Shamanistic Rage: The Way of the Totems.
Shamanistic Rage is a Horde Review column specifically about the Shaman class in World of Warcraft. Each week RTC will be bringing you exciting and informative postings about every aspect of a shamans life inside the game, while adding his own dose of sarcasm and ranting. Expect Shamanistic Rage to bring you information for every spec from PVP to PVE as well as how the class fairs related to other classes on boss fights, battlegrounds, and even arena.
This week Shamanistic Rage discusses the different aspects and uses of the shaman in general. From DPS’ing as both melee and ranged, to healing, and even dare I say it…TANKING?!
Shamans, the kings of nature in the world of warcraft, have been through a lot of good times and bad times throughout the life of the game. All the way back to the vanilla days when shamans were exclusive to the Horde side. When an enhancement spec’d shaman with the Hand of Rag would come up to an ally player in a BG and basically one shot them with a crit Windfury proc. Sadly however, those days have long since passed. More recently shamans have had every reason under the sun to complain to blizzard about the nerfs from patch to patch. At one point, in WOTLK, shamans’ hp was so far behind other classes that it had to have a direct buff to compensate. Thankfully the life of a shaman isn’t always lined with such terrible chains of nerfs.
One of the amazing parts about being a shaman though, are diversity of play styles all slapped together into one interesting class. From being able to capably raid and/or tank heal even the hardest of content, to being a strong melee dps that brings a slew of great raid buffs, to even being one of the highest burst ranged classes with some fun mechanics and raid buffs as well. The heart of the shaman really lies in its ability to bring a wide range of group/raid buffs to the table. Spell power increases, Melee and Spell haste increases, Stat increases, and even AoE slow’s can be found within the power of the shamans totems. These totems, which are unique only to the shaman, are what really set them apart from the rest of the games classes. Although this does also add a sort of complicated side to them that, for some, goes unseen. Simply put, the whole idea of totems and their uses as buffs, damage mitigating moves, and even aggressive maneuvers needs to be masted to truly play a shaman to its full potential. However, proper uses of such things in PVP and PVE will be discussed in depth in a later week 
So for this week we will take a deep look into what it really means to be a shaman, how it is that they can delve into so many areas of expertise in a raiding group, and we may even answer that age old question…can shamans realistically TANK?
Experiencing a DPS shaman over the course of the last expansion or two is much like riding a roller-coaster. At times your enjoying yourself and flying high through the air at a speed that makes you feel untouchable. Then without a moments notice you take a dive that just makes you feel like your insides are going to erupt. To put it lightly, being a DPS shaman…is anything but easy, but extremely rewarding!
Enhancement
Ah, enhancement. What a brilliantly laid out spec that really makes you embrace both melee dps combined with the power of nature. Between the different type of shock abilities to the magnificent Stormstrike ability it really does shine nowadays. However, the most notable ability of the enhancement shaman is Windfury. Although it has had its share of nerfs, it is an amazing and unique ability in and of itself. Everything about enhancement makes you feel mobile and fast. Dual-wielding is the name of the game and your white attacks (aka auto-attacks) hit like a truck. Combine that with the power to unleash all kinds of natural fury from wind to fire to frost and you really see some crazy action while playing Enhancement. As of 3.3 this spec is completely comparable in a raiding enviroment and has seen some great buffs as well as some promising abilities for the next expansion.
Elemental
Not many things can bring down the havoc of the storms upon your enemies like the Elemental Shaman. Summoning the power of lightning and being able to burst their opponents to oblivion. Elemental is one of those specs that you just absolutely adore because your able to see extremely large and constant critical strikes while dps’ing your enemies. Top that off with some great buffing totems open to only the elemental shaman and the ability to cast Thunderstorm and punt all enemies around you 30yd or more away, and your feeling of power is unlimited. Elemental stands up well against other casters in raids, and is even adored because of the great buffs they bring for their fellow casters. Few classes take less damage while stunned like the elemental shaman can, which is a great way to counter rogues. Destroying your opponents in a battleground is just something everyone should experience as an elemental shaman. If you’ve ever wanted to wield the power of nature in a way that makes you feel like you have the power to drop even the toughest opponents in seconds, this is your ticket.
Personally, my favorite aspect of the shaman is in restoration. What other class has the ability to summon ancestral spirits into battle to help heal your comrades by just hitting critically with a spell? Its amazing. Healing as a shaman is one of the most diverse things you can do in the game. You can be a completely capable tank healer, or raid healer, or even both simultaneously. Although some classes do excel more than a shaman in ONE of these areas at a time. The ability to change play styles on the fly during bosses is where a shaman really shines while healing. They are a true hybrid healer. Some important aspects come from the ability to hasten the speed of their slowest spell, or make their fastest spell crit more often to allow for more healing at a higher speed, and this all becomes activated by my favorite ability in the resto tree, Riptide. An instant cast heal that applies a buff and Heal over Time (HoT). The buff allows your next chain heal to consume the HoT for a more powerful chain heal. Speaking of which, chain heal is probably the most well known and unique ability to the class. Being able to jump to other targets in your raid that need healing (up to 5 targets if glyphed) makes it an extremely useful and fun raid healing spell. It hits hard even on its last jump and most shamans stack haste just to make sure they can pump this specific spell out as fast as possible to keep their raiders alive. Overall the funnest part of being a shaman healer is only felt once you can safely and correctly abuse the use of totems and all the different healing tools you have. Once you realize how powerful you can be in any aspect of healing during a raid or PVP, you start to understand how just slightly changing your healing style from boss to boss or even in a battleground or arena, can in many ways decide the outcome.
To put it bluntly and somewhat short, yes and no. I know its confusing, but there was a time when shamans were thought to be viable tanks (I know, crazy huh?) and there are even some folks out there who still believe it is possible and even fewer who actually MAKE it possible. So basically YES it is possible, however, it is not truly ‘viable’ unless you completely out gear the raid or instance your trying to tank. On top of that the aggro issue is quite a pain being a shaman tank. But I decided I would go ahead and confront this rumor/myth/legend in my first weeks article for this shaman column. Below is a link to a youtube account where you can an amazingly talented and capable shaman tank who shows you EXACTLY how he does what he does.
http://www.youtube.com/user/sharicasmi
Check back here each week for content articles devoted to the shaman class. I will be touching on every topic from specs to PVP/PVE play styles as well as tips and tricks you need to play your shaman successfully. So keep up to date on this new column folks! You may even see a few shaman specific leveling guides in the near future!
Out Standing RTC Glad to see you back on here.