i have multiple 70s, and my favorite is my elemental shaman. yep, ELEMENTAL shaman--least powerful spec, all other things being equal. i say this after grouping with several lifelong friends in so many varied situations (one such friend is, gasp, a warlock), and noting the damage meter ridiculousness (and we're all wearing equivalent gear, and have roughly the same level of skill). people can point to what's "outside" the realm of the raw damage meter data--you know, other abilities that aren't straight damage. i merely point back and say "what, you mean like fear, stun, resistance to stun, and the ability to not get spell-locked for eternity since your only school of magic is nature?"

elemental shamans are like 2/3 of a mage when it comes to dps casting, yet lack the sheeping ability (and the long-ass spell-locking ability that plagues my sleep), the iceblock, etc. groups choose an elemental shaman when either (a) the shaman forms the group; or (b) when there are no mages, locks, hunters, or other dps+cc available.

my focus in this post is on pvp, though. i think the following two (yes, just TWO!) changes would drastically help to level the playing field in PvP:

(1) wind shield. only one elemental shield can be active at any time. instant cast. absorbs the next one movement-impairing/stunning effect that would have otherwise hit the shaman. after absorbing this effect, the wind shield fades.

(2) frost school totem; flame school totem. when either of these totems is active, all spells cast by the shaman are treated as if they were from the school of magic corresponding to the active totem (i.e., frost or flame). thus, spell lock that occurs as a result of casting a nature school spell will cease to be effective upon a frost or flame school totem becoming active.

the school totems would give an advantage (a much needed one, i think) to shamans when dealing with rogue-kick, mage-spell lock, and warlock felhunter spell lock, things that have virtually guaranteed quick death to me in pvp and arena on a consistent basis (haven't noticed the rogue kick being as much of an issue, actually). it would, as an additional benefit, give the shaman a bit more versatility in raid situations since their spells could become frost or fire, and thus the relevant resistant would change from nature where that is a factor.

as to the wind shield, before anyone goes nuts bitching--pallies already have the bubble of ridiculousness that effectively requires you to kill pallies twice to actually kill them, and rogues have cloak of shadows, which is the rogue version of the pally bubble, though designed to "only" stop 90% of spells, rather than 100% of everything. a one-shot "bubble" vs only stuns/slows is a far cry from a threat to game balance, and would inject some much-needed pvp viability to elemental shamans (and not overpower the other two shaman specs).

if you have thoughts on this, i welcome your emails to delchrys@comcast.net, just make the subject line obvious so i don't think it's spam. oh, and if you flame me with irrational crap, i will not take the "bait," i'll just lawl and delete.

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