06-24-2005, 08:05 PM
So I have a shaman who I play with a warlock friend of mine. I find myself being the main healer and main tank in ALOT of situations. We often end up with a group of shaman, warlock, mage, rogue, rogue. I'm not sure we have ever grouped with a warrior, druid, or priest. :blink: I'm hoping this changes because I don't know how many more instances we can do with me being both tank and healer. (we are around 28 currently) I pretty much end up shocking a mob a few times and chain healing myself while everyone else beats up on mobs. This seems to keep me alive and keep the mobs on me instead of them attacking the other people.
So the bits of my build that I know I want to keep:
Elemental Mastery
Concussion Rank 5
Convection Rank 5
Reverberation Rank 5
Elemental Focus Rank 1
Elemental Total: 16
Restoration Mastery
Tidal Focus Rank 5
Totemic Focus Rank 5
Improved Lesser Healing Wave Rank 5
Restoration Total: 15
Total
Total Points Spent: 31
Level Required: 40
This basically gets me good shocks as well as healing that is cheaper to cast and less likely to be interupted. The question is, where do I go with the last 20 points? There are lots of options I think.
I really like the idea of 5 in Call of Thunder and 1 in Elemental Fury because it improves my shocks even more and I use them quite a bit. if I did that it also opens up the option for 8 points to get Lightning Mastery or 9 to get Elemental Mastery. This is tempting because it makes chain lightning and regular lightning bolt more viable. In my current role it wouldn't be all that useful, but a shaman generally is backup healer and not the main tank. So if things start changing towards that then I could stay back and use my spells while keeping an eye on my mana so I could have some available if additional healing is required.
I could use 6 points to get Nature's Swiftness. This seems promising because with me both tanking and healing alot, an instant big heal could come in handy.
I could put 5 in Ancestral Knowledge. This is a pretty simple idea, more mana means more healing and more shocksghtning. I like this alot. This also opens up the option of putting 2 in Improved Ghost Wolf and 3 in Improved Lightning Shield. IGW would help in situations where I need to run away from a fight (I don't PvP so that doesn't matter and this is a PvE server as well). ILS would be more damage for while I am tanking. My problem here though is that I'm hoping to get out of the tanking roll some which makes me not like ILS that much. Its just too reactive of a skill for my liking. I have to be getting hit for it to do any good. I much prefer skills where I choose when to do damage instead of ones where its up to the mobs. I could also get Thundering Strikes and Flurry for improved melee. If I went that far I would be tempted to look at Parry as well, but then I would have to pull 1 point from elemental probably.
So there are alot of ways I can go from here. I'm leaning away from the melee route and more towards healing and elemental. I like the idea of improving my shocks so am strongly leaning towards Elemental Fury. So that would use up 6 points, leaving me with 14. From here it seems like I have to choose lightning or healing. I currently don't use my lightning skills very much, but I am unsure how much that will change. Having the 5 points in call of thunder tends to encourage me to go further in improving my lightning as well, but yet nature's swiftness just seems so useful as well. So I don't really know what to do here. I could get Nature's Swiftness and Lightning mastery. I could get Nature's Swiftness, Ancestral Knowledge, and Improved Ghost Wolf (leaving one more point somewhere). I could get Elemental Mastery and Ancestral Knowledge. I just don't know which way to go. So I'm looking for advice from people here. What would you do? What do you think are the pros and cons of the various routes? Help me! :)
So the bits of my build that I know I want to keep:
Elemental Mastery
Concussion Rank 5
Convection Rank 5
Reverberation Rank 5
Elemental Focus Rank 1
Elemental Total: 16
Restoration Mastery
Tidal Focus Rank 5
Totemic Focus Rank 5
Improved Lesser Healing Wave Rank 5
Restoration Total: 15
Total
Total Points Spent: 31
Level Required: 40
This basically gets me good shocks as well as healing that is cheaper to cast and less likely to be interupted. The question is, where do I go with the last 20 points? There are lots of options I think.
I really like the idea of 5 in Call of Thunder and 1 in Elemental Fury because it improves my shocks even more and I use them quite a bit. if I did that it also opens up the option for 8 points to get Lightning Mastery or 9 to get Elemental Mastery. This is tempting because it makes chain lightning and regular lightning bolt more viable. In my current role it wouldn't be all that useful, but a shaman generally is backup healer and not the main tank. So if things start changing towards that then I could stay back and use my spells while keeping an eye on my mana so I could have some available if additional healing is required.
I could use 6 points to get Nature's Swiftness. This seems promising because with me both tanking and healing alot, an instant big heal could come in handy.
I could put 5 in Ancestral Knowledge. This is a pretty simple idea, more mana means more healing and more shocksghtning. I like this alot. This also opens up the option of putting 2 in Improved Ghost Wolf and 3 in Improved Lightning Shield. IGW would help in situations where I need to run away from a fight (I don't PvP so that doesn't matter and this is a PvE server as well). ILS would be more damage for while I am tanking. My problem here though is that I'm hoping to get out of the tanking roll some which makes me not like ILS that much. Its just too reactive of a skill for my liking. I have to be getting hit for it to do any good. I much prefer skills where I choose when to do damage instead of ones where its up to the mobs. I could also get Thundering Strikes and Flurry for improved melee. If I went that far I would be tempted to look at Parry as well, but then I would have to pull 1 point from elemental probably.
So there are alot of ways I can go from here. I'm leaning away from the melee route and more towards healing and elemental. I like the idea of improving my shocks so am strongly leaning towards Elemental Fury. So that would use up 6 points, leaving me with 14. From here it seems like I have to choose lightning or healing. I currently don't use my lightning skills very much, but I am unsure how much that will change. Having the 5 points in call of thunder tends to encourage me to go further in improving my lightning as well, but yet nature's swiftness just seems so useful as well. So I don't really know what to do here. I could get Nature's Swiftness and Lightning mastery. I could get Nature's Swiftness, Ancestral Knowledge, and Improved Ghost Wolf (leaving one more point somewhere). I could get Elemental Mastery and Ancestral Knowledge. I just don't know which way to go. So I'm looking for advice from people here. What would you do? What do you think are the pros and cons of the various routes? Help me! :)