All shaman, regardless of spec benefit from flexibility. Because the other hybrids (druids and paladins) have trees for DPS, healing AND protection and shaman ONLY have DPS and healing its much easier for a shaman to cover the 2 roles. Proof of that is me writing this post for Tryst. Akime is and always has been Enhancement spec. Yet, I've been the 2nd healer in Kara more then once -- and not just on boss fights but through the entire instance a few times. Another pre-breakdown thought is that Shaman in general is a class built around pre-planning anod NOT reacting. Do you want to focus on totems or shocks? Are you healing one target here or a group? Know what totems you're dropping before you even engage. 90% of what a shaman does in EVERY fight is decided long before the pull. People who like shaman like strategy games like CIV and Axis and Allies over games like Halo or God of War. Its all about planning, theorycrafting, building, and examining the results when you're a shaman. I might even make my own blog post on this later, but for now lets look at HEALING!! (yay?)
Strength:
Shaman have 2 primary strengths. One is their flexibility, and breaking that down for a Resto Shaman it means they're equally good as single-target healers or small group healers (ie- the melee, or the casters not 'party 3'). I'll break this down more later.
Our other strength is that our tree gives us more bang for our buck then any other healer. Our heals are all overpowered if built right, and they're all extremely mana efficient (with the small exception of Earth Shield in arenas).
Weakness:
There are three here, so bear with me. While we're good at many things, we're not the best at any. Paladins are better single target healers, druids are better raid/party healers, and priests have better 'oh crap' recovery, Jack of many trades, master of none.
Shaman have the highest healing-threat of the 4 healers, and we have absolutely no safety net (bubble, bop, fade, barkskin, fear, bearform) short of a little totem that will get one-shot by any elite in any 70 instance.
Last, and this is for Trystery, shaman have the absolute CRAP for mana regen. Unlike priests, we get manatick per 5 spirit instead of 4 and of course Pallies have their awesome mana-back-per-crit ability. I know everyone says 'you have totems!' but allow me to math that for you. Mana SPRING totem costs 120 mana for 2 minutes and maxes at 17.5 mana per 2. So, for the two minutes its down we get about 1050 mana back. Mind you, the minute its gone we drop 1-4 more totems. The average totem is actually 250-350. If you drop 3 250 totems its 750+120 for your mana totem so 870 of the 1050. Now, to be fair, usually you'll only drop 2 and a Mana Spring, but at best you'll actually get circa 500 mana in 2 minutes which is really not a lot when you break it down. (You're looking at 1 Chain heal or Healing Wave every 2 minutes.) Mana TIDE is a little better because you get about 24% of your MAX MANA POOL from it, but it has a 5 minute cooldown. Use it during boss fights when you're at about half your mana. In the end though, the totems are really more for buffing others much more then for buffing you. Don't get me wrong, they DO help (especially now that they last 2 minutes) but the real money for a shaman is in efficiency.
Vital Talents:
Okay, one minute here to explain these talents before I start referring to them all over the place. Note, most of these reference my early comment of our tree giving us the best bang for the buck.
Improved Healing Wave + Healing Way: makes your strongest one-target heal a 2 second cast, and the second makes a stackable buff on the target giving each following cast 6-18% more heal. Absolutely vital combo for single-target healing.
Totemic Focus + Totemic Mastery: 25% cost redux on your totems, and an increased range for your friendly totems for just 6 points. I honestly think EVERY shaman regardless of spec needs these two talents.
Purification + Improved Chain Heal: Purify increases all your healing spells effectiveness by 10%, and I.C.H increases Chain Heal by 20%. Now, here's the best part: the two stack. That means CH gets 30% making the most mana-efficient heal in the game also the most powerful. Oh, and both also stack with Nature's Blessing which gives you more damage AND healing by an amount equal to 30% of your intellect.
Common Talent Builds:
I'm very guilty of many posts on many forums complaining about our talent tree's needing a serious rehaul. HOWEVER, I fully believe of all the trees Resto is by FAR the best end game tree for a shaman. Having said that, I now say expect to spend almost ALL your talent points in the tree. Its not unheard of to see 0/0/61 though 0/5/56 is more common (for the extra 5% max mana found in enh. tree). If you want a little more bang, you might stretch for 10/0/51 to get the top 2 talents in Elemental. Dipping further then that RARELY happens though, because Resto shaman will want almost EVERY ability found at the bottom of their tree, and nothing in the other 2 trees will ever help them that much anyway.
Basic Strategy + Spell Rotation:
Okay, for this I'll cover both single target and group targetting. First, single targetting:
For a single target begin with them having Earth Shield. Two reasons: first, its a self-proc HoT and will allow you to sit on idle for a good 20-30 seconds to start the fight so you can mana-back after dropping your first round of totems. Second, the ES procs actually add threat to the person it procs on instead of you. If thats a tank, then the proc recieves BONUS threat according to that tanks talents. Nice, huh? Important thing though: ES is expensive, so really the one cast pre-fight is all you'll use even in a boss fight unless you need to cover for an 'OH CRAP!' situation.
After the first 20-30 seconds, ES should be about half-burned (it has 10 procs) so you'll start building you're Healing Way stacked buff. Cast a Healing Wave, wait for at least 8 seconds (11 if you can) and then cast again. Rinse and repeat the rest of the fight with the exception that when ES drops you'll probably need to cast every 8 seconds. Remember, Shaman get a LOT of power out of their heals so you can afford to wait 8 seconds. SHAMAN DO NOT SPAM!! On a single target (who's usually a tank) you're going to start healing when they hit about 80%.
Multi-Target Healing:
Okay, this is a little different in that you use a completely different pair of heals. Ignore ES completely, you won't need it for a multi target. (I do recomend putting it on a tank between pulls but don't use it in fight when you'll need that 900 mana).
Begin with rounds of Lesser Healing Wave. Spot heal anyone that falls to about 80%. This should jump them up to about 90-95 depending on their HP. After a while, you will fall behind regardless of how on top of it you are. When this happens, take a breath and use the BEST HEAL IN THE GAME! Chain Heal 1-2 times quickly to top everyone in your small group back up. Ideally, a Chain Heal should start when 3 or more people are around 60-70% and continue till all (or all but 1) are back to 90+%.
To give you an idea of the pace of this... if I'm watching all the melee I'll use 2-3 LHW then wait about 6 seconds, hit a Chain Heal, wait about 6 seconds and start over. Again, do NOT spam. If you're falling behind, then drop the LHW not the Chain Heals. Cast 2-3 Chain Heals, then wait 6-7 seconds, cast another 2-3 if you need to. This strat also works well for bosses with large, timed AoEs such as Void Reaver.
Best Stats:
After a lot of reading and theorycrafting I've come to believe Shaman only need to worry about 2 stats. INT and +HEAL.
INT does 2 things for a shaman. First, it gives you a larger mana pool. Since our regen is pathetic and our key is efficiency the more mana you have at the start means the longer you're going to last. Along with that our best regen is Mana Tide Totem which gives back about 24% of your MAX MANA POOL.
The other thing INT does comes from the talent Nature's Blessing. Increases your spell damage and healing by an amount equal to 30% of your INT. Quick note: EVERY resto shaman will take and max this talent because its a prereq for Earth Shield. That being, you might as well maximize its use by stacking up the INT.
That leads to the +HEAL stat. Your +HEAL affects everything, including your Healing Stream Totem, your Earth Shield, and your second/third targets from Chain Heals. Everything that heals. Again, our regen is crap so SHAMAN DO NOT SPAM!! The only, only, ONLY way to avoid being a spammer when you're not a druid is to get the absolute most healing out of your heals.
The more mana you have and the less you have to spam the less reliant you are on Spirit (which again is bad for Shaman) or your mp5. However, if you're going to pick one I personally suggest the mp5 as you have no talents in your tree that influence or are influenced by Spirit. I wouldn't completely ignore Stamina - but if you take the 2 talents for threat redux and you don't spam then you shouldn't fear aggro too much. I would not take high stamina gear over high INT or +heal myself.
Final Comments:
1. SHAMAN DO NOT SPAM!! Can't say this enough. Max out your healing and mana pool and ease off the throttle. Do not spam: not a heal, not in /trade, not for gold. DO NOT SPAM!
2. Realize what your role is in a fight, and use your abilities accordingly. If you're a single-target healer why would you Chain Heal (short of 'oh crap!' situations). If you're in charge of a melee, then don't waste an Earth Shield on just one of your 5 targets. Being a shaman, regardless of spec, is all about thinking in ADVANCE and then acting out a PLAN. We're not a reactionary class - leave that to the priests.
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