Here’s my thoughts on mana consumption after maining both Resto Shaman and MW Monk this expansion. I try to focus on being as efficient with mana as possible while still preforming well. That being said Resto Shamans Water Shield spell is completely useless in most end game cases.
The fact we really only benefit from the spell after taking melee hits is not ideal in any practical situation as we are not melee healers. And one hit from many mobs in higher keys and mythic content is a one shot or very close.
Compare that to the raw power of Mana Tea and the Fistweaving play style MW Monks have and it makes little sense why Water Shield exists in its current incarnation for Resto Shaman in just about any scenario. If anything the two abilities should be swapped with each other.
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Resto Shaman mana management is brutal. I’m babying my mana pool like a newborn duck, hard casting chain heal as a last resort, using mana pots and stealing our druids innervate on CD and in heroic I’m totally oom on most fights. I wonder if 4 piece helps much at all.
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Its not just useful on melee hit.
The resurgence talent gives us mana from water shield on spell crit. That’s why Crit is your best stat.
At the start of an xpac, itemization is very bad (i.e we dont have much crit) so yes mana management feels a little rough
What does resurgence have to do with water shield? (other than the icon)
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Seems silly to compare these honestly. It’s a tradeoff you make on shaman with being able to turn your mana into aoe healing with no limit except your mana pool. No other classes even have this option.
Resto shaman just don’t have the same mana efficient or cheap options other healers have. Other healers have cheap filler and/or free procs and/or secondary resource systems.
Said in beta a million times they should make healing wave a lot cheaper than it is so it can be resto shaman’s cheap filler and actually serve a purpose in their kit. As it is healing wave is less mana efficient than surge if hw doesn’t crit and surge does and surge is much more likely to crit with the set bonus.
Holy priests can spam AoE healing as well. Mistweavers with a caster focused spec are probably the best healer in the game at converting their mana pool swiftly into healing. Both single target and AoE via vivify.
Although totemic shaman have the easiest faceroll raid healing playstyle currently.
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Mana Tea is miles ahead of Water Shield.
They need to make it proc off more things. MW is a lot of fun simply because you have variety in how you can play due to how good mana tea is without being broken or super OP.
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I feel like the idea of shaman shields proccing from melee is very outdated. That basically removes their effectiveness from all group PvE and even sometimes in PvP.
Imagine it earth shield only healed from melee attacks? lol. Why can’t water shield and lightning shield have their proc conditions changed to “when you take damage”?
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I don’t see your point there. Are you basically saying Resto Shaman play style consists around how many chain heals NOT to cast? the spec is mana hungry period. It’s not just spamming chain heal that limits our mana pool, it’s the inability to recover mana after minutes of prolonged healing even if done correctly like the other healing classes can. Take pres evokers, insane aoe healing, better mana consumption and recovery. Do you play a healer?
To clarify my point.
Base MP5 is 100,000
Shaman’s Water Shield adds 2,015 MP5. Even if you take Mana Tide Totem for the 80% MP5 over 8 seconds that’s only 293,803 mana on 3 minute cooldown.
Mana Tea returns 62,999 every stack up to 20 stacks. Thats 1,259,980 MP5 + the base 100k.
Whats also important to note is that MW Monks can choose how many stacks to consume providing even better mana management.
I have the math on Resurgence too, here’s a short breakdown on Chain Heal. It costs 140,000 mana > crit proc Resurgence > .20% mana refund > 2,800 mana pre crit Chain Heal. It just underperforms no matter how you look at it. There also no point in mentioning Reactive Warding as it further relies on you taking melee damage to remove stacks of Water Shield for it be remotely useful returning 40k mana at 1/8 stacks.
Am I missing anything?