Shaman revamp.

Snake

Dalayan Elder
Shaman's are #1 class of a few things, but in my opinion, things that doesn't make them very desirable in 6 man groups, this is where I feel they need a revamp.

They are #1:
Slow.
Spam healer - they can heal a moderate amount (less than Druid and Cleric), for seemingly ever.
Malosinia and or Malo.

Raids:
These things makes them very good in a raid force, where you have a tank who benefit greatly from having constant spam of healing on her, and then (usually) Clerics just have to spot heal spikes.
The slow may be mitigated to some degree on many raid mobs, but it still matters.
Lowering resist across the board usually means more dps from everyone in general.

So raid wise, they are good. Revamp is not dire needed as such.


6 man / groups:
In most 6 mans and exp groups, you need a Tank, a Group Healer and high DPS.
The Shaman does neither very well.


Let me try some examples to illustrate my point:

Curator in OG.
The R1 g hot is only an option if its a pure caster group more or less, and have to be careful when you snare the whole group, don't want the tank not making it up/down stairs when the AE is about to go off.
The R2 is to much self damage, very risky doing that for spot heals.

4.3.
Again R1 snare is not something you want here, mobility is very important.
R2 for spot healing is too risky most the time, cause of heavy AE damage.
There is a feature in this fight, that you can do malo on Empress, and there will be cast a group heal. This mechanic is in my view, made so that a Shaman might have a chance to help g heal it. A hint to a fix?

Forest Gloom.
R1 snare will make this fight really hard with the need to move away from puddles ect.
R2 don't have range to reach the dpsers dpsing the wisps in the very last part + the self damage is probably to high with the AE going on as well.

Melek Taus.
R1 is probably ok to heal the group, but unless you bring mostly caster dps, the fight will take a long time, because of the slow component.
R2 is probably ok for the most part, the 2. white emote with a random non tank DB, you obv. want to avoid it at this part.
Shaman is probably ok here, but it's going to be a long grind. Even with constant R1 going, it may not be enough g healing, I haven't tried.



These are all 6 man's with relative high need of g healing, and for the most parts, the shaman just doesn't help enough.
Most the time the g healer is not going oom from the single target healing, but from the g healing.
Sure it will help the g healers mana not having to spot heal the tank, but then on the other hand, the fight will take that much longer, cause you gave up a dps slot for the Shaman, and in a 6 man, that's upwards of 25% of the dps (3 dps instead of 4).


Solution:
My suggestion is...
Fix R1 so it doesn't snare and slow. Look at the mana cost and the cast time (imo it's to expensive and to slow to cast, at least it will be to long cast time if snare and slow is removed, since it will no longer be counted as casting a buff spell).
Fix R2 so the self damage is not so severe (perhaps remove it all together so the Shaman can use it as a fast heal on self), make it range 200 so it can take the spot of Chloroshock, and increase the mana cost, to make up for the lessened self damage, perhaps even lessen the healing, so it doesn't end up replacing both Chloroshock and Woundbane.

This way the Shaman can help the g healer, or even be the g healer, as well as being a better spot healer, opening up for more dps.
So even though the Shaman probably would have to be a 50/50 healer dps'er, at least they can help the g healer to keep g healing for a longer time, thus they become a more viable option in a 6 man; slower but safer.
Also a g hot worth casting + a fast heal that can target self, really opens up for more aggressive use of their class tome stance, so imo it binds the different parts of the Shamans arsenal better together.


Thank you for your time.
 
on the low end of the spectrum they could use a lot more group stat buffs to make buffing the rare group/raid a bit less of a chore. Their first group stat buff that isn't strength isn't til their 50s.
 
this is quite random as shamans seem to be in a solid spot in most if not all tiers. yes theyre not the best in duo/group/6man situations ALONE but theyre still strong nonetheless
 
shaman runics blow and should be reworked, but I'm not sure how to go about it honestly. removing the slow from r1 would actually make it useable in 6mans and exp, albeit a little annoying. r2 could be changed to a higher throughput, but mana inefficient woundbane that also uses HP. r2 could also be reworked to fill the role of a quickheal.

they're already capable of outputting bard level (or higher) dps when they go full dps mode. they can also sustain a tank on their own for 6 man content, massively extending the cleric/druid mana bar and allowing them to focus entirely on ghealing when needed. that doesn't include the constant padding they do on the group from weapon+wrist procs and clickies. granted, this only really matters when progressing on 6 man content - but a lot of classes are massively different in terms of progress vs farm.

shamans are pretty annoying to duo with and can't solo heal exp groups effectively though. the recent addition of hibernate has made them worse relative to druids in terms of general healing ability as well. they also fall off a bit at the very high end when mana pools get huge and the abilitiy to sustain infinitely matters less because nobody is going oom anyways. regardless, shamans are pretty good throughout the game vs content that is hard but they start to fall off around t12~ when healer mana in general scales up. it doesn't matter if you can woundbane spam a tank for 2 hours if the fight ends in 10 minutes and none of the other healing classes get close to OOMing anyways.

tldr; shamans are good until t12/t13ish where they become average, they're relatively weak duoing or when solo healing exp in all tiers of the game.
 
Good luck on fighting a fight that others have tried in the past. However without actual numbers / actual recommendations you're wasting your time.
shamans are pretty annoying to duo with and can't solo heal exp groups effectively though. the recent addition of hibernate has made them worse relative to druids in terms of general healing ability as well. they also fall off a bit at the very high end when mana pools get huge and the abilitiy to sustain infinitely matters less because nobody is going oom anyways. regardless, shamans are pretty good throughout the game vs content that is hard but they start to fall off around t12~ when healer mana in general scales up. it doesn't matter if you can woundbane spam a tank for 2 hours if the fight ends in 10 minutes and none of the other healing classes get close to OOMing anyways

maybe exp has changed quite a bit since i've played but i never had any issues exping with my shaman. it was always great times.
 
Shaman kind of just have an awkward position in high tier XP. Sure they can heal but they lack the group healing and utter laziness boxing a cleric brings since their damage is mostly from hitting things and they can save mana for healing or druids which make aoe pulling even more rewarding just by being in the group with ds tome, not even mentioning cataclysm and hibernate helping them in dangerous situations. Shaman you actually have to vaguely pay attention to to do respectable damage which means if someone is forced to box a healer for XP they're probably going to pick a cleric for the sheer laze or a druid for utility.

If there was more single target XP that didn't suck ass they'd probably feel better but in a world where you go pull 30 mobs at a time in kaesora or pull 10 at a time in first ruins they start to look shabby in comparison.

The moral? Buff tunnels XP and make the cash not completely trash. You could probably triple it and it would start to compare to other things.
 
you're wasting your time because whenever people get back around to class balance im sure the knight change will be first up.

FTFY

maybe exp has changed quite a bit since i've played but i never had any issues exping with my shaman. it was always great times.

119 tomes on my shaman and pretty much every second of it was me wishing i was a druid so i could heal better and do more aoe dps.
 
Shaman kind of just have an awkward position in high tier XP. Sure they can heal but they lack the group healing and utter laziness boxing a cleric brings since their damage is mostly from hitting things and they can save mana for healing or druids which make aoe pulling even more rewarding just by being in the group with ds tome, not even mentioning cataclysm and hibernate helping them in dangerous situations. Shaman you actually have to vaguely pay attention to to do respectable damage which means if someone is forced to box a healer for XP they're probably going to pick a cleric for the sheer laze or a druid for utility.

this guy is literally complaining that he wants to play a game and be lazier.

If there was more single target XP that didn't suck ass they'd probably feel better but in a world where you go pull 30 mobs at a time in kaesora or pull 10 at a time in first ruins they start to look shabby in comparison.

The moral? Buff tunnels XP and make the cash not completely trash. You could probably triple it and it would start to compare to other things.

I did this years ago and it wasnt a problem.

-------------------------------

You dudes are complaining without giving concrete changes. Maybe Taryth does things different than Slaar but in the yesteryear this would get look at 0%
 
I mean yes if I'm going to box a healer for XP I don't really want to pay attention to it too much. Granted it gets me out of looting so that's always a plus. Either way yes a shaman can fill that spot. It's just a hell of a lot easier to get like 80% efficiency on a cleric when all you have to do is press autoattack and hit bigs once in a while. Druid you replace that with cata after aggro is settled a bit while rolling hibernate.

XP is for being a lazy turd and hanging out with your friend online, raid is for pump
 
Good luck on fighting a fight that others have tried in the past. However without actual numbers / actual recommendations you're wasting your time.


maybe exp has changed quite a bit since i've played but i never had any issues exping with my shaman. it was always great times.
exping on a shaman forces you to pull smaller/safer, your dps have to throttle themselves so they rip aggro less, you can't do lava spirits in FR. all of that stuff just adds up to being less efficient than other healers.

taryth hasn't really been around for anything afaik. the new dev dudes (cole/rymy/duke) tend to like to come up w/ ideas+numbers by working with people in the community, then fine tuning it after its been released. I also know there are plans for some new spells to be added at some point, so its hard to provide a concrete suggestion to change r2 (that wouldn't be redundant/add too much w/ what the new spells will bring) w/o knowing what those future spells will end up being. some of the issues shamans face are just problems that stem from high tier scaling/encounter design, and raise questions that devs have to answer in terms of what direction they want to take the game and niche/theme of the class itself.

removing the slow from runic 1 would put the spell in a far better place than where it is now. runic 2 needs a fully blown rework.
 
your dps have to throttle themselves so they rip aggro less, you can't do lava spirits in FR. all of that stuff just adds up to being less efficient than other healers.

If players dont have to play their class and use their mechanics with druids and clerics then the problem is that druids and clerics are op and need to be looked at. As a person that played a shaman I was totally ok understanding my class wasn't a perfect fit in every situation. I also come from a period in time when not everyone was welcomed.

I understand your and everyone's quest to attain perfect balance.... However I do not subscribe to the new norm of everyone should be the best class.

i know the server is low on numbers and shit needs to change. i know i shouldnt give a shit because i dont play... i also think this thread is really half assed and more thought should be put into it before crying for a change.

PS: i'm done posting in here. good luck changing the class!
 
I did this years ago and it wasnt a problem.
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It's been some years since I have played, but here is my 2 cents:
1. Runic 1 is mostly garbage. (The utility of having a group heal is better than not having one, but it is pretty crappy...)
2. I never got Runic 2 so I can't comment there.
3. Stat buff casting sucked at lower levels.
4. Useful group healing and improved AE DPS was always on my shaman wish list.
 
If players dont have to play their class and use their mechanics with druids and clerics then the problem is that druids and clerics are op and need to be looked at. As a person that played a shaman I was totally ok understanding my class wasn't a perfect fit in every situation. I also come from a period in time when not everyone was welcomed.
its moreso the fact that dps tanking some mobs and taking unnecessary damage is easy enough to patch w/ a group heal - this isn't something you can really change w/o deleting group heals or making them awful and then rebalancing the entire game about group heals not existing in a meaningful capacity.

I think classes having weaknesses is fine but as it stands right now the disparity between shaman and clr/dru in exp feels too significant.

massive power creep from class reworks/ 2.5 giving everyone massive hp/mana / opus availability making a lot of content trivial devalues the strengths of shamans. the class (and this game in general) is just kind of in a weird spot.
 
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