Q. What is the expectation for how shamans choose the gear they use?
A: Players sometimes have the expectation that everything that drops that they can use should be an upgrade for them. This isn't strictly speaking the developer view though. We want gear to be a little bit of a puzzle where you have to analyze if that piece is really an upgrade or not and how it fits with your other stats. Remember also that much of the normal versions of Ulduar is itemized at the same level as Kel'Thuzad and Malygos.
There are some pieces that are just inferior to what they should be and we are getting those updated over time. As I mentioned above, we also want to improve the situations where some stats are so superior for your spec compared to other stats that pieces with the latter on them are just perceived as junk.
While we have a lot of bosses in Ulduar, those bosses also drop an awful lot of loot. Having loot drop that is attractive to more than one spec is paramount in making the bosses feel rewarding enough. Otherwise boss loot tables are just too large and your chance of getting what you want is low. (The huge loot table works for Emalon who is easy to reach, but not Algalon.) We have to avoid the situation where say the Elemental shaman only wants one set of shoulders in the whole instance and those shoulders are unattractive to everyone else in the raid. This is why we often say that we need to fix these problems on the class side, not the item side.
This is a situation where the distinction among the shaman specs can hurt them a little. Restoration and Elemental shamans both basically want caster gear, but the healer wants regen and the nuker has no use for it. This means if there is mana regen on mail, it is pretty much only useful for a Restoration shaman. (Healing plate presents the same problem for paladins.) We don't have a great solution for this problem yet other than just dropping three kinds of mail.
Community Team: Continuing to discuss the PvE element of the game for shamans, the introduction of Ulduar changed the strategies players had employed in the past to account for these larger-than-life encounters. Restoration shamans in particular have brought up a concern for their role as raid healer being diminished in light of their inability to effectively raid heal like they once did with the use of Chain Heal specifically. Many have taken to the role of main target heals and are concerned about their continued effectiveness in a raid environment.
Q. Where do we feel the role of the shaman is in raids now and where do we see that going in the future?
A: We want all three shaman specs to feel like they can contribute to raids, and to be honest, we think they're in a pretty good spot certainly relative to some classes that have specs that are perceived as much more viable than other specs. Enhancement can do great melee damage. After the recent Lightning Overload change, we think Elemental can do competitive ranged damage. I know there is some concern about Restoration shamans losing their healing niche of area damage. We think that perception might exist in Ulduar just because recent talents, glyphs, and set bonuses have all propped up things like Lesser Healing Wave over Chain Heal. Chain Heal is still quite useful in some situations and with different gear in the next couple of tiers, we expect to see more shamans going back to it. We don't want to see them return to just using Chain Heal as was the case in much of Burning Crusade. We do think Restoration shamans are at the risk of running out of mana perhaps more than any other healer right now, and in fact the seemingly unlimited mana in some healers is what leads to Chain Heal getting stomped on by other big heals. This is a problem we plan on addressing.
Q. Is the change in how shamans are used situational only as we move forward into the next encounters, or is this a shift in philosophy as to the role of the shaman in raids?
A: It isn't a philosophy shift. We want Restoration shamans to be a strong group healer with the option of focusing on a single target with Lesser Healing Wave as needed. Restoration shamans have two distinct healing styles now that they can shift between, and we want to preserve that. We don't want to return to the Sunwell era, where 95% of healing came from Chain Heal. It's just a boring play style. (And yes, paladins, we hear you.) We suspect that with a new totem or set bonus that propped up Chain Heal a little more, you'd see it getting a lot more use. We're cool with that. It's fun when you upgrade your gear from tier to tier and it actually pushes you into a slightly different play style.
Elemental shamans have had a couple of opportunities to shine in Ulduar -- blowing up constructs on Ignis is one example. We try to make sure the encounters are diverse enough that the same classes aren't always in the spotlight on every encounter, but we also don't want to constrain our encounter designers' creativity too much. Elemental may suffer from so many fights in Ulduar requiring movement. Also, while we have given Elemental strong AoE in the form of the Magma Totem, some players feel like this comes at too high a cost to their buffs and mobility, so this is something we'll look at.
We're pretty happy with Enhancement shamans in raids, though we want to continue to analyze whether their DPS is where it should be and if their buffs are comparable to other classes that can bring the same benefit.
We do hope we've finally settled the issue of which weapon enchantments shamans should use with the now normalized Flametongue.
Issue: 137 | June, 2012