Elemental Shaman DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — Shadowlands 9.0.2
On this page, you will find out the best talents for each tier for your Elemental Shaman in World of Warcraft — Shadowlands 9.0.2. We also have default talent lists for various types of content, such as raiding or Mythic+. If you play with Warmode on, we have your PvP talents covered as well.
If you were looking for WoW Classic content, please refer to our Classic Elemental Shaman DPS talents.
Talent Choices for Elemental Shaman
Level | Choices | ||
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15 |
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25 |
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30 |
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35 |
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40 |
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45 |
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50 |
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Talents can be freely changed when out of combat and in a rested XP area
(such as an inn or a capital city). Moreover, Tome of the Still Mind and
Codex of the Still Mind can be used to temporarily allow players to change
talents anywhere, as long as they are out of combat.
Talent Cheat Sheets for Elemental Shaman
Optimizing talents on a contextual basis is the highly
recommended method of setting up your build. That being said, the builds
listed below are very well rounded and should give you good results. For Mythic+,
your choices will heavily depend on whether the key is
Fortified or
Tyrannical,
although other affixes are also important. Either way, you should generally use
the AoE/Cleave build as a baseline for dungeons.
Single Target
This is the best generic single target build for Shadowlands.
- Level 15:
Echo of the Elements
- Level 25:
Elemental Blast
- Level 30:
Spirit Wolf
- Level 35:
Master of the Elements
- Level 40:
Nature's Guardian
- Level 45:
Icefury
- Level 50:
Stormkeeper
AoE/Cleave
This is our recommended build for encounters with cleave and intermittent AoE.
- Level 15:
Earthen Rage
- Level 25:
Aftershock
- Level 30:
Static Charge or
Spirit Wolf
- Level 35:
Master of the Elements or
Liquid Magma Totem
- Level 40:
Nature's Guardian
- Level 45:
Primal Elementalist
- Level 50:
Stormkeeper
Raiding
The builds suggested above do not account for specific fights in the current raid tier. If you wish to have a boss-by-boss breakdown of talent choices, you should check out our dedicated page below.
Mythic+
Mythic+ can potentially require a mix of certain talents, depending on affixes and other variables. If you want advice that is specific to Mythic+, you should check out our page below.
How To Use Elemental Shaman Talents
There are multiple talents that require a change to your rotation in order to use them optimally. You can find more information on how your rotation will look after selecting your talents on our rotation page below.
Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Earthen Rage causes your most recently attacked target to take damage over 6 seconds.
Echo of the Elements grants
Lava Burst 2 charges.
Static Discharge deals moderate damage to a single target over 3 seconds.
Earthen Rage is okay in every situation.
Echo of the Elements is the best single-target talent if you also
use
Master of the Elements.
Static Discharge is currently too weak to consider.
Tier 2 (Level 25) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Aftershock grants your spells a 25% chance to refund their Maelstrom cost.
Echoing Shock deals moderate damage and causes your next damage or healing spell to be cast a second time 1 second later for free.
Elemental Blast deals significant damage, generates 30 Maelstrom and increases your Critical Strike, Mastery or Haste by 3% for 10 seconds.
Aftershock is a very unreliable talent, but with the potential of
significant damage if you are lucky with its procs. Strong for 5+ targets AoE.
Echoing Shock is strong for burst damage, but loses out to its neighbours
in longer fights.
Elemental Blast is very good in single-target and surprisingly useful
in AoE.
Tier 3 (Level 30) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Spirit Wolf grants you 5% increased movement speed and damage reduction every 1 second, stacking up to 4 times, while you are transformed into a Ghost Wolf.
Earth Shield places a shield that heals its target for a small amount whenever they take damage. This heal can only occur once every few seconds, and has 9 charges.
Static Charge is a new talent that reduces the cooldown of
Capacitor Totem by 5 seconds for each enemy it stuns, up to a maximum of 20 seconds.
Spirit Wolf is mediocre, the gain starting only after 1 second
spent in Ghost Wolf form. It should still be the default talent for raiding if
you do not need to use
Static Charge. It is potentially a 20% damage
reduction available whenever you really need it.
Earth Shield is a niche talent that is mostly useful for solo play
or on encounters where you will never use
Ghost Wolf.
Static Charge is useful if you need to stun adds more often than
once per minute.
Tier 4 (Level 35) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Master of the Elements causes your
Lava Bursts to increase the damage of your next Nature, Physical or Frost spell by 20%.
Storm Elemental replaces
Fire Elemental. It summons an elemental for 30 seconds that deals significant damage and reduces the cast time of and the GCD incurred by your
Lightning Bolt and
Chain Lightning by 3% each time you cast either spell, up to 20 times. This has a 2.5-minute cooldown.
Liquid Magma Totem summons a totem at the target location for 15 seconds that hurls liquid magma at a random nearby target every 1 sec, dealing Fire damage to all enemies within 8 yards. It has a 60 second cooldown.
Master of the Elements combined with
Echo of the Elements
and
Icefury is the best single-target talent. It also works with
Fae Transfusion and
Echoes of Great Sundering.
Storm Elemental is now fairly mediocre after its AoE component from
Primal Elementalist
got weaker. It remains strong for 4-6 target burst, but, unless you have a specific
dangerous pack to use it on, it is probably not your best option.
Liquid Magma Totem is solid if you need DPS bursts with that particular timing
(or in dungeons). Good if you can have it for every AoE pull.
Tier 5 (Level 40) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Nature's Guardian heals you for 20% of your maximum health when your health is brought below 35%. It can only proc every 45 seconds. It does not proc if you take fatal damage.
Ancestral Guidance converts 20% of your damage and healing done into healing on up to 3 nearby party and/or raid members. Lasts 10 seconds, with a 2-minute cooldown.
Wind Rush Totem summons a totem for 15 seconds that increases the speed of allies within 10 yards by 60% for 5 seconds. The speed buff is continually refreshed as long as they are within range.
Nature's Guardian should be the default pick, as it nearly always
gives you value and you do not need to do anything.
Ancestral Guidance can be useful to survive a particularly
hard-hitting phase or if you are confident you will not need
Nature's Guardian.
Wind Rush Totem can have some use in organized fights where you
place it at a prearranged location to help your raid move somewhere fast. If you
do not specifically require it, it is not very good.
Tier 6 (Level 45) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Surge of Power causes
Earth Shock to enhance your next spell cast within 15 seconds.
Flame Shock: Your next cast also applies Flame Shock to 1 additional target within 8 yards.
Lightning Bolt: Your next cast will cause an additional 1-3
Mastery: Elemental Overloads.
Lava Burst: Your next cast reduces the cooldown of
Storm Elemental or
Fire Elemental by 6 seconds.
Frost Shock: Your next cast freezes the target in place for 6 seconds.
Primal Elementalist grants your elementals 80% increased damage, new abilities, and the ability to control them directly. Notably, this talent grants your
Earth Elemental the ability to cast
Harden Skin, reducing your and your elemental's damage taken by 40% for 10 seconds. It also grants new damage abilities to your other elementals. Be careful NOT to summon both your elementals back to back if using this talent, you can only have one primal elemental out at a time.
Icefury hurls frigid ice at the target, dealing high damage and causing your next 4
Frost Shocks to deal 300% increased damage and generates 8 Maelstrom. It generates 25 Maelstrom, has a 2-second cast time and a 30-second cooldown.
Surge of Power does a bit of everything, but not very well. It can occasionally
be used by advanced players for specific situations and has some synergy with
Primordial Wave and
Skybreaker's Fiery Demise.
Primal Elementalist is an excellent all-around option on this tier, fairly
easy to use and giving you a bit of everything. Recommended for beginners and non-raid
content.
Icefury takes some time to learn but it is very powerful for single-target
situations, especially when you have to move a lot. This is the default choice for
single-target encounters assuming you can play around it correctly, and also use
Master of the Elements and
Echo of the Elements.
Tier 7 (Level 50) Talents for Elemental Shaman
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Unlimited Power grants 2% Haste for 10 seconds when one of your spells causes an Elemental Overload. This stacks, but gaining a stack does not refresh the duration of the previous stacks.
Stormkeeper has a 1.5-second cast time and causes your next 2
Lightning Bolt OR
Chain Lightning to be instant cast and trigger an additional Elemental Overload on every target hit. If you use the buff on Lightning Bolts, they will also do 150% more damage.
Ascendance transforms you for 15 seconds, removing the cooldown from
Lava Burst and transforming
Chain Lightning into
Lava Beam. The damage of
Lava Burst is further increased by your Critical Strike chance while Ascendance is active. Ascendance has a 3-minute cooldown.
Unlimited Power has significant scaling, which means it gains
significant value the more mastery you have. Unfortunately, it is currently much
too weak to use.
Stormkeeper is very strong and versatile. It should be used in every situation.
Ascendance is now too weak to be considered unless you specifically
need it to help beat a short DPS check.
PvP Talents (War Mode)
In Shadowlands, you can go into "War Mode". Enabling War Mode provides the following benefits:
- PvP talents enabled in the outdoor world.
- 10% increase in World Quest rewards at maximum level.
- 10% more experience gained while leveling.
- Earn Conquest Points which can reward gear every week.
With the benefits of enabling War Mode for leveling and PvE content, it is recommended to enable the feature to maximize your leveling and rewards at maximum level. However, you will make yourself available for open world PvP, and the possibility to be "ganked" while leveling or doing World Quests exists. If you need advice on how to fight against other players, visit the link below.
Elemental Shaman War Mode Talents
In this section we will rank the PvP talents best for leveling and doing solo / small group PvE content. Below is a ranking of both General PvP Talents and Elemental Shaman-specific PvE talents.
General PvP Talents
Relentless is a passive ability that reduces the duration of all crowd control effects on you by 20%.
Gladiator's Medallion is an on-use ability that removes all movement impairing effects and all loss of control effects on a 2-minute cooldown.
Adaptation removes a loss of control effect with a duration of more than 5 seconds once per minute.
All 3 of these talents have their use, I personally recommend using
Gladiator's Medallion if you will think of using it whenever it is
useful. Otherwise,
Relentless is always nice to have.
Elemental Shaman PvP Talents
Skyfury Totem increases the critical effect of spells of allies within 40 yards by 20% for 15 seconds, 40-second cooldown. Good for solo play, excellent if you are doing outdoors content with others.
Swelling Waves makes your
Healing Surges 50% stronger.
Elemental Attunement increases your maximum Maelstrom by 50, allowing for a lot more banking and control.
Counterstrike Totem replicates and reflects damage you take for 15 seconds, on a 45-second cooldown. This can be really strong when in a high damage area to deal some chip damage to targets around you, and convert your health pool into additional damage.
We recommend picking 3 of the above 4 talents, depending on what you what you value most.
Grounding Totem,
Lightning Lasso,
Purifying Waters,
Spectral Recovery,
Traveling Storms and
Control of Lava
have either niche uses or are simply not very useful compared to the other talents.
Do not dismiss them entirely but for the most part you can safely ignore them.
Changelog
- 21 Dec. 2020: Fixed a tooltip issue, updated an outdated talent description.
- 15 Dec. 2020: Added warning about Primal Elementalist.
- 24 Nov. 2020: Page updated for Shadowlands release. Removed references to Azerite traits and essences, updated talent recommendations.
- 12 Oct. 2020: Page updated for the Shadowlands pre-patch.
More Shaman Guides
Guides from Other Classes
This guide has been written by Stormy, Elemental main since Wrath of the Lich King and member of the Storm, Earth and Lava Elemental theorycrafting team.
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