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With every change a development house like Blizzard makes to one of their games, inevitably someone will complain. Such has been the case with every class review thus far made for World of Warcraft (WoW), though sometimes, the complaints ring a bit truer than others.

In upcoming patch 1.11, both the Mage and Shaman classes are getting their respective talent trees redone. While the Mage review wasn’t stunning, it at least made numerous builds viable for PvE encounters. Quite the opposite for the Shaman review, which continues to pigeon-hole Shamans into a healing role in raid settings.

The complaints many are finding with the review is in response to the problems associated with the class since WoW’s release. First and foremost is the fact that the Shaman is supposed to be a more caster-oriented version of the Alliance’s Paladin class, the more melee-oriented counterpart. I’ve discussed the comparison of the two classes before, and while my respect for Paladins has grown, my concern for the future of the two classes has as well.

At this time, the Paladin serves as a decent PvP combatant, and is able to use talent points to pump up his damage-per-second (DPS). Some have argued that when properly specced, a Paladin is able to meet or even exceed the DPS of a properly specced Shaman, despite the Shaman’s go-to ability Windfury, which not only increases a Shaman’s attack power, but also gives a chance to land two extra hits on a normal melee strike. While I would dispute that an Enhancement-specced Shaman can be outdone by a Paladin specced for similar melee damage, the point remains that a Paladin’s melee DPS can be pumped up high enough to make an adequate showing as the Shaman counterpart for the Alliance.

This is all well and good, because as we know, the Paladin is the melee version of the Shaman, so we should expect his melee DPS to be high, which compliments his high armor. What sets the Shaman ahead of the Paladin in terms of DPS is the Shaman’s spells, which are high-damaging, despite the mana cost involved. This again corresponds nicely with the class’ armor rating, as casters are expected to die quicker, though kill quicker as well.

The Shaman talent review has only solidified the idea that Shaman DPS is rooted in their spells. While Enhancement builds are still doable, and allow high melee damage, Shamans are expected to take a DPS hit if they focus away from their spells. Sadly, a downgraded base Windfury ability as of 1.11, makes melee strikes weaker and less complimentary to Shaman spells. On the plus side, the Elemental tree, which accentuates spell casting for Shamans, has been buffed, which means that Shamans will maintain an edge in PvP combat, and will continue to be recognized for having high DPS, even if it’s not sustainable due to a smaller mana pool than other casters.

The changes thus far discussed are fair, and one can easily liken the Enhancement tree to the Rogue’s Combat tree, in that it focuses on sustainable damage (albeit with burst improvements due to Windfury and Flurry). However, it seems clear that Blizzard’s objective is to force players away from melee damage when it comes to the Shaman, and instead view such damage as a backup form of DPS. These changes are reasonably fair, and still allow two viable DPS builds, where one is higher in damage but forgoes available mana that the other can use for heals.

The problem comes in when one looks at what the two aforementioned trees are used for: DPS. More particularly, it’s solo DPS, or at most, five-man DPS where the Shaman can still support the group by off-healing or dropping appropriate totems. It is here that the Paladin no longer becomes a counterpart for the Shaman, but succeeds in surpassing a Shaman’s utility in a group setting.

As many others have said in the past, and now shout in response to the 1.11 Shaman changes, Paladins are able to offer a mobile aura to the groups they support. What’s more, they can place buffs on individuals in their party and their raid group prior to battle, and these buffs remain mobile with the characters they were cast on. Since the buffs can be cast before combat, they also do not interrupt mana generation mid-combat, since casting anything while in combat gives a mana regeneration hit for a certain amount of seconds.

The Shaman class, on the otherhand, does not have a mobile aura, or castable buffs. Rather, all the buffs the Shaman has are stationary, since they’re tied to the Shaman’s totems. As soon as a party member gets out of the totem’s radius, the individual loses the respective buff. What’s more, totems only affect those individuals in the Shaman’s party, must be cast in combat to make use of their short duration and inability to follow the group, and interrupt mana generation whenever they are dropped. To add to the shortfalls, AoE attacks, and enemy players, can take out the totems and effectively “purge” the buffs everyone in the Shaman’s group gets. Effectively, totems are not nearly as good as Paladin auras/buffs, and since no change was announced that Blizzard would change the very nature by which totems work, Shamans will continue to be a poor support class in end-game raiding, especially since more and more PvE encounters require movement beyond a totem’s radius to overcome particular battles.

The Shaman has thus far been relegated to the role of a healer in end-game PvE. This is a significant complaint among Shamans, but to be fair, Paladin’s are considered same, with the added bonus of being a mana-battery, buff-bot, and debuff cleanser. Neither class is usually welcomed on the front-line, and neither class is expected to be played anything like they are in five-man groups (or as they solo), compared to how they are in a raid. The difference is that a Paladin, regardless of spec, can still heal, buff, and cleanse in a raid in an effective manner, while the only Shamans regularly invited to raids are those who are Restoration specced.

Admittedly, Blizzard made some nice changes to the Restoration tree, but unfortunately, they did not go far enough. Mana Tide, the 31-point talent that most raid groups expect Shamans to have, strongly limits where Shamans can put talent points. This seems doubly silly when one considers that Mages are now getting Evocation (formerly an 11-point talent) for free as of 1.11, which allows them to regenerate mana for themselves. Similarly, the 31-point Druid talent Innnervate will similarly be given to all Druids for free, while its former place in its respective talent tree will receive a new healing-specific ability. Yet, despite these changes, Shamans do not gain Mana Tide for free as of 1.11, which does the same thing as Evocation and Innervate, albeit to more people. The issue isn’t even that they should get it for free, but that they shouldn’t be forced into spending 31 points in the Restoration tree just to be able to receive routine raid invites. In effect, Shamans, unlike Paladins, will continue to be expected to spec one particular way in order to raid, while their Paladin counterparts remain better raid partners, while still maintaining their ability to do good DPS.

Interestingly enough, since the Druid patch (1.08), Druids have been viable in raid scenarios even without Innnervate, while no such claims are regularly made for Shamans without Mana Tide. With this in mind, it seems strange that a powerful talent not seen as mandatory for Druids should be given to all Druids, while a talent that is seen as mandatory for all Shamans is left to the purview of only Restoration Shamans.

What can be done? Unfortunately, it looks like the Shaman review overlooked the core problems of the class and instead decided to buff things that didn’t need buffing. Rather, the core mechanics of how totems worked (or don’t work depending on one’s perspective) needs to be analyzed. A number of good suggetsions have been given on the WoW Shaman forum, to include a simple AoE change to totems to make them process on raid members in addition to party members. This would make dropping totems pay off more, despite their inability to move with the group. Giving Mana Tide to all Shamans for free would also greatly impact the class, since less raids would require Shamans to heavily invest in the Restoration tree. Finally, some sort of “buff” to the party if an Enhancement Shaman is along would give more use to the class, akin to a Druid’s Leader of the Pack talent. Or, a “debuff” on enemies for an appropriate Elemental ability would benefit the class, such that Elemental builds have a similar purpose for being invited to raids.

For classes who are expected to support their parties and raids, more than one build needs to be viable for end-game PvE. As it stands, with 1.11 going live in the next couple weeks, Shamans will still only be feared for their PvP prowess, while nothing they do aside from healing and dropping Mana Tide totems actually helps them support their allies, which is precisely where the review should have been looking. Hopefully, Blizzard will address these issues prior to 1.11 (or more realistically, in future patches), else many of us who have played Shamans will be forced to spend all of our time on the Battlegrounds, and outside of the instances that make up such a large portion of the game.

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