Not liking shamans so far

My shamans will probably hit 60 later today. They are 56 now and so far I think they are pretty boring. They are elemental right now. Most of the time they run out of mana right away, and every mob takes two rotations of lightning bolt to kill. 5 lightning bolts usually bring them to about 15% left, then I can either finish up with melee (incredibly slow) or another round of bolts.

Chain lightning is meh. Totems are really annoying to keep up with while questing. I hardly ever put them down, and if I do then there goes a shitload of mana. Even totemic recall is useless, I barely get any mana back. So I only lay down a totem of wrath, and maybe fire totems to finish off the mobs if I don't feel like casting lightning bolt again.

Compared to my 5 paladins, they have been pretty darn boring. The paladins never had any downtime from 0-60. Every mob was one shot, then move on.

Wil they get better once they hit 58 and get outlands gear from doing those quests?

It will get better when you get water shield (you'll almost never run out of mana) and when you get outlands gear which has some mail that has spellpower on it. Elemental shaman gear is pretty much non-existent prior to BC. You'll also hit a bit harder as well.

Elemental shaman suck hard pre 60. Get through that portal, do the first few quest chains to gear up, and you will see the power.

I had the same experience on my alliance shaman (okay - i'd levelled a horde shaman and new what they were capable of but it did make it more painful).

I was converting from enhancement , had zero spell power gear, but within the first few quests in outland it changed.

Things will get much better once you hit outlands. BC gear is not only a huge step up, but it itemised much better for Ele shams.

My adivce - keep water shield up at all times, make sure you have 3 points in Unrelenting Storm and 5 points in Ancestral Knowledge. Grab the www.wowhead.com/?item=Glyph of Lightning Bolt as well. Also once you get Thunderstorm, you can use that inbetween combats for a quick mana boost as well.

Cheers,
S.

Good to hear. I guess that makes sense, there really isn't any shaman gear pre 60.

Completely forgot about glyphs.

Personally my shammy team was and still is IMO one of the most enjoyable to level up. Post 60 is just a cake walk. Between proper spec, glyphs, and water shield I never drink accept after a boss fight. I don't bother with totems unless fighting elites/bosses. I'd suggest getting the Astral Recall glyph as well since it will reduce that spell to 7.5 min which is insanely useful when questing since it will save you time running back to turn in and pick up more quests.

The style of play is pretty much the same at any level.
However, the power is drastically different.

With one mana spring, water shields and lightning glyph, its hard to run out of mana with only Lightning Bolt spam.

Quite a few mobs require a second shot for me, but I'm running four shammies and a pally. My cast sequence click macro gives me a Lightning Bolt, then into the rotation of click macro's... Flame Shock every 18 seconds, Lava Burst every 8 seconds, Chain Lightning every 3.5 seconds and Lightning Bolt spam when the other spells are not ready yet. Lightning Overload fires off almost every volley, from at least one toon, and when it does, the Flame Shocks aren't needed.

The class feature is the totems. With the new totem bar thing (which I generally hide but hotkey the bars), we have three options of totem sets to drop at once. I personally have a default set and an AoE set. In addition to this, I have a totemic recall [nomounted] macro (which is on the same keybind as my pallies macro [mounted] Crusader Aura, [nomounted] Concentration Aura). I can also drop 4x Totem of Wrath (for the Glyph bonus), 4x Grounding Totem, 4x Cleansing Totem, 1x Mana + 3x Healing. On round robin, Tremors for fear immunity, Fire Elementals, Earth Bind for root, Fire Nova for stuns.

Shaman's as a boxed group have more controlled burst then anything else. With Elemental Mastery + Flame Shock + Lava Burst + Chain Lightning.... in pvp, direct this barrage at your focus target, while having no toons targeting them. You can glyph your shocks to 0.5 sec GCD, which if you're into pvp is essential.

Shammies are casters, but in mail armor, with shields. Thunderstorm on round-robin to blast melee away from them, Earthbind on round robin to root, Fire Nova on round robin to stun... With a spread out macro, and click to move + interact + any movement key to break that movement, your toons all face the rooted, stunned etc offender and burst them down hard.

As stated by others, 60+ in BC your gearing gets a lot better.
I believe Water Shield is 62, but has also been implemented at lower levels in a reduced form.
At 70th Heroism is a huge boost.
Lava Burst is 75 (or 76) and that's a huge burst increase again.

Just to whet your appetite, here's the sort of Shammy kit you can pick up very early on in TBC...

Shield: Landslide Buckler
Level 58 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10482

Helm: Helm of Affinity
Level 58 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10078

Legs: Arcane Ringed Greaves
Level 58 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10163

Chest: Stormstrike Vest
Level 58 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10937

Trinket: Vengeance of the Illidari
Level 58 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10400

Boots: Boots of the Earthcaller
Level 60 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9490

Ring: Circlet of the Victor
Level 60 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10106

Gloves: Verdant Handwraps
Level 61 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=10351

Cloak: Windtalker's Cloak
Level 61 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9418

Bracers: Netherweave Bracers
Level 61 www.wowhead.com/?item=Netherweave Bracers

Belt: Netherweave Belt
Level 61 www.wowhead.com/?item=Netherweave Belt

Ring: Expedition Caster's Band
Level 61 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9731
NB: Need to be on "Balance Must Be Preserved" for Schematics to drop http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9720

Shoulders: Ikeyen's Pauldrons
Level 61 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9788

Neck: Lunatic's Choker
Level 62 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9951

Wrists: Goldenvine Wraps
Level 62d http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9738

Ring: Cenarion Ring of Casting
Level 62d http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9738

Dagger: Nethershard
Level 63 www.wowhead.com/?item=Nethershard

Mace: Sporeggar Smasher
Level 63 www.wowhead.com/?item=Sporeggar Smasher

Dagger: Talbuk Sticker
Level 64 http://www.wowhead.com/?quest=9859

Get that lot on and your spellpower, armour and mana regen will sky rocket and you'll start to have no problems at all and lots of fun, instead :)

Of course, if you're Hordie scum<spit> you'll need to find the Horde equivalent quests :)

I would also.. Um would have advised u leveled with instances not quests.. If ur 4 shamans get a tank and do ramparts...if 5 you could prob still instance.. I think it's a lot easier because u don't have to think about collection quests

i hope you haven't been leveling as elemental... lol