Until l they admit their scaling and bad mechanics issues there is no point in trying to fix it. The devs have said we are balanced with a innovative mechanic since day one. Its ironic they buffed us to the point we used to be before they nerfed us and we still are not a viable dps class.

The LVB -> FS is so inherently flawed until they change this we are a 2 spec class.

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Q u o t e:
I think the main solutions to Elemental problems are mainly buffing our +hit talents due to the lack of elemental itemization, and coming up with both an exciting and balanced way to fix our haste / crit

I think adding a residual dot after Lava Burst makes us seem too mage-ish, but I have been thinking that perhaps allowing it to explode and deal splash damage on impact might be fun.

Maybe - 'Your Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning spells have a XX% chance to add a Static Charge to yourself. When activating Thunderstorm, increases your Spellpower by X amount depending on your stacks of Static Charge. Makes Thunderstorm more exciting, and maybe make the Thunderstorm graphic more intense for more stacks.

To be honest, I find Thunderstorm to be a boring Shaman talent. Its like Hurricane, only crap. So move it down the tree, and add something like 'Elemental Guardians' - similar to Druid's treants, but more like Resto's Ancestral Awakening - 'Your spell Critical strikes have a chance to call on the elements, summoning elementals, which buff your raid in some way, or deal damage on a target. Maybe a cool animation, where a mini air / earth / water / fire appear, converge on the target and deal damage.

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Hit talents will not help us, neither will giving us elementals.

The Static charge or some form of additional Synergy between our spells is something we need, something that gives us another 20-25% damage boost.

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Q u o t e:


Hit talents will not help us, neither will giving us elementals.

The Static charge or some form of additional Synergy between our spells is something we need, something that gives us another 20-25% damage boost.

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Well i'm of the 'wait and see' mindset. Lets see what changes they have in store, and lets see them in motion, then I'll make my statement of what is needed or not from there. Probably the best idea i've seen in all this is making a skill where lightening does more damage when a mob is under a % of health (35, 25).

A concern. or perhaps annoyance, I don't think has been mentioned in this thread, though it seems some over at EJ share it.

T6 Elemental gear has set bonuses that are so good that there may not be gear good enough in the game to look past them for min-maxing. I fear the solution may be as was done with resto T2 shaman gear, but it would be nice if the way to gear up was absolutely definitely not "LF24M Hyjal/BT/SW".

While I don't believe this state of affairs is unique to elemental shaman, it stands nonetheless.

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Q u o t e:


Well i'm of the 'wait and see' mindset. Lets see what changes they have in store, and lets see them in motion, then I'll make my statement of what is needed or not from there. Probably the best idea i've seen in all this is making a skill where lightening does more damage when a mob is under a % of health (35, 25).

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With that mindset we'll end up being on par with other hybrids sometime in the second quarter of 2009.

Wait and see is the old status quo and look where it has gotten us.

We need to be proactive, with clear concise breakdowns of where we need help.

I was always of the mind that the mob under "X" health DPS increases were gimmicky, plus enough classes already have this that another class is just going to make all the other classes seem less unique.

We really need something unique to shaman, that is simple, fun, and not difficult for Blizzard to implement.

I'd love to have OMGWTFBBQ lazer beams come out of my eyes myself, but requests like that aren't going to be looked at.

Programmers live by KISS(Keep It Simple Stupid), our suggestions should mirror this.

We shouldn't have to wait until sometime AFTER the Ulduar patch to be viable. We should be viable at very least the day that content comes out, if not sooner.

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Q u o t e:
A concern. or perhaps annoyance, I don't think has been mentioned in this thread, though it seems some over at EJ share it.

T6 Elemental gear has set bonuses that are so good that there may not be gear good enough in the game to look past them for min-maxing. I fear the solution may be as was done with resto T2 shaman gear, but it would be nice if the way to gear up was absolutely definitely not "LF24M Hyjal/BT/SW".

While I don't believe this state of affairs is unique to elemental shaman, it stands nonetheless.

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T6 Elemental set bonus, while nice costs you 4 pieces of gear upgrades.

At Ilvl 200 epics this makes sense, but once you compare the loss in stats/damage from Ilvl 213/226 gear it just doesn't make sense any more.

Binkenstein from EJ calculated the equivalent bonus for 4 Piece T6 and it is easily surpassed by Ilvl 213 gear.

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Q u o t e:
Until l they admit their scaling and bad mechanics issues there is no point in trying to fix it. The devs have said we are balanced with a innovative mechanic since day one. Its ironic they buffed us to the point we used to be before they nerfed us and we still are not a viable dps class.

The LVB -> FS is so inherently flawed until they change this we are a 2 spec class.

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/this

Our problems come down to the fact that the Fs -> LvB mechanic is flawed. There are just too many gameplay and scaling issues that stem from this one mechanic for it not to be considered the heart of the problem. Eliminate this flawed mechanic and we could be fixed very quickly.

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Q u o t e:
Binkenstein from EJ calculated the equivalent bonus for 4 Piece T6 and it is easily surpassed by Ilvl 213 gear.

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To be fair, others seem a little less convinced.

It'd be nice if one of those bonuses (particularly, say, the 4pc) was used to replace the current 2pc T7 (without the ability to stack both, of course) to help put an end to the debate. Though that could cause future problems with 2pc T7 being too strong, heh.

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Q u o t e:


T6 Elemental set bonus, while nice costs you 4 pieces of gear upgrades.

At Ilvl 200 epics this makes sense, but once you compare the loss in stats/damage from Ilvl 213/226 gear it just doesn't make sense any more.

Binkenstein from EJ calculated the equivalent bonus for 4 Piece T6 and it is easily surpassed by Ilvl 213 gear.

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He did, and it was, but a few people (like myself) don't put any "weight" on stamina. To me it's MP5's brother ... if you need it great, if you aren't dying (or OOM) it's a useless stat in a raid environment.

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Q u o t e:


/this

Our problems come down to the fact that the Fs -> LvB mechanic is flawed. There are just too many gameplay and scaling issues that stem from this one mechanic for it not to be considered the heart of the problem. Eliminate this flawed mechanic and we could be fixed very quickly.

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/agreed

Another weeked comes and I don't get in any guild raid groups for Naxx!! F#$#!
Please fix elemental shamans! We are being exclued!

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Q u o t e:
Another weeked comes and I don't get in any guild raid groups for Naxx!! F#$#!
Please fix elemental shamans! We are being exclued!

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I strongly encourage you to do your best to refrain from QQ-type posts and try to remain on topic with ideas and suggestions to resolve any elemental problems there may be. No doubt, GC will be checking back to this thread often to get player feed-back. The more concise this thread is, the better off everyone will be.

first
AND AWESOME!!!
New Elemental mastery = winnar


So our clearcasted (-40% cost) spells are 10% more damage?

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Q u o t e:
Hopefully this won't get buried here.

Here is what we are thinking about to try on the PTR for Elemental:

Elemental Oath -- In addition to existing effects, now increases spell damage done by the Shaman by 5/10% while Elemental Focus Clearcasting is active.

Elemental Mastery -- Overhauled. Now increases the Shaman’s critical strike chance by 20% for 30 seconds. Cooldown remains 3 minutes. We recognize this might be a slight nerf in certain PvP situations where players relied on the shaman to nuke an injured person to death. Still, I'm betting most shamans will prefer the new design.

Glyph of Lightning Bolt -- No longer affects cost. Now increases damage by 4%.

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These changes definately look promising. I may actually checkout the PTR this time.

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Q u o t e:
Hopefully this won't get buried here.

Here is what we are thinking about to try on the PTR for Elemental:

Elemental Oath -- In addition to existing effects, now increases spell damage done by the Shaman by 5/10% while Elemental Focus Clearcasting is active.

Elemental Mastery -- Overhauled. Now increases the Shaman’s critical strike chance by 20% for 30 seconds. Cooldown remains 3 minutes. We recognize this might be a slight nerf in certain PvP situations where players relied on the shaman to nuke an injured person to death. Still, I'm betting most shamans will prefer the new design.

Glyph of Lightning Bolt -- No longer affects cost. Now increases damage by 4%.

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Thanks for the update.

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Q u o t e:
Hopefully this won't get buried here.

Here is what we are thinking about to try on the PTR for Elemental:

Elemental Oath -- In addition to existing effects, now increases spell damage done by the Shaman by 5/10% while Elemental Focus Clearcasting is active.

Elemental Mastery -- Overhauled. Now increases the Shaman’s critical strike chance by 20% for 30 seconds. Cooldown remains 3 minutes. We recognize this might be a slight nerf in certain PvP situations where players relied on the shaman to nuke an injured person to death. Still, I'm betting most shamans will prefer the new design.

Glyph of Lightning Bolt -- No longer affects cost. Now increases damage by 4%.

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I like the changes to Elemental Oath and Elemental Mastery.

A flat 10% boost to our damage might not be enough to catch us up to Boomkins, but we'll see.

Glyph of Lightning Bolt would replace the Flametongue Weapon Glyph. For Lightning Bolt damage, the LB Glyph would increase our DPS by (.4*8% + .6*4%) for someone with 40% crit rate, or a ~7.3% increase to LB damage. Since we're losing 2% damage to Lightning Bolt by swapping out FT Weapon Glyph, it's a ~5% increase to LB damage which is probably what you were aiming for.

I do not want to seem negative GC but there is alot of crit out there right now gear wise. More crit is nice but I believe Elemental Shaman need more help with scaling with gear and how about give them a talent to summon elementals as perma-pets?

This would help solve the Elemental Shamans AoE problem some if the fire element is similar to the fire element pet now.

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Q u o t e:
Hopefully this won't get buried here.

Here is what we are thinking about to try on the PTR for Elemental:

Elemental Oath -- In addition to existing effects, now increases spell damage done by the Shaman by 5/10% while Elemental Focus Clearcasting is active.

Elemental Mastery -- Overhauled. Now increases the Shaman’s critical strike chance by 20% for 30 seconds. Cooldown remains 3 minutes. We recognize this might be a slight nerf in certain PvP situations where players relied on the shaman to nuke an injured person to death. Still, I'm betting most shamans will prefer the new design.

Glyph of Lightning Bolt -- No longer affects cost. Now increases damage by 4%.

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Why not leave EM as it is now, and simply add the 20% crit for 30sec? This way arena (an area where we are arguably the most handicapped) is not gimped while achieving the pve buffs you're looking for. I can't imagine this would make us OP... considering the sorry state of Ele now.