How are Shamans without the expensive spells and items?

[DeathsSilkyMist]

In Velious STA is easier to max than WIS, so WIS is the min/max option (25 WIS/ 5 STA, or 25 WIS / 5 AGI for Ogre).

[zelld52]

Didn't read any of this, but I did level a shaman 1-60 last year. I did 1-55 without much gear. At 54, I took a break and farmed Sebilis for plat for weeks. Bought a Fungi and did 55-60 with Fungi. Sold Fungi at 58 and bought Torpor, stashed it away for 60.

1-24 was a slog. Every fight was Drowsy, miss 12 melee swings in a row -- 5 minutes later it's dead.

At 24, I started DoTing along with Drowsy tanking, cannibalize and regen made it pretty easy to stay 70% mana or more at all times.

At 34, I Drowsy tanked with pet behind. Cannibalizing with Chloroplast and Bind Wound during downtime. I absolutely flew from 34-45 in about 3-4 days.

At 45, I duod with monks and rogues. Same strategy. Drowsy tanking with melee behind.

34-45, I did alot of guards, and hill giants. Had 15k saved up and bought a discounted JBB.

46-51 was Root, JBB until dead. Bloodgills - then CoM until I finished my epic faction with pages.

51-54 was the slowest. JBB wasn't strong enough and I didn't have epic yet. I did Kaladim guards, face tanking with pet, Turgur's, and JBB spam.

At the end of 54, i finally finished my epic. And it was off to the races. At 56, I got Paralyzing Earth and every fight was the same. Root 4 melee mobs, Malaisement, Paralyzing Earth, epic click. Refresh epic every 1m 30s on mobs, and refresh root every 2 epic clicks per mob. Repeat until 60.



Few notes:

-Bind Wound. It goes perfectly with Cannibalize. Shaman get 200 bind wound by level 40, which is 33hp per tick. Combined with Regen its 38 per tick, 43 per tick with Chloro and 48 per tick with Regrowth. (Plus racial regen and any worn) At 56, they can bind to 70%. Works perfect while root rotting. Canni Down > Bind Up
-Save up for a JBB. It's still good at 60, and made the 46-54 soo much better than trying to DoT mobs.
-21% Haste, Poison Wind Censer, and some HP/AC rings is all you need to get to 45.
-Drowsy is the best slow until Turgurs, in my opinion. It's 25% slow (guaranteed 25% less damage from mob) and only 20 mana. 2.5s cast.... compared to 5s cast from Tagar's / Togor's. Excellent spell to pull with.

[Crawdad]

Originally Posted by Vanessa [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

How well does a level Shaman solo level / farm things, compared to other classes who solo level like Druid, Necro and Mage etc.?

Personally I found Shaman really boring to level and gave up at 49. 1-24 was an absolute slog, even with haste+fungi+pwc. 24-34 was more of the same, just with canni. 34-49 was.. more of the same, just with a pet and slightly better spells.

Solo, you're basically a melee with no melee skills, Meh slow, Meh DoTs, and you'll fight that way until ~50+. You eventually get a pet and spells that aren't so Meh and some fun toys (Fungi staff, JBB stuff, Snare neck, etc).

Grouping, you spend all your time buffing/rebuffing and then canni'ing for your lame heals. Being stuck with Greater Healing from 29 to 51 absolutely blows. Yes, Torpor is amazing, but that's after 60 levels and an ungodly amount of plat/lucking out.

A 60 geared shaman is a lot of fun, and I enjoyed mine a lot on Live... because I didn't level deck it out.

[Raj]

A talented shaman will truly take you on a serious mental road-trip of introspection or even finally making some really tough but healthy decisions in your life if you physically and mentally prepare well for the journey.

Stay strong my friends! [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Raj]

Originally Posted by DeathsSilkyMist [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

In Velious STA is easier to max than WIS, so WIS is the min/max option (25 WIS/ 5 STA, or 25 WIS / 5 AGI for Ogre).

WIS is very good overall to boost early but I wonder how well the average iksar shaman casual raider gets to maxing their STA. I am just curious. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Encroaching Death]

Originally Posted by Raj [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

A talented shaman will truly take you on a serious mental road-trip of introspection or even finally making some really tough but healthy decisions in your life if you physically and mentally prepare well for the journey.

Stay strong my friends! [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I wonder how many WW dragons this guy soloed:

[DeathsSilkyMist]

Originally Posted by Raj [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

WIS is very good overall to boost early but I wonder how well the average iksar shaman casual raider gets to maxing their STA. I am just curious. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Shamans get a +50 STA buff, but only a +10 WIS buff from Bear Form. An Iksar with 80 STA and 115 WIS (25 WIS / 5 STA split) is going to have 130 STA and 125 WIS self-buffed and naked. So you still have more STA than WIS. A casual raider can get Vindi BP and Othmir Prexus Totem quite easily, so you are at 165 STA already just from those two items and self buff.

In Velious STR/STA items are a lot more common than items with WIS/INT, and Shamans typically favor the items that make you tankier over the WIS/INT items. So you are typically going to have better STA than WIS.

Obviously there are many item combinations, so this isn't always the case. However, generally speaking the best stat to dump into on character creation is the one that is hardest to cap. My Shaman is STA capped, but still only has like 208 WIS, and I did the 25 WIS / 5 AGI route.

[Raj]

Originally Posted by Encroaching Death [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I wonder how many WW dragons this guy soloed:

I like this one better: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJaPUFefKx4 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]