by BruneNote: This guide is updated for patch 3.3
Original author: Trollvink
Table of content.
This guide was originally created by Trollvink, sometime around the start of WotLK. I’ve revamped and updated it to take into account all the changes since then, and also to explain some of the things needed to become a good raiding enhancement shaman, such as Enhsim.
Your Role
As an enhancement shaman you’re obviously a DPS class, and a support class. The idea is that shamans boost the damage of the whole raid! Just look at our (raid/group) buffs, Enhancement shamans bring the following buffs:
- Strength of Earth – This totem gives 155 strength and agility to the whole raid! Horn of Winter overwrites it, but if the shaman is specced for Enhancing Totems, Strength of Earth becomes better, and will overwrite Horn of Winter.
- Windfury Totem – This is a totem that gives a flat 16% melee haste, can be improved which makes it on par with the the DK version.
- Unleashed Rage – This is a talent you always pick up. The expertise is good, and the 10% more AP is very strong, and almost passive (as you will crit in the time you have this buff). The same as the DK version. Any Enhancement shaman should always take this, the expertise it gives is more then welcome.
- Flametongue Totem – This is totem that increases the spellpower of those in range, since you will be hitting the boss, and casters standing at a distance, the pure caster classes won’t gain the most out of it. You, on the other hand, get better shocks and lightning bolts / chain lightnings.
- Bloodlust / Heroism – This is our best buff. This is one of the major reasons to take a shaman to a raid. Don’t forget to pop this during the essential burst times in a raid.
- Healing / Mana Stream Totem – Depending on your group setup(since this one is not raid wide), this can be a very strong totem, if your in a melee group, you can probably better drop Healing Stream, but if you’re in a group that has mana problems, you can better use Mana Stream. Doesn’t stack with Blessing of Wisdom, nor does it overwrite it (unless one is improved and the other isn’t).
- Stoneskin Totem – Stacks with devotion aura. Raidwide.
- Wrath of Air – Again, this is not a recommended totem, the haste more of use for casters, and those will probably don’t get the buff. We have it, so I list it.
We still have a bunch of other totems, which I am not going to list here, since they are hardly used, click here for a list of totems.
This said, totems for the best buffs (for ourselves) are Strength of Earth, Flametongue Totem (if you have no elemental shaman and it’s not or Magma Totem, Windfury Totem and either Healing- or Mana Stream Totem.
- Magma totem for more personal DPS. Place near adds in encounters with adds. Refresh when you have spare GCDs.
- Flametongue totem if there is no elemental shaman. (In 5s, use magma)
Now I will show what kind of stats we’ll need to be succesful as a shaman.
Weapons
Windfury, Stormstrike and Lava lash all do damage based on weapon damage, so the slower the weapon, the better. 2.6 and 2.7 will be the speed of your weapons.
A blue 2.6 speed is better than an epic ilevel 245 1.6 speed.
Stats
Hit Rating
The most important stat to cap, this should be the first stat that you stack and cap. You only want to hit the spell hit cap, which is 17% which also caps your “specials”. Caps are as listed below.
The cap is 17%, 16% for Draenei. In a raid, the cap is 14%, 13% for Draenei due to the 3% hit from Shadow Priest and/or Moonkin.
In short:
17%- 446 hit rating.
16%- 420 hit rating (Draenei).
14%- 368 hit rating (Raid).
13%- 341 hit rating (Draenei Raid).
It should be noted that you should first cap for special attacks (8%), then get expertise capped, see below, and then get spell hit capped.
Expertise
Expertise reduces the chance that a mob can dodge and parry your attacks. In most raid situations you’ll be attacking from behind so there is no chance of the target parrying, only dodging, and you’ll want to reduce this to 0%.
The cap to make mobs not be able to dodge is 6.50%. So if you are going to attack from behind, the amount of Expertise Rating you need is as follows:
6.50%- 214 Expertise Rating or 26 Expertise
6.50%- 140 Expertise Rating (This is only if you have Unleashed Rage, which increases your Expertise by 9 (not rating). This will take dodge off of the table, and since you are attacking from behind, the mob will not be able to parry).
Note that expertise rating is useless in attacks where the mob is always casting (Shade of Aran).
Haste vs. AP
After capping the above, you will want to raise one of these through gemming and enchanting as high as possible.
To find out what is best, use Enhsim/Rawr. (guide with pics inc).
Red
Precise Cardinal Ruby
Bright Cardinal Ruby
Blue
You’ll need one Nightmare Tear to activate your meta.
Yellow
Rigid King’s Amber
Quick King’s Amber
Orange
Meta
Relentless Earthsiege Diamond
Standard meta
Good for those with low crit rates (i.e, poorly geared people).
Head
Shoulders
Greater Inscription of the Axe
Master’s Inscription of the Axe
Chest
Enchant Chest – Powerful Stats
Cloak
Enchant Cloak – Major Agility
Enchant Cloak- Greater Speed
Flexweave Underlay
Bracers
Enchant Bracers – Greater Assault
Enchant Bracers – Expertise
Fur Lining – Attack Power
Gloves
Enchant Gloves – Precision
Enchant Gloves – Expertise
Enchant Gloves – Crusher
Hyperspeed Accelerators
Belt
Leg
Boots
Enchant Boots – Superior Agility
Enchant Boots – Icewalker
Enchant Boots – Greater Assault
Nitro Boosts
Weapons
Acceptable alternative to Berserking if you need the hit.
Feral Spirit and Stormstrike are must haves. I prefer Windfury as my third, but Lightning Shield is also viable.
This is the community certified priority list. Use the ability highest up on the list at any given GCD.
-
- LS_0 – Use Lightning Shield if you have no orbs left.
SW – Use wolves (time with BL if possible, and use your BL with it if you have sated)
SR – Cast Shamanistic Rage if the ability is off CD. (with 2p T10 should be used immediately)
SS_0 – Use Stormstrike if the debuff has worn off.
MW5_LB – Use lightning bolt on single target fights and chain lightning on multi target fights.
FE – Cast your fire elemental if it’s off CD. If you use this during CDs, you get more GCDs since you don’t have to drop magma.
MT_0 – Refresh magma totem if it’s expired.
FS – Flame shock if the target has no debuff.
ES – Cast earth shock when it’s off CD.
SS – Cast Stormstrike.
LL – Lavalash.
FN – Cast Fire Nova regardless of single target or AOE targets.
MT – Refresh magma totem if its nearly gone.
LS – Refresh lightning shield
- 19/52/0This build is your basic Enhancement build. If you find you have too much mana, remove mana talents and put points into Imp. Shields.
Making your own build
If, for some reason, you’d like to make your own build, remember this good tip from Chriske:
Quote:
Rule: When selecting talents for mana regen purposes the following is true on a per point basis.
Shamanistic Rage > Improved Stormstrike > Shamanistic Focus > Elemental Focus
That’s it! With this information, you should be able to raid succesfully, goodluck!
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Code after the break commandHeya, Brune. I wanted to let you know that the code [=30] is showing up before the break command, so your guide looks a little screwy on the front page. Just wanted to let you know. (I think you can move that piece of code to below the break command and it’ll be fine.) Otherwise, great guide!
Weapon SpeedI’d add a blurp about weapon speed. Since the changes to Flametongue in 3.1 a fast OH weapon is no longer viable, yet I still see tons of Enhancement Shammies running around with <1.7 sec OHs.
I'd also list some priority as to which gems are better. General rules of thumb is that it is best to stack AP, but of course that varies.
Perhaps you can add a line in your hit table for the special hit cap hit rating needed for consistency.
Nice guide though. Well done.
was thinking boss fights vs.was thinking boss fights vs. adds, so maybe that should be the note. on bosses figured you probably won’t have mael up yet anyways so maybe a mute point on trash and the adds i can see your point if you have the stacks and using chain lightning.
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all i want in life is to be happy!
yeah i was thinking blueyeah i was thinking blue socket, the 16ap + mp5 is just something i prefer on my hunter over the 16ap + stam, and figured it would translate well on the shammy. i agree with the blue socket and the +stats, and since i’m still in the progress of leveling my sham haven’t done the math on blue socket gear with set bonuses.
thanks for the heads up gives me something to look into.
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all i want in life is to be happy!
You don’t need the SS alwaysYou don’t need the SS always for Maelstrom. For example: you kill one mob, have 5 stacks, and while your walking to the next, you’re better of casting it, then stormstriking first — what if you would get 2 – 3 stacks from that stomstrike (and maybe windfury proccing it?).
Think about Emalon fight, where you want to get the adds down as soon as possible, I rather start on the run!
[b]But[/b], I’ll make a note of it.
I’m sorry, I’d have toI’m sorry, I’d have to disagree and say that the infused twilight opal is terrible. For blue sockets, I’d recommend activating your meta with just one, then gemming for hit, unless you’ve got a good socket bonus, in which case chuck ina +6 to all. Mp5 is just useless, and you’re basically (ESPECIALLY if you put it in a red slot, not a blue,) swapping 16 AP for 3Mp5. I don’t think there are many socket bonusses on blue sockets that make up for 16 AP lost by not going straight red, let alone what you lose if you’re not hit capped. Let’s face it, Mp5 is useless for us.
However, you are absolutely right about the value of hit. Compare the value of the socket bonus to the value of straight hit, and most of the time hit wins (at least until cap. In Uld the massive hit on gear makes this pretty irrelevant, and you just socket for whatever).
Brune
Noticed on the rotation youNoticed on the rotation you forgot to use Maelstrom only if Stormstrike debuff is up.
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all i want in life is to be happy!
Under purple gems I wouldUnder purple gems I would suggest the [url=http://www.wowhead.com/?item=40030]Infused Twilight Opal[/url] I would also either limit to the best in color slot, or make a note that multi-color with AP are the best with +hit, etc until you get your caps. Ex: I use Red = AP, Yellow = AP+Hit till Capped then AP+Crit, Blue = AP+MP5. I could be slightly biased since this is the same formula I use for my Hunter.
Otherwise looks like a nice guide been using the Leveling guide and hit 70 and was looking for some raiding advice before I hit 80.
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all i want in life is to be happy!
I’ll change all as soon as[s]I’ll change all as soon as possible,[/s] Changed 🙂 Thanks for your comment.
Hmm, I’ll look into it,Hmm, I’ll look into it, but… Is it [i]needed[/i]? It seems like a big thing…
Heh, fail.
I tried to moveHeh, fail.
I tried to move it to the correct place, and it’s *supposedly* there, but still not showing correctly in the Shaman category. Hopefully this will resolve itself in a bit.
Ah, well, because of theAh, well, because of the complex nature of enhancement DPS (Maelstrom procs, interactions between abilities and the WF cooldown, etc…) the best way to calculate enhancement DPS is to ‘sim it’. You put in your stats, set a few parameters to fit your playstyle, put in trinkets, buffs, etc and then you simulate 10000 hours of fighting against a boss. This will tell you your theoretical DPS. When it gets really valuable, however, is for calculation of the value of each stat. You simulate 1000 hours or so fighting, and it compares your DPS with various stats, and fiddles around until it discovers the relative value of each stat. You then give this number to Pawn, and bam, instant gear value check. You can also use SnA to easily export your stats to EnhSim.
Oh, and also, since when was shammy raiding a tradeskill? 😛
Enhsim is currently the best simulator, and is endorsed by EJs. Here’s the link [url=http://enhsim.wikidot.com/]to the main page[/url]. Oh, and you’ll need an archiver or whatever they’re called. I’d recommend Izarc.
Enjoy 🙂
Oh, yeah, the Magma totem…Oh, yeah, the Magma totem… I’ll make a note of it
But, can you tell me what this ‘Enhsim’ is? I’ve never heard of it, but I suspect it’s a tool for shamans, enhancement.
Any info would be great!
Pretty good. Why was therePretty good.
Why was there no inclusion of magma totem? If I could be bothered to do the maths, I’m sure it would reveal that it does more DPS (particularly on AoE) than flametongue. There’s also that it’s a handy little way to ‘steal’ some DPS on fights like Emalon, you drop your magma where the OT is tanking the adds, refresh it every over charge, and bam, 400 free DPS, just for dropping tots in the right place.
Obviously you should only use tricks like that when your DPS really needs boosting, but even so, it’s nice to know.
EDIT: Oh, and I think enhsim deserves a mention too 🙂
In the upcoming days, I makeIn the upcoming days, I make a gear list, which I will refer in here. I’ll also try to link as much raid related stuff in here, from wow-pro.
If you have any suggestions, just post a comment.
~Trollvink
I’ll do, but it’s quite aI’ll do, but it’s quite a big thing, which I wanted to do later and right in one time. I’ll probably change to titles/formatting too.
Looks pretty good Troll. ILooks pretty good Troll. I don’t have time to read it in depth right now, unfortunately, but overall looks good. However, make that table of contents interactive! I’ve got a guide in the “General Guides” section in this site on how to do that.
Keep up the good work! 🙂
Wow, what an excellent, inWow, what an excellent, in depth block of feedback! Thanks!
A couple of suggestionsStats:
Order of importance:
1) Hit – Until Specials are capped
2) Expertise – Until capped
3) Hit – Until Spell capped
Once you have you reach the hit cap for specials an argument can be made either way for the importance of expertise vs. hit.
Unfortunately we share gear with Hunters who do not use Expertise so reaching the Expertise cap can be much more difficult. In most cases we reach the cap through Tier pieces, Gems, a few off-set pieces, and finally Unleashed Rage… Sorry I’m trying to segue into my first suggestion.
1st suggestion
Unleashed Rage – This is a must have for all enhancement Shaman. The expertise portion alone makes it one of your greatest assets. Any reference to UR as an option should kindly be removed from your article. (UR description & First talent build listed)
2nd suggestion
Mana Regen abilities:
According to math done over at elitist jerks, Improved Storm Strike gives more mana regen per point then either Shamonistic Focus or Elemental Focus.
Build 2: Remove 1 point from Shamanistic Focus
Add 1 to ISS
Build 3: Remove 1 point from Shamanistic Focus and Elemental Focus
Add 2 to ISS
Build 5: Remove 1 point from Elemental Focus (Clear looser of the mana regen talents)
Add 1 to ISS
Talents and builds can be argued endlessly, ghost wolf vs. no ghost wolf, so I only choose to give the above examples because regarding regen things are very cut and dry.
Rule: When selecting talents for mana regen purposes the following is true on a per point basis.
Shamanistic Rage > Improved Stormstrike > Shamanistic Focus > Elemental Focus
Confession: I learned the mana regen priority several weeks ago and even after experiencing the “Post-Ankh OOM” for a good minute last week I still havn’t made the change… Lazy me:P
Cheers!
CK