Classic Shaman PvP Guide

Being a Shaman in PvP can be a completely different experience, based on your talents:

1. Elemental focused Shamans are all about dealing sustained damage from afar with Lightning Bolt, which is occasionally followed by Chain Lightning and Earth Shock for massive burst. They are also good supports.
2. Enhancement focused Shamans are also all about dealing massive burst damage, but in melee and randomly, with Windfury Weapon.
3. Restoration focused Shamans are all about supporting your allies, both through Totems and your healing spells, especially Lesser Healing Wave.

Also, Shamans are a healer's worst nightmare, with their ability to consistently interrupt heals from afar with Earth Shock, Purge off their buffs / heals over time and ability to cause unhealable bursts of damage with Windfury and their spells.

WoW Classic PvP is a path that will encourage you to learn the tools of the class(es) you are facing and how to trade your cooldowns for theirs. Experience is key!

As detailed above, your playstyle will vary heavily depending on your talent build. We will provide examples of all types of builds, but feel free to experiment!

This is the Elemental talent build for Shamans in PvP, complete with good emergency healing capabilities. See a similar build in action here, by Wheeliecool.

Your main playstyle will be to damage enemies with Lightning Bolt from a range while supporting your allies with Totems and heals in the case of emergency, but do not be afraid to burst enemies down by following up on Lightning Bolt with Chain Lightning and Earth Shock, when needed.

Control tools, such as Frost Shock and Earth Shock Rank 1, and Grounding Totem and Earthbind Totem should be used to keep key enemies slowed and their casts disabled. Meanwhile, make sure you Purge any important buffs, such as shields from Mages and Priests that you are focusing on.

Ancestral Healing and Improved Reincarnation are taken because they provide a much bigger impact on your gameplay than the alternatives, as you should never be casting Healing Wave without Nature's Swiftness and Mana for Totems will generally not be a problem.

Also, consider using a gear swapping macro, such as the one detailed in our Addon page to equip your Spell Damage or Spell Healing gear, depending on what type of spell you are casting.

While we feel this version of the talent tree is the most versatile, feel free to swap to Elemental Mastery instead of Nature's Swiftness if you want more burst, although it will come at the cost of your main emergency heal ability. Also, once you have enough hit on your gear to be capped for PvP (3%), drop the points in Nature's Guidance and pick up more points in Healing Focus, instead.

This is the Enhancement talent build for Shamans in PvP, maximum damage oriented. See a similar build in action here, by Unbreakable.

Your main goal will be to get close and personal with Stormstrike and a big two-hand weapon. If you manage to activate Windfury Weapon, you will be able to instantly remove 50% of your target's health bar, more if critical strikes are involved. The remaining health on the enemy is simply finished off by Earth Shock or Frost Shock.

Unfortunately, damage is quite low if Windfury Weapon does not proc, but that is the nature of the spec. You will still be able to deal some damage and support your allies with Totems while disrupting enemies with Grounding Totem, Purge, Earthbind Totem, and the aforementioned shocks, regardless.

While we feel this version of the talent tree is quite stable, feel free to swap Guardian Totems to Enhancing Totems instead, for more group support potential. The remainder of the points all serve an important purpose.

This is the Restoration talent build for Shamans in PvP. While it will be able to provide more healing than the Elemental build, it sacrifices a lot of the damage potential too.

Your main playstyle will be to heal yourself and allies with Lesser Healing Wave, while supporting your allies with Totems and your utility spells, such as Frost Shock, Earth Shock, and Tremor Totem.

You should also search for situations where you can help burst someone down with Chain Lightning and Earth Shock or remove their buffs and shields with Purge.

By removing some of the less impactful Restoration points and moving them to the Elemental tree, you can gradually gain damage at the cost of raw healing and sustain potential, creating a hybrid build.

You can find our recommended macros and addons for Shaman PvP in the links below.

You can find our recommended gear for PvPing as a Shaman in a healing role in the link below.

If you prefer to one shot enemies with Elemental Mastery while still having great healing capabilities, check out our Elemental BiS PvP guide below!

If you prefer to roll the dice with Windfury Weapon, we have you covered as well with a guide for Enhancement BiS PvP gear.

Consumables are an important part of PvP in Classic. While using as many as possible will quickly get you to 0 gold, you should always have some on you for the fights you cannot afford to lose. We made a list of the most important consumables to have as a Shaman in PvP:

The potions listed below have a 2-minute shared cooldown.

• Major Healing Potion
• Free Action Potion
• Living Action Potion
• Swiftness Potion
• Invisibility Potion
• Limited Invulnerability Potion

Noggenfogger Elixir is also a popular consumable used for PvP. When you drink it, it will do one of three things: make you smaller, turn you into a skeleton, or cast a slow fall spell on you. The shrink effect can be useful to make it harder for players to see and target you, and the slow fall can allow to jump off high places and not die, while attackers will not be able to follow.

A special remark must be made for Limited Invulnerability Potion. This potion is great for Elemental and Restoration Shamans, making you immune to most physical damage effects for 6 seconds. Use it when engaging a pack of enemy players, possibly in combination with Goblin Sapper Charge and Fire Nova Totem for maximum damage potential.

After using a bandage, you cannot do so again on yourself for 1 minute.

• Heavy Runecloth Bandage

These consumables have a 1-minute shared cooldown.

• Magic Dust
• Clutch of Foresight
• Wail of the Banshee

Most of these are very annoying to farm, so use them only in the case of an emergency.

Engineering is a great profession in WoW Classic, as it creates a lot of useful consumables and trinkets. Some of those are especially strong in PvP, but most of them have a 1-minute shared cooldown, unless otherwise specified:

• Goblin Sapper Charge (5-minute cooldown, triggers 1-minute on rest)
• Goblin Land Mine
• Thorium Grenade
• Dark Iron Bomb
• Iron Grenade
• Dense Dynamite