Hey, Mike, I've been on test with my pally and shammy, and some of this stuff is really working nicely. I'll let you know more when I get back on there tonight.

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Um, isn't Earth Shield a HoT in and of itself?

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Kyle -

No, Earth Shield heals the target when he is struck in combat. In practice, it's very similar in mechanism to a HoT, but it doesn't actually 'tick' the way a real HoT works, it just procs a heal periodically when the person it is on takes a hit.

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Listening to the podcast this week, and now reading this post, I think you're missing some of the new features of Water Shield (by the way, you called it Mana Shield above). Not only is it free to cast, but it'll be giving more mana than before (200 per charge, up from 123). It'll also last just 1 minute, which would be annoying except that when it expires, it automatically gives you the mana for any remaining charges. In other words, if you're not hit for a minute, you'll receive 600 mana.

This patch goes a LONG way to fixing most of the long-standing shaman problems. Maybe in 2.4 they'll turn their attention to totems...

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It's good that he's shaking things up, because gawd do shammies need it. But what about our ridiculous totem problems? I suppose he doesn't notice them because he's elemental, but totems need a LOT of work, like an enhanced radius or instant-cast or SOMETHING. As an enhancement shammy I find my totems useless half the time because of how long it takes to put them down or because I'm fighting ranged enemies who refuse to pull into a place where my totems will be useful to me. Or because of the gobs of mana it costs to cast them for EVERY FIGHT.

Totems need MASSIVE UPGRADES to be as useful as pally buffs in ordinary play, for which at least you don't have to spend a quarter of your mana casting on every single frickn pull.

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I rarely used Windfury at all as an Elemental Shaman. But I have seen Enhancement Shammies drop dead instantly after a stray Windfury crit on a boss. Anything that lets them maintain steady DPS and control their threat/aggro is definately a plus. Three cheers for Blizzard!

P.S. Why do MAGES get a Water Elemental? Shouldn't they get an arcane golem instead?

I recently found out that there are Human Shamans in Warcraft Lore.
http://www.wowwiki.com/Highlord_Demitrian
Although rare, it could happen.

The way that NPC Shaman trainers talk to Alliance players in Exodar; well, it almost looks like they're ACTIVELY recruiting for new Shamans, yet unable to find willing recruits.
The alarming presence of friendly Furbolgs on the Alliance side, and the strong history of friendship between them and the Night Elves, suggests also of a possible future Alliance race.

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Mike, I've been listening to your podcasts ever since episode one, and I can't help but notice that you really really want Earth Shield to be buffed. As a career Resto Shaman myself, who raids Black Temple and a little bit of Arena on the side (10 games of 5v5 per week), I'm sorry to say that I cannot agree with your request to buff Earth Shield.

Earth Shield IMO is already one of the best, if not THE most powerful 41 point talents amongst all classes already. It essentially makes us rogue-proof in PvP, and sometimes it's the only heal I have to cast for the entire first half of a 5-man instance. There really is no need to buff Earth Shield - it's already more than amazing.

Too many times I've had rogues try to gank me while I'm doing my daily quests or something, only to discover that all the damage they could put out was almost completely nullified simply by the power of Earth Shield. After they blow all their cooldowns and realize that I'm still at 100% health, they quickly resort to Sprint and Vanish. Now this does not happen because I spent a long time collecting epic gear from raids, this has been happening ever since the first time I specced Resto at lv70, and all I was wearing were easily attainable quest items.

Earth Shield does not need a buff.

Water Shield was the one that truly was underwhelming and needed a good buff, and I'm glad Blizzard realized this and gave it what it deserved.

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Earth sheild is actually getting nerfed in an upcoming patch. Its ridiculously powerful.

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@5

There are resto tree talents that increase the effective range of your totems depending on how badly you want it, that option is available. There is also a resto tree talents that reduce mana cost for totems.

I think that as for "how long it takes" to plant totems, they need to take totems off the global cooldown. They did it for Mages' Counterspell, which is generally used in the same manner, so why not do it with totems? They are a completely independant system from our spells and melee attacks anyway, I don't think they should effect the global cooldown at all.

Also, Draenei shaman will never be REAL shaman. FOR THE HORDE :P

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@6 Because Jaina Proudmoore (Mage) had it in WC3. That's why.

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I am really impressed with the fire that has recently been lit under Blizz's collective behind. It seems like A) their CMs actually give a damn, B) they are paying attention to PTR feedback, and C) they are giving players what they want (within reason).

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@5

Take a breath, slip off some of that rogue gear, and strap on some int. When I'm soloing, I generally don't even use totems (except for shamanistic rage, in which I'll drop str). For groups, I'll drop SoE, GoA/WF, and Mana Spring, and by the 2nd tick of the spring, I'm back to where I was before the totems (Yes, I'm full enhancement). Range is always an issue, but I did take the improved totem range talent, which IMO is one of the most underrated talents for shaman, period.

As far as how long they take to put down, meh. Think ahead. Is the fight going to go longer than 7 seconds? Start dropping totems on the pull. Personaly, I don't mind the GCD since it gives the tank a chance to grab some extra threat before I snap it off him/her. :D No GCD would be fun, as every shaman would have macros to drop all 4 totems at once (which is probably why it won't happen).

Totems could use a touch up, yeah, but I don't think they're quite as broken as you let on. Heck, I still love Totemic Call everytime I use it, being and old school shaman who had to waste mana just to move totems out of the way of a pull as to not get adds and never get it back.

Now, if we could get an active threat reduction (e.g. feint, soulshatter, fade, etc), that would rock. :)

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LOL Windwall
LOL Sentry Totem
LOL Crazy aggro some totems create
LOL totems in mobile fights
LOL 20 minCD pets on leashes (and unavailable for Arenas)
LOL WF totem nerfed to proc only on white damage
LOL WF nerfed multiple times to heck and back
LOL Ele's getting LBs gutted
LOL Purge being given to Hunters

I loved my shammy back in the old days... and great players can make great shammies still, but lordy... to say the class isn't in bad shape is a mighty big pile of denial.

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yes, that means in curator fights not only does Water shiled give great mana, but no longr activates teh FSR. so this is doubly good, even though the totem is now a waste (+20 mana MORE back) or did they buff this as well?

as for Lightning shield, that was always a useless shield it's something like 1.45 damage per point and that's only at 1200+ spell damage so it's mana per damage makes it not even worth casting. even as a lame threat gainer, of which shaman sadly already excel at gaining threat a little too well.

as for Erth shield it is by far the most powerful mana efficient healing spell in game with a whopping 7.48 healing per mana spent ratio with 1200 +healing where as chain lightning with a 7.42 healing per mana spent rating (and for comparison HW is 6.28 at rank 12 and LHW is only 3.88 at rank 6)

so over all, Mana shield got buffed, Earth Shield does not need to be buffed, and Lightning shield is just trash, and the sad part is: the new food (stormchops) looks like it might even do better damage cost no mana, and last longer.

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@6 -- There's absolutely no reason to die as an Enhancement shaman in a boss fight, even if you get an insane Windfury crit. Give the tank a lead of about 4.5-5k threat before unloading, and you won't have to worry about grabbing aggro. If you do, upgrade your tank.

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@ 10/6

Actually, It's because Mages could summon Water Elementals in Warcraft I... as in the very first game. ;)

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@8

Pure speculation? It's not that OP and its easily removed by another Shaman, lock, hunter, mage, or priest in 2.3

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"For groups, I'll drop SoE, GoA/WF, and Mana Spring, and by the 2nd tick of the spring, I'm back to where I was before the totems (Yes, I'm full enhancement)."

That's a flat out lie. It takes 10 ticks for mana spring to pay FOR ITSELF. Less if you specced for mana tide. Which used to be considered a 6pt talent, now the improved water totems is actually worth it.

It takes a while to get that mana back, and I have put points into improving totems, making them cheaper, and mental quickness just to be sure. I never care about mana, unless the fight hits minute 6. This is where Shaman actually begin complaining.

Spend 1 long fight trying to keep the buffs up, trying to keep them in range, and fighting all at once while maintaining mana and you understand how painful the totem system really is.

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@MikeSchramm

While I agreee that the *class* isn't broken, it's hard to ignore things like:

-Elemental Shaman core Lightning talents being gutted
-total lack of both CC and CC-escape
-DPS that is capped, not enhanced, by talents and does not scale with gear beyond a certain point (hidden WF cooldown, hidden LO cooldown, both work to put a hard cap on maximum dps output)
-the most akward, if interesting, buffing system in the game (shaman buffing is extremely awareness-intensive and even fun, but that doesn't compensate for its extreme lack of intuitiveness and it being linked to the GCD of every other ability)

But Restoration is perfectly viable, outstanding in fact, for both PvP and PvE gameplay. So the *class* is not at all broken. What *is* broken is DPS spec playstyle at the extreme high end (Hyjal and beyond, where the class currently stops scaling with gear).

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