I thought it wise to pull together a lot of the different points being asked again and again into a simple FAQ.


What "rotation" do I use now?

In Wrath we have a priority queue now instead of a repeating rotation. The reason is quite simple we have Maelstrom Weapon randomly hitting 5 stacks and since a Lightning Bolt instant cast is our highest dmg ability then we want to use that as soon as its available so we start building MW stacks again. Also we have different cooldowns from our other abilities so its very difficult to have a rotation that times this right.

However the major reason is that if you always use your highest dps ability as soon as its ready you are doing max dps. If you are using a lower damage ability when a higher one is available simply because the lower dmg one is next in the rotation then you are doing lower dps. Sticking to a fixed rotation will therefore give you lower dps.

The priority list for Enhancement Shaman is :

MW5_LB - cast a Lightning bolt when you have 5 Maelstrom weapon stacks - Chain Lightning does less dmg as it doesn't scale as well.

SS - cast a Stormstrike whenever its off cooldown and MW hasn't got 5 stacks- this does a fair whack of damage but more importantly refreshes the SS debuff on the target giving 28% extra nature damage (20% base + 8% glyph and you have the glyph because its our best glyph not having the SS glyph is lower dps). Note testing shows that getting 5 stacks of MW back up is more important than the Windfury proc so don't delay a SS waiting for Windfury as you did pre patch 3.0.

ES - cast an Earth shock whenever its off cooldown and the above two are not available - this can crit and benefits from SS debuff unlike Flame Shock it is for these two reasons we can safely retire Flameshock and not use it.

LL - cast a lava lash whenever its off cooldown and none of the above three abilities are available - a lava lash does a reasonable amount of damage and whilst not fantastic its better than the alternative which is just keep on swinging white dmg.

Shield or Totem refresh - if all else is on cooldown take the opportunity, if required, to refresh your Lightning/Water shield or totems.


NB. Flame Shock does less damage the DoT component cannot crit and it doesn't benefit from the Stormstrike debuff all of this #%%%@#@!s lower damage. This means you can safely remove it from your toolbar and of course it means that the Flame Shock Glyph is just bad for an Enhancement Shaman.

Lava Burst will always have a cast time, it will reset your swing timer, that means no white damage, no windfury procs, no maelstrom stacks ie: no dps whilst casting, this is just bad and other than PvP it shouldn't be used by an Enhancement Shaman.

You may wonder how on earth you can track all these different cooldowns, well of course there are plenty of cooldown tracking addons out there including the one written for Enhancement Shamans (by myself) called ShockAndAwe - you can download it from http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/shockandawe.aspx



What Glyphs should I use?

The glyphs - there is some debate as to exactly which is the best glyphs, simulation testing indicates that

Glyph of Stormstrike & Glyph of Earth Shock are top with

Glyph of Lightning Shield, Glyph of Flametongue & Glyph of Windfury Weapon all fairly competitve.

Glyph of Lava Lash is slightly lower dps.

Glyph of Lightining Shield becomes fairly useless however if you are having mana issues and need to use water shield.

NB. Earth Shock glyph at time of writing has a bug so it only reduces the GCD to 1sec not 0.5 sec as advertised.



What Weapons should I use/What weapon imbues should I use?

Use slow weapons in BOTH hands, almost all of our abilities benefit from SLOW weapons and do more dps with slow weapons. Two handers have been dead for two years and will always give lower dps in PvE. We have abilities that favour faster weapons but they do a far smaller portion of our overall dps and use of a fast weapon to boost low dps abilities at the expense of high dps abilities is just plain daft. You do more dps with two slow weapons. Slow means at least 2.5 speed preferably slower.

Weapon imbues - as you level you will have dual windfury weapon imbues, after you get 5/5 in Elemental Fury, the benefits of Flametongue on your offhand weapon start to match and then outweigh windfury. The exact point at which Flametongue becomes better depends on gear however at 80 with decent gear and 5/5 Elemental Fury, Flametongue on offhand wins. Thus the recomendation is WF/WF slow/slow and when you have decent gear swap to WF/FT slow/slow.



What talents should I take?

A lot of it is a matter of personal choice, however a cookie cutter build that works well for PvE raiding is http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hi0hqZhhxcoxdAIkufot]http://www.wowhead.com/?talent=hi0hqZhhxcoxdAIkufot



What stats on gear should I be going after?

Gear choices have changed a lot with Wrath mainly due to the fact we only get 1AP from 1 STR, down from 2, and now get 1 AP from Int. Also because we do a lot more of our damage from instant cast spells its a lot more important that these don't miss.

Gear stats priorities:

First you must cap your specials (Stormstrike & Windfury Weapon) : 9% hit required. We get 6% from Dual Wield specialisation so you need 3% from gear. At level 80 thats 99 hit rating to cap specials.

Secondly you want to make sure none of your attacks are dodged or worse parried. To eliminate parry's you need to stand behind the boss. To reduce dodges you need Expertise, 26 Expertise (6.5% dodge/parry reduction) means your attacks cannot be dodged. At level 80, that means you need 214 Expertise rating. A lot of the expertise available comes from rings, neck pieces & trinkets as well as buff food, gems and enchants.

Third once you have capped your specials and your Expertise, you need to make sure that all those instant cast spells actually hit the target a missed spell is zero dps. To do this you need to cap your spell hit which is 17%. Now stacking hit rating is great because it helps your white damage too (due to merged spell hit and melee hit rating) which means that the 40% of your damage that is from regular swings of your weapons hit more often too.

In a raid you can expect to get a 3% hit buff from moonkin druids or shadow priests, this leaves 14% from gear. This means you need 367 hit rating or 341 if you are a Draenei. Remember that you don't need all that from gear you can get it from food buffs, gems and enchants.

Ok so having capped all your specials, expertise and spell hit (which is not something immediately obvious to most players) what now can I now look at the "normal" stats. The answer is yes once you have capped all three elements above go for : Crit, AP, Agi, Haste. More hit isn't a bad thing either but a lot less important once you have capped spell hit. What order you go for with Crit/AP/AGI/Haste will very much depend on your overall gear balance. For best results use the Simulator EnhSim available from http://code.google.com/p/enhsim/downloads/list

Int comes in here somewhere but again it really depends on your gear use the Sim to get personal values, Int for you might be ahead of Agi or might be behind.

Lastly you can take Str, Spellpower but these are poor stats compared with the above.



What Addons should I use?

ShockAndAwe addon (available at http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/shockandawe.aspx ) comes highly recommended by the rest of the Shaman community, and I will continue to try to make it support everything that an Enh Shaman needs in PvE. You can also export your stats from ShockAndAwe for use in the simulator to get your personal Enhancement Points values (EP values).

When you have your personal EP values (which stats benefit your talents and gear setup most) you can plug those values back into EquivalencePoints addon (available from http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/equivalence-points.aspx ) this will show the total value of the item to you on the tooltip. ie: something has 40 Str, 20 Agi, 30 hit rating vs another piece with 40 Agi, 10 crit, 40 Expertise - which is better? Equivalance points can show you by a single figure weighted using your personal EP values from the simulator.

If you also use EquipCompare addon (available at http://www.wowinterface.com/downloads/info4392-EquipCompare.html ) you can see the tooltip for the item you are looking at (a drop, a quest reward or a badge item for instance) and the tooltip for the equivalent item you are wearing side by side. Both tooltips will have the total EP score on them so you can at a glance compare the two items.

I also recommend YATA as a totem management addon. You can get Yata from http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/yata.aspx



Further reading

If you want more detailed testing and more in-depth information please read the Enhancement Shaman Think Tank article at http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t20765-shaman_enhancement/

A few comments.

In order not to get parries one would want to stay behind the mob/boss. The parry cap isn't at 214 expertise. That's the "I won't get dodges" cap. Meaning that a level 83 mob (bosses in raid instances) has a 6.5% (not 6.25%) chance to dodge your attacks. For which you indeed need 214 expertise or roughly 26 expertise rating. Again, that is the dodge "cap".

Intelect isn't a "very poor stat". It's a so-so stat. Not in range of strength and spell power anyways.

As for the priority of attacks in rotation I'd say that except the obvious lightning bolt when 5/5 Maelstrom weapon is up, the order of the other three is governed (in my opinion) by what relic you have equiped in the relic slot. Since most of them would require to use an ability to get a bonus.

Otherwise, nice job on summing and condensing up the threads on Elitist Jerks forum. You should have mentioned the source if you ask me, but that's OK. :)

Great post:). Gonna be very helpful when i hit level 80:)

Reported! For sticky!

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Q u o t e:
A few comments.

In order not to get parries one would want to stay behind the mob/boss. The parry cap isn't at 214 expertise. That's the "I won't get dodges" cap. Meaning that a level 83 mob (bosses in raid instances) has a 6.5% (not 6.25%) chance to dodge your attacks. For which you indeed need 214 expertise or roughly 26 expertise rating. Again, that is the dodge "cap".

Intelect isn't a "very poor stat". It's a so-so stat. Not in range of strength and spell power anyways.

As for the priority of attacks in rotation I'd say that except the obvious lightning bolt when 5/5 Maelstrom weapon is up, the order of the other three is governed (in my opinion) by what relic you have equiped in the relic slot. Since most of them would require to use an ability to get a bonus.

Otherwise, nice job on summing and condensing up the threads on Elitist Jerks forum. You should have mentioned the source if you ask me, but that's OK. :)

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I didn't say Int was a very poor stat - I said it was a very poor state COMPARED TO THE ABOVE. However I agree that's confusing so I've amended it. Typical EP values show Int to be better than Str and a lot better than spell power point for point.

I've added a "further reading" section at the end to reference EJ forums. I am a very active contributor there and the analysis of others as well as myself contributed to the this article it wasn't lifted from anywhere, so the EJ forums whilst they undoubtedly informed my post, they are NOT the source of my post.

Regards dodge/parry, yes standing behind a boss where practical is the ideal as this eliminates parry, this is not always possible however. Thanks for spotting the typo, I'll fix that yes it should have been 6.5% not 6.25%, 1 expertise is 0.25% 26 is 6.5% and the cap for dodge. I can add something about standing behind the boss when practical too, and tidy up that section.

Useful constructive comments thanks.

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Q u o t e:


I didn't say Int was a very poor stat - I said it was a very poor state COMPARED TO THE ABOVE. However I agree that's confusing so I've amended it. Typical EP values show Int to be better than Str and a lot better than spell power point for point.

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well, a talented intelect point will give you a nice boost, waaay better than strenght - - but still, i wouldn't place it behind crit / ap/ haste , because :
1int = 1,1AP
1int = 15mana
1int = 0,33 SP
1 int = 0,00x spell crit - it helps here too...but not a lot ;)
so, i'd say it's on par with the other stats - when you are capped ( hit, expertise etc )

plus - a lot of intelect can help you o use the much more mana intensive CL and get more damage / MW stack

but that's just my opinion. . . . better go to EJ and see what ppl did on enhsim ;)

It really does depend on your gear balance, usually Int lags Crit, AP, Agi & Haste because we do so much more dmg through melee than through spells. However different gear balances can bring Int right up there with those 4. You really need to use the sim to test it out for yourself with your own gear and talents.

I deliberately put it in rank 5 however to emphasise that whilst you are gearing up its a lesser stat than crit, ap, agi & haste. However only the sim will give you personal EP values.

a) the glyph order is wrong

b) bosses have 5.6% chance to dodge against you, even from behind

c) EJ isn't allways 100% right

d) repeating stuff other people said without understanding it fully is a bad idea

e) good job compiling stuff for the masses, but try to double check your facts :)

Snorkle

Great post. Was a good read.

Through this bit of reading I learned quite abit. However I do no agree about your view on INT for an enhancement shaman. If you have specced for it (and you should) INT will not lag your AP. On the contrary it will boost it 1/1 just like AGI and STR. AGI and INT should go before STR now.

And yes, mobs (at least bosses) can dogde attacks coming from behind. Other players cannot.

Apart from that I couldn't agree more. Thumbs up! :)

Edit, abit of spelling errors.

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Q u o t e:
every selfrespecting enh uses http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t20765-shaman_enhancement/

no need to create a venicicle

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With respect whilst I am an active contributor to the EJ forums and am deeply involved in assisting with the testing etc, a huge number of people on THIS forum never read or know about the EJ forums as a lot of the information goes over their heads as we debate the minutiae.

This is very very clearly evidenced by the number of repeated questions here on this forum asking exactly the same thing. Having an FAQ for the forum that answers these questions as well as pointing people in the direction of a more authoritative source like EJ Think tank article.

I wasn't aware I'd created a "venicicle" as I have no idea what this is and neither does google nor any dictionary I can reference. Can you enlighten me please?

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Q u o t e:
every selfrespecting enh uses http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t20765-shaman_enhancement/

no need to create a venicicle

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You mean versicle ?

The thread is most welcomed since it does try to answer the most common question an enhancement shaman, beginner or "self respecting", would have. Kudos to Levva. And yes, Levva, I know you are a big contributor over there. Didn't tried to belittle your work and effort or anything. :)

Snorkle would you care to actually say more than basically stating things. With all respect, if glyph order is wrong, saying what would be the correct order would be more helpfull than just saying is wrong. That goes for the other statements aswell, except the one with the dodge chance. Are you abso100%lutely sure is 5.6% ?

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Q u o t e:
a) the glyph order is wrong

b) bosses have 5.6% chance to dodge against you, even from behind

c) EJ isn't allways 100% right

d) repeating stuff other people said without understanding it fully is a bad idea

e) good job compiling stuff for the masses, but try to double check your facts :)

Snorkle

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I do appreciate your contributions to this forum as a usually knowledgeable source Snorkle, however I do believe you to be misguided in your comments here.

a) what would you say is wrong with the glyph order? I agree that these are current and not final recommendations for glyphs.

b) Bosses have a 6.5% dodge chance not 5.6% as 1 expertise is 0.25% dodge and 26 expertise is the cap this is a very widely acknowledged figure.

c) agreed we debate, we test, we prove, people who lift stuff before the testing and proving usually fall foul in the end.

d) I reject your suggestion that I don't understand stuff I have done a massive amount of research, and I take exception to your suggestion that I do otherwise.

e) Which facts are wrong?

Please whilst you are a respected contributor here stop with the condescending attitude towards others who are also knowledgeable contributors it doesn't show you in a very good light.

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Q u o t e:
I can't understand why u miss lightnighte shield, dmg from LShield is same as lava lash, some time LS better, for example yesterday on Pachwerk http://wowwebstats.com/xwkoo4fevmqly?s=302186-358496&a=xfeaea3

With glif on LS and 1st bonus of T7 and talents dmg enscreased very much, I got crit from LS 1900.


Not tested yet fast OH with FT and slow OH with FT, mb there dps will be highder.

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Lightning Shield is passive but yes I should have put Lightning Shield in with refreshing totems section, I'll update that now. The Lightning Shield Glyph and the Imp.Shields talents are to be utterly avoided however as they are a LOT worse than other choices available.

"Slightly" offtopic...

Snorkle - What's it with you and still lvl 60. And why aren't you appointed to a specefic realm in the char portrait window?

lol, yeah. that has been buggin' my mind lately... ;)

/wet

Static Shock is not in any way shape or form dependant on Imp. Shields. Static Shock is a good talent without Imp.Shields, the glyph & T7 bonus help but are still poor compared with the other choices.

Elemental Fury is far superior dps per talent point than Imp.Shields you can see this extremely clearly using the sim. Stacking even more poor stuff on top of Imp.Shields makes the shield better but you have to ask what you are giving up. When you test the alternatives you will see that boosting Lightning Shield is poor in comparison to boosting other abilities.

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Q u o t e:
And Lewa as my expirience shows me the right rotation is : MW-SS-ES- Lash(If only others on cd or MW not stacked) , and again if ES refreshes at same time with SS il prefer use ES than SS coz ES deals aprox 3-4k when me SS never crits above 3k, and any time if MW is stacked must be used before any other of cd's.

So result: LB - dmg 4-6k , ES dmg - 3-4.5k , SS dmg - 2-2.8k.

This numbers taken from statistick and can be used for rotation priority.

Forgot dmg taken from full 25ppl buffed raid with 45int, 40hit elix, and 40 hit food.

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ES before SS can give similar dps and tbh there is a fair bit of debate as to which is better and until the ES glyph bug is fixed I doubt if we will have any firm answers. As a general guide for people looking for help however putting SS first ensures that they have the SS debuff on the target which will boost ES dmg by 28% so yes ES will do more dmg but that dmg is boosted significantly if the SS debuff is on the target.

Levva, thanks for this thread. While it doesn't tell me anything I didn't already know, (mainly because I read every page of the discussions on EJ forums as it was happening), hopefully it will cut down on the hundreds of posts all asking the same questions on these forums, and also on the number of people posting misleading or simply incorrect information simply because they 'think' it might be right rather than actually testing it.

I appreciate what you are trying to do here, even if some people mis-interpret it.