TOW vs NS comparison list

[magwo]

I want to compare these thoroughly, because TOW has so many overlooked advantages IMO.

NS:
Ability to reliably kill at least one opponent.or...
Ability to panic heal yourself.

TOW:
Long lasting high, unpredictable damage output. Ability to kill lots of people for a long time.
Mana efficiency - triggers Clearcasting more often.
Increased healing, both from yourself and your healer.
Holy Paladin gets much better mana efficiency.
I don't see why people rule out TOW so easily for arena.. it has SO many awesome advantages.

[Tizer]

I like to start my arenas 4v5 and ToW cant do that for me xD

If you like using ToW why dont you just carry on using it :)

[merujo]

Whats so great about NS is that...in 3 minutes u'll have another one. I really fail to see what i want mana efficiency for, when they rush into ur face and nuke ur main, mana burning ur healer, stun locking him to death.

I'll put it this way: sometimes, ur sidekick is the bait, and u gotta output all damage u can in seconds, and i think a 14k instant spell can help more than 12% crit and hit with spells.
Everyone knows that a elemental shaman often chooses NS for PvP, thats why u'll have on wotlk a knockback spell, to kinda give u time to cast that spell u couldn't with an enemy on u. Either u choose thunderstorm or NS, but then i think u will lack astral shift. i really dunno at the moment, all i know is that pvp aint pve. pvp isn't about long fights, or at least, long action fights im most cases. they come, u start nuking, kill one or at least try to, and in my case 12% crit more wont be an element of surprise.

in the end, its about how u feel, and if u feel comfortable with 12% crit hit instead of an instant attack that most times will make them crap their pants, its ur choice man.

perhaps thats why spell dmg gems would make a smarter choice in pvp if u have tow's. if u don't, u gotta stack a bit more crit in gems.

as for awsome or not...

Long lasting high, unpredictable damage output. - long lasting only if they hide behind a pillar, i wont need dmg output.

Ability to kill lots of people for a long time. - their only five, doing los almost all the time if their smart.

Mana efficiency - triggers Clearcasting more often. - unfortunnetly, their not mobs, they are moving self inteligent targets, that can be unpredictable. if an arena was a still spot fight, we're u aim ur spell to ur target, that would be different imo lol

Increased healing, both from yourself and your healer. - from what i experience, i wont always spamm heals like in pve, wihout anyone bothering me. i was a high end healer and a pvp healer in my pala, and i see big differences. in pvp i will have to use a lot of tools so i can heal at least...5 times in a row. 12% helps, thats makes 30% on my pala for eg. but...i prefer my partner to insta gib someone instead of giving me more crit, and making the fight a long one. MS debuffs cant be fought with 12% crit in spells, but instead if they are killed, fast.

Holy Paladin gets much better mana efficiency. - i have a holy paladin, for a long time. rest, read above.



i have to say i understand ur opinion. i know what u mean. i just dont know if u know how to use NS, or if u were always unlucky with it, but in my case, in PvP, an instant attack, is an instant attack.

[Feehza]

When you use TOW you cant have any other fire-totem in the same moment.

Very often i won a match due a late NS+ES.

Some of my long arena-games against heavy LOS-Teams looks like:
You didnt manage to get an opponent down in the first 5 minutes and they nerf you with little attacks until you are oom.
When you oom they start to attack very hard, and then i pray "plz stay alive for the next xx seconds until my NS-EM are ready again"
Most teams are totaly unprepared for the second or third NS+EM.
I often manage to win such games when i was oom just by not dieing and wait for my 3min-damage.

[Dominian]

Will certainly go for a holy paladin in WOTLK after theyr holy tree was changed...

Holy shock critts reduce the next holy light spell with 2.5 seconds!!!

If totaaam of wrath stacks my holy paladin would have had +40% critt ;D Not to speak of the talent that makes your next holy spell a 100% critt!

[Skrimshaw]

Its not even a question for me. I'm dropping Fire Nova Totems whenever their ready. This allows me to damage all the melee while taking out the ranged or healers first. I seem to lose if I focus on the melee first. As long as the enhance shaman is dead I can worry about everyone else and let the novas take them down.

[Ellay]

The Fire Totem tree has mutiple uses, Searing Totem is really good for dropping the opponents grounding totems and stopping spell reflects from Warriors while also doing a decent amount of damage. Fire Nova a healthy chunk of timed burst damage. Searing also keeps rezzers in combat if you place them near a dead body.

[Elektric]

I want to compare these thoroughly, because TOW has so many overlooked advantages IMO.

NS:


Ability to reliably kill at least one opponent.or...


Ability to panic heal yourself.

TOW:


Long lasting high, unpredictable damage output.
Ability to kill lots of people for a long time.
Mana efficiency - triggers Clearcasting more often.
Increased healing, both from yourself and your healer.
Holy Paladin gets much better mana efficiency.
I don't see why people rule out TOW so easily for arena.. it has SO many awesome advantages.
Magwo,

Your points are valid but I thnk your missing the strat of 4 shaman in a 5v5.

Im in the school of though with Ellay that 4 Shaman and a Healer has no counter. SImply from the fact that I will get my nuke off and then its a 5v4 fight. What 4 classes can beat 4 shaman and a healer?

I don't mean to point out the obvious but 5v4 isn't balanced and its possible to lose, but really 5 people should never lose to 4. In the 1800 bracket thats the problem I've been having. I drop one and then lose my main. Then its a 4v4 and we lose. I play a couple games figure out what I did wrong and we win. I just need to be a little more defensive and theres nothing they can do. If anyone stands in range for more than 2.5 seconds they're dead. 4XLB + 4X (NS+EM+CL) + 4XES = Death.

In the next month my goal is (1891 is my personal best) +2k. I dont see any reason why I wont achieve it. Its so imminent I've already started leveling 3x Warlock and Spriest to keep me busy. I'll back up my response in a month with my rating and then follow it up with: I could never have done this with ToW. The current state of arena will not allow it.

[Littleburst]

For everything exept Arena ToW is a lot more usefull then NS. currently lvl 64 and my first thought was to go for 40/21, like everyone. But after some AV's i couldn't see the point in having NS for BG. So i'm just staying 41/20 till i got some decent pvpgear to do some more serious tries at arena. With less then 200 resi i rather farm more easiliy, PVP and PvE and be pretty much sure to lose 5vs5 then have NS to have a small chance to win 1 out of 10 games.

[Elektric]

For everything exept Arena ToW is a lot more usefull then NS. currently lvl 64 and my first thought was to go for 40/21, like everyone. But after some AV's i couldn't see the point in having NS for BG. So i'm just staying 41/20 till i got some decent pvpgear to do some more serious tries at arena. With less then 200 resi i rather farm more easiliy, PVP and PvE and be pretty much sure to lose 5vs5 then have NS to have a small chance to win 1 out of 10 games.Right on Brother!

I used ToW while gearing up, its a huge upgrade for anything BUT arena.

[Crayonbox]

I know this discussion is for tbc, however I would like to point out that in WotLK, ToW will most likely not stack. They changed the totem to give % based damage increase to all spells and made it raid wide. In terms of raid utility, the totem has gotten a buff, however as a multiboxer, the totem got a huge nerf. No more insta hit cap + 50% crit with spells.

[Lyonheart]

I know this discussion is for tbc, however I would like to point out that in WotLK, ToW will most likely not stack. They changed the totem to give % based damage increase to all spells and made it raid wide. In terms of raid utility, the totem has gotten a buff, however as a multiboxer, the totem got a huge nerf. No more insta hit cap + 50% crit with spells.

you might be right about ToW getting nerfed. But they have not nerfed it yet. Most guilds will never have more than a few Ele shamans in the raid.. so over stacking ToWs is, and always will be< unique to multiboxers. They are not going to nerf ToW just because of 5 boxers. But they could nerf it.

Has anyone given thought how you might spec now that Thunderstorm is in? I mean you wont be able to have TS and NS. Might be able to have a few with NS and a few with TS.

[Crayonbox]

There have been couple of threads flying around about wotlk specs. Personally I think getting instant ghostwolf and guardian totem and the rest in elemental is what im going to go with.

[Tizer]

For everything exept Arena ToW is a lot more usefull then NS. currently lvl 64 and my first thought was to go for 40/21, like everyone. But after some AV's i couldn't see the point in having NS for BG. So i'm just staying 41/20 till i got some decent pvpgear to do some more serious tries at arena. With less then 200 resi i rather farm more easiliy, PVP and PvE and be pretty much sure to lose 5vs5 then have NS to have a small chance to win 1 out of 10 games.I disagree, you cant beat going into a tower in AV and letting rip with an insta nuke. Plus it has a huge "lol" value to make those boring BGs a little more fun. I still grin every time i do it :D It just makes things a little more interesting tbh :P

[Nixi]

tbh I like what magwo is trying to do. He's trying to do something different. We've all told him how awesome NS is, and he's tried it. So just let him continue to do what he's doing and if he ends up having nice success, i hope he can say "i told you so" and then I'll have the balls to try it too. :P

But until then, personally, i'm sticking with NS.

I managed to push to 1855 before getting knocked down to 1840 to close out the night. So I feel NS works well for my play style.

[magwo]

I like to start my arenas 4v5 and ToW cant do that for me xD I'm really torn on this issue.. due to the big killing capacity you gain from TOWs, I can basically start my games 4v5 aswell, but not always.
From there on, when it's 5v4, and I have TOWs, I'm in a MUCH better position than 5v4 with NS on cooldown.

Then there's the nova/etc totems to consider.. can't really make up my mind.. I've respeced back and forth about 5-6 times the last month.

[Boylston]

We covered this a while back. ToW Theorycrafting in Arenas. ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=3920') I started out feeling just the same, but practical experience has proven that NS is the better choice by a long margin.

If all you were going to do was BG, PvE, and maybe just dink around in arenas, you could get away with a ToW spec. To be competitive in arena, you need NS.

The big question for me in WotLK is whether to get the last elemental talent or to get ToW + NS... :) I think the last talent is going to be pretty damn good, though.

[Boylston]

The one interesting historical tidbit from that thread is that Ellay used to love NOT taking the improved fire nova totems, claiming that he could drop them so that they would go off right when a rogue's Cloak of Shadows wore off. Personally, that never seemed to work well for me. Ellay and I are both back to the shorter duration fire nova totems, I think.

[mitoshy]

I know this discussion is for tbc, however I would like to point out that in WotLK, ToW will most likely not stack. They changed the totem to give % based damage increase to all spells and made it raid wide. In terms of raid utility, the totem has gotten a buff, however as a multiboxer, the totem got a huge nerf. No more insta hit cap + 50% crit with spells.

you might be right about ToW getting nerfed. But they have not nerfed it yet. Most guilds will never have more than a few Ele shamans in the raid.. so over stacking ToWs is, and always will be< unique to multiboxers. They are not going to nerf ToW just because of 5 boxers. But they could nerf it.

Has anyone given thought how you might spec now that Thunderstorm is in? I mean you wont be able to have TS and NS. Might be able to have a few with NS and a few with TS.Someone with a beta account has confirmed that as of current beta, TOW works as follows:

+6% spell damage
+3% crit

...and it stacks!

You call this a nerf?

[merujo]

and it stacks ?

Blizzard said totems and other buffs are now raid wide buffs, meaning, u dont need a class per group, just in the raid.
Would like to see is stacking with those stats.

[mitoshy]

and it stacks ?

Blizzard said totems and other buffs are now raid wide buffs, meaning, u dont need a class per group, just in the raid.
Would like to see is stacking with those stats.I can't find the post at this instant, but someone from here has tested it on beta as of the current changes and it does stack.

...and it's got a 30 yard range, not so OP IMO. :)

[Littleburst]

For everything exept Arena ToW is a lot more usefull then NS. currently lvl 64 and my first thought was to go for 40/21, like everyone. But after some AV's i couldn't see the point in having NS for BG. So i'm just staying 41/20 till i got some decent pvpgear to do some more serious tries at arena. With less then 200 resi i rather farm more easiliy, PVP and PvE and be pretty much sure to lose 5vs5 then have NS to have a small chance to win 1 out of 10 games.I disagree, you cant beat going into a tower in AV and letting rip with an insta nuke. Plus it has a huge "lol" value to make those boring BGs a little more fun. I still grin every time i do it :D It just makes things a little more interesting tbh :PThat's fun yeah, but the biggest advantage of NS is the surprise element so you can nuke someone down before he gets healed back up. In BG's there are hardly any dedicated healers, so the 1,5 cast is no problem. But when you're in a big offense/defense Those ToW really boost your damage, a NS is fun to nuke one person, but then you have to wait 3 min till you can nuke 1 person again. ToW effects a lot more in the long run because it effects pretty much every LB/CL you cast.

[xtobbenx]

NS for sure owns and it is our main wepon tbh.. But personoly i use Fire nova totems so much and it really helps out in the time after you NSed someone down.. Fire nova totem, start a chainlighth and then shock.. and it will all hit on the same time.. alsmost like a new NS on melees. (specced with short CD on fire nova totem)

In wotlk we seem to be more of a Bunker up setup that kill anything that get in range.. with the TOW and the slowing and freezing we will get. But lets see :D

[Naysayer]

It's nice that they changed ToW to damage% instead of crit% in WotLK, because it makes the EM/NS/CL nuke much more powerful with ToW. Before the change ToW wouldn't have helped the nuke very much at all.

[Griznah]

It's still crit, they changed the hit%.

[Havelcek]

I will be absolutely stunned if those still stack when this goes live. 5 shaman dropping ToW will be completely ridiculous.

[Naysayer]

It's still crit, they changed the hit%.oh snap