Ele Shaman Critique

[Stingyring 0]

WoL: http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/rt-dxbodyctap48nwhu/

 

Armory: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/character/blackrock/Gnirygnits/simple

 

It should be noted that my gear changed a lot tonight from when I started because it was my first night in 25H. At the beginning I was 567 and by the end of the night I was 570 (snagging a heroic immer trinket vs the flex I started with)

 

My damage seems really low compared to other people around my item level were out dpsing me and I'd like to know what I can do to improve.

Edited July 28, 2014 by Stingyring

[grautod 6]

Hi Stingyring

I will share my 2cents and I am sure others will. Personally I find Ele shaman are great where we can stand and deliver against multiple adds and struggle with high movement and single target fights.

In no particular order here is my 2c based on the logs and profile.

Looks like you have put your toon through MR Robot and reforged which is good, but you still have too much spirit. Try getting more gear without spirit on it, though it seems that just about all intellect mail has spirit on it except the T16 elemental pieces. First thing that comes to mind is to try to get Gaze of Arrogance of Sha rather than the healer staff you have now.

Looking at the logs.. (Sha to beging with)

6 Minute fight which you have 16 casts of elemental blast out of a theoretical maximum of a possible 31. (Malrok) 17 EB in 5 Min. Those numbers are to low. Cast EB on cooldown, for high movement fights that you struggle to cast EB on cooldown (like sha) try swapping to Primal Elementalist.

Flameshock up time on Malrok was 93% which isn't bad, remember you can always clip it (cast before it expires) to get that up time even higher.

In the 8 min Spoils fight you used ascendance twice and there is time for a third one in a 8 min fight. Generally ascendance is best used when other buffs have proced so make sure you use it with lust, meta haste gem proc etc.

Chain lightning rocks for us and I see you have it glyphed. It is a dps boost ONLY if it hit 4 or more targets. Don't have it in unless you regularly hitting 4 or more adds in a fight. It is situational like most glyphs If you can use lava beam and hit 3-4 adds it really rocks so be sure to use it on pull for fights like Shaman and protectors if you have them stacked.

Looks like you are using Earth Shock to trigger Fulmination which is good.

You are using your healing tide totem which is great.. Shaman are a utility player so making use heals is a must IMHO. Looks like you used Ancestral Guidance 15 times in total in 13 boss fights. It certainly could be used a lot more.. without checking in more detail I cant tell if it should have been (let you work that one out but the other shaman used AG 5 times as often as you did across the entire raid)

Well that is all I have time to look at now .. Good luck

p.s. are you using elementals on cooldown ? Couldn't see it when I looked but maybe I just missed them ?

p.p.s Did you keep your Flask of the Warm sun up for the entire raid.. Couldn't see that either ?

Edited July 28, 2014 by grautod

[Hybrys 199]

Hi Stingyring!

 

I can't tell as much from World of Logs, so if you have the option, could you try logging ot WarcraftLogs, and I may be able to better tell things like cooldown and Fulmination usage (as long as you enable Advanced Combat Logging in WoW).

 

From your Malkorok:

 

As mentioned previously, your Flame Shock should be as close to 100% uptime as possible.  Remember that you can safely recast within the last 3 seconds of it's uptime!

 

You should never be using Unleash Elements when you're not specced into Unleashed Fury.  It's a loss just versus the GCD, unfortunately, even as an opener.

 

Keep a closer eye on your Elemental Blast cooldown!  You had 17 casts out of a possible 24.  That's going to be a large damage contribution, if you can get that up a bit higher.

 

Are you not properly using your Fire Elemental Totem?  Remember that it's a big contribution to your damage, and it's important to use it as often as you can.

 

Related to that, your opener looks really weak, while it's a rather large opportunity for burst from Ele Shamans.  The recommended opener is:

 

Fire Ele + Pre Pot @ 3 seconds to pull --> Elemental Blast @ 1.5 seconds to pull --> Flame Shock --> Lava Burst --> Ascendance --> Lava Burst spam

 

Make sure you're getting that free reset when Ascendance comes back during the fight!

 

Gear:

 

While Haste gearing is a viable strategy, Mastery comes ahead ever so slightly once you're past a certain soft cap.  If you're up for minmaxing your gear, I'd recommend this AMR layout:

 

http://www.askmrrobot.com/wow/gear/374100f8-d91a-460b-898f-cf158b38be90

 

I've also added a soft cap for Mastery, at 87%.  This is only recommended if you plan on staying with Elemental Blast, and is based on the buff from Elemental Blast and the Bindings Amplification, along with the hard cap of 100% Mastery.

 

As mentioned, you should definitely be trying to get rid of some of your Spirit gear.  The best places to do so are your weapon and your boots.  

 

Because of the 0 value of spirit past the hit cap, sometimes lower ilvl gear that has less spirit and more of other stats can come ahead in value.  For example, a normal Powder-Stained Totemic Treads would actually be better than your Sabatons of Defilement because of that nearly 700 wasted Spirit.  This almost never applies to weapons, unfortunately, because Spell Power has such a high value.

[Stingyring 0]

Thanks for the pointers, I kept what you guys said in mind and my damage was a lot more consistent. I really appreciate the help.

[Ambien 0]

Hi Hybrys new to the forums~! I have a question for you regarding the soft mastery cap of 87%.  I have been wondering about this for some time.  Given mastery > 100% is useless for ele, why do I see that nearly all of the top ele shaman still cap their mastery at 100%.  I do realize some of them swap to UF spec for a few fights in SoO but it just seems to me that with EB being the primary spec and the EB buff lasting 8 secs with the cooldown of EB spell at 12 secs wouldn't putting that extra mastery into haste be more beneficial given how close haste and mastery stat weights are.  Any words of wisdom??

[SparkSovereign 61]

Hi Hybrys new to the forums~! I have a question for you regarding the soft mastery cap of 87%.  I have been wondering about this for some time.  Given mastery > 100% is useless for ele, why do I see that nearly all of the top ele shaman still cap their mastery at 100%.  I do realize some of them swap to UF spec for a few fights in SoO but it just seems to me that with EB being the primary spec and the EB buff lasting 8 secs with the cooldown of EB spell at 12 secs wouldn't putting that extra mastery into haste be more beneficial given how close haste and mastery stat weights are.  Any words of wisdom??

A lot of the very top end people use UF almost exclusively.  If you use it perfectly, it is slightly ahead on single-target damage, after all.  During farm and pushing for rankings, that matters.  (Well, for certain definitions of "matters" anyway.)  However, during progression, EB is a lot easier to use, gives you valuable snap damage vs adds, actually benefits your AoE damage, etc., which is why we've been generally recommending it.  And, if you are using EB, going over 87.4% mastery isn't "bad" just "suboptimal".

[Hybrys 199]

Spark beat me to it. Most Shamans above ilvl 570 will typically run UF for the majority of fights, not bothering to swap. We can't even really call EB the primary spec for the Heroic raider anymore.

However, there are some like me that run EB exclusively (to some potential detriment) because of the 'smoother' playstyle and less intricate decision-making.

Honestly, Mastery above the soft cap doesn't have a particularly low value; it's just enough for it to slide under Haste in value. To restate, the soft Mastery cap doesn't make Mastery bad, it just makes Haste better than Mastery after that point.

If I was running UF, even for 8/14 of the fights, I would most likely run 100% Mastery, and would likely see relatively minimal differences in EB damage layouts.