WotLK Changes 7/25 & 8/1
Continuing right along with the changes for Enhancement Shamans in WotLK using my Nobel-nominated SEESWARS system let's start with three massive and entirely horrible changes.
Weapon Specialization: Removed. (Axe - Increases the critical strike damage bonus by 5/10/15/20/25%. Mace - Has a 1/2/3/4/5% chance to increase your melee haste by 10% for 15 sec. Fist - Attacks from your fist weapons have a 1/2/3/4/5% chance to reduce the armor of your target by 20% for 6 sec.)
SEESWARS - 5
This was a great talent. I was thoroughly excited to see how this would play out in end game and with gearing selections. I was particularly excited by the Axes effect which would increase crit damage and scale with gear. But instead it's replaced with this half-assed piece of shit talent:
Maelstrom Weapon - When you critically hit with a melee weapon, you reduce the cast time of your next spell by 4/8/12/16/20%. Stacks up to 5 times. Lasts 15 seconds. (5 Ranks)
SEESWARS - 4
I have to sink 5 talent points, then crit 5 times in order to get a free cast of a spell that I would otherwise never freakin use because... I'M MELEE SPEC!! Hi, news flash: Enhancement is the MELEE tree. When I first saw this change I had to read it twice and then double check they didn't suddenly move the Elemental tree over to the middle. But there it is as plain as day: a melee talent being replaced by a caster talent, not in the first two ranks but as the 46 point talent.
There is a decent discussion happening on the comments section of Wowhead for this talent with most posters excited to combine it with an Elemental Devastation build. In the comment thread runjah makes the most important point but is unfortunately buried as a reply towards the bottom of the page. His words that are the make-or-break for this talent: it resets the swing timer.
I'll say that again for the kids in the back row: IT RESETS THE SWING TIMER! That means working in a Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, or the new Lava Burst will throw off your Windfury procs in the worst case scenario, in the best case you'll have to carefully time your insta-spells with your WF internal cooldown, your Stormstrikes, and your shocks.
Maybe I'm being bitter here because they took away Weapon Specialization which was such a cool talent. Maybe I'm being bitter because they are forcing the Elemental Devastation build on me (currently that build is garbage, but that may all change as you'll soon see). Or maybe I'm just being lazy and I don't want to have to time my shocks with my Stormstrikes with my WF with my Lava Bursts.
There are two rays of hope here. First one poster commented that Blizzard already changed the talent to work for every spell, though the tooltip does not yet reflect the change. And secondly, one commenter speculated they mean for it to NOT reset your swing timers. If that comes to pass then I will revise my rating. But for now I'm not happy about it.
Anyone out there with a beta key willing to test this one out extensively? Does it reset your swing timer? Does it throw off your WF procs? Would it be worth it to spend 5 points in this purely for DPS' sake?
Nature's Guidance is missing from the Restoration tree.
SEESWARS - 5
There is no mention of it in the WotLKWiki.info site but I stumbled across this little tidbit while mocking up a few builds. If I could give this a worse rating I would. 'Hello, welcome to Northrend, please turn all of your current gems for +Hit ones. Thank you and enjoy your stay.' What an absolutely horrid thing to do. It was one of the great things about an enhance shaman, we didn't have to stack Hit Rating like an idiot (i.e., rogue) because we got 3% from Nature's Guidance and 6% from Dual Wield Specialization. Not so anymore. We now have another 3% hit to make up after this loss.
The only bright side here I already alluded to above: this could make the Elemental Devastation build a viable one for Enhance Shamans. Regardless, we will be forced to sacrifice other stats for hit rating when we didn't have to do so before.
The range of all “friendly totems” has been increased to 30 yards, up from 20.
SEESWARS - 1
I felt like injecting some good news. Yay 30 yard totems! As a result, Totemic Mastery was removed. With Nature's Guidance gone, Totemic Mastery implicit in all totems, and Totemic Focus a 1st tier talent, the Elemental Devastation Build is looking more viable.
Shamanistic Rage now gives your successful melee attacks a chance to regenerate mana equal to 15% of your attack power. (Old version : mana regeneration equal to 30% of your attack power)
SEESWARS - 4
Only a slight nerf compared to the blasts above, but a nerf nonetheless. Why must you punish us Blizzard? And why must you constantly mess with Shammy Rage? At first it was 15% for 30 seconds, then 30% for 15 seconds. Then you added the reduced damage component. Next came Improved Shammy Rage. Which was subsequently taken away. And now the effectiveness of this ability is halved with one hand while the other hand serves up insta-spell casts.
Feral Spirit now lasts 45 seconds instead of 30 seconds.
SEESWARS - 3
I don't even have the heart to get into how incredibly mediocre this 51 point talent will be. I've read rumors of the wolves getting stun or some other ability. If that happens then maybe... but until then this is a bit fat MEH. For me it comes down to the question of the usage of the talent point. Just because it's there doesn't mean we need to use it. Are these wolves going to be the Shaman version of treants, or will they have some additional usage like a Shadowfiend or the ever annoying Water Elemental?
Weapon Specialization: Removed. (Axe - Increases the critical strike damage bonus by 5/10/15/20/25%. Mace - Has a 1/2/3/4/5% chance to increase your melee haste by 10% for 15 sec. Fist - Attacks from your fist weapons have a 1/2/3/4/5% chance to reduce the armor of your target by 20% for 6 sec.)
SEESWARS - 5
This was a great talent. I was thoroughly excited to see how this would play out in end game and with gearing selections. I was particularly excited by the Axes effect which would increase crit damage and scale with gear. But instead it's replaced with this half-assed piece of shit talent:
Maelstrom Weapon - When you critically hit with a melee weapon, you reduce the cast time of your next spell by 4/8/12/16/20%. Stacks up to 5 times. Lasts 15 seconds. (5 Ranks)
SEESWARS - 4
I have to sink 5 talent points, then crit 5 times in order to get a free cast of a spell that I would otherwise never freakin use because... I'M MELEE SPEC!! Hi, news flash: Enhancement is the MELEE tree. When I first saw this change I had to read it twice and then double check they didn't suddenly move the Elemental tree over to the middle. But there it is as plain as day: a melee talent being replaced by a caster talent, not in the first two ranks but as the 46 point talent.
There is a decent discussion happening on the comments section of Wowhead for this talent with most posters excited to combine it with an Elemental Devastation build. In the comment thread runjah makes the most important point but is unfortunately buried as a reply towards the bottom of the page. His words that are the make-or-break for this talent: it resets the swing timer.
I'll say that again for the kids in the back row: IT RESETS THE SWING TIMER! That means working in a Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, or the new Lava Burst will throw off your Windfury procs in the worst case scenario, in the best case you'll have to carefully time your insta-spells with your WF internal cooldown, your Stormstrikes, and your shocks.
Maybe I'm being bitter here because they took away Weapon Specialization which was such a cool talent. Maybe I'm being bitter because they are forcing the Elemental Devastation build on me (currently that build is garbage, but that may all change as you'll soon see). Or maybe I'm just being lazy and I don't want to have to time my shocks with my Stormstrikes with my WF with my Lava Bursts.
There are two rays of hope here. First one poster commented that Blizzard already changed the talent to work for every spell, though the tooltip does not yet reflect the change. And secondly, one commenter speculated they mean for it to NOT reset your swing timers. If that comes to pass then I will revise my rating. But for now I'm not happy about it.
Anyone out there with a beta key willing to test this one out extensively? Does it reset your swing timer? Does it throw off your WF procs? Would it be worth it to spend 5 points in this purely for DPS' sake?
Nature's Guidance is missing from the Restoration tree.
SEESWARS - 5
There is no mention of it in the WotLKWiki.info site but I stumbled across this little tidbit while mocking up a few builds. If I could give this a worse rating I would. 'Hello, welcome to Northrend, please turn all of your current gems for +Hit ones. Thank you and enjoy your stay.' What an absolutely horrid thing to do. It was one of the great things about an enhance shaman, we didn't have to stack Hit Rating like an idiot (i.e., rogue) because we got 3% from Nature's Guidance and 6% from Dual Wield Specialization. Not so anymore. We now have another 3% hit to make up after this loss.
The only bright side here I already alluded to above: this could make the Elemental Devastation build a viable one for Enhance Shamans. Regardless, we will be forced to sacrifice other stats for hit rating when we didn't have to do so before.
The range of all “friendly totems” has been increased to 30 yards, up from 20.
SEESWARS - 1
I felt like injecting some good news. Yay 30 yard totems! As a result, Totemic Mastery was removed. With Nature's Guidance gone, Totemic Mastery implicit in all totems, and Totemic Focus a 1st tier talent, the Elemental Devastation Build is looking more viable.
Shamanistic Rage now gives your successful melee attacks a chance to regenerate mana equal to 15% of your attack power. (Old version : mana regeneration equal to 30% of your attack power)
SEESWARS - 4
Only a slight nerf compared to the blasts above, but a nerf nonetheless. Why must you punish us Blizzard? And why must you constantly mess with Shammy Rage? At first it was 15% for 30 seconds, then 30% for 15 seconds. Then you added the reduced damage component. Next came Improved Shammy Rage. Which was subsequently taken away. And now the effectiveness of this ability is halved with one hand while the other hand serves up insta-spell casts.
Feral Spirit now lasts 45 seconds instead of 30 seconds.
SEESWARS - 3
I don't even have the heart to get into how incredibly mediocre this 51 point talent will be. I've read rumors of the wolves getting stun or some other ability. If that happens then maybe... but until then this is a bit fat MEH. For me it comes down to the question of the usage of the talent point. Just because it's there doesn't mean we need to use it. Are these wolves going to be the Shaman version of treants, or will they have some additional usage like a Shadowfiend or the ever annoying Water Elemental?
Labels: analysis, hit rating, SEESWARS, WotLK
posted by Rich @ 11:05 PM
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