Shaman Leveling

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Recently I read an interesting question from someone leveling a Shaman. Level 40-80: Elemental or Enhancement Shaman?

In my opinion, the answer to this question consists of two parts. The first part of the answer is…

If you are below level 60, DO NOT level with the Elemental Shaman spec!

There’s a simple reason why Enhancement will beat Elemental any time below level 60. The gear is insufficient. In the “old world” you will have a hard time finding any equipment that provides you with the necessary spell power, critical strike rating and mana regeneration.

Sure, you can always ask a friend to pull you through an instance and loot all the blue items, but seriously… Spending so much time on instances in order to level as fast as you would do with the Enhancement build? It’s much easier to stick to Enhancement until you finally hit level 60. Or at least level 58-59.

When you hit level 60, you will travel to the outlands and get your hands on much, much better items. Even the first few quests will provide you with everything you need to equip an Elemental Shaman.

Now to the second part of my answer: From level 60 on both Elemental and Enhancement Shaman leveling builds are viable.

I recommend you to stick to the build you feel most comfortable with. Learning to play with different skills and abilities takes time, too. And playing with a talent build that you don’t feel comfortable with can be the greatest time sink of all.

Perfect execution of your skills and attacks is important for your leveling speed. That means if you don’t like your talent build and misuse your skills, you won’t level any faster. You are more likely to die more often and have to run all the way to your corpse.

If you ask yourself “How should I level 40-80: Elemental or Enhancement Shaman?” I suggest you stick to Enhancement until you hit 60 and go with what you like the most from there on.

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If you want to level a shaman with the Elemental talent build, you will have a hard time unless you know how to find the right Elemental Shaman leveling gear.

The Elemental Shaman is much more item-dependant than the Enhancement Shaman which makes it absolutely necessary to find the right gear all the time or lose a lot of your leveling efficiency.

Low Level Elemental Shaman Leveling Gear

Most people do not spec Elemental before they reach the outland where the items are a lot better for caster classes. If you want to level with this spec in the early levels, there are two things you can do.

The first thing is to visit the AH and look for random green items with the right prefixes. It’s faster than visiting instances, but the gear is not too great.

• [Item] of Healing = +spell power
• [Item] of Nature’s Wrath = +nature damage
• [Item] of Intellect = +intellect
• [Item] of the Eagle = +intellect and stamina
• [Item] of the Owl = +intellect and spirit
• [Item] of the Gorilla = +intellect and strength
• [Item] of the Falcon = +intellect and agility

The second option is to run instances and collect better Elemental Shaman leveling gear. This will take more time and you should think twice before doing it since instances slow down your leveling progress unless you really rush through them (with a level 80 friend, for example).

• Ragefire Chasm: Robe of Evocation, Crystalline Cuffs
• The Deadmines: Emberstone Staff, Lavishly Jeweled Ring, Gold-flecked Gloves
• Wailing Caverns: Deep Fathom Ring Robe of the Moccasin, Slime-encrusted Pads , Seedcloud Buckler, Serpent Gloves
• Shadowfang Keep: Eerie Stable Lantern, Feline Mantle, Girdle of the Blindwatcher, Robes of Arugal
• Blackfathom Deeps: Gaze Dreamer Pants, Glowing Thresher Cape Moss Cinch Rod of the Sleepwalker
• The Stockade: Kam’s Walking Stick
• Gnomeregan: Electromagnetic Gigaflux Reactivator , Acidic Walkers
• Razorfen Kraul: Death Speaker Mantle, Death Speaker Scepter, Death Speaker Robes
• Razorfen Downs: Bonefingers Deathchill Armor, Glowing Eye of Mordresh
• Scarlet Monastery: Hand of Righteousness, Triune Amulet, Hypnotic Blade
• Zul’Farrak: Jinxed Hoodoo Kilt, Jinxed Hoodoo Skin, Jumanza Grips, Lifeblood Amulet
• Maraudon: Soothsayer’s Headdress , Charstone Dirk, Gemshard Heart, Gizlock’s Hypertech Buckler
• Sunken Temple: Bloodfire Talons Crest of Supremacy, Featherskin Cape, Windscale Sarong , Horns of Eranikus, The Dragon’s Eye

Outlands and Northrend

Once you access the outlands, lots of your problems will disappear and Elemental will be a lot easier to play. There will be tons of viable gear and all you have just have to do is to choose the one that will help you the most.

To find the best Elemental Shaman leveling gear, I recommend these stat priorities:

Spell Damage > Intellect > Critical Strike Rating > Hit Rating

I hope you enjoyed this guide and can now find your perfect Elemental Shaman leveling gear! Have fun leveling!

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What is the best way to play your Shaman in PvP? In this Shaman PvP guide I want to show you some great PvP builds as well as some tactics and general advice about the role of the Shaman in Player versus Player combat.

Playing an Enhancement Shaman PvP is most common and most effective. That’s why my guide will only take a look at this aspect. There are some Elemental Shaman PvP talent specs as well, but if you want to fight in the arena, you should choose the talent tree that helps your team the most. And that tree is Enhancement.

Your Role In PvP

The roles that Shamans play in PvP usually are: Pressure, Anti-Caster, Burst and Support. Of course, this always depends on your team.

To deal large burst damage you will rely a lot on your Wolves. Use this strategy to build up pressure on the enemy team and support your own team whenever necessary.

Shaman PvP Talent Builds

Here are some highly recommended, up-to-date Shaman PvP talent specs:

Damage-Support Build (16/55/0)

This Shaman PvP build is a damage-dealing build with Guardian Totems as minor support element.

Full-Damage-Build (18/53/0)

This Shaman PvP spec is a full damage build. It deals even more damage thanks to Fire Nova.

Anti-Caster Build (16/55/0)

The last Shaman spec I want to show you is an Anti-Caster build with low shock cooldowns and some more range on Earthbind. It also acts as a support build.

Shaman PvP Tips

There are some mistakes that inexperienced players often make that can easily be avoided. Here are some advices for Shaman PvP combat:

• Toughness isn’t needed. You don’t have to rely on reducing movement-impairing effects when you have Earthbind Totem and Ghost Wolf at hand.
• Always dual-wield weapons! You are going to need the consistency more than anything else. Nothing is worse than relying on 2H weapons and having bad luck in a teamfight. Big numbers are fun if you make a vid, but that’s it.
• Get yourself a Weapon Chain for your off-hand weapon.
• Lava Burst is a waste of time since your basic abilities should do more damage. Especially since you don’t have to set up a Flame Shock first.

I hope you got some value from this Shaman PvP guide. Your next step is to go out and get some experience from the front line of fire. Get yourself a

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Do you want to know the best Shaman build to level up your Shaman? Great, that’s exactly what my Shaman guide is all about.

In fact it’s easy to choose the best Shaman build for every situation. You just have to take a look at the talent trees in order to find out which tree is viable for your current situation.

In case you are new to WoW, let me explain what each talent tree is about and which one is best for leveling:

Elemental Tree – This Shaman build makes you a caster. It focuses on spells that require lots of mana but it also enables you to deal great damage. Because you will need lots of mana and spell damage gear, it’s not a build that everyone uses for leveling. Most people use it to be a damage dealer in raids when they already have some equipment.

Restoration Tree – This Shaman build focuses on healing. It’s not viable for leveling but the only way to go if you want to be a healer in your group.

Enhancement Tree – The Enhancement Shaman build is all about dual-wielding and melee combat. Enhancement Shamans can wield two weapons and can deal enormous damage even without the high-end gear. This is the way to go if you want to level faster.

And this is what your Enhancement Shaman build should look like. In my opinion, Enhancement is a very strong leveling spec and I highly recommend it to every Shaman that just wants to ding 80 as fast as possible.

Make sure to always go for the higher talents whenever possible.

Instead of spending points in the Elemental Tree, you can also spend the rest of your points in Restoration. But this Shaman build deals more damage and helps you to increase your leveling speed a lot.

I hope you got some value from this guide and have a good idea what your Shaman build will be. Check back later for more popular and up-to-date Shaman builds!

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