Some thoughts about Cataclysm Shaman Preview...

There! first classsss! woooot! ... eh ok, it is not that exciting... well, some are quite interesting, but overall really not much to be amazed. Come on Blizzard, no buff to my beloved lightning bolt? :D

Anyway, here's some of my thoughts about that blue post.


New Spells

Primal Strike - Primal Strike is a new weapon-based attack that every shaman will learn very early in the game. Our goal with this ability is to make leveling as Enhancement rather than as Elemental more viable, since many key Enhancement talents become available at fairly high levels.

as stated, it is supposed to be a low level Stormstrike, which would probably be useless for other trees, but this also be useful for other trees as some sort of support instant damage, particularly in pvp situation (say if usable if silenced, or able to couple with a shock to do more damage, for a killing blow or support damage, etc), we will see when actual spell detail is revealed.

Healing Wave - While the shaman already has an ability called Healing Wave, we're adding another spell to the class's direct-healing arsenal and giving it a familiar name. The current Healing Wave will be renamed Greater Healing Wave, and the intent is for the 'new" Healing Wave to be the shaman's go-to heal. Lesser Healing Wave and Greater Healing Wave will be used on a more situational basis.

so this is a middle spell between the 1.5 lesser healing wave and 2.5 (spec-ed) healing wave.... I doubt the usefulness of this but yea I don't heal a lot, so.... whatever! :D or we should understand it like a down ranked version of original healing wave, this change is to add in "mana management" back to the game instead of only choosing from fast and slow spell. However our previous go-to heal was a down ranked chain heal instead of healing wave, so how will our healing change? we will see.

Unleash Weapon (level 81): Unleashes the power of your weapon enchants for additional effects (see below). A dual-wielding Enhancement shaman will activate the effects of both of their weapon enchants. Instant cast. 30-yard range. 15-second cooldown. Undispellable.

Here are a few examples of effects we're considering for this ability:

• Windfury Weapon – Hurls a spectral version of your weapon at a target, dealing 50% weapon damage and increasing the shaman's Haste for the next five swings.
• Flametongue Weapon – Deals instant Fire damage and buffs the shaman's next Fire attack by 20%.
• Earthliving Weapon – Heals the target slightly and buffs the shaman's next healing spell by 20%.

this is some NOT very interesting spell, and lots of questions about this. Does it work like a hunter's mark with few minutes duration? or does it work like another flame shock? Either way it will just increase the complexity of our dps rotation, I do not like it thanks! hohohohoho~ anyway we still need more information about this before drawing any conclusion.
update: oops, some guildie pointed out my misunderstanding, looks like it is similar to old flame shock, it is an instant spell, plus a debuff, which will be consumed by next Fire Spell, so how it will affect elemental rotation will be like: Flame Shock > Unleash Weapon > Lava Burst > LB LB LB LB LB > Unleash Weapon > Lava Burst > etc, it will very likely reduce a lightning bolt per rotation due to it should be sharing same gcd with other spells, so unless the initial damage + the 20% buff is more than 1 lightning bolt (assuming DoT damage not be affected, nor it will not be consumed by a DoT tick), we may still be using our wrath rotation, but we will see once they release some actual number, or detail about talent modifier for this.

Healing Rain (level 83): An area-effect heal-over-time (HoT) spell that calls down rain in a selected area, healing all players within it. There is no limit to the number of players who can potentially be affected; however, there are diminishing returns when healing a large number of targets, much like the diminishing returns associated with AoE damage spells. This should give Restoration shaman another healing tool that improves their group-healing and heal-over-time capabilities. 2-second cast time. 30-yard range. 10-second duration. 10-second cooldown.

"2-second cast time. 30-yard range. 10-second duration. 10-second cooldown." sounds like a  HoT version of circle of healing tiny tranquility to me without the limit to number of players. Would it be like our magma totem before the buff? like become some joke HoT while there are too many people inside the circle? cannot give a "wow" or a "lol" before they release some actual number.

Spiritwalker's Grace (level 85): When this self-targeted buff is active, your spells are no longer interrupted by movement and possibly even by your own attacks. This will give shaman of all three specs another way to heal or do damage when it’s necessary to move in both PvE and PvP. Instant cast. 10-second duration. 2-minute cooldown.

this is the most exciting one, wow that would be really awesome if you really can do full dps while moving during that 10 seconds, or do a few full big heal in arena while still moving away from your enemies. This sounds really overpowered if coupled with spirit link, and 2 minutes sounds short enough that you can use multiple times during a boss fight or arena... but then again, it is not finalized, they can always take it away right before the actual expansion like spirit link in wrath, better not to put too much expectation into this.

Changes to Abilities and Mechanics

Restoration shaman and other healing classes will need to pay attention to mana more than they've had to during Wrath of the Lich King. Spirit will be the Restoration shaman's primary mana-regeneration stat.

this issue had been repeated many times if you had read these news regularly. oi, Blizzard, some number please...

We're making changes to which classes and specs are able to dispel magic, diseases, curses, and poison, largely for PvP purposes. Shaman will have Cleanse Spirit as a baseline ability, but it will only remove curses. Restoration shaman will have a talent that will improve Cleanse Spirit so that it also removes magic. Shaman will no longer be able to remove poison.

they have just revealed a whole new offensive / defensive dispel combination for all classes, this in fact mainly affects PvP more than PvE, we will see how it goes when it comes to action.

Cleansing Totem will be removed from the game, as we want dispels to be a decision for players, not something done mindlessly. To that end, all dispels will cost slightly more mana, and you will waste the spell if you cast it when there is nothing to remove. (Currently, the dispel is only cast when there is something to remove, which encourages spamming 'just in case.") We will balance PvE dispelling with this new model in mind.

encounters like Yogg Saron+x will become much more harder I can imagine as you do not just waste mana but also wasted a chance to heal if you did a false dispel. Unless they are not going to make this kind of dispel intensive counter any more, this would be a pain in the ass for us 300-400ms players... because instead of spamming the dispel button so it can land as soon as the curse goes up, you have to wait for the whole 400ms for the curse to come up, dispel makes 400ms to go to the server, then wait for another 400ms to see if the curse is gone and decide to cast it again or not.... that is over 1 tick already, good luck on that.

Totem of Wrath now will replace Flametongue Totem for all shaman, and dropping this totem will buff the group's spell power by 4%. Elemental shaman will have a talent that lets all Fire totems provide +10% spell power, allowing them to drop Searing, Magma, or Fire Elemental Totems without losing their spell-damage buff. The 4% and 10% buffs will be exclusive with each other and with the warlock's Demonic Pact, so you can't benefit from all of them at once. We're also considering letting Elemental drop Searing Totem at range.

ok that's a reasonably nice change. If they are making searing totem to have the same duration as other buffing totems, I would be more happy.

We want to free up Enhancement global cooldowns to make the spec more dynamic to play. We're considering, for example, increasing the cooldown of Lava Lash so shaman have time to work other interesting abilities into their rotation.

care-o-meter + <------------------|-> - . :D

New Talents and Talent Changes

Elemental Reach will be simplified so shaman have a more consistent spell range.

Oh yeah finally, no more 25 Frost shock, 40 Flame Shock, 25 Wind Sear, 36 Lava Burst/Lightning Bolt/Chain Lightning, 20 Searing Totem, so the question is, what do we get instead? all 35? all 40? we still need to wait for some actual numbers.

We plan to add Earthquake as a deep Elemental talent for targeted and persistent AoE.

Hurray for real AoE damage! Add snare to it please~~ so it looks cooler! Even cooler if targets inside keeps getting knocked down, LOL!

Spirit Link will likely be worked back into deep Restoration in some form. The idea is that you will be able to link targets together so they share damage. When we had previously tried to implement Spirit Link, it was hard to balance and a little confusing. However, we really liked the concept -- and so did players -- so we are trying to bring it back.

...... I do not want to be disappointed again, so let us leave it be.

Elemental will have a deep talent that allows Spirit (which will appear on the gear they share with Restoration shaman) to boost their Hit rating.

Yea yea yea, you have said 1000 times that Elemental is going to share the same gears with Restoration, so there will be no hit on gears. The problem is, how does it actually scale? It makes sense to have spirit to hit in a ratio so that the hit converted will be same or very close to same level of hit on equivalent Dps cloth.

Ancestral Knowledge will boost mana pool size, not Intellect.

with the whole change of intellect becomes spell power, it makes sense to have this change. Will it be a great impact to our Dps due to the lost of crit from intellect? I am sure they will do something to compensate this in Mastery thing.

Enhancing Totems will be replaced with Focused Strikes, which will improve the damage of the new spell Primal Strike and Stormstrike.

care-o-meter + <------------------|-> - . :D

With the Mastery system, we're also considering removing a number of talents that grant passive bonuses, such as Mental Quickness, Improved Windfury Totem, Mental Dexterity, Call of Thunder, Tidal Mastery, Purification, Nature's Blessing, and others, to allow players more freedom to choose more interesting talents.

With like over 10 of those kind of talents gone, I do look forward to what they are adding to fill those slots.

Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses

Elemental

• Spell damage
• Spell Crit
• Elemental Overload

Elemental Overload: Your direct-damage spells have a chance to proc a less powerful 'bonus" version of the spell. This will work much like the current Lightning Overload talent, but would also apply to Lava Burst.

So we get a Lava Burst overload? ... why all about fire buffs :(

Enhancement

• Melee damage
• Melee Haste
• Nature Damage

Nature Damage: This will provide a passive bonus to the Nature damage dealt by the Enhancement shaman.

Restoration

• Healing
• Meditation
• Deep Healing

Deep Healing: Your direct heals will do more healing when the target's health is lower. This will scale to damage (e.g. someone at 29% health would receive more healing than someone at 30%) rather than have arbitrary break points.

Just to clarify a few things:

Meditation – the amount of mana you regenerate in combat as a function of your Spirit.

Also of note, you only get one set of passive talent tree bonuses: the tree in which you’ve spent the most points. Sub-speccing in another tree will not net you those bonuses in addition.

Blah, I was hoping to get some buff to Nature Damage if I spend 20 on enhancement tree... so what now, there are no more talents that buffs passive stat, and you do NOT get any bonuses with sub-spec tree! Are we getting more 76-0-0 specs? We will see when they release some talent previews.

Elemental in Cataclysm


Here is a short summary of what will be changed for us Elemental based on this preview:

• Unleash Weapon may add another gcd spell to our dps rotation. Glyphs and rotation may need to change due to this.
• Spiritwalker's Grace would solve the turret issue of our dps.
• Elemental shamans becomes mages with purge (dispelling wise).
• Now we have to dps with a unmovable pet called searing totem, let's give it a name called Searie!
• We MAY have an AoE damage spell that can be used in range.
• We may start to wear full mail for PvE... finally.
• Lava Burst overload! More luck factors in PvP!

There is still nothing about Path of Titans thingy yet, we will see when more previews come.