ELE: Advice on breaking 2.7k (SQ)

Allright, so i doubt i'll actually meet any real advice here, but thought i wanted to give it a try anyways.

I came here because it offered a less time consuming 3vs3 alternative than retail (solo queue) and started playing frequently after the wipe, and every season i played, i've been 2.6k+ so far.

It's really starting to annoy me that i'm stuck, mainly because i can't figure out why. The only thing i can make of it, is that it must be my positioning, because i feel like i spend my globals as flawless as possible and execute groundings and shears pretty well.
I also feel like i have a solid overview of the match and what the opposing team is trying to accomplish. I'm also pretty decent with shears and not getting faked. I usually place tremors out of opponents LoS, and i'm very aware of double fears for example and usually make distance to my healer whenever they push for fears. Against stuff like locks and Eles, i ground chaosbolts/haunts/lavabursts if it doesn't seem like a waste, otherwise i obviously use groundings to prevent cc and i don't use them randomly. I stoneskin pretty much every swap on myself.
On dalaran and blades edge, try to use knocks to gain positioning advantage, i often times use it offensively, unless playing against a melee cleave.
I noticed that during the climb throughout the season and up untill 2600, i was able to compete against pretty much everyone of the other top players, but now that the rating has gone up, those same players are simply higher.
I've been spectating some of the eles who usually play above 2900 end-season, and i noticed in particular, that they seem to be mindlessly offensive in my eyes, but without getting seriously punished for it (their healer just keeps them up) and they are actually rarely targeted. I know this play also depends on awareness of what cc and cds the opponents got for them, but alot of the time, they play this way, straight out of the gates. How?
Another thing i noticed is, that these people seem less concerned about eating some cc and when they're cc'd, their team often times is fine for the duration.
Whenever i get cc'd i feel like my team destabilizes really fast..
Also, i purge alot, but don't always clean teams entirely, as it would take a year (pala, priest, druid for example). I use purge alot at the end of a fake for example, and try keep kill target as clean as possible.
It's kind of hard to generalize how things play out, which is what i've kind of tried to. But it's just to create a picture of what i experience.

Also, i don't feel like i'm one of those who's oblivious to my own flaws in gameplay. What made be progress from starter to 2.6 first season i started playing, was the fact that i'm able to criticize my own play. I can also feel if i have one of those nights, when i'm playing like a complete dog (i still blame team, cause... Blackrock, lel) and then i stop playing or play an alt usually.

WHat i know for a fact i need to change, is reapplying watershields and just try to do even more damage than i already do.
My own thoughts on the bigger picture are, that it has something to do with my positioning and ability to balance offensive positioning with defensive positioning.
Any thoughts or pointers?

I will be following this thread because I find it interesting.

P.S I have the same question about restoration.

Elemental is one of the easiest classes to play in solo queue. If you try to theorycraft around it for too much it can cost you a lot of rating. You have to play it as it is: simple. First of all I've played some games with you in Solo Queue and for sure I can tell you that you're not purging enough. Maybe I'm super pretentios having played only with top notch Ele's in my teams but when you were paired with me (Mercedesa) I had to remove certain buffs from our targets with my Devour Magic (which is not ok at all). For example, when I'm playing Elemental (2919 Solo Queue on my second season) I try to be the guy that adjust to his team. I never try to top Damage or being the shiny player in every game even tho Elemental has the biggest carry potential in Solo Queue. Try to play for your your team to win, as in: think about it's your team vs. their team, not you vs their team.

There are no specific tips for breaking 2700 barrier as you have to somehow "feel" how the game is being played. Starting to keep all the enemy targets clean would be a good start (at least 2 out of 3 players cleaned) and Lesser Healing Wave for party1/2 macros would be great aswell so you can insta assist your teammates.

If you want to see a general good gameplay you can spectate Punter or even me (Qualitydoge) with Arena Spectator addon (to see globals used) and how specific games go. If you have any more questions ask here.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Mariusykk

Elemental is one of the easiest classes to play in solo queue. If you try to theorycraft around it for too much it can cost you a lot of rating. You have to play it as it is: simple. First of all I've played some games with you in Solo Queue and for sure I can tell you that you're not purging enough. Maybe I'm super pretentios having played only with top notch Ele's in my teams but when you were paired with me (Mercedesa) I had to remove certain buffs from our targets with my Devour Magic (which is not ok at all). For example, when I'm playing Elemental (2919 Solo Queue on my second season) I try to be the guy that adjust to his team. I never try to top Damage or being the shiny player in every game even tho Elemental has the biggest carry potential in Solo Queue. Try to play for your your team to win, as in: think about it's your team vs. their team, not you vs their team.

There are no specific tips for breaking 2700 barrier as you have to somehow "feel" how the game is being played. Starting to keep all the enemy targets clean would be a good start (at least 2 out of 3 players cleaned) and Lesser Healing Wave for party1/2 macros would be great aswell so you can insta assist your teammates.

If you want to see a general good gameplay you can spectate Punter or even me (Qualitydoge) with Arena Spectator addon (to see globals used) and how specific games go. If you have any more questions ask here.

---

Appriciate the feedback.

You're right about the purging. The only thing though, is that i find it really hard on my mana against certain match ups (pala druid teams just for example) and even worse if theyre good at rebuffing. But as i mentioned in first post, i've been focusing on not forgetting to spam water shield.
I have healing macros for party, but i'm focusing on starting to offheal earlier atm, cause i sometimes wait abit too long i believe, where i should probably just do it to weaken enemy swaps etc in a preventive way, instead of waiting till someone is already kind of low. So i feel i'm pretty aware about that atm.

I already spectated alot, and as i mentioned, i notice some really offensive positioning and getting away with it.
Hmm. I get what you're saying about adjusting to the team and being more of an assistance than the one setting the pace. I might be trying too hard to setup stuff, instead of just letting partners with spammable cc etc do that part. It actually makes alot of sense to me how you said it when i think about how my current style is.

I'll try to add these things together and apply them to my play, and see how it turns out.

Hello there since you seem quite proficient in ele sham i'd like to ask you a burning question, me and my pal play 2s ele/destro and we get obliterated vs any variance of spriest/frost mage/rogue(doesnt matter the spec), can u maybe share some advice how to beat those comps, especially shadow/rogue and frost/rogue also disc/frost if you could spare some time, effort and knowledge in answering this i would be very much grateful.
Just to point something out, even when we don't get sapped we tend to lose cuz theres too much control from the comp going on and we are really stuck vs those variations of comps. Help out pls. Ty in advance.