Before the release of WoW Forever, Blizzard released their final class tuning notes. While these changes were received with mixed emotions, Shaman players were especially upset with the removal of the Lava Burst spell and the general watering down of class fantasy. In response to these adjustments, moderators of the Shaman Discord decided to shut down the server in protest.
Less than 24 hours later, the Shaman Discord was reopened, but their sentiment had not changed. Catching wind of this event, Principal Designer Kris Zierhut stated in a recent interview that Shaman changes will be coming in early 2027.
Shaman Changes Coming Next Week
Specifically, the team recognizes that Enhancement Shamans are too incentivized to roll on Cloth caster gear. In an ideal world, Enhancement would benefit most from a combination of Strength, Intellect, and Spell Power on their equipment. In fact, the same day that this interview went live, Blizzard released a Blue Post stating that this change would be coming as part of the weekly reset on November 10th.
Class Tuning Incoming – November 10
- Enhancement Shamans are finding that Intellect and Spellpower are superior stats compared to Strength and Attack Power. We plan to make changes so that Strength is always their strongest stat, and Enhancement Shamans will not prefer gear intended for Mages and Warlocks. Ideally, Enhancement’s best items have Strength or Attack Power, along with some Intellect and/or Spell Power.
Please note: Enhancement Shaman players who are leveling up will want to collect Strength and Attack Power gear from now on.
Significant Changes in 2027
In this interview, Zierhut confirms that significant Shaman talent adjustments will be coming in early 2027, as part of a patch. Once raid data has been received in December, Blizzard also has plans for additional class tuning. While specific Shaman changes have not officially been discussed, moderators of the class Discord have shared their wishlist.
| The biggest complaints from the shaman community are not throughput related, this is not about damage output. We repeat, this is not about damage output. Truthfully, hybrid tax us all you want if the result is a cohesive class with strong class fantasy elements that are actually represented in our playstyles. This is about fundamental design intent and overall class feel. Design Issues with Enhancement – Windfury Weapon will not be our primary imbue for raiding, which feels antithetical to the 2-Handed Enhance Class Fantasy. – Spell Power and Intellect gear appears to outperform physical or hybrid gear, especially when considering Maelstrom Weapon and utilizing Flametongue Weapon as our primary imbue. – Changes to Maelstrom Weapon and Intellect exacerbate the spellpower issues rather than solving them. Design Issues with Elemental – PvP perception continues to hold back Elemental’s spec design and Shaman’s class design as a whole. Moving Improved Ghost Wolf is yet another example of this that feels specifically targeted at Elemental PvP and ruins an exciting milestone for all Shamans. – Blizzard has made it clear that Elemental can’t have both  and  , so they’ve chosen . This leaves Elemental without a second school to fall back to in PVP and against nature immune mobs, and is still barely worth using in Single Target because of its high Mana cost, leaving us with a 2 button rotation.–  was left in our rotation with zero interactions with the rest of our kit. Now it just becomes even more of a boring maintenance DoT. At the very least there should be some form of interaction that lets it feel like a valuable part of the rotation.– Elemental’s Mana situation is dire. While some specs have been given near-limitless access to it. Water Shield should not consume charges when procced from crits, otherwise we’re constantly having to refresh it for worse Mana gained than other specs. – Totemic Projection being changed disproportionately hurts Elemental, as we no longer have an option to project totems from range. Yet another way that fun has been removed. Design Overlap between Elemental and Enhancement – The hybrid Spell power issues mentioned above shove Enhance directly into Elemental’s path, muddling the differences between the two specs’ identities. – This overlap makes tuning one spec without effecting the other nearly impossible, often resulting in Elemental getting the short end of the stick. Design Issues with Restoration – Removing the upfront healing from Riptide fundamentally changes how the spell feels to press and turns it into a sad copy of Renew or -Rejuvenation. Furthermore, it also takes away any decision-making when choosing who to heal, as you’re punished for not healing the person with Riptide rolling. – Just like Elemental, Restoration should not be punished for its PvP perception. |
