Spooncraft

There is a lot of drama as always within the Shaman community. We have… how do you say, been the bastard red headed step children of WoW since classic vanilla WoW.

This post is turning into an article which is turning into a big fat rant about how shaman were pretty much shat all over by every CM that goes through. Tseric pretty much left (or was fired) by Blizzard after his tour of duty as the shaman representative, Eyonix got more death threats than your local abortion clinic (but we like him now… kind of) and every thread no matter how polite and well written even if it’s laced with crack cocaine and expensive hookers gets deleted or ignore or the standard bullshit reply by any Blizzard reps that bother to post in it.

I appreciate the post and I don’t have any specific answers for you now. As you know we’ve been in a holding pattern on some things and are focusing more on bug fixes and adjustments (aside from Wrath development) of which some may have application toward what we’re working on in Wrath of the Lich King. While I understand the frustrations when seeing other classes getting changes that might be considered larger than just a fix or nerf, we aren’t doing class reviews or revamps. Most of the big changes you are going to see will come as a part of Wrath of the Lich King.

For now, I can say what we’ve been telling a lot of people, your feedback is noted. Hopefully when we get into the beta, we’ll see a lot more solid feedback from everyone who gets a chance to test. Just keep in mind that if we don’t implement something you feel is necessary, that there are reasons for it or we just don’t agree that it’s the best possible option at that time.

I understand the frustrations of people wanting things to happen before the expansion, but in order to do that we end up delaying its development and many things are very intricately woven together within the development. (src)

The thread is indeed REALLY FREAKING LONG with a lot of Blue posts in it. But the short and sweet of it is that they have no plans to change anything until the expansion which is obviously ticking a bunch of shaman off. Personally, I think we’re good to go in PVE. Only thing needed there would be better itemization so we don’t have to steal from rogues or druids or worse yet hunters. PVP is a different story altogether. In the lower levels of the PVP spectrum we’re competitive, in the midrange you really have to bust your ass to be competitive, in the upper echelons of PVP gear and skill you have to be damn near fucking perfect and have 4-leaf clovers growing out of your ass next to the paladin-priest-druid keeping you alive. As of right NOW enhancement shaman get locked down very easily, resto shaman are viable but have their issues, elemental shaman can also be locked down very easily too. However.

Here’s some light at the end of the tunnel.

We got a new spell to cast (Lavaburst) that uses the fire tree and does more damage if flameshock is on the target so elemental shaman now have a little more to offer in the way of damage. Elemental talents are fucking godlike for PVP, let me show you.

Lava Burst - You hurl molten lava at the target, dealing 888 to 1132 Fire damage. If Flame Shock is on the target, Lava Burst will consume the Flame Shock, causing Lava Burst to critically hit.
(655 Mana, 2 sec Cast, 8 sec Cooldown, 30 yd Range)

Elemental Oath - Increases your chance to hit with all spells by 50/100% while Elemental Mastery or Elemental Focus is active.
(2 Ranks)

Astral Shift - When you are critically hit twice in a row, you have a 33/66/100% chance to shift into the Astra Plane, causing you to be immune to all physical damage for 3 sec. This effect has a 30 second cooldown.
(3 Ranks)

Lava Flow - Increases the amount of spell damage gained while having Flametongue Weapon equipped by 5/10/15%, and increases the damage done by your Flame Shock and Lava Burst by 4/8/12%.
(3 Ranks)

Storm, Earth, and Fire - Your Frost Shock has a 5/10/15/20/25% chance to root the target in frozen ice for 2 sec, your Earth Shock’s range is increased by 1/2/3/4/5 yards and the periodic damage done by your Flame Shock is increased by 20/40/60/80/100%.
(5 Ranks)

Thunder - You call down a bolt of lighting, energizing you and damaging nearby enemies within 10 yards. Restores 5% mana to you and deals 595 to 679 nature damage to all nearby enemies, knocking them back 200 yards. (typo probably 2 yards)
(1 Rank, Instant, 45 sec Cooldown)

On top of that are some other major changes in the elemental tree. Almost everything has been moved up in the tree or changed to 3 point talents allowing for a wider spread of points and less of the old cookie cutter. Also Fire Nova totem when the 2 pts are put into it, has a 100% chance to stun all affected targets for 2 seconds. Elemental shaman are going to have it a little easier in the expansion when it comes to keeping their distance from enemy players. Finally there’s Hex. The new CC that slows down the target by 75%, doesn’t let them attack of cast spells, and turns them into a frog. It only works on beasts and humanoids which isn’t a problem at all. Hex seems like a great way to run away from incoming traffic with a 1 minute cooldown though I can see it used by enhancement shaman too for catching runaway mobs or players. They still retain control but cannot do much other than walk.

A class that was the God unquestioned and unchalleneged fucking big bad wolf of PVP, able to heal able to crit 2K windfury, able to annihilate with lightening. It was insane. Then we got nerfed into complete and utter impotence. The whole event was like pumping equestrian grade steroids into the bleed hearts of every class in the game and then lopping off the testicles of ever shaman that existed at the same time (this was around the days of AQ I believe but I might be too toasted to recall so any other old school shaman please help me out in the comments. Also a note I apologize for generalizing that all shaman has testicles but even the female shaman out there would enact such intense fits of bloodlusted badassery in PVP and parts unknown that you’d swear they had a massive pair of brass 20 pounders hanging over the saddle. But I digress)

I’ll follow this post up in a moment with enhancement and restoration shaman changes coming in the expansion that should ease many more tensions in the shaman community. However WotLK is still far away so it’s a moot point right now. Another blunder that reads “keep paying now for the game you want to play, but you won’t get it until the end of the year.”