Shaman Hero Talents — The War Within (11.0.7)

This page is specifically about Hero Talents in The War Within. If you want to learn more about the best regular talents for Elemental Shaman, check out our Talents page:

If you want a detailed list of all the new Hero talents, check out our Spells page:

Stormbringer is way ahead of Farseer in situations where significant AoE will occur and remains close to Farseer in single-target.

Farseer is now slightly ahead in pure single-target following the November 26th hotfixes. It remains behind in multi-target and becomes vastly worse in AoE situations with more than 3 targets. Best for pure single-target encounters and viable for raiding in general depending on how much AoE matters.

Stormbringer gives you top-tier heavy AoE/Cleave damage and is still adequate in single-target. The added mechanics can be somewhat annoying to keep track of but they add significant power.

Farseer remains far behind in Mythic+ although it could be viable for keys where AoE matters relatively little and where you mostly pull small packs.

2.

Best Hero Talent Builds for Elemental Shaman

Stormbringer (universal) Farseer (single-target focus)

3.

Best Stormbringer Mythic+ Build for Elemental Shaman

Nature's Protection is vastly better than Surging Currents in every circumstance and is essentially a non-choice. You always take Supercharge as Storm Swell is nowhere close its power even with low Mastery. You always take Electroshock as it give reliable movement while Lightning Conduit can proc at the wrong time, making you move further than you wanted and cause problems.

3.

Best Farseer Build for Elemental Shaman

Natural Harmony will, most of the time, be much more practical than Earthen Communion. Currently, aside from solo play, you should always take Ancient Fellowship and Routine Communication because of the important synergies with Final Calling and Offering from Beyond.

Due to the diminished importance of Lightning Bolt compared to Stormbringer builds, you end up using Icefury-empowered Frost Shocks rotationally, unlike Stormbringer builds. Other than that, press Ancestral Swiftness on cooldown. We recommend macroing it to Primordial Wave, Lava Burst or both. Remember to put it BEFORE those spells in the macro.

You might think there is some potential benefit from holding it one GCD to gain the damage bonus on a stronger ability, or make something instant, but in almost every case you are better off putting it on cooldown immediately so you can start reducing its cooldown again. There is no other rotational change for Farseer.

Stormbringer is more interactive but adds multiple things to track and can be difficult to fully optimize in practice. Most people are likely better off just using the procs as they happen and not thinking too hard about them. Otherwise, you will want WeakAuras tracking Rolling Thunder timing, tracking Maelstrom spendings for Tempest availability, and an Awakening Storms tracker to at least know if your next proc will give you Tempest. You probably do not need to track Arc Discharge but make sure you desync your Tempest uses (since you have two different sources of them) in order to avoid munching Arc Discharge procs.