
So technically, if your crit is less than 48%, it’s better to duplicate Lvb. (assuming you have 40% mastery)
If 0 mastery rating, base mastery is 18%. then C = 32%.
And that’s just dmg. You’d also be up 10 maelstrom from duplicating Lvb.
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Good points being made about Maelstrom generation and Elemental Overload. I didn’t consider these for simplicity’s sake, but they both weigh in favor of Lava Burst. If we’re just looking at single target, we can consider the 10 extra Maelstrom from Lava Burst as 1/6 of an Earth Shock, or 35% additional spell power worth of damage in favor of Lava Burst.
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Just taking the text as is and not figuring what is best but just what icy veins says, I interpret it to be either echo or LvB if at 60 maelstrom, not one then the other. Then ONLY if maelstrom is at 90 or above use ES to prevent over capping, then LvB. So in general use echo then LvB but ES takes priority when at high maelstrom to prevent capping maelstrom. Hope that clears it up!
Meh even at 90 maelstrom I would probably dump maelstrom and then echo LvB.
Using the ES/EQ legendary on single target, i will get 70 maelstrom, ES, then echo icefury to get right back to an EQ. Don’t have to worry about low maelstrom or movement causing you to lose the buff.
Now trying to understand the value of Echoing Shock used on a Stormkeeper buffed Lightning Bolt…
Lightning bolt is a base 95% SP. Stormkeeper adds 150% SP for a total of 245%. Then we have the guaranteed overload at 245% x 0.85 = 208.25%. On top of that we have 8 Maelstrom generated from the primary cast and 3 generated from the overload for a total of 11. That 11 Maelstrom is worth 18.3% of an Earth Shock or 38.43% SP
245% + 208.5% + 38.43% = 491.93% SP
So if the Echoing Shock/Stormkeeper interaction stays, it is far and away the best use of Echoing Shock. Quite frankly, I think this interaction is too powerful in comparison to the other Level 25 and 50 talent options. This is not at all to say I think the combination is objectively too powerful, rather, I think it necessitates a look at the other talents in those rows to bring them up to par.
EDIT: On top of all of that, if one happened to have a Lava Surge proc queued and was using the Master of the Elements talent, I think you could (but still need to test)…
Lava Burst/Flame Shock > Stormkeeper > Echoing Shock > Lightning Bolt > Lava Surged Lava Burst > Echoing Shocked Lightning Bolt > Lava Burst > Lightning Bolt
…with all of the lightning bolt casts being buffed by Master of the Elements. That would be an insane burst chain.
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Yep, that’s why it probably won’t stay. Now think about echoing a SK empowered chain lightning lol. SK echoed in aoe would look like: CL > EQ > echoed CL > EQ > CL > EQ and still have 40 maelstrom left, its pretty nutty haha
I have been thinking about this for a while now and am unsure if I have found the correct answer so I figured I would ask the following question:
Can you Echo a SoP empowered LB to achieve two SoP empowered LB’s?
Cast sequence would be as follows:
SK>Echo>ES>LB>(Echo ES)>LB>ES
And furthermore, if this is possible, does surpass the damage from MotE & SK empowered LB’s?
Food for thought!
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EDIT: Does this combo surpass the damage from MotE & SK empowered LB’s?
Yes on Live but they removed this interaction on Beta
SK > ES > Echo > SoP empowered LB’s
Maybe a better way to ask the question is this:
SK>Echo>ES>SoP LB>(Echo ES)>(SoP?) LB
Does the echoed ES provide SoP for the subsequent LB?
No it does not work like that… atleast I am
pretty sure it does not
I did some testing and found that my LB overloaded twice on the 1st SoP empowered LB, and my 2nd LB also overloaded twice.
It appears that the echoed ES is providing SoP for the 2nd cast of LB, otherwise I would only get one overload on the 2nd LB…but I may be overlooking something. Also, in order to pull this off you need to cast very quickly so that the instant cast LB hits in between the echoed ES.
The total damage is over 21k - and since I only have under 19k it seems like this would be massive burst!! If this is working as intended it leads me back to my original question:
Is this combo more dps than LB buffed by Echo, SK, and MotE?
I need to check echoing ES … I know that if you use Echo before casting SOP empowered SK, it’s echoing both the first and second charge of SK. But on Beta only the first charge of SK get echoed . The second is not.
This will echo ES and you cannot cast LB fast enough to consume the SoP buff before the second ES to generate a second SoP buff because of the GCD after casting ES.
You will just:
EchSh>ES(SoP)>ES>LB(SoP buffed)
SK>SFT> BotE>MotE+ES>EchSh>LB
Is a ridiculous amount of dmg.
On the Beta using SK with EchSh consumes the second charge of SK whereas on Live it does not.