#0 - May 7, 2007, 12:59 a.m.
1) Rockbiter is viable for a offhand enchant if you have a good amount of haste rating.
2) Windfury 5 on both weapons still do alot of damage on average.
3) Itemization has gotten alot better.
Among other things.
Hello. I am Ral'Garog and i am a shaman. Not just an normal QQing shaman but one that raids and does heroics on a regular basis.
In this thread i hope to be able to give a clear and comprehensive list of problems that i have faced while raiding and running heroics. I will not touch on PvP, and i will not touch on normal instancing.
First off: There is a misunderstanding between what Shaman were, and what Shaman are. Previously, a Shaman was able to spec with a little in each tree and was able to actually perform rather well with casting spells at range, running in to melee as well as healing. Shamans use to be “The true hybrids of WoW.” They were the “Jack of all trades; Master of none.” At one point of time, a Shaman was able to run away from an enemy then attack them at a range then run into melee them and be very effective and efficient at doing so. Also: They was able to heal themselves by a good amount. This was back when from my understanding: 4k health was considered a lot to have.
The Shaman of today are nothing like that. There is a design flaw in the game which prevents Shaman from becoming a jack of all trades. That flaw is two fold: But both of the flaws are hand in hand. The first flaw is Itemization. The other flaw is talent trees. Due to limited raid spots: A Shaman must pick a spec, stick to it, and hope for the best.
Because Shaman have to spec deep into their talent trees to be a viable substitution for the “true form” of the spot they are trying to fill, they must gear themselves accordingly. For example It's currently impossible to have +1500 healing, +850 spell damage, +18% spell crit, +20% melee crit along with also +1200 attack power. Since this is a thread about enhancement, we must stick with the +20% melee crit and the +1200 attack power. That completely gimps my spells and healing.
Itemization:
One of the major problems with enhancement Shaman gear itemization is the fact that blizzard are currently setting us up as if we were offshoot hunters. Even enhancement Shaman specific gear has tons of mp/5 which is almost completely not needed by a enhancement Shaman because of shamanistic rage. [Which is a quite efficient spell when it works as intended.]. Unlike hunters: Shamans need a lot of +hit as so that they can dual wield competently and efficiently: The problem is since there is almost no mail gear in the game [besides desolation] with +hit; Enhancement shamans must roll on leather. Gimp their attack power and critical strike percentage by taking on a a lot of weird gear which has a lot of hit but not much of anything else.
Right now: It can be argued that the Desolation set is better for enhancement shamans than their tier 4 because it has more hit and almost just as much attack power with gems and enchants. In my opinion: that should not be the case. I may be wrong: But a shaman should not have to roll on leather [even high end leather] if they are suppose to inherently wear mail.
The changes made to the tier 4 [and tier 5] on the PTRS are a step in the correct direction: But i have noticed something odd. Last Friday i copied my characters over to the ptrs as so that i can do some battle grounds with the blizzard staff: The only pieces of tier 5 which were upgrades for me were the shoulders and the helm: Chest: downgrade. Legs: major down grade. Gloves: downgrade. All of those are including enchants mind you.
I do not think that my current gear should be able to compare with what i get from 6 or more months of high end raiding. I do know that there is a high chance for our tier 4 – 6 to be buffed before it makes it over to live: but i just wanted to point that out.
There needs to be some kinda implementation of better enhancement Shaman specific gear. Yeah: another class can use it, but it suits the needs of enhancement Shaman much better than the needs of other classes and not a mixture of Hunter and rogue gear on mail. Enhancement Shaman need more crit, more strength, less int [not too less. Just enough], the stamina you place on our gear is just high enough so thats good.
A good alternative would be to remove the mp/5 from our sets. Add armor penetration bonuses,more hit, more critical strike rating(Or agility) and make the sockets Blue and yellow sockets mostly with mp/5 as the socket bonuses: Thus making the mp/5 on our gear completely optional and not forced onto us.
