Pet Care for Shamans (a.k.a "Mike Told You So")
by Mike Schramm 
Aug 31st 2006 at 8:57PM
You laughed when I said it, readers. You said I was just whining. You called my character a "dirty Shaman." You even told me to reroll Hunter! Yes, when I suggested Shaman pets to Blizzard, you tried to laugh me off the Internet. But the new talents and spells came out this week, and lo and behold, look what Blizzard added to the Shaman class.That's right, suckers! Pets! Ok, well, I didn't get my shadow wolf, but two new totems will give Shamans the ability to summon at least two elementals-- a Fire Elemental (to "rain down destruction"-- sounds like a caster), and an Earth Elemental. I suggested we should get them for sixty seconds, but Blizz doubled that, and we will get to have them around for a whole two minutes in the expansion. Serves you all right for questioning my suggestions. Don't do it again!
And there's more pets on the way-- Mages have picked up a 41 point talent that will summon a Water Elemental for them to play around with. And while the Druid (or "Drood" as I like to call them) talents haven't been officially released yet, the rumors say they'll get their very own Treant (that has some really neat talents of its own). Pets for everyone! Although maybe this is why they lowered the raid limit to 25. If everybody brings a pet, you'll have 50 entities fighting on your side. Sweet!
Filed under: Mage, Shaman, Blizzard, Expansions
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
AcceptableRisk Aug 31st 2006 9:28PM
Don't take this the wrong way but the elementals Shamans get can hardly count as pets if you ask me. They're throwaways. You get them for two minutes every twenty. Plus they're summoned by a totem which may or may not give them some kind of maximum range. Sure they're kind of cool but they aren't going to change the style of the Shaman to any major extent.
Kallos Aug 31st 2006 9:39PM
Personally I think the fire elemental would have made more sense as a Warlock spell. All of our spells fall into either shadow or flame, and we already have a shadow elemental more or less.
I say give the shamans air elementals instead of fire.
Eliah Aug 31st 2006 9:41PM
Yes, and my holy priest will get a little cherub that flies around putting Renews on people and dispelling...that would be so cute.
BloodNova Aug 31st 2006 9:48PM
um, am i the only one thinking of the MAJOR flaw here?
totems usually only have 5 HP (unless specified as something else)
and with talens, have a maximum range of 40 yards
so these spells are 100% useless for pvp, as any player only has to kill the totem with a single hit for it to waste a big chunk of mana, and 20mins of cooldown.
sure, they *may* have some use in PvE, but come on, compared to the spells pally's have gotten, this is a joke.....
i am one majorly unimpressed shammy
Abe Sep 1st 2006 12:35AM
will the elementals have to hang around the totems is what I would like to know, also if they die when the totems are destroyed
if the answers are yes and yes, then these elementals might as well just be fire totems
mike Sep 1st 2006 12:41AM
blizz hasn't really said yet, Abe, but I'm guessing the answers are yes and no.
boneyard Sep 1st 2006 6:09AM
gotta love that i told you so style. or not.
Urthona Sep 1st 2006 2:20PM
Well, fire and earth elementals... they look cool. And I'm sure they'll find a use. And while I'm impressed you predicted it, I'm not impressed by the design of the two new entities.
I can understand the practicality of utilizing existing models for elementals, but that's exactly why I'm non-plussed. I ought to say right now that my Horde main, a shaman, is patiently waiting for me to bore of raiding as a nelf druid.
There's a lot of things that could happen to surprise and delight me with the implementation of them, but having a single summoned mob just ain't doin' it. If the shaman is supposedly a mage-DPS/healer hybrid, why not create a swarm of smaller fire elementals that run around tagging enemies with fire damage, as opposed to another fireball shower? Why not create a fire-spirit body double in the shape of your shaman as the elemental, or perhaps have a heightened fireform, like shadow priests get shadowform?
An earth elemental off-tank, usable so late in the shaman's career, seems like a waste of time. If you have made it all the way to level 60+ without the need of a distracting off-tank, why now? Will raids in Outland consist of battles so complex you need a tank on every single mob? There's a reason voidwalkers, tanking pets, and bearform are all accessible at level 10.
I still prefer the suggestion of summonable shadow wolves. As translucent DPS, with an electrical breath/bite, they fit the system as "air elementals". Appropriate, as air is the last and most dangerous of the totems collected.
I look forward to getting a treant, but if I don't get a batch of three or four crazed trees that pop out of the ground to cause serious damage and ridiculous chaos, I'm not going to see the point of using it.
Bugmaster Sep 9th 2006 6:30AM
guys plz dont say these pets arent gonna change playstyle in major end game content because u dont know how usefull there gonna be and u dont know if u need them
Ryan Nov 7th 2006 11:13AM
"Although maybe this is why they lowered the raid limit to 25."
No... it's because the hardware they picked up from Walmart can't handle instances all that well.