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WoW Classic Shaman Overview

World of Warcraft fans finally got to experience the old version of the game with the WoW Classic's release. It brought back the nostalgic quest lines and old gameplay mechanics from the Vanilla version of the game. Vanilla has a unique style of gameplay that has almost nothing in common with the modern version. Shamans are one of the game's unique classes, and in this guide, you will learn everything you need to know about them.

Table of Content:

  1. Shaman Class Overview
  2. Available Races
  3. Shaman Gear
  4. Shaman Totems and Why They are Important?
  5. Basic Totem Rules
  6. Earthbind Kiting
  7. Leveling Tips
  8. Combat Efficiency and Specializations
  9. What is Downranking?
  10. Why Should you Choose Shaman?
  11. WoW Classic Boosting and Its Benefits

Shaman Class Overview         

Shaman is one of the most versatile classes in WoW. They can fight on the front line, stay back and cast spells, give consistent heals, and even tank to some extend if needed. They are one of the few classes with more strengths than weaknesses as you can see below:

Strengths:

  • They have high mobility.
  • Very high burst damage.
  • Excellent group utility.
  • One of the most flexible talents.
  • The Totems, unique only for them.
  • They can heal allies and also self-heal.
  • Pretty much a second Heard tone with the ability Ancestral Recall.
  • They can reincarnate and come back to life.
  • Incredible kite potential.
  • They can also tank, but it's not the most ideal.

Weaknesses:

  • They use quite a lot of mana, so you need to manage your mana continually.
  • A large number of key binds can be a problem for some players.
  • Shamans struggle with multiple targets.
  • They don't have hard crowd control.
  • Very high skill cap.

Shaman Guide Enhancement Build

Available Races 

In World of Warcraft Classic, Shamans are exclusive to the Horde Faction. This gives you three race options to choose from Orcs, Trolls, Taurens.

For PvE

Orc Shaman with enhancement specialization is very good because you have the attack power-on-demand burst, cooldown with Blood fury that will help you throughout every stage of the game. You have a 25% resistance to stuns. And plus five Axe specialization. This is going to help you against glancing blows and increase your DPS significantly. However, for PvE Trolls Shaman with Restoration or Elemental specializations are going to be the best choice.

For PvP

Here you can choose between Orc and Tauren as they are both excellent options. You maybe have a little bit more of an edge with Orc if you are playing Enhancement. But for Restoration and Elemental, Taurens are the better choice. The increased health is always great, especially on a Shaman, and there is a unique interaction between War stomp and Totems.

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Shaman Gear

Shamans can use almost every weapon in the game except swords and all the armor types except plate. That makes them have a large variety of upgrade options for their gear as they are not bound to one type of weapon or armor. The stats important for Shamans are Agility, Hit, and Critical Strike, but the priority of them can be different, depending on the talents that you decide to use. This class brings incredible utility. They are one of the best support classes being at it's best while helping others.

Shaman Totems and Why They are Important?

Totems are a significant part of a Shaman's toolkit and that's what really makes them unique. They provide player and party-wide utility in the forms of DPS, damage mitigation and reduction, resistances, debuff removal, resource regeneration. These totems are unlocked as you level up from four different quests. At level 4 you have a quest for your Earth Totem. At level 10 you have a quest for your Fire Totem. At level, you have a quest for your Water Totem. And at level 30 you have a quest for your Air Totem.

Different Element Types of Totems

Earth Totem

  • This is the first totem that you will obtain, which is at level 4.
  • Earth Totems are usually defensive in some way however, there are some significant exceptions.

Fire Totem

  • This is the second totem that you will obtain, which is at level 10.
  • Most fire totems are usually offensive in some way by providing damage over time effect to a single target, area of effect fire damage, or a weapon enhancement.
  • There is one exception to this, which is Frost Resistance Totem that provides resistance to frost damage.

Water Totem

  • This is the third totem obtained at level 20
  • Water Totems are supportive in nature. They either regenerate resources, they provide debuff cleansing. or they provide resistance.

Air Totem

  • This is the last totem obtained at level 30.
  • Air Totems have many different useful effects. They can increase damage, increase damage reductions, provide resistance in the form of nature resistance, act as a threat reduction, and even for some reconnaissance.

WoW Classic Shaman Guide - Hybrid Build

Basic Totem Rules

  • Only one totem of each element type can be down at any one time.
  • Totem effects are either player or party-wide if you are by yourself, only you are receiving the benefits of your totems, and if you are in a party, your entire party receives the benefit is they are in the range of the totem.
  • Totems are on the Global Cooldown, so when you click a totem, it will cause up a Global Cooldown to elapse. It will take a global of three Global Cooldowns to place all four of your totems down.
  • Totems need to be in the line of sight of the player and party member in order for the totem to work. If you are behind a wall, the totem cannot see you, therefore it cannot provide you the benefit.
  • · Most totems in the game are pulsing, which means that they produce their effect not all the time but in waves.
  • Totems of each element type are always placed in the same position around you.
  • The Fire Totem is in front of you on the felt side.
  • The Earth Totem s always in front of you on the right side.
  • The Water Totem is behind you, on the right side.
  • And The Air Totem is behind you, on the left side.
  • All of this means is that you may have to start planning where you are standing and where you are looking, depending on where you put your totems, because it may affect the range of effect that you are trying to produce.

Earthbind Kiting 

At level 6, you get your Earthbind totem. This totem slows enemies by 50%. Now, hot get an advantage from this. When a mob attacks you and gets afflicted by the Earthbind totem, then you hit the mob, and then you have side strafe through the mob, out of range of its hitbox, but you need to make sure not expose your back because if it is, your are susceptible to the daze mechanic. This way, you can trade one hit for one hit. Mobs out in the open world generally have a higher movement speed and attack speed than you. By applying this slow and then weaving in and out of range of the mob's hitbox, you're effectively negating both of those advantages, and you are trading one hit for one hit with that mob. If you have a really slow weapon and your mob is attacking really fast, you get the best result of this method.

Leveling Tips

When it comes to leveling, there are a few things you can do that can help you be more efficient:

  • Kill mobs with the best XP to time ratio, this means killing mobs that are one or two levels lower you, this will increase your XP per hover.
  • Dungeons are not the best way to level fast; it's much better to do quests that are easy to get to and easy to complete.
  • Front-load your spells and abilities, you don't want to stagger your abilities throughout the fight.
  • Resist the urge to refresh Lightning shield halfway through and stop your spirit-based mana regeneration.
  • Keep everything on cooldown and constantly regenerating, you never want to be at full resources. You always want to be regenerating stuff on cooldown.
  • Be adaptive with your damage rotation cycle. You don't want to overkill the mob but to get full value out of your spells and abilities.

Shaman Guide - Elemental Build

Combat Efficiency and Specializations

In World of Warcraft Classic, there are only 51 talent points, but Shamans have a large number of talent combinations to choose from. They are one of the few classes that have good hybrid builds at their disposal. Here are some of the most popular builds for Shaman:

A Slow Two-handed Weapon with Rockbiter

This is one of the most efficient damage setups. With Windfury, you don't know when or if it's going to proc, and you have the potential to overkill a mob. This is why you get Rockbiter, it scales really well with slow weapons, and you have access to the Earthbind kiting method because you will be using a slower weapon. You get more value from Storm Strike because it gives you an instant second attack, regardless of your weapon speed. You also have a better value out of Perry.

Rotation for slow two-handed weapon with Rockbiter:

  1. Lay down your totems
  2. Apply Lightning Shield
  3. Pull with Lightning Bolt
  4. Auto-attack and wait for a Flurry or Windfury proc
  5. Use Stormstrike immediately after the firs auto-attack
  6. Cast max rank Earth Shock or Frost Shock

Elemental Caster 

This is the second most efficient damage setup you have. It has extremely high PvP potential. Once you have Elemental Mastery and you have your Lightning bolt's fast cast speed, you will have insane single target kill speed. And if you do /sit against mobs, and  proc Eye of the storm, you will get 100% resistance to push back. However, the main disadvantage is that you can't mitigate damage from Earthbind kiting.

Rotation for Elemental Caster:

  1. Lay down your totems
  2. Cast max rank Lightning Bolt until the mob gets in melee range
  3. Apply Lightning Shield as soon as the mon enters melee range
  4. Begin White-hitting

WoW Classic Shaman Guide - Resto Build

Fast One-handed Weapon with a Shield 

With this talent build, you have a Consistent DPS and a pretty quick leveling from 1-40. But you have low PvP potential. Having a shield can be beneficial in combination with a fast, one-handed weapon. Also, you want to have Windfury, not Flametongue, because the math supports that Windfury excelled more when you have more opportunities to proc it.

Rotation for Fast One-handed Weapon with a Shield :

  1. Lay down your totems
  2. Apply Lightning Shield
  3. Pull with Lightning Bolt
  4. Auto-attack and wait for a Flurry or Windfury proc
  5. Use Stormstrike immediately after the firs auto-attack
  6. Cast max rank Earth Shock or Frost Shock

Restoration Healing Shaman 

With your talent points, all spend on the Restoration tree, you won't really have any damage potential in fights, so it's good to avoid any PvP confrontations. A Restoration Shaman shines in a group with other players, but you need to have the right gear to be a good healer. Your healing gear priorities are +Healing, Intellect, and Spirit. When it comes to rotation, there really is no such thing, because healing is a situational reactive type of activity. However, it's essential to understand Downranking's concept because it is vital in order to become a good healer. As a Restoration Shaman, you have three healing abilities, Lesser Healing Wave, Healing Wave, and Chine heal. Using the most mana efficient ranks of Lesser Healing Wave and Healing Wave will ensure that you don't run out of mana too fast.

What is Downranking?

Downranking is the intentional use of lower ranks of spells to increase your mana efficiency. It can be done with any class with mana, and it's usable for most of the spells. Healers more commonly use downranking, but it can be used by DPS classes too. 

Why Should you Choose Shaman?

Shamans bring some truly unique group utility. They perform incredibly well in a group with other players, but they can also be good on their own. Shamans have many different play styles that can fit the way you like to play the game.

WoW Classic Boosting and Its Benefits

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Author Eugency
Published 2022-09-24
Views 1126