I'm not an expert on shamans, but I think reducing the mana cost of your most common spells by 10% (Convection 2/3) would give you more than increasing your maximum mana by 10%.

For an example: let's say you have 20k mana normally, and your Lightning Bolt costs 440 mana. That means you can cast 45.5 lightning bolts before running out (before considering mana regen). If you increase your max mana by 10%, you will be able to cast (22k/440=) 50 bolts before running out, and if you reduce cost by 10% you will be able to cast (20k/396=) 50.5 bolts. OK, in that particular case the difference is not quite enough to actually matter, but you can see how it would still be a larger number if the margins were different.

Furthermore, let's say you bring out your Mana Spring Totem. Currently, MST returns enough mana to cast another Lightning Bolt in about 24 seconds (91 mp5, and a LB costs about 440 mana at level 80). With Ancestral Knowledge, you'd still get an extra bolt per 24 seconds, since it doesn't care about max mana. But with Convection, it would only be 22 seconds. The same goes if you use e.g. a Runic Mana Potion: it normally gives you (4300/440=) 9.8 bolts, but (4300/396=) 10.9 bolts with Convection.

Now, there are some tradeoffs there. If you're casting spells that aren't affected by Convection, like a Healing Wave, or totems, Ancestral Knowledge starts catching up pretty fast, since AK helps no matter what you're casting. But I guess that's up to each shaman to figure out how much that matters.

Reply