Totem Talk: Enhancement and spellpower weapons, a problematic pair
by Josh Myers 
Jan 1st 2011 at 4:00PM
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Totem Talk for elemental, enhancement, and restoration shaman. Do your likes include bladed weapons, the elements, and fights with little to no movement/target switching? So does Josh Myers, new kid on the block and now host of Totem Talk: Enhancement!
To some enhancement shaman, wielding a spellpower weapon in their main hand is an abomination. More unholy than a death knight, more wicked than a warlock, using a spellpower main-hand just feels wrong. I've never agreed with the majority on this point. Having hit level 80 and started raiding at the time enhancement shaman started realizing spellpower main-hand/dagger off-hand was the optimal build, spellpower weapons were my ace in the hole. I felt a small thrill of victory every time I topped DPS after being threatened to be kicked from a PUG Naxxramas for my peculiar weapon arrangement. At that time, a spellpower main-hand felt more like a handy trick, a DPS sleight of hand that helped you top meters while annoying every caster in your raid.
When patch 3.1 hit, the neat trick that made spellpower weapons optimal for enhancement was patched out. At Wrath of the Lich King release, Flametongue Weapon always did the same amount of damage, regardless of weapon speed. This meant that Webbed Death, a 1.4 speed dagger and the best-in-slot enhancement off-hand, would do the same amount of Flametongue damage as Angry Dread, the 2.5 speed mace we were supposed to be using. When you coupled that with the massive spellpower and the fast speed of Torch of Holy Fire, our Flametongue Weapon gave us very reliable, sustained DPS.
I was slightly melancholy when patch 3.1 hit and the Flametongue Weapon formula was tweaked to make it scale with weapon speed, and the spellpower weapon fell from grace. However, my personal opinion is that anything that allows me to perform well is welcome, so I got over losing my fiery fists of doom right quick. My regret at the time was more because enhancement started to lose its footing as the highest DPS hybrid spec, a decline that hit rock bottom in the soul-sucking past year of raiding Icecrown Citadel. Regardless of how the end of Wrath of the Lich King happened, though, Cataclysm has brought to us a resurgence of my old favorite trick, the spellpower weapon. With that resurgence comes questions, questions this post hopes to address.
Why are you so convinced spellpower weapons are better?
Excellent question! First off, we have the scientific data. Rawr4 has finished alpha testing and is fully released, providing me with an incredibly useful platform to play around with weapon combinations before exporting them to the newest version of the Enhancement Simulator, alpha version 2.2.7. This alpha is also really close to release status, and it is now giving very reliable DPS values. Rawr4 has a few very specific issues; the main one is that caster weapons that have been hotfixed to be lower DPS in game are not using these lower damage numbers in Rawr, meaning that I needed to be careful to check against the actual in-game values and transfer the weapon DPS values myself. Many thanks to Vixsin of Life in Group 5 for some help in validating weapon damage values in game!
With every test, I used our standard priority rotation. I simmed using Elam's current gear, reforging stats on each new weapon to remain at the hit cap in every test. The only stats that changed were those on the weapons themselves. My off-hand was always the Vicious Gladiator's Left Ripper. Full raid buffs/debuffs were used, Potion of the Tol'vir was enabled, Flasks were used, and I even ate some tasty Skewered Eel. Here were the results, from lowest DPS to highest:
- Vicious Gladiator's Right Ripper, ilevel 359, 2.6 speed agility weapon with Windfury Weapon: 15,834 DPS
- Heroic Crul'korak, the Lightning's Arc, ilevel 372, 521.8 weapon DPS 2.6 speed agility weapon with Windfury Weapon: 16,131 DPS
- Modgud's Blade, ilevel 333, 1.8 speed/41.9 weapon DPS with Flametongue: 16,512 DPS
- Heroic Modgud's Blade, ilevel 346, 1.8 speed/56.9 weapon DPS with Flametongue: 16,761 DPS
- Heroic Biting Wind, ilevel 346, 1.8 speed/204.7 weapon DPS with Flametongue: 16,972 DPS
- Blade of the Witching Hour, ilevel 359, 1.8 speed/53.1 weapon DPS with Flametongue: 17,063 DPS
- Vicious Gladiator's Gavel, ilevel 359, 1.6 speed/231.2 weapon DPS with Flametongue: 17,397 DPS
If you're a little leery of the scientific evidence in support of spellpower main-hands, here's some anecdotal evidence. First is a log from last Tuesday's Magmaw kill, when I clocked in at a whopping 13,700 effective damage per second using an agility main-hand. Next up is this Tuesday's Magmaw kill, where I magically jumped a full 3,099 damage per second to a grand total of 16,799. Did I improve my gear between attempts? A piece or two. Did I manage cooldowns better? You bet I did. Did I play better because it was our third kill of the fight? Almost certainly. Did I use a spellpower weapon this week? Yes, yes I did. This is why this data is anecdotal -- the use of the spellpower main-hand was not the only variable in the equation of my DPS this week and can't be entirely trusted. However, my sudden boost in DPS coupled with the mathematical proof offered by the Enhance Simulator makes a strong case. Spellpower weapons are mathematically superior to agility weapons at this point in time.
There are two main reasons for spellpower superiority. First off, main-hand spellpower items are the most heavily statted items in the game. An agility axe, mace, or fist weapon that you get for your main hand is designed to complement the rest of your gear, providing small bonuses to your secondary stats in a ratio to the stats on the rest of your gear. Conversely, spellpower weapons are the main source of spellpower for casters, requiring them to have huge amounts of spellpower on them. EnhSim puts Elam's (with the Vicious Gladiator's Gavel in his main hand) spellpower as equivalent to 1.05 points of attack power, while his mastery rating EP is equivalent to 1.53 attack power.
To put it in perspective, if your weapons had equivalent DPS and other primary/secondary stats, you'd need a weapon with around 1,200 mastery to be equivalent to the spellpower itemization on a single epic caster weapon. Even adding in main-hand weapon DPS and agility into the mix, the total stat weight of an agility weapon is just less than a caster weapon.
The second culprit of the caster weapon conundrum is Flametongue Weapon itself. Beyond just the phenomenal base spellpower we get from imbuing Flametongue, current theorycrafting suggests that Flametongue Weapon is bugged to do higher damage than it should be right now. The issue seems to be that it's applying two versions of Mental Quickness, the current version where we get 50% of our attack power as spellpower, and the pre-4.0.1 version where we got 30% of our attack power as spellpower. Unfortunately, fixing this bug is the least fun option in nerfing enhancement's use of caster weapons, as it means that beyond DPS loss from losing caster weapons, we'd lose out on damage from our off-hand Flametongue procs. I personally like having a Flametongue Weapon that hits harder than a wet noodle, so I'd like to see this bug stay.
So now what?
Spellpower main-hand weapons will be nerfed, as Blizzard has said multiple times in the past. (For the most recent, check out WoW Insider's coverage of Ghostcrawler's most recent class balance blog.) A change might be hotfixed in next maintenance, or it might not come until 4.1. Your job is to weigh the information and make an informed decision -- will you buy a Vicious Gladiator's Gavel, knowing the next week it might be useless for your main spec? Will you ask your guild to run with you through Vortex Pinnacle for a Biting Wind, knowing that you won't be seeing an epic caster weapon any time soon? Will you farm the mats for an Elementium Spellblade?
What you do with this information is all up to you. My only hope is that no one who reads this column thinks that I endorse ever taking caster weapons from legitimate caster main specs. Personally, I'm planning on having my PvP gavel by this time next week.
Show your totemic mastery by reading Totem Talk: Enhancement every week. Manage the trip through Cataclysm content with WoW Insider's tips for the best enhancement macros.Filed under: Shaman, (Shaman) Totem Talk
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
TTFK Jan 1st 2011 4:21PM
Don't get your long term hopes up:
http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/1829962
From Blizzard: "We want to make sure Enhancement shaman avoid caster weapons."
StormDance Jan 1st 2011 4:37PM
If you read before you commented you might have noticed the disclaimer paragraph stating just this, under the "so now what?" heading
TTFK Jan 3rd 2011 9:56PM
Someone hasn't read the Blizzard forums lately...
Dozens of Enh have now been crying over losing this, and at the same time, making hundreds of 2H Enh and Shaman Tank threads even though both specs have been dead for years.
Time to get over your wet dreams of 2H SP Tanking Shaman and get back to reality with the rest of us.
Infinite Duck Jan 1st 2011 4:27PM
While Blizzard has already admitted they'll be changing this, is it really so far fetched and evil idea that a enhance shaman should use spell caster weapons? After all they were recently (speaking in a six year time frame) changed to be more of a melee caster hybrid. If you look at them like a melee caster it almost makes sense for them to be beating people with maces/daggers/sticks of magical power.
However, I do agree, using a caster dagger on an enhancement shaman makes me die a little inside. Caster weapons just aren't as scary as the melee weapons. It's like seeing hunters take the strength gun because it did more dps than most agility ranged weapons before when entering ICC. The numbers added up, but the idea of using a strength made many hunters cry.
Boobah Jan 1st 2011 6:01PM
"After all they were recently (speaking in a six year time frame) changed to be more of a melee caster hybrid"
Yes, they were changed to be more of a caster. Of course, they're designed (like ret pallies and DKs) to be a melee combatant that throws some spells, not a caster that just happens to swing with their stat-stick.
To be honest, it would probably cause a lot less grief if hybrid abilities changed their scaling stat depending on spec; you'd get enhancement shamans who had lightning bolts that scaled directly from attack power, just like DK diseases and Death Coils, instead of the attack power to spell power kluge we have today. Poof! No more worrying about caster gear; you just wouldn't scale with it.
Jamz Jan 1st 2011 6:45PM
@Boobah
SHHH....we play a videogame, common sense should not be used
flint Jan 1st 2011 8:04PM
The biggest problem with it is that caster weapons already have huge competition, being used by spriests, elemental shaman, warlocks, mages, and balance druids. The last thing we need is another spec in the mix, needing on our caster gear so they can whack people with it.
Léona Jan 2nd 2011 12:27AM
@Flint
You're forgetting all the healers who like to have spellpower main-hands too. Or did blizzard change it so that healers want to get tanking gear while I wasn't looking?
cpd01_eric Jan 9th 2011 9:38AM
If it makes you feel any better, your shaman can pickup a [i]Lifeforce Hammer[/i]. it's a more manly mace, it has oodles of spellpower and a decently slow 2.1 speed. and best of all, it has the same weapon DPS as any other melee 316 1-hand
vocenoctum Jan 1st 2011 4:39PM
While I certainly understand that plenty of folks already roll on caster main-hands and that they want to keep the system agility based for Enhancement...
One of the main things I love about enhancement is the feeling of combining melee and magic and spellpower main-hands seem to sync nicely with that.
And really, if they want to nerf it, just tweak the framework to make caster weapons have no/little actually dps to them. Not like a caster uses it in melee enough to care. The shaman is about it, unless some paladins are trying it.
Josh Myers Jan 1st 2011 5:39PM
The problem with tweaking the numbers is that they've already done that. Most caster weapons are in the 40s/50s with damage per second, with a bottom-line damage of 1, and they're still high dps for us.
Res Jan 1st 2011 10:38PM
It just doesn't work in my mind.. to me the enhancement Shaman should be using big scary melee weapons and using magic to uh.. enhance them. Big explosions, lightning arcs and whirlwinds just look so much cooler with two big axes rather than swinging around dinky caster daggers to me :). Plus have you ever seen what a tauren or draenei looks like meleeing with daggers?
Pyromelter Jan 2nd 2011 3:08AM
Well at the very least, they can't nerf maces (and presumably caster swords), because it would significantly mess with holy paladins.
I like the suggestion of having things work more like DK's, in terms of scaling.
Eldoron Jan 2nd 2011 7:20AM
Pyro, shamans cannot use swords. Nvm.
Angus Jan 1st 2011 4:41PM
If only he had linked to that blog post in the second to last paragraph...
Oh wait...
Yeesh
passad Jan 1st 2011 4:49PM
nice guide man
cyanea85 Jan 1st 2011 5:22PM
As one of your Resto brethren who has been trying everyday for the past two weeks to get the Biting Wind to even DROP, if I lose it to an Enhance shammy trying to get it for a mainspec where it's going to be useless a week later, I'm going to blame you. :P
Josh Myers Jan 1st 2011 5:37PM
If it makes you feel better, it probably won't be useless until 4.1 hits! D:
I really, really don't endorse them taking caster weapons from you, though! At the same time, I don't endorse withholding information because it's not what people want to hear. I hope that anyone reading this has the tact and the respect for other people to leave the caster weapons to the casters and treat them as offspec weapons. We can still do ok damage with agility weapons...a caster can't.
Saeadame Jan 1st 2011 6:10PM
I haven't started leveling my Shammy yet (but it'll be my next 85... once I get all my lowbie alts to 60 ugh), but I'll be sure to keep an eye on this. I know I'm rocking Biting Wind on my resto druid, and being enh/resto, being able to use one of the same weapons would be nice =).
Thanks for the article =D.
Andalvar Jan 1st 2011 6:17PM
I'm currently leveling an enh shaman and curious about what weapons would be best for me to use while leveling heirloom-wise. I only have one of the agility maces, the spell caster mace, and the dagger. Of those three weapons which ones do you think I would gain the most from and in which hand? I understand this article is for end game but I figured I'd check.