The Days of Pure Shaman DPS Are Numbered

[shaeman]

If you want a reasoned, grown up discussion on the merits of various classes that would be great.

Perhaps drop the use of emotive and derogatory terms such as negligent, lazy and incompetent for anyone who isn't going to pick the exact team you deem to be best.

You know I had decided not to respond any more, to see what other peoples points of view were and let others evolve the discussion. But this needs a response.

You are totally misrepresenting me in your statement , 'anyone who isn't going to pick the exact team you deem to be best'. I agree with your post, though; at one point my choice of language was poor and, as its been referred to by you, just editing it would be unfair. I regret saying it and I apologize if it was offensive. As I have said, I am one of the people who has boxed extensively with 5 Shaman.



There is nothing I would like more than a grown up discussion on the merits of various classes and the damage increasing synergies they can bring to a party post 3.02

And I apologise on my addition of " 'anyone who isn't going to pick the exact team you deem to be best'." That was unnecessary, although added as it appeared you had already decided on two of the dpsers with your comment regarding it being negligent not to include them.

I was editing my post to make it more constructive when you replied, so I'm glad you quoted the original so the thread still makes sense.

[magwo]

Interesting thread. However, I think that in the right hands, hex will be a BIG factor at level 80, ESPECIALLY in PvP. If handled with great skill, and in combination with strong AOE in elemental, this has the potential to turn multiple shaman teams into powerhouses in PvP, being able to tackle great numbers of opponents and opening up many opportunities for kiting abuse.



Edit: To summarize the elemental shaman at level 80: A tanking mage with CC, mail, shield, heals, self-res, res, fear immunity, partial spell immunity, aoe slow, aoe knockback, instant-cast travel form. You give up a lot of these strengths to make a multi-class team that is harder to play, but with higer dps output.

[badashh]

As far as having a Boomkin or a lock in your group, doesn't earth and moon negate Curse of Elements? Or do they stack so to speak? Thanks.

[Ellay]

I don't think they stack, the warlock buff seems to be much better. If they do stack which I didn't notice in my ZA run, the CoE overrides it as it is more powerful.

[Ughmahedhurtz]

[quote='badashh',index.php?page=Thread&postID=13931 6#post139316]As far as having a Boomkin or a lock in your group, doesn't earth and moon negate Curse of Elements? Or do they stack so to speak? Thanks.[/quote]A very good point. [url='http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&threadID=12576']We discussed this in a bit more detail in this thread.[/url] Though it should be noted that the effects the OP mentioned all are different auras.

[Flight]

We discussed this in a bit more detail in this thread.[/url] Though it should be noted that the effects the OP mentioned all are different auras.

Note some numbers in that thread have been subject to change. Earth and
Moon, for example, was a 3 point 13% talent and is now a 5 point 15%
talent. Personally, I think the resist debuff of Curse of Elements offers even more to the party than the damage increase. And, of course, while Earth and Moon wouldn't stack, Boomkin would still bring Moonkin Form Aura. There are some very strong Boomkin builds that don't take Earth and Moon or Starfall.


Very good threads on 'locks and Boomkins over at EJ on their Class Mechanics forum : http://elitistjerks.com/f31/


Threres a good thread on 3.02 Elem Shaman with a lot of good hard lvl 80 numbers by reputable players, also : http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t27016-e...ts_discussion/

[valkry]

The Dk magic dmg debuff, the earth and moon debuff and the curse of elements..do not stack.

Elemental oath and Moonkin aura...do not stack. The haste does with the crit though.

[Catamer]

I think the biggest nerf I've seen so far is the non-stacking +crit/+hit totem.
I used to run round being able to get 30% crit rating using lousy green gear and closer to 40-45% with good gear, add on top of it a +15% hit rating.
now with the same good gear I'm only getting 20-25% crit rating, lower than the crappy gear I used to use.
This was such an incredible nerf you can never underestimate it, we lost at least 12% crit and 12% hit right off the top.

Now add on top of the totem nerf the fact that you can't round robin heroism anymore and you are pretty much left with a so-so DPS or a so-so healer class.

Thanks to RAF i've started to look into other team setups.
I'm currently working a shaman+4xhunter team and this team seems to rock pretty nicely.
The shaman seems to be a nice fit for hunters and all I do is spam chain heal on the pets.
I did ramparts at 62-63 and blood furnace at 63 and only had one team wipe in the blood furnace over a one really bad pull ( mild bad pulls were not a problem )

I also have a priest+4xwarlocks team that is level 61. I'm going to see how they handle ramparts when they reach 62.

[Hachoo]

I'm not sure why anyone is saying shaman DPS is going to DECREASE from 70-80...In fact the devs have stated our damage is going to INCREASE more than most other classes, as we get one of our new primary DPS spells (lava burst) at 75.

Personally I chose 5 shamans for MANY reasons. PvP was a large one of them, the fact that they can PvP AND PvE is great, even without a paladin in the mix.

I really like my priest + 4 warlock team right now but when wotlk comes out im going to have to make a decision which team to go with for starters, and I still haven't decided yet. Need more playtime on my shamans since 3.0.2 to decide. Honestly I don't think shamans are going anywhere as the most popular 5 box class, and boxing a "mix" of classes really is only for a few people. Honestly I tried it and its more of a headache for me then I want, makes the game feel more like a job then a game So I think for people that just want to have fun, 5 shamans will still be near the top of the list.

[Schwarz]

A buddy of mine just dinged 70 with his 5 shaman team. They aren't very well geared (~400 sp). His old main was a warlock. He said bringing in a warlock brought his shamans DPS from 700 to around 1k. I am going to try to run a heroic today or tommorrow to see what my dps does when we include a warlock to the bunch.

Am I reading it correctly that if you wanted to switch out a dps you should include a warlock over a boomkin?

Has anyone tried any heroics with 5 mages or 5 warlocks? Ya gotta think that granted they might put out more dps than a shaman but can they survive as long as a shaman? (mail+shields seems to mitigate alot of damage)