1.9 patch notes

[cevik]

The reason that Divine Shield will never go away (and thus the reason Pallies will remain both overpowered and boring) is that Divine Shield was in WC3, and thus it would be "against the lore" to remove it from the game.

[Hoax]

You guys are tripping balls if you dont think shaman are great in large scale pvp.  Even stupid shaman players are pretty good.  Pally's on the other hand are only good if the player is completely unselfish in his/her playstyle.  A pally who doesn't give two shits about personal dps and specs and gears to get the most out of their mana and healing is a tremendous force in group pvp.  Any time you can break the kill order by having a hard target with healing that is a major boon.  But shaman add a ton to group pvp through totems alone.  I've been out of the game for awhile but saying that shaman dont add as much as pally's in group pvp is really rediculous.  Oh and your racials wtfpwn alliance racials.  All in all though complaining about WoW's balance is pretty lame because the best thing I can say about the game is it has the best balance I've ever seen in a MMO, if they ungimp mages it will be pretty much perfect.

[El Gallo]

  If you are talking about PvE, who cares. 

I care about PvE 
Their deaggro buff alone makes it very hard to have an encounter which is challenging to both sides, to say nothing of BoW, BoK and practically aggro-free healing.  Hence my earlier bitching about the utterly inferior deaggro buff given to shamans in 1.9.

I am much crappier and less experienced at PvP, but my feeling is that in group PvP it goes good paladin > good shaman >> bad shaman >>>>> bad paladin.  Luckily for the Horde, 90% of both classes suck.

[Evil Elvis]

You guys are tripping balls if you dont think shaman are great in large scale pvp.  Even stupid shaman players are pretty good.  Pally's on the other hand are only good if the player is completely unselfish in his/her playstyle.  A pally who doesn't give two shits about personal dps and specs and gears to get the most out of their mana and healing is a tremendous force in group pvp.  Any time you can break the kill order by having a hard target with healing that is a major boon.  But shaman add a ton to group pvp through totems alone.  I've been out of the game for awhile but saying that shaman dont add as much as pally's in group pvp is really rediculous.  Oh and your racials wtfpwn alliance racials.  All in all though complaining about WoW's balance is pretty lame because the best thing I can say about the game is it has the best balance I've ever seen in a MMO, if they ungimp mages it will be pretty much perfect.

Look, I'm not saying shaman suck.  I'm saying, in decent sized pvp battles, pallies add more to the group than the shamans do.  It's doesn't make the game e-z mode, but it's defintely a leg up in group situations.

Cleanse is better than purpge.  Paladins have better mana efficiency.  Plate armor, and other boons to give them higher survivability.  Bubble threat forces you to put them on the bottom of the priority list.  They have stun(s) (arguably the best CC in the game), ranged execute, BoP, BoF, and a few other tricks depending on their talents.

Windfurry, earthbind, frost shock, ghost wolf, and war stomp just don't compete with that.  They're not gimp abilities, but the amount they benefit a group drops pretty fast.  The larger the group, there are more/better people to provide snares and DD.  Shaman might be better emergency healers, but pallies survive long enough to allow them to win via attrition, or until backup arrives.  Shaman are the more well rounded class, but pallies just plain outshine them when it comes to group battles.

[Hoax]

I would argue that in 5v5 Pally and Shaman are close, and again this is only if the Pally is a good pvp player (only about 5% of ret spec'd pally's aren't complete fucking morons).

I would also argue that with the advent of the BG's you aren't going to see large scale combat anywhere, so even by your own admission Pally's only shine when what?  A raid is camping BRM and runs into another raid?  Nobody who is serious about pvp touches AV, so where exactly is this mythical truly large scale pvp taking place?

I'm not saying I dont agree with your sentiment, I will be the first person to tell you that when you give a very hard to kill class healing you are treading dangerously close to imbalance.  But WoW is not SB there are not large (read 10+v10+) fights anywhere but HB/SS and at least on Arch not many people bother with that area anymore.  If your looking for pvp your best off going to Sithilus and starting some fights out there which are almost gaurenteed to be 5v5 if not smaller scale.

[Evil Elvis]

AB is 15 vs 15.

AV was always pretty busy on our server.

WSG was the dead BG on our server, and even there, the fact that alliance always has a few people who can cleanse/dispell sheeps/snares/roots makes iis pretty nifty when the object is to stay alive and mobile.

Also, any time there was a town raid, or clashes at dragon spawns.

Or when groups meet heading into an instance.

Or when you're raiding Tyr's Hand to annoy the keke's.

Pretty much everything outside of random ganks when you're out leveling or farming.

Yeah, shaman are easier to play.  But I'm trying to factor our human stupidity when comparing the two classes usefulness.

[Teleku]

Shamans have to be one of the most insanely overpowered class's I have yet ever witnessed in any MMOG.  If horde just brought an entire team of Shamans in every BG, they would never lose again.  A class that can do great damage with weapons, good damage with spells, and heal, is the definition of imbalance.  There like druids, only they do everything well instead of everything mediocre.  Yes, they are less effective in large 40 man pvp raids, but everybody becomes less individually effective.  My shaman I made is a god, and I don’t even try.  I can understand the less usefulness of Shamans in PvE being a complaint, but when it comes to PvP, Shaman is 5 times as great as any pally.

[Merusk]

4 Shaman guarding a flag in WSG = Alliance loses.  That's all you need to guard the flag, ever, regardless of how much the Alliance throws at them they aren't going down and the flag's going nowhere.

[Brolan]

4 Shaman guarding a flag in WSG = Alliance loses.  That's all you need to guard the flag, ever, regardless of how much the Alliance throws at them they aren't going down and the flag's going nowhere.

I wonder why Shamans haven't been hit with the big nerf bat?

[cevik]

Shamans have to be one of the most insanely overpowered class's I have yet ever witnessed in any MMOG.  If horde just brought an entire team of Shamans in every BG, they would never lose again.  A class that can do great damage with weapons, good damage with spells, and heal, is the definition of imbalance.

Uhh pallies can do all of this, plus they have plate armor instead of mail and can cast a spell that allows nothing in the entire game to touch them while they heal, basically a second free life..

[Teleku]

Pallys cant do jack shit in the way of damage with either their weapon or their spells.

All they can do is sit there and heal while people beat them.  Or if the other team is smart, just kill everybody around them, and then kill them.

[Sairon]

All they can do is sit there and heal while people beat them.  Or if the other team is smart, just kill everybody around them, and then kill them.

I can't help but think that you haven't played a lot of PvP centric games, or that the last sentence there was really supossed to be in green. Let me see here, a class that is so durable that they're always saved for last and has the games probably most mana efficient heals. Add to that the best buffs, 2 invuls and insta usualy complete heal ( allthough loh is on a long timer ).

Pallys cant do jack shit in the way of damage with either their weapon or their spells.

See, here is what as good as every damn pally I've ever seen has a misconception, paladins aren't supossed to be doing damage, it's as laughable as priests not healing and trying to do damage. Supe durable + heals + good dmg has never been a formula for balanced class.,

[bhodi]

Shamans have to be one of the most insanely overpowered class's I have yet ever witnessed in any MMOG.  If horde just brought an entire team of Shamans in every BG, they would never lose again.  A class that can do great damage with weapons, good damage with spells, and heal, is the definition of imbalance.

Uhh pallies can do all of this, plus they have plate armor instead of mail and can cast a spell that allows nothing in the entire game to touch them while they heal, basically a second free life..

Shamans do have one thing pallys don't have. An INSTANT cast snare that does over 1.5k damage on a crit. Nerf frost shock, thx

[Merusk]

Pallys cant do jack shit in the way of damage with either their weapon or their spells.

See, here is what as good as every damn pally I've ever seen has a misconception, paladins aren't supossed to be doing damage, it's as laughable as priests not healing and trying to do damage. Supe durable + heals + good dmg has never been a formula for balanced class.,

Agreed.. thus the complaints about Shamen...

[cevik]

Pallys cant do jack shit in the way of damage with either their weapon or their spells.

All they can do is sit there and heal while people beat them.  Or if the other team is smart, just kill everybody around them, and then kill them.

No team that leaves the healer for last should ever be allowed to pvp, it's the worst mistake you can make.

Any team that attacks the pally first should never be allowed to pvp, it's the worst mistake you can make.

Do you see the conflict here?

[Sairon]

Pallys cant do jack shit in the way of damage with either their weapon or their spells.

See, here is what as good as every damn pally I've ever seen has a misconception, paladins aren't supossed to be doing damage, it's as laughable as priests not healing and trying to do damage. Supe durable + heals + good dmg has never been a formula for balanced class.,

Agreed.. thus the complaints about Shamen...

Shamans aren't as durable as paladins, not even close. Shamans with good gear and deep into elemental do fairly decent damage at the cost of heals, all other specs only do slightly better than paladins.

[Teleku]

All they can do is sit there and heal while people beat them.  Or if the other team is smart, just kill everybody around them, and then kill them.

I can't help but think that you haven't played a lot of PvP centric games, or that the last sentence there was really supossed to be in green. Let me see here, a class that is so durable that they're always saved for last and has the games probably most mana efficient heals. Add to that the best buffs, 2 invuls and insta usualy complete heal ( allthough loh is on a long timer ).

Yeah, thats nice.  And I'm telling you, from the many BGs and PvP conflicts I have been in general, the horde always just focus fires on everybody else, and take them down regardless.  The extra burst DPS you guys have in the form of Shamans is to much for a pally to heal off.  The pally doesnt make much of a difference since he cant heal fast enouph before the person is down.  Priest do better here with the bigger flash heals, PW:S, and fear they can use.  Again, their durability is nice, but I've never seen a pally able to really hold off an attack the way you say.  They just dont heal fast enouph.

See, here is what as good as every damn pally I've ever seen has a misconception, paladins aren't supossed to be doing damage, it's as laughable as priests not healing and trying to do damage. Supe durable + heals + good dmg has never been a formula for balanced class.,

I'm not saying they are suppose to, just responding to Cevik who is implying they can do as much damage with their weapons and spells as a Shaman.  A Shaman, using green equipment, can 1 shot a level 60 cloth wearer with his 2 hander, not even having bothered to cast any of his INSTANT CAST (very big for PvP) damage spells yet.

FUCK THAT.

[Evil Elvis]

There must be some other game with the acronym WoW, because you're not playing the same game we are.

Seriously, no shaman should be 1 or 2-hitting a cloth caster that's tried to gear for pvp.  If you're going into a BG with 2.2k hp's, that's just your gear sucking ass, and itemization fucking you over.  It's not the class.

[Calantus]

Epic geared with a TuF and Enhance spec, my brother has only ever 1-shotted mages in pvp when they sacrifice mass HPs for +damage gear. With me in blue enhance gear (cause all my purple stuff was for healing), a reaper, and a few points in enhance I never one-shot any level 60. I call bullshit on green geared shaman 1-shotting cloth.

[Sairon]

All they can do is sit there and heal while people beat them.  Or if the other team is smart, just kill everybody around them, and then kill them.

I can't help but think that you haven't played a lot of PvP centric games, or that the last sentence there was really supossed to be in green. Let me see here, a class that is so durable that they're always saved for last and has the games probably most mana efficient heals. Add to that the best buffs, 2 invuls and insta usualy complete heal ( allthough loh is on a long timer ).

Yeah, thats nice.  And I'm telling you, from the many BGs and PvP conflicts I have been in general, the horde always just focus fires on everybody else, and take them down regardless.  The extra burst DPS you guys have in the form of Shamans is to much for a pally to heal off.  The pally doesnt make much of a difference since he cant heal fast enouph before the person is down.  Priest do better here with the bigger flash heals, PW:S, and fear they can use.  Again, their durability is nice, but I've never seen a pally able to really hold off an attack the way you say.  They just dont heal fast enouph.

Paladin heals aren't THAT much worse. If your team mates consistently are going down before you can land a single heal there's something wrong. WoW is in fact one of the MMORPGs where the players can take a fairly large beating before dying.

See, here is what as good as every damn pally I've ever seen has a misconception, paladins aren't supossed to be doing damage, it's as laughable as priests not healing and trying to do damage. Supe durable + heals + good dmg has never been a formula for balanced class.,

I'm not saying they are suppose to, just responding to Cevik who is implying they can do as much damage with their weapons and spells as a Shaman.  A Shaman, using green equipment, can 1 shot a level 60 cloth wearer with his 2 hander, not even having bothered to cast any of his INSTANT CAST (very big for PvP) damage spells yet.

FUCK THAT.

We have an enhancement shaman in my guild with the best melee gear available for a shaman ( ragnars hammer included ), and his DPS is in my opinion pretty laughable. He doesn't even show up on top 10 DPS.

[Paelos]

Ugh, pally v. shaman debate.

They both need nerfs people. Blizzard is retarded for giving any healing class mail or plate, but they did.

If you play Horde, you've never played with your average pally. They don't heal much if at all. Most of them are complete morons only worried about keeping their asses alive. The utility to the group is low at best. Kill everyone else around them, and kill them last, they aren't firing off a ton of heals to keep the group going. As a warrior I can assure you of this. Also, pallies have nothing really cool that helps assault or defend graveyards or nodes other than their ability to stand there. In large scale pvp, I don't see them as an overwhelming force, unless it's for overwhelming stupidity of the people that play them.

As for shamans, they get totems. Even the stupidest shaman in the book can throw down a totem near a node or a graveyard. That alone means you can't cap flags easily when one is standing around, all other fun shammy things aside. To me, they are much much more efficient for accomplishing objectives in pvp than pallies. Mostly because of the LCD effect they can have on the outcome. Shamans are some of the best defenders in the game.

If both classes were wiped clean, I'd be a happy man.

[TheWalrus]

The real problem with pallies is greed. Cp man, if they aren't killing stuff, they aren't getting points. But seriously, after watching paladins forever, I know I could play a better one than the majority that are.  Their ability to stand a node is exactly what makes them valuable in AB. They live forever, so they can keep people off the flag long enough till help arrives. I've seen 3 paladins that consistently heal their groups, and they're damn near unstoppable. Just don't think you get the right kind of people playing the class is all.

[SurfD]

Eh, it IS possible for a shaman to "1 Hit" a cloth caster, in green gear, but it would require a fairly obscene stri of luck (i have seen it happen tho)

A good damage 2 hander + improved Windfury + Hand of Justice trinket (proc extra attack trinket from BRD) means that with the following:

First hit procs windfury, Hand of Justice procs off the last windfury hit and Windfury procs again off the Hand of Justice hit, with a lucky string of crits you can technically churn out around (6 hits times 400 or so damage) 2.5k or so damage off a "single hit"

Now, you want to talk UGLY, A friend of mine hit a Rat in scholomance for nearly 6k damage off a "single hit".  The character in question is a warrior, with sword spec, with hand of justice, and had a windfury buff running from the shaman in the group.  His attack went something like: Hit rat (proc windfury, Proc HoJ, Proc Windfury, Proc Swordspec, Proc Windfury).......It you should have heard him on teamspeak.  Sounded like he just about fell out of his chair when it happened.

[Calantus]

HoJ is blue, windfury cannot proc off itself, and shaman have no other way to get extra attacks. So you can't get what you described on a shaman in green gear.

[Merusk]

HoJ is blue, windfury cannot proc off itself, and shaman have no other way to get extra attacks. So you can't get what you described on a shaman in green gear.

Read it again, windfury wasn't proccing off itself.  Would be funny to see, but yeah, something like that would require an obscene amount of luck.

[Righ]

If you play Horde, you've never played with your average pally. They don't heal much if at all. Most of them are complete morons only worried about keeping their asses alive.

I play Horde, and just wanted you to know that this is also my experience of most shamans, druids and priests in PvP. It has very little to do with character class, and a lot more to do with player class. However, there are probably a higher number of morons playing paladins and shamans simply because these are popular 'well rounded' classes (to use Blizzard's words).

All classes in WoW are horrendously overpowered if geared up or played well.

[Fabricated]

Strangely enough one of by best friends is a guildmate of mine, and he's happy to play his pally as a healer in either PvE or PvP. He's pretty damn good at it too.

[Calantus]

HoJ is blue, windfury cannot proc off itself, and shaman have no other way to get extra attacks. So you can't get what you described on a shaman in green gear.

Read it again, windfury wasn't proccing off itself.  Would be funny to see, but yeah, something like that would require an obscene amount of luck.

I know what it was. Windfury proccing the extra hit of HoJ, or multiple hits of HoJ, which is impossible for a green geared shaman because they wouldn't have a HoJ. My comment about windfury not proccing on itself was to clarify that only HoJ can bring about the random crazy chain of hits for a shaman (as they don't have sword spec like warriors/rogues), and since that's out of the equation a green geared shaman just cannot do it.

Also it's not really fair to back up a statement meant to show how imba a class is if you are including a very rare drop item with getting multiple 2% chance hits on top of a 20% chance on hit. Especially when this is available to other classes, has everything to do with an item, and nothing at all to do with the class in question. Hell, if you want to go into the realm of crazy-stupid-lucky you could say a priest with that trinket can potentially 1-hit someone if he gets multiple procs on the hit.

[Hoax]

Ugh, pally v. shaman debate.

They both need nerfs people. Blizzard is retarded for giving any healing class mail or plate, but they did.

If you play Horde, you've never played with your average pally. They don't heal much if at all. Most of them are complete morons only worried about keeping their asses alive. The utility to the group is low at best. Kill everyone else around them, and kill them last, they aren't firing off a ton of heals to keep the group going. As a warrior I can assure you of this. Also, pallies have nothing really cool that helps assault or defend graveyards or nodes other than their ability to stand there. In large scale pvp, I don't see them as an overwhelming force, unless it's for overwhelming stupidity of the people that play them.

As for shamans, they get totems. Even the stupidest shaman in the book can throw down a totem near a node or a graveyard. That alone means you can't cap flags easily when one is standing around, all other fun shammy things aside. To me, they are much much more efficient for accomplishing objectives in pvp than pallies. Mostly because of the LCD effect they can have on the outcome. Shamans are some of the best defenders in the game.

If both classes were wiped clean, I'd be a happy man.

Sadly I agree w/ Paelos..   

To the person who said most priests/druids/shaman dont heal, you must smell funny or be a terrible player so they dont want to waste mana on you.  Shaman dont need to heal others unless that is how they have spec/geared.  They can get crazy burst dps, keep entire groups snared and do other cool stuff while keeping themselves alive.  Druids and priests heal, unless you are playing with only 26shadow spec'd priests and have never met a restore(?) druid.  I've only seen one balance druid and feral is gimpy unless you have all the right gear and are quite skilled so most druids will be casting heals.

You really can't appreciate how stupid most pally's are, I played a priest and I still remember the first time a pally bubbled me, I was like "wtF, that can be cast on others!???" I was like lvl 50 and it was during a big pvp fight.  I had never been bubbled ever by a pally in 50 levels...  they are all selfish cockmunching douchebags.  Something about the type of person who wants to be a holy warrior just means 96% of them are fucking retards who couldn't pvp their way out of a wet paper bag.

Frankly I blame alliance having palladins for why they almost always loose in BG's pug vrs pug on any server.

[Sairon]

They can get crazy burst dps, keep entire groups snared and do other cool stuff while keeping themselves alive.

Hunter, Rogue, Warrior, Warlock and Mage has better and more reliable burst dmg though in end game

[SurfD]

They can get crazy burst dps, keep entire groups snared and do other cool stuff while keeping themselves alive.

Hunter, Rogue, Warrior, Warlock and Mage has better and more reliable burst dmg though in end game

The sad part is, there is an elemental shaman in my guild with better DPS then some of our mages, and believe me, our mages are not slouches when it comes to gear.  Nothing like Being hit with 2300 damage from a crit Chainlightning, followed by 1.6k from a crit earth or Ice shock.

Mages pretty much only work when you are 31 Arcane and 20 in either fire or Ice.  And quite frankly, I think it sucks that you pretty much have to be 31arcane to get anywhere in PvP.
- Arcane power trumps any of the other two trees 31 pt talents for insane damage output. 
- Arcane Power + ZHC + ToeP + 300 or so in damage gear = Mage is a litteral god for 20 seconds every 3 or so minutes.

Hunters, well, hunters are just fucking broken.  Aimed shot+Multishot+autoshot+arcane shot, all tossable in less time then it takes me to cast a single Pyroblast......On an elven hunter this generally means I am dead before I even knew the fucker was there.

[Ironwood]

Hunters are so overpowered right now it's not funny.  There was a short-lived thread on the Rogue boards about how to beat them :  it stopped after someone pointed out 'You Don't.'

[Jeff Kelly]

Mages pretty much only work when you are 31 Arcane and 20 in either fire or Ice.  And quite frankly, I think it sucks that you pretty much have to be 31arcane to get anywhere in PvP.

We were doing MC on the weekend. At the end of the raid our RL posted the damage meter (yeah, inaccurate and whatnot). None of our mages, including me even showed up in the top 15. We were beat by Hunters (Places 1 to 5), Rogues and the odd Warrior.

Ice mages only work as far as damage is concerned when you have ridiciously high amounts of *dam/+crit% gear.

 

[Calantus]

I see you guys have never been hit by a 3k frost bolt.

Seriously, I don't get the shaman worship in this game. I played a shaman for months, got her geared up in purples, tried a crapload of different specs. I know how they play, I know their weaknesses, I know their strengths. I rerolled priest for my guild, got good blue gears and some armor items... and I was so much better than my shaman was in group PVP it almost made me sick. PW:S is so much better than NS it's not even funny. It's on a 15 second timer on a person, and a 5 sec timer for using on different people. It is instant instead of "once the NS animation is finished you can heal". And after all that it is still half of what an NS heal would do anyway. I thought that it would change when I rerolled alliance. Nope. Yeah it gets purged quite often, but it almost always absorbs at least a hit or 2 if a person is being focussed. AoE fear... hot damn that shit is tight. Even undead with the pvp trinket, even warriors, it is still useful against them. Renew? Am I drooling yet? Should I talk about dispell/cleanse vs Purge? Every time I dispell a frost nova, polymorph, entangle, sleep or warlock fear/seduce I can't help but think of how shitty it was being helpless against them as a shaman.

Any priest spec has better pvp healing than any spec shaman, a disc/holy priest has better survivability than an enh/res shaman, and a shadow priest makes both elemental and enhancement shaman look weak. The only thing shaman really have over priests are good snares.

[Evil Elvis]

3k frostbolt comes from Arcane Power/Tome of Ephemeral Power/Zandalarian Hero Charm.

Mages are broken as fuck.  The only way they can kill most classes is by stacking those crutch trinkets and a 31 point talent.

I'd love to see AP dropped to, say, 20% dmg/mana, but made undispellable.  Maybe even dropping it a little more, and putting it on a lower timer.  Then, remove the ability for ToEP and ZHC to stack, and maybe even nerf them a little bit.  Then, fix the fucking class.  Making the mage community eat shit for 1 1/2 years, and forcing them to wait behing shaman (and maybe even rogues now) is unacceptable.

And I don't understand some of the decisions the devs make.  Shadowmeld is by far the best racial in the game, and it's re-fucking-diculous when coupled with a NE hunter and their now stealthable pets.  Who makes a warrior class that's basically anti-caster?  Spell resistances are fubar, but instead of coming up with a better system, they're nerfing CoE and forcing -resistance items on casters.  And whoever thought up letting warlocks have 300 resistance felhunters, with devour, silence, and soul link needs to have his junk bashed in with a rusty shelaileigh.