I'm confused as to why you're putting 3/3 talent points into Improved Shields (http://imgbox.com/wllGAEA6), since as far as I know Lightning Shield doesn't even trigger on spell casts. Is it merely due to some bosses' AoE abilities triggering the Lightning Shield for a slight possible increase in damage? Putting three talent points into it feels kind of unnecessary. They could perhaps be used for Booming Echoes, Elemental Warding or Earth's Grasp?
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Mate, there are couple of specialisations which have like 3 last points for talent tree which you can put everywhere you wanna without changing the dps meter. The only one talent worthy those last points is Earth's Grasp - Utility Talent. Read the guide's chapter 3.3. Elementals in Heroic Raids for possible good usage of those points, also navigate through thread posts. During leveling, - go with Improved Shields (3/3), during raiding in HC mode - go Earth's Grasp (2/2 and Imp Shields (1/3).I had some debate about this in this thread and on many other threads. This is the main theme for debate on class forums.
Anyway, Imp Shields gives to you better options: on some fights like 2% of total damage (sometime under FS DD, sometime more than FS DD), when ooming you can change to water shield and regenerate additional 15% of mana from orbs (during some AoE encountes). Some kind of managed talent. It needs decent play time to check this.Edited: August 7, 2015
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i just want to say to this guide author - youre fkn crazy lol :D :D
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Great guide, very impressive.
I'm 100% new to WotLK shaman (won't even play it until Lord release actually) but I can see you're very familiar with it so could you tell me what your favorite part about ele sham is? From what I've read it seems like you guys cast 3 spells (on single target) and don't even swap totems, is that true?
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My favorite part...?
It's ele shaman's versatility and adaptation to practically any random and haotic fights for both PVE and PVP areas even while you are aimed a lot.
Something like LoL Teemo's playstyle but much more harder to play well. I'd say - the only one Spec in Wotlk which playstyle just a LOT depends by environment (terrain, buildings, objects). You should watch around while dpsing, healing or kitting.
PVE:
...it seems like you guys cast 3 spells ...
In general, yes. But practically all classes cast like 3 or 4 spells, believe me. Just some of them have a bit more complex starting rotation. They must to refresh some buffs, - you need to refresh totems. That's all. For example., paladins (Crusader Strike, Divine Storm, SoW), Aflocks (Shadow Bolt, Haunt, Unstable Affliction, cause CoE is a long term debuff and Corruption is autorefreshed), Doomkins (Wrath, Star Fire, Insects), DK (Obliteration, Blood Strike, Frost Strike) and e.t.c. It's importan how you'll do this (in time).
PVP:
During PVP you need to cast much more spells. Moreover, you need to keybind like 5-6 totems to be good. Bad side - is no good options to write macros for shamans. It's very hard to PVP master this spec. Don't expect to have some good performance with less than 6 months of random play time. Sadly, beginning from patch 3.2.2 many PVP abilities for ele was nerfed. Has good performance at high gear level. Maybe the only one caster spec which can beat practically all melee Specs - even prot warriors and Blood DKs (at high skill levels). Exceptions: only Feral druids can be problematic ... Hard Specs to defeat: Affliction Locks (without LoSing near impossible), Destro Locks and ,as for me, Fire Mages (on Warmane ;) due to incorrect resilience scripts and diminishing returns cooldowns.
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Thanks dude. Raided with you some random TOCs and a VOA25 yesterday or sumtin. This stuff is BEYOND helpful. And for all the "dikgrabbers" that act like smartasses towards this guy - Eat a fat one boys!
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I'm sorry if I missed reading something or it's in the comments already and I didn't see it, but since you go 5parts, why don't you use Horrific Flesh Epaulets instead of t10 shoulders? They have 10 less spell power and 8 less haste (18 stat points assuming same weight) but they have one more gem slot and 2 more socket bonus if you activate your meta wisely (25 stat points assuming you gem runed cardinal and obtain socket bonus by activating the meta smart). It's an item that noone in the raid ever wants and it's a save of 60EoFs + Normal mark + Heroic mark for the raid.
Also, why not use BQL Choker and go with 11% hit since you get 3% from Ele Precision and 3% from boomie/spriest?
Besides that, and having only looked at the BiS part of the guide, I totally agree with the rest, I totally agree that one shouldn't use Plaguebringer's Stained Pants and use T10 with crit instead. As well as I totally agree with using the Marrow ring versus the BPC one that 99% of ele shamans use.
I just want an explanation on, why not these shoulders, and why not bql choker?
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Not at all. Horrific Flesh Epaulets vs Sanctified Frost Witch's Shoulderpads. Both items should be gemmed with Glowing Dreadstone and Reckless Ametrine respectively, otherwise you'll increase one stat and lose significantly other stat. If used specified gems you'll have for: Sanctified Shoulders (167 SP, 90 Cr, 82 Hr); Horrific Shoulders (171 SP, 90 Cr, 84 Hr). Finally, Horrific Shoulders will stack more: +4 SP and +2 Hr. They are practicall identical. Sure, you can roll for Horrific sshoulders, they are good. But when we talking about BiS set that not means only the biggest GearScore or some stat; we also should take into consideration Utility and Versatility of the gear, how we can optimise the Set to different encounters. The BiS set for "donors" is full T10 HC set, because they can buy the set at once. If you gonna farm the gear from "zero", then the optimal and fastest way to do that is: buy T10 Chest (95 EoF) and Shoulders (60 EoF), T9 Head(45 EoT + Trophy) and T9 Legs(75 EoT + Trophy), Gloves try to farm from VoA or buy later. I noticed that both T9 items doing the same performance as T10 items respectively. but the HC one even better. With this T9/T10 Combo Set you can go to ICC25N even HC if other items are good also. The funny moment is: T9 2 set bonus give to your character practically the same effect as T10 4 set bonus ;) (An fair example what BiS also means for different gear or Tier levels). With decent guild raid runs you should not worry about what is expensive or cheaper in EoF, you should choose the "donor" way or the fastest way to built your character. The Horrific Shoulders worth such a castling if you have HC one already.
Moreover, you should farm those Sanctified shoulder just to pair with Plaguebringer Pants, stacked with haste or Reckless gems, just for "tuneling" DPS mode by gaining additional 150-180 haste on such single target burst encounters as BQL, Festergut, Halion N, Sindragosa, e.t.c. It's all about after "Long raiding time".
About the neck... The BQL Chocker doing the same average performance as Silent Eulogy Amulet. You are forced to stack that blue Chocker's slot with Runed or Reckles gem by losing 5 SP bonus. Also, the roll competition for BQL Chocker is very high even in Core ICC25HC guilds - you'll get the "Eulogy" amulet much faster. In many raids there isn't specified charaters with hit debuff on a boss. For example, for 10 man raids. I did a lot of Bane runs without Balance druid and Shadow priest. Missing 3% hit will hurt your Lightning Bolts mainly (overall 2-3% missing) and a lot your Binary spell - Flame Shock! - serious dps lost. Anyway, Hit isn't so expensive stat to cap. In any 25 man raids the Eulogy also has superiority: You can dps other Boss trashes, which are lvl 83! without missing, because the misery can miss on those summoned NPCs, especially if dudu or priest alrdy died during the encounter. IT'S YOUR MAIN JOB - TO DPS WELL SPREADED TRASHES.Edited: October 25, 2015
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If one item provides more stats than another one, it's better. No matter the difference is 1 or 100 stat points. Being cheaper or easier obtainable doesn't change nothing.
In my opinion it's also not a good idea to plan items around a "what could happen" state of mind. Sure, every Shadow Priest and every Boomkin in the raid might be dead at some point. (Shadow Priests have much higher survivability than an Elemental Shaman...) But 99% of the time they are not and running 3% over the hit cap at these moments is an overall dps loss. The trash statement is also debateable.
Have a set for the 10man variant with no 3% hit buff - but don't use it in 25mans...
BiS lists are based on min-maxing every major stat. And you have to consider raid buffs.Edited: October 25, 2015
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I pretty much have nothing to say that doesn't look what the guy above me said since I agree with him, I just feel the need to elaborate a bit.
BiS is BiS. When a piece of gear is undebatably better than another piece, it's best in slot. Yes there are other ways to gear an ele shaman, but there's ONE way to gear it for maximum single target damage which is what you need in most, if not all, Icc. That makes Horrific Flesh Epaulets (sorry I'm not good at linking) undoubtably best in slot, since it gives more stats than the T10hc equivalent that you consider BiS in your list. If you want to be versatile, T10hc shoulders are almost free, if you wanna get them as backup so you can use them along with PsP. But as you said, like bql choker, PsP is too expensive in high end guilds and I doubt that anyone would let you have it, knowing that it's not your actual BiS item. That being said, there's absolutely no reason not to use Horrific Flesh Epaulets as your best in slot shoulders, as they are both easier to get, and undoubtably better.
About necks. If you wanna be hit capped, considering there's no shadow priest in the raid, thus not taking into account all raid buffs, then you should also consider PsP pants best in slot. Since, if you miss the 6% haste that raid buffs give you (3% from boom and 3% from ret, yes they do stack, no they shouldn't), then you probably need more haste and PsP would do the job.
Other than that, every high end guild player's know the value of Eulogy and it's on average as expensive as Choker is since both are as easy obtainable (any run that can pass LDW, thus gunship too, can kill bql as well). Also, in high end guilds, there will ALWAYS be a 3% hit buffer, and to be precise, there will be 4-5-6 of them. That will make sure that the hit debuff is on boss from second 0 till the end, and, hopefully, at the adds too.
Talking about 3.3.5a, thus Icc25hc and RS25hc, I really don't know what trashes you are talking about. Marro spikes? They melt too fast to matter, marro spike uptime in the fight is prolly something close to 10% and boosting your dps by 3% for 10% of fight really not worth it. Lady Deathwhisper? Any smart shadow priest will dot the **** out of every add and be on top 5 of burst while applying hit buff everywhere. Dbs? No need to comment. Next fight with trashes is VDW that is too easy to ever gear for it and you'll probably be resto anyways.
Now let's switch to the fights that matter. LK25hc, your job is NOT to dps well spreaded trashes. Any LK25hc worthy raid will have enough melees to literally rape them and whatever's left the OT gets it anyways. You probablly know that on LoD your only dpsing target will be LK and raging spirits (that will have the hit debuff). Halion25hc, if shaman AoEs the adds, he does it with Magma Totem and Fire Nova for which 3% hit is irrelevant. When the ele shaman switches to the big add the debuff will be already applied there.
That being said I can find very few to almost 0 situations were you don't have the 3% hit buff, except for Icc10 with foolish leader. Our best in slot lists are based in having all raid buffs, otherwise there wouldn't be such thing as 5part boomie for example.
If you want to show a best in slot list that is not optimal for dps, you should state it. The least you can do is write before your list something like "With 14% hit (not counting 3% hit raid buff)" and then elaborate why you wanna play with the 14% hit. And you'll have my full support on it. I agree that Eulogy can be as BiS as Choker is, and it's kind of personal, that's why I'm not arguing that, I just believe that in most, if not all, cases Choker will pull ahead, and I really can't find situations that the extra hit would actually help.Edited: October 27, 2015
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Very good guide by Rexar. But i can say only 3 things. First never say that CL for single target sux i can prove that CL using on cd is DPS and damage done increasing for every SINGLE target, second always be like meele stay closed to boss and use auto hits from weapon it's way for alot more dps and damage done increasing because bonus fire damage from Flametongue and third if you want to be crazy with ele shaman prepare to broke your fingers hard. My current gear is 6491 GS i miss 2 hc trinkets (my both are normals for now) and fester's boots (i use Earthsoul Boots). DB 25hc: 24k burst 20k end, LOD: 23k burst 13-14k end, about icc 25n on all bosses except valitria and gunship ofc my burst is in border from 19k to 23k and end from 14k to 18-19k. now i want to talk about gear, gems and enchants. So alot of ele shamans where are bis or closed to bis prefer more SP than haste and crit even some shamans ignore crit raiting with using of Fester's legs and BPC's finger both with hit and haste what is totaly wrong. As all ele shaman rotation is one of the easiest in this game all is about how you will balance your stats other is just 3 buttons nothins else. So because every point of haste raiting increase potent your dps and how much more haste you have faster will refresh your Elemental Mastery what gains you additional 15% spell haste more haste is never in excess. Ofc in opposite side we have SP what is very very important for your DPS. Every point of SP icrease potent your dps too. Now about crit - alot of ele shamans ignore this stats. So as all crit affect only over LB and CL because Lava Burst does 100% critical because flame shock. LB and CL are nature spells and Lava Burst and flame shock are fire spells. As more of us know the coefficient of critical for nature spells is 175% on fire 225% if we ignore talents ofc. Mathematical really more SP than critical is much better but on practice this is totaly wrong. So for finish more shamans play in style SP>Haste>Crit so i say SP=Haste=Crit, more shamans use LB and Lava Burst on cd i say CL and Lava Burst on cd and LB in rest. Regard Teamstars.
Edited: November 1, 2015
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Its totaly wrong. For example every finger from 3 where drop from icc 25hc can be your bis depends what neck or any other part from your gear you will use. More GS never means more damage even for dps class. For example 264 itelem can be your bis instead of 277 ilevel. The idea is what you miss as current stats and what you need to cap hit or haste or crit. And this different "BiS"es come from this what you want with your ele shaman more haste more crit or more SP for everyone is individual, depends how you understand this class. 100 SP + or - when you are closed to bis is nothing no one even will feel these 100 SP. But if you are - 100 SP that means you are +100 haste or +100 crit for example. All is about how you play with ele shaman gear is just some numbers.
Edited: November 1, 2015
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You missed my point, I understand that there can be a couple of BiS lists, depending on some gear choices and all can be equal, but sometimes, that's not the case. Sometimes, like in this very case, there is item in the BiS list that is undebatably worse. You are the one who showem the Fester Shoulders BiS list and you understand this. No matter how small the difference is, BiS is BiS, in this case, there's an item that is a flat stat increase. NO MATTER how small the difference is, if you consider the BiS list in the starting thread correct, it is not.
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Mate, I just don’t want to sophisticate some basic and obvious concepts. We are not talking about enormous 100 points of some stat. I just pointed you to digits – the Horrific Flesh Shoulderpads have +4 SP and +2 Haste Rating compared to T10 HC. It’s matter, - the difference between 2 and 100 is enormous, of course it is! Due to my experience, every stat equally to a gem value should be taken into consideration. Every stat less than 10 points can be completely negligible. WHY? Ask yourself, why on most private servers, on Warmane, melee classes stacking not 26 Expertise (as official Blizz cap from theory craft), but mainly 21 Expertise. Compared to 4SP or 2 Haste Rating the 5 Expertise is a fu-king ton! Because digits are rounded and truncated many times due to computation to save RAM and CPU performance and some scripts are not correct also. Go and check melee glancing blows, OMG, from encounter to encounter they vary between 22 and 28%!!!, but not 24% as designed.
It seems we have a couple of questions: “What is BiS for a WoW character – a higher stat(s) BY 0,05%, the best burst DPS, the best sustained DPS, the highest GearScore, in-raid usefulness, the best versatile performance, high or low skill cap?” This is a big question… I didn’t found the absolute response.
For example, There are three BiS lists for Demo Locks: Spirit “stackers” by granting more SP through Demonic Pact for raid members (Raid lovers), Crit/Haste “stackers” (Selfish) and Midi-Locks – something medium between two. It’s wrong to say that only Selfish locks have BiS gear. It’s clear that in a melee raid Selfish locks doing better than Spirit locks, but in a caster raid Spirit locks are just much better than Selfish ones. Both kind of locks can do practically the same DPS, but being a Spirit lock is much harder to keep sustained DPS high (they are harder to play well) – this is what I understanding under skill cap. There are class specs (with diff BiS lists) which require high skill cap; every mistake in a ability rotation can turn to a huge DPS lost.
… and please, don’t tell me about those Theory Crafters Selfish Shadow Priest without capped hit rating. I just don’t remember how many times they wiped our Normal and HC LK encounter in transition, because they missed spells vs Orbs. The same for hunters and OT (huh, a missing taunt on Shambling). If a Shadow Priest got grabbed by Valkyr’s – it’s your job to help hunters to kill Orbs in second LK 25HC Transition and your character should not miss!
Talking about defined BiS list, - I crafted it for years of game play in different raid environments and can say: it’s BiS for orc race, it’s balanced, it grants to your character the best Damage/DPS/Performance ratio in any situations (for all races), it grants very high balanced stats, versatile set, easy to obtain or farm, never miss spells (on private servers!), it grants the best Burst and Sustained STABLE DPS in ANY RAID COMPOSITION (with profession stats).
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There isn’t an absolute BiS list (READ the post above). I just published one variant which is, due to my long time experience, the most universal, balanced, easy to obtain or farm, with stable DPS none dependent by encounter or/and raid composition. Moreover, the set with T10 shoulders doing the SAME DPS as the set with Horrific Flesh Shoulderpads. I got Horrific Flesh Shoulderpads like 14 months ago, did few normal and heroic raids, just before Moltdown, and didn’t noticed any increased performance even with ICC 30% buff! Those addition negligible stats over OVERALL BiS gear set looks so YOLO SWAG:
Sure, the Horrific Flesh Shoulderpads are good as T10 HC Shoulders, but they don’t worth for a donation. I did a lot of ICC 25HC raids last 5 months and they dropped 2 times in my ID: first time I passed to a leveling Resto Shaman. The normal ilevel dropped like 2 or 3 times. If you are very lucky, you can get ‘em in a month or two. Otherwise, farming T10 HC shoulders is a way faster and guaranteed.
I built that list around specified talents, Glyphs and professions described in this guide. Just notice, with different Glyphs and professions the BiS can vary again.
The elemental shaman BiS list is based around balanced stats.
Read BiS list paragraph again. I noticed, there are couples of ICC amulets and rings which can increase the DPS for different races a bit, but not for orcs: cause draenei don’t need so much hit due to their racial so they can go with only crit/haste (BQCC[crit/haste] + RRA[crit/haste]); trolls due to their racial haste need basic hit and more crits (BQCC[crit/haste] + LEL[hit/crit]); orcs can go both (ASE[hit/haste] + LEL[hit/crit] or ASE[hit/haste] + VOSR[hit/haste])). These combo amulet+ring will grant much more performance for specified race than those addition “Horrific low stats”.
@mirmigis - “Why only one BiS list is posted?“
- Well, I don’t want to confuse new players or anybody else who just decided to level up an elemental shaman ALT, with a lot of “GURU” concepts about tuning, play style, tunneling DPS as we talking here.
@mirmigis - “If you want to show a best in slot list that is not optimal for dps, you should state it.”
- Ok, mate, of course I’ll state for it, but what kind of NONE OPTIMAL SUSTAINED DPS IS THIS:
...no need to explain what is over 300% GearScore Performance on Recount … just notice, it’s not a burst DPS (look, no EM, Bloodlust, Gloves, Blood Fury and e.t.c)
A DPS example without ICC buff in a PUG raid:
A lot of vague words was posted there. I just can conclude these posts as:
I don’t talking about hitting trashes, spikes e.t.c. they are lvl 82 which requires 75 hit for 100% hits. I’m talking about Orb Spheres and Raging Spirits (lvl 83) on LK mainly; there are few more encounters with lvlv 83 trashes also. Missing there can wipe the fight. Anyway, going with soft capped hit is a way of none stable, floating DPS. About the secrets of hard capped hit I’ll publish in my guide later. Going with only 11% hit and Misery buff, you can have like 0.3-0.5% miss rating and I don’t know why. Without any hit buffer in the raid your dps will suffer significantly (few Flame Shocks and Lava misses and 2-3% of Lightning Bolt misses).
CONCLUSIONS:
1. You are wrong saying that Horrific Flesh Shoulderpads gives the best dps, but you are right saying that they also can be an alternative BiS.
2. Raiding with Horrific Flesh Shoulderpads is so boring. I noticed myself missed those spirit deers animation so much.
I’ll take your concepts into consideration anyway and few more from reply posts. When I’ll publish last paragraphs of this guide, I’ll show all kind of BiS lists just for Chapter 3 – not for Chapter 2 of this guide. Just feeling, it’s good idea to post here all possible BiS sets as an option, and no matter it’s so boring job.Edited: November 8, 2015 Reason: BB-coding
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