Shaman: Commanding Totems in the Flow of Combat
The Shaman update puts more of the class’s power into active decisions made during an encounter. Totems can be summoned, tracked, dismissed, and repositioned with greater control, while weapon imbues and new talent paths give Elemental Combat, Enhancement, and Restoration more ways to contribute without interrupting the pace of play.
Baseline Abilities
Totems:
All totems now have a 1.0 second global cooldown, down from 1.5 seconds.
All totems that provide persistent buffs have their duration increased to 5 minutes from 2 minutes. Shorter duration totems are unaffected by this change.
Totems now have a tracking UI showing which totems are active and their remaining duration. It can also be used to instantly unsummon a totem by right clicking on the UI.
Resistance Totems now provide their resistance bonus to the entire raid group.
Weapon Imbues: All weapon imbues (Frostbrand Weapon, Flametongue Weapon, Rockbiter Weapon, Windfury Weapon) have their duration increased to 60 minutes from 5 minutes. In addition, they can now be active at the same time as temporary weapon enchantments like Sharpening Stones, Weight Stones, and Wizard Oil.
Fire Nova: Fire Nova Totem has been removed and replaced with a new Fire Nova spell. With Fire Nova, you cause an eruption of Fire damage at the location of your current Fire Totem. Now you can place a Fire Totem and trigger AoE damage at that Totem’s location multiple times, instead of needing to place the Fire Nova Totem every time.
Windfury Totem: No longer a weapon enchantment, and now a party-wide buff. Shaman cannot benefit from this totem if they have Windfury Weapon on their weapon. Parties cannot benefit from this totem at the same time as Grace of Air or Flametongue Totem.
Flametongue Totem: No longer a weapon enchantment, and now a party-wide buff. Shaman cannot benefit from this totem if they have Flametongue Weapon on their weapon. Parties cannot benefit from this totem at the same time as Windfury Totem.
Tranquil Air Totem: Removed.
Totemic Projection: This new ability learned at level 22 allows you to teleport all your totems to a new location within 30 yards. 1 minute cooldown. Costs 25% of base mana.
Totemic Recall: This new ability learned at level 20 instantly destroys all your totems and returns 25% of their Mana cost. Note there is a bug in beta currently that Mana is not being refunded.
Call of the Elements: Learning this ability at level 20 unlocks the totem bar User Interface (UI). You can pre-program a set of 4 totems, one of each element, and Call of the Elements will summon all 4 after a 3 second cast. This costs Mana equal to the sum of the Mana cost of all 4 totems.
Call of the Spirits: Learned at level 30, this ability allows you to pre-program a second set of 4 totems.
Call of the Ancestors: Learned at level 40, this ability allows you to pre-program a third set of 4 totems.
Lightning Bolt: Cast time of ranks 4 and up of this spell changed from 3 seconds to 2.5 seconds. Its spell power coefficient was also reduced to match.
Chain Lightning: Cast time of all ranks of this spell changed from 2.5 seconds to 2 seconds. Its spell power coefficient was also reduced to match.
Talents
Elemental Combat
Convection: Now also reduces the Mana cost of Lava Burst.
Concussion: No longer applies to Frost Shock or Flame Shock.
Reverberation: Moved from row 3 up to row 2.
Call of Flame: Now also increases the damage done by Flame Shock, Fire Nova, and Lava Burst.
Elemental Devastation: Moved from row 4 up to row 2. This talent is intended primarily as a reason to entice Enhancement Shaman into spending points on Elemental talents, and so was made more accessible.
Elemental Focus: Chance to trigger reduced when casting low rank spells.
Elemental Alacrity: (Formerly Lightning Mastery.) Moved from row 6 up to row 3. Now requires only 3 points for maximum rank and reduces the cast time of Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning by only 0.5 seconds at max rank but also reduces the cast time of Lava Burst. This talent was both very deep in the tree previously, making it unavailable to Shaman leveling up, and was twice as strong as similar talents with other classes, causing a spell power scaling problem. To account for this, its potency was reduced and it was moved much earlier in the tree.
Improved Fire Nova: (Formerly Improved Fire Totems. Redesigned.) Now increases Fire Nova’s damage and reduces its cooldown.
Eye of the Storm: (Redesigned.) This talent now grants resistance against spell pushback from damage while casting Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, and Lava Burst. Formerly it was only effective after being hit with a critical strike. This talent was previously only really useful in PvP. It is now useful broadly in the game.
Call of Thunder: Moved from the row 3 down to row 4, and now has Elemental Alacrity as a pre-requisite. This talent is now the 16-point gold medal talent, granting 3% increased critical strike chance to Lighting Bolt and Chain Lightning.
Elemental Reach: Now also increases the range of Fire Nova and Lava Burst by up to 6 yards and increases the range of Flame Shock by up to 15 yards.
Lighting Overload: This new row 5 talent grants a chance for every cast of Lightning Bolt or Chain Lighting to instantly cast a second copy of that spell at no Mana cost but for half damage and no threat.
Earthbound: This new 21-point gold medal talent causes Earthbind Totem to instantly immobilize nearby targets for 5 seconds when cast.
Elemental Fury: Moved from row 5 down to row 6 and requires Call of Thunder as a pre-requisite.
Lava Burst: This new 31-point gold medal talent grants the Lava Burst spell. This 2.5 second cast spell deals Fire damage to a target, increased by 20% if the target is afflicted by your Flame Shock. 10 second cooldown.
Removed talents: Elemental Mastery. While this talent was a signature mainstay of Elemental Shaman, especially in PvP, it was also a problematic talent that was holding the class back. We could not increase Elemental Shaman damage to appropriate values in PvE and keep this talent. It would have made them much too strong in PvP. The best solution was to remove this talent and give Elemental Shaman new spells and capabilities.
Enhancement
Earth’s Grasp: Moved from Elemental to row 1 of Enhancement.
Thundering Strikes: Moved from row 2 up to row 1. Now increases critical strike chance of all spells and attacks instead of only weapon attacks.
Ancestral Knowledge: Now increases Intellect instead of maximum Mana.
Mental Dexterity: (New row 2 talent.) Increases your Attack Power by a percentage of your Intellect.
Improved Ghost Wolf: (Improved. ) Rank 1 now makes Ghost Wolf useable indoors while reducing its cast time by 1 second, and Rank 2 now makes Ghost Wolf Instant.
Elemental Weapons: Moved from row 5 up to row 3.
Shamanistic Focus: New 11-point gold medal talent. Reduces the Mana cost of Shocks and Lightning Shield by a large percentage.
Anticipation: Now grants twice as much Dodge chance.
Toughness: No longer increases Armor. Now increases Stamina by a percentage.
Flurry: Now increases attack speed by 5% per talent point up to 25% (down from 30%). Now requires Mental Dexterity as a pre-requisite, instead of Thundering Strikes.
Stormstrike: Moved from the 31-point gold medal talent to the 16-point gold medal talent. Cooldown reduced from 20 seconds to 8 seconds. Now increases damage done by your next Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, or Earth Shock spell by 20%, instead of the next 2 Nature attacks from any attacker.
Spirit Weapons: (Formerly Parry.) This 21-point talent now also reduces threat while you are not using Rockbiter Weapon, and increases threat while you are using Rockbiter Weapon. This talent will help Enhancement Shaman manage their threat now that their damage is competitive, while also retaining their unique ability to generate high threat and serve as a temporary tank in small group gameplay.
Mental Quickness: (New row 5 talent.) Increases your spell damage and healing by a percentage of your Intellect.
Improved Stomstrike: Requires Stormstrike as a pre-requisite. This new row 5 talent grants a chance for Stormstrike to activate Mana regeneration while casting spells, and a chance for Stormstrike’s cooldown to reset each time you Dodge or Parry. This talent allows Enhancement Shamans to regenerate Mana from Spirit, and also to have more active Stormstrike usage when serving as a temporary tank.
Maelstrom Weapon: This new row 6 talent grants a chance on every melee attack to stack charges of Maelstrom, reducing the cast time of Lightning Bolt. At sufficient ranks and charges, Lightning Bolt becomes instant.
Rage of the Farseer: This new 31-point gold medal talent grants you a 3 minute cooldown that increases your attack speed by 30% for 25 seconds. We were inspired by the Heroism and Bloodlust abilities found in early World of Warcraft expansions but wanted to make it a personal cooldown for the Shaman instead of a raid or party wide event.
Talents Moved to Baseline: Shield Specialization, Enhancing Totems, Two-Handed Axes and Maces, Weapon Mastery, Improved Weapon Totems are all now baseline abilities.
Restoration
Totemic Focus: Moved from row 2 up to row 1. Now also discounts Totemic Projection and totem Call spells.
Mindfulness: (New row 2 talent.) Allows Shaman to regenerate Spirit while spellcasting. This is deliberately placed to make it more accessible for Elemental Shaman.
Natural Grace: (Formerly Healing Grace.) Moved from row 3 up to row 2. Now reduces all threat from spells and moved up to earlier in the tree to make it more accessible to Elemental Shaman.
Tidal Focus: Now also grants increased chance to hit with all spells and attacks.
Improved Reincarnation: Now also increases maximum health by a percentage.
Ancestral Healing: Moved to row 3 down from row 2.
Healing Focus: Now only requires 3 talent points for full effect instead of 5.
Water Shield: This new 11-point gold medal talent grants you a new Shield ability. Only one shield can be active at a time. The 3 globes on this shield grant you Mana when an attack hits you, or when one of your healing spells gains a critical result.
Tidal Mastery: No longer affects Lightning spells.
Restorative Totems: Bonus to Healing Stream Totem doubled.
Mana Tide Totem: Now the 16-point gold medal talent instead of the 31-point gold medal talent.
Healing Way: Redesigned. Increases amount healed by Healing Wave by a percentage.
Riptide: (New 31-point gold medal talent.) Pre-requisite Healing Way. This new ability heals the target instantly and then periodically over 15 seconds. Increases the effectiveness of Chain Heal casts on targets with your Riptide by 25%. 6 second cooldown.
Removed talents: Nature’s Guidance.
Shaman are masters of totems, and use those totems to buff, heal, and solve problems for any party or raid they join. While Shaman have gained new capabilities to move and summon many totems at once, their choice of totems and totem placement remains a critical skill differentiating experienced Shaman. They can be effective melee or spell damage dealers and healers of parties or raids, tapping into their unique chaining spells for damage or healing. They are among the sturdiest of classes, with the use of Mail armor and a Shield. They have a diverse toolkit of abilities to solve problems but lack an effective crowd control. Shaman will always be welcome in a group but also need those allies to make up for their own weaknesses in control and survivability.
Shaman a WoW Foreverben
