Elemental Shaman DPS Easy Mode — The War Within (11.2)
On this page, we explain how to easily play Elemental Shaman in World of Warcraft — The War Within (11.2), using the simplest rotation, talent tree, stat priority, gear setup, etc., without sacrificing performance.
Foreword
This section is intended for players who are new to the game or class, have no intentions of raiding Mythic difficulty or simply want a more straightforward way to play their specialization without being overwhelmed by the numerous priorities and active abilities that need to be taken into consideration for optimal play.
The Basics for Elemental Shaman Beginners
Elemental is a specific specialization that can easily adapt to most situations comfortably. The amount of keybinds required to play this specialization effectively is relatively low, making it a great choice for less seasoned players. This section will focus on a setup that is universally strong and should function adequately in every situation. Minimizing the number of buttons and reactivity was the original goal of this page, but with the Shaman rework, it is unfortunately very difficult to drop active abilities without severely compromising your overall damage output.
If you are new to Elemental and need more information on your abilities, you can check out our Spell Summary page.
Beginner's Guide to Elemental Shaman in The War Within
Talent Choice for Elemental Shaman Beginners
Remember that you can use the "Copy Export String" button to import these talents directly into your game!
Be sure to use the 'Export Talents' button to import our build in game!
The following build is not the best possible for every specific
situation but works fine no matter how many pieces of which tier set you have.
However, it tries to be universally "good-enough" while focusing on
ease of use. Notably, if you want to optimize your AoE damage in high Mythic+,
we recommend you pick the Stormbringer build from our talent page below instead.
If you are looking for the absolute best talents for Elemental, you can find a more in-depth analysis on our full talents page below.
Single Target Priority List for Elemental Shaman Beginners
- Cast
Storm Elemental.
- Cast
Stormkeeper.
- Cast
Ascendance, sync it with on-use trinkets,
Bloodlust,
Tempered Potion
- Keep
Flame Shock up, mainly with
Liquid Magma Totem.
- Cast
Primordial Wave (or
Tempest if using a
Stormbringer build).
- Cast
Earth Shock, preferably after a
Lava Burst.
- Cast
Icefury.
- Cast
Lava Burst.
- Cast
Frost Shocks empowered by
Icefury (only outside of
Ascendance) though you may want to keep at least one for movement.
- Cast
Lightning Bolt.
- Cast
Frost Shock while moving.
You can find that on the rotation page for a more detailed and optimized version of the priority list.
Multi-Target Priority List for Elemental Shaman Beginners
Note that the ideal Elemental Shaman priorities differ depending on how many targets you are fighting. This is an approximative "overall" list. For more accurate priority lists for every situation, please refer to the Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities page.
- Cast
Storm Elemental.
- Cast
Stormkeeper.
- Cast
Liquid Magma Totem
- Cast
Primordial Wave
- Cast
Ascendance, sync it with on-use trinkets,
Bloodlust,
Tempered Potion.
- Only for
StormbringerCast
Tempest Make sure to pay attention to its procs as it replaces
Lightning Bolt.
- Cast
Earthquake.
- Cast
Chain Lightning.
- Cast
Icefury while moving.
- Cast
Frost Shock while moving (ideally empowered by
Icefury).
You can find that on the rotation page for a more detailed and optimized version of the priority list.
Should I use the Combat Assistant feature?
For basic information on how this new feature works, please visit our Combat Assistant guide.
Short version: It has very limited uses as a new Elemental player.
We recommend against using the Single-button Rotation feature except maybe if you have never played Elemental at all and are off-speccing it for the first time, or are using a level boosted Shaman. In those cases only, it can initially help giving you an idea of the "rhythm" of how Elemental plays, but the built-in GCD penalty is a massive DPS loss. Beyond those basics relying on that button will prevent you from learning how to actually play the specialization, and your damage will be lower.
The Button Highlight feature does not incur a built-in GCD penalty, and is a more reasonable in-between, especially as a fresh Elemental practicing on target dummies or in trivial content. That being said, it is also worse than doing a "proper" rotation, as it will regularly give you bad advice. Finally, it requires you to stare at your action bar and lose focus on your combat environment, which can lead to many mistakes.
Stat Repartition for the "Beginner" Elemental Shaman Build
For pure single-target, out of 100% of your secondary stats you ideally want to have a spread of roughly:
- 40% into Mastery;
- 25% into Haste;
- 25% into Versatility;
- 10% into Critical Strike.
Haste and Versatility are very volatile secondaries at the moment and, depending on your exact gear, sims may recommend you getting much higher Versatility or much higher Haste, this is not unexpected.
Note that these are for Farseer and optimized for raid fights.
AoE favors Critical Strike more than Versatility, and
Stormbringer
also values Critical Strike more in general. If you absolutely want to optimize for AoE,
drop some Versatility in favor of Critical Strike.
To see the stat priority for optimal builds, head to our full stats page below.
Changelog
- 07 Sep. 2025: Removed disclaimer about the page being built around not having any tier.
- 02 Sep. 2025: Changed build to a "universal" Farseer setup, more sensible with new tier.
- 05 Aug. 2025: Removed Tempest Macro as it is sometimes buggy and a bad habit. Updated stat priority.
- 04 Aug. 2025: Added mention that this section is meant for people with no Tier set. Reviewed for Patch 11.2.
- 15 Jun. 2025: Added section on the new Combat Assistant system.
- 21 Apr. 2025: Added an image block, Farseer mention, Primordial Wave option on the single-target rotation. Picked Earthgrab Totem instead of Jet Stream.
- 07 Mar. 2025: Added a recommended macro.
- 03 Mar. 2025: Updated with a more universal build.
- 24 Feb. 2025: Updated for Patch 11.1.
- 15 Dec. 2024: Updated for Patch 11.0.7.
- 22 Oct. 2024: Updated for Patch 11.0.5.
- 09 Sep. 2024: Slight adjustement to the recommended Talent Tree.
- 30 Aug. 2024: Fixed talent recommendation, accidentally had the wrong Elemental there.
- 21 Aug. 2024: Updated with Lightning Build and Farseer Hero Talent.
- 23 Jul. 2024: Fixed some talent tree bugs, updated stat priority.
- 23 Jul. 2024: Updated for The War Within pre-patch.
- 07 May 2024: Reviewed for 10.2.7.
- 22 Apr. 2024: Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 4.
- 17 Mar. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.6.
- 15 Jan. 2024: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.5.
- 06 Nov. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.2.
- 04 Sep. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.7
- 10 Jul. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.1.5.
- 01 May 2023: Changed some wording.
- 20 Mar. 2023: Updated talent tree for Patch 10.0.7.
- 24 Jan. 2023: Reviewed for Patch 10.0.5.
- 11 Dec. 2022: Reviewed for Dragonflight Season 1.
- 28 Nov. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight launch.
- 18 Nov. 2022: Updated with a new build.
- 25 Oct. 2022: Updated for Dragonflight pre-patch.
More Shaman Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Stormy, Elemental main since Wrath of the Lich King and member of the Storm, Earth and Lava Elemental theorycrafting team.
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