Concillian,Aug 16 2005, 11:27 AM Wrote:Mana Tide is the only 'must have' raiding totem, and it requires so many relatively low-usefulness talents to get there it's ridiculous.
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Oh how true is that? The shaman restoration tree sucks. It looks OK on paper for some of the talents but it's really a lot like the priest holy tree. Natures swiftness is cool but not as cool as it is for a druid since it's a 1357 to 1561 heal for a shaman vs a 1890 to 2230 heal for a druid that you are instant casting. Though both of those should have some talents to make them better. Mana tide is nice but requires 10 points in crappy talents.
* Improved healing wave simply puts healing wave in line with the paladins blessing of light.
* Tidal focus is one of the good talents
* Ancestral healing is the priests inspiration talent and is of minimal benefit for both classes.
* Improved Reincarnate only helps if you are going to wipe a lot and the improvement is as actually less valuable than the Paladins revelation talent.
* Totemic Focus is OK but nothing to write home about.
* Eventide is pretty much pointless since the two totems it buffs are very weak anyway but is required for mana tide (it's required for improved mana spring which is required for mana tide)
* Combat endurance is pointless. 10% continued health regen is nothing.
* Improved lesser healing wave gets you 75% chance to not be interrupted on your short cast heal. It helps solo, it helps very little in raids or party where the shaman is not likely to be getting hit if they are doing a lot of healing.
* Improved Healing Stream - I think this takes the highest rank of this poor totem from 14 to 17 health every 2 seconds from the totem. This is just a very poor blessing of sanctuary really as 17 health every 2 seconds isn't realy healing it's more of a damage mitigation type deal.
* Tidal Mastery is good. 5% more crit on your heals and lightning spells is nice.
* Improved Mana Spring. Required for mana tide. Goes from 10 to 12 mana every 2 seconds for 22 seconds (12 +10 from eventide) to those in the totem range. Blessing of wisdom destroys this as does the improved blessing of wisdom talent. Besides it's a water totem and you will use mana tide over this anyway.
* Natures Swiftness. Very good talent but as mentioned not as good for a shaman as a druid.
* Purification. 10% better heal spells since you are this deep in the tree is not a bad talen. But you are 25 points in to get it.
* Mana tide totem. 140 mana every 3 seconds for 12 seconds to all in 20 yards is a good totem. This is a better talent than Holy Nova and is good enough to get people to get the other crappy talents in the tree. But again there are other opportunity costs to getting this talent. No improved windfurry or even the ability to pary (yes shaman have to spec to get parry, 21 points into enhancement). No elemental fury which is what really makes shaman rough in PvP because it does huge things to your shock crits. So not only do you take a bunch of bad healing talents on a class that is your #3 healing choice for hord but you give up some other very powerful talents to get it.
So yeah, shaman have things to complain about for end game PvE as well. :)
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It's all just zeroes and ones and duct tape in the end.
It's all just zeroes and ones and duct tape in the end.