Elemental Shaman PvP Guide in Battle for Azeroth (BfA 8.2)

1. Spec Overview / Place in the Current Meta for Elemental Shaman

Elemental Shamans are one of the strongest casters right now. They are currently one of the highest bursting classes with multiple burst windows, along with strong crowd-control abilities. Elemental Shaman have become very viable in a variety of compositions after the Patch 8.1 rework. This is mainly due to Lightning Lasso, the Surge of Power talent, and Stormkeeper. Elemental Shaman are now much more viable in Rated Battlegrounds; with their overall damage increased as part of Patch 8.1, they bring the utility and kill potential a team needs.

1.1. Strengths of Elemental Shaman

• Very high instant-cast burst damage with Earth Shock empowered by Lava Shock, and Stormkeeper's empowered Lightning Bolts
• 5-second stun and significant damage with Lightning Lasso, which cannot be dispelled
• Good mobility and kiting
• Has Healing Surge for off-healing
• Short cooldown interrupt in Wind Shear
• Grounding Totem and Tremor Totem provide a lot of utility to the team

1.2. Weaknesses of Elemental Shaman

• Moderate damage outside of burst windows
• When focused it is challenging to generate Maelstrom
• Play-style is dependent on Azerite traits
• Few defensive cooldowns

2. TL;DR / Easy Mode

This is your quick guide to what you need to know quickly to be able to play Elemental Shaman in PvP.

2.1. Azerite Traits

Stack 3x Lava Shock Outer Ring traits, with 3x Igneous Potential for maximum damage.

2.2. Stat Priority

1. Intellect;
2. Critical Strike;
3. Versatility;
4. Haste;
5. Mastery.

2.3. Talent Builds

2.3.1. PvE Talents

Level	Choices
15	✔ Earthen Rage	✘ Echo of the Elements	✘ Elemental Blast
30	✘ Aftershock	? Call the Thunder	✔ Totem Mastery
45	? Spirit Wolf	✔ Earth Shield	✘ Static Charge
60	✔ Master of the Elements	✘ Storm Elemental	✘ Liquid Magma Totem
75	✔ Nature's Guardian	✘ Ancestral Guidance	✘ Wind Rush Totem
90	✔ Surge of Power	✔ Primal Elementalist	? Icefury
100	✘ Unlimited Power	✔ Stormkeeper	✘ Ascendance

Elemental Shaman talent selection:

• Level 15: Earthen Rage
• Level 30: Call the Thunder or Totem Mastery
• Level 45: Earth Shield
• Level 60: Master of the Elements
• Level 75: Nature's Guardian
• Level 90: Surge of Power or Primal Elementalist
• Level 100: Stormkeeper

2.3.2. PvP Talents

• Lightning Lasso
• Skyfury Totem or Spectral Recovery or Purifying Waters
• Grounding Totem

2.4. Elemental Shaman PvP Rotation

Spending Maelstrom to deal massive damage requires you to have maximum 20-stacks of Lava Shock, and enough Maelstrom to include 2 Earth Shocks within the rotation. When this burst damage at the end of a Lightning Lasso the combined damage is overwhelming, particularly if your Earth Shock is a critical.

1. Use Fire Elemental or Storm Elemental.
2. Use Skyfury Totem.
3. Cast Stormkeeper.
4. Use Lava Burst to empower you with Master of the Elements.
5. Use Blood of the Enemy, or other Major Azerite Essence on your kill target.
6. Use Lightning Lasso.
7. Use Earth Shock, with 20 Lava Shock stacks, to activate the Surge of Power talent. Also use Meteor if you have Primal Elementalist selected.
8. Use Lightning Bolt, with Stormkeeper buff.
9. Use Earth Shock to re-activate the Surge of Power talent.
10. Use Lightning Bolt, with Stormkeeper buff.
11. Use Earth Shock, if you have sufficient Maelstrom.

2.5. Racial Options

Dark Iron Dwarf has a defensive cleanse, which also buffs the Elemental's Intellect significantly, which works perfectly with burst windows.

Orc has stun resistance and on-use damage.

Pandaren can get a Versatility food buff in Arena, and a 4-second racial crowd-control.

Goblin provides mobility through Rocket Jump, and 1% overall Haste is good.

2.6. Pet Macros

If you take the Primal Elementalist talent you will need the below macros to effectively use the full potential of your elemental pets.

The Earth Elemental has a special defensive ability, Harden Skin. You will need to press this macro twice to make the special effect work. The first press summons the elemental, the second press will use the ability on the Elemental Shaman.

• /cast Earth Elemental
• /cast [talent:6/2] Harden Skin

The Fire and Storm Elementals have special offensive abilities, Meteor and Eye of the Storm respectively.

• /cast Fire Elemental
• /cast Storm Elemental
• /cast Call Lightning
• /cast [talent:6/2] Eye of the Storm
• /cast [talent:6/2] Meteor

3. Azerite Essences for Elemental Shaman

Essences allow players to customize their characters while adding a new ability to use. This section will cover the best overall Azerite Essences for Shamans in PvP. For a general guide to all the essences, as well as how to obtain them and increase their ranks, check out our Essence Guide.

3.1. Major Essences

The best Major Essence is Blood of the Enemy. When used near enemies, this increases your Critical Strike chance, and at Rank 3, the Critical Damage against those targets by 25% for over 10 seconds. This is significant since Elemental Shaman depend on landing a critical Earth Shock with Lava Shock.

The Unbound Force is an alternative which works well with Lightning Lasso's damage over time effect. This, along with Earthen Rage and Flame Shock, adds a significant amount of damage over time during the Lightning Lasso stun.

3.2. Minor Essences

In addition to having a Major Essence, you can choose two Minor Essences to place in your neck at Heart of Azeroth Levels 55 and 65.

The best Minor trait for an Elemental Shaman is The Unbound Force which, after not having a certain amount of critical strikes, gives the Shaman up to 70% Critical Strike. This is the best buff possible when going for large Earth Shock critical hits, as well as Stormkeeper empowered Lightning Bolt's along with Surge of Power talent.

Another very strong Minor Azerite Essence is Blood of the Enemy. This gives a strong buff of Haste after a certain amount of critical strikes. Since Lava Burst is always a critical hit while Flame Shock is on the target, this stacks quickly.

A strong defensive Minor Azerite Essence is Conflict and Strife. This trait is a likely candidate if the Elemental Shaman is being targeted often in Arena or battlegrounds, particularly in stuns. Against Rogue, Mage, Healer 3v3 teams, this will be the optimal choice to provide as much defensive strength as possible.

A fall back option is Memory of Lucid Dreams. This gives your spells and abilities a chance to refund 50% of the Fury spent on them and heals you. This is great for refunding Earth Shocks, which will increase overall damage output.

4. Azerite Traits for Elemental Shamans

Lava Shock is the most important Azerite trait for Elemental Shaman to do well in PvP in the current Meta. This is a single-target trait with significant burst potential combined with our main damage dealing ability, Earth Shock. Each Flame Shock tick will increase the damage of your next Earth Shock stacking up to 20 times. The higher the item-level, the higher the stacking damage. Having multiple Flame Shocks will help increase the rate of stacks.

Igneous Potential enhances our Lava Surge proc which makes our Lava Burst proc rate from 15% to 18%, and increases the damage of this ability. Elemental Shaman mainly use lava burst as our main Maelstrom generating ability. Since this spell is always a critical strike, as long as the target has a Flame Shock, the tool-tip miss-represents the increase of damage. The increased damage is double the tool-tip number in PvP.

Natural Harmony will increase all secondary stats while playing an Elemental Shaman in PvP. Specifically, Haste and Critical Strike will increase the consistent pressure the Elemental will be able to apply throughout the match.

Undulating Tides is a secondary choice and provides a defensive shield which will help with Elemental Shaman's defense against strong melee teams in the current meta.

4.1. Middle Ring Traits

Overwhelming Power has the highest DPS potential of the traits for this ring, since this will increase cast time, the tick rate of Flame Shock and decreasing of global cooldowns. Increasing cast speed leads to faster Maelstrom generation and more Earth Shocks.

Unstable Flames this trait provides substantial Critical Strike which helps you have the highest chance at getting a Critical Strike during your burst.

Blessed Portents is a fall back option if you find that you are healing your teammates often in PvP. This applies a buff on healing which is consumed at 50% health to heal the target. This can be a good choice as one of your middle ring talents for wizard cleave compositions in 3v3 arena. You can heal while the healer is crowd-controlled to negate the effect.

Gutripper is a good single target selection, especially against defensives reducing the damage of magic effects, since this is physical damage.

4.2. Inner Ring Traits

Resounding Protection is a great trait as it provides consistent shielding and damage reduction stacking pretty significantly every 30 seconds. With Shaman's ability to kite and reduce how often we are hit this is a great option.

Impassive Visage provides consistent but small healing when you take damage. Most classes have damage over time abilities which can consistently activate this heal. In the current state of PvP, Elemental Shaman will often be targeted due to the high damage output. This is not the optimal trait but is better than other traits with no healing.

Pack Spirit is no longer viable due to the adjustments to the trait's effectiveness in PvP. This should not be selected, even with the synergy from Spirit Wolf, as Elemental Shaman need to be more offensive to keep up with fast paced arena and battleground fights.

5. Stat Priority for Elemental Shamans

The basic stat priority is as follows.

1. Intellect;
2. Critical Strike;
3. Versatility;
4. Haste;
5. Mastery.

For PvP the stat priority ratios are not explicit, due to the various situations you could find yourself in.

5.1. Statistics Explanations for Elemental Shaman

Mastery, through Mastery: Elemental Overload, causes your spells to have an additional chance to deal additional damage and generate extra Maelstrom.

Versatility is a flat-out damage done increase and damage taken reduction.

Critical Strike increases the chance to hit for 200% of the normal spell damage in PvP. Elemental Shaman is unique in the fact that it has an additional 50% critical strike damage than all other classes. This is due to Elemental Fury which is 250% of the base spell damage in PvE and 200% of the base spell damage in PvP.

Haste increases the speed of your casts as well as the tick rate of your damage over time effects Flame Shock.

6. Enchants and Gems

The weapon enchant should use Enchant Weapon - Machinist's Brilliance, for the Intellect buff as well as secondary stats. Although the secondary stat is random, if Critical Strike is selected, this could help with providing Criticals during the burst windows. Haste provides overall smoothness of play, casting speed, and increased proc rate for Flame Shock. Critical Strike is important for bursting for as high as possible with Earth Shock empowered by Lava Shock, and using Stormkeeper-empowered Lightning Bolts, along with Surge of Power.

6.1. Haste

You should use Leviathan's Eye of Intellect in one socket, and Quick Sand Spinel (or the cheaper Quick Owlseye) in all other sockets.

Slot	Enchantment
Rings	Enchant Ring - Accord of Haste Enchant Ring - Seal of Haste (much cheaper)
Weapon	Enchant Weapon - Quick Navigation

6.2. Critical Strike

You should use Leviathan's Eye of Intellect in one socket, and Deadly Lava Lazuli (or the cheaper Deadly Amberblaze) in all other sockets.

Slot	Enchantment
Rings	Enchant Ring - Accord of Critical Strike Enchant Ring - Seal of Critical Strike (much cheaper)
Weapon	Enchant Weapon - Deadly Navigation

7. Regular and PvP Talent Builds

Elemental Shaman are mainly a burst caster, with average general pressure. Their main source of damage is using Earth Shock to activate Surge of Power and then using Stormkeeper, and Lightning Lasso. This combination puts out some of the highest burst damage in the game right now. There are two viable Arena PvP builds which have small variations depending on your arena team's composition, as well as the opposing team's composition.

The talent and PvP talent combination focuses on maximizing Maelstrom generation through Lava Bursts and Pets, and maximizing Earth Shock's damage and utility.

7.1. Regular Talents for Elemental Shaman

Level	Choices
15	✔ Earthen Rage	✘ Echo of the Elements	✘ Elemental Blast
30	✘ Aftershock	? Call the Thunder	✔ Totem Mastery
45	? Spirit Wolf	✔ Earth Shield	✘ Static Charge
60	✔ Master of the Elements	✘ Storm Elemental	✘ Liquid Magma Totem
75	✔ Nature's Guardian	✘ Ancestral Guidance	✘ Wind Rush Totem
90	✔ Surge of Power	✔ Primal Elementalist	? Icefury
100	✘ Unlimited Power	✔ Stormkeeper	✘ Ascendance

While the above table provides a generally accurate overview of the viability of talents, some finer points are discussed in the sections that follow, and we recommend you read those for a deeper understanding.

7.1.1. Tier 1 (Level 15) Talents

• Earthen Rage causes your most recently attacked target to take damage over 6 seconds.
• Echo of the Elements grants Lava Burst 2 charges.
• Elemental Blast deals good damage and increases either your Critical Strike, Haste, or Mastery by 366 for 10 seconds. It has a 2-second base cast time and a 12-second cooldown.

Earthen Rage provides consistent pressure and damage even when you are crowd-controlled or casting other abilities. This general pressure is the preference in this patch. With Icefury now a viable choice, these talents can work together well to provide overall damage output.

Echo of the Elements is not preferred due to the heavy casting meta of this season of PvP. This option should only be taken if Control of Lava is selected.

Elemental Blast is not viable for PvP currently due to the ability being affected by critical strike chance, and if interrupted the player is locked out of all schools of magic and cannot cast any ability. Overall, Echo of the Elements is significantly better.

7.1.2. Tier 2 (Level 30) Talents

• Aftershock grants your spells a 25% chance to refund their Maelstrom cost.
• Call the Thunder increases your maximum Maelstrom by 30 and reduces the Maelstrom cost of Earth Shock and Earthquake by 10.
• Totem Mastery is an active ability that summons 4 totems for 2 minutes. The benefits of these 4 totems are 2% increased Haste, 10% increased Flame Shock damage, 5% increased chance to trigger Mastery: Elemental Overload on Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning, and 1 Maelstrom generated every second.

Aftershock provides the chance of refunding Maelstrom which could allow for multiple Earth Shocks, if you are lucky, but this does not provide the highest burst damage for the Elemental Shaman. This talent should be taken when looking to maximize the utility of Surge of Power for rooting enemy team members or spreading Flame Shocks. This is currently not the preferred talent of this tier.

Call the Thunder is a possible choice if you do not feel comfortable keeping Totem Mastery's totems in range with high uptime. This talent works well with Surge of Power and they are often taken together. The decreased cost of Earth Shock to 50 Maelstrom allows for pooling of Maelstrom. This reduces the cost of our burst window by 20 Maelstrom which is significant. Since our burst window also provides Maelstrom, this will likely provide another Earth Shock as well.

Totem Mastery is the preferred choice of this tier to increase the Elemental Shaman's damage throughout the PvP arena or battleground. The Maelstrom generation, increased Flame Shock damage, and Haste are particularly useful. Taking Totem Mastery does mean to burst you need 20 more Maelstrom than if you had picked the Call the Thunder talent. The challenge with this talent is making sure you maintain the uptime of the totem buffs, and reset them when you move out of range. Totem Mastery should be selected if Control of Lava is selected for more Haste.

7.1.3. Tier 3 (Level 45) Talents

• 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 the main value coming from this talent is the 20% defensive it provides. Against arena teams which you know will consistently pressure you, take this talent to help with mobility and kiting. This along with and Spectral Recovery and Impassive Visage can provide strong defense against teams training you.This is a defensive choice, and while in ghost wolf you are not putting pressure up which will quickly put your team behind if you kite for too long.

Earth Shield is the best option on this tier as this spell can be purged or dispelled off of you, but cannot be spell stolen by mages. This talent provides significant passive healing when hit as well as providing additional healing to the earth shielded target from the Elemental Shaman.

Static Charge can be useful in rated battlegrounds, though the defensive alternatives on this tier are usually preferred given the focus of Elemental Shamans in battlegrounds. For arena this talent is not useful due to the lack of number of targets and the 3-second stun duration which is underwhelming.

7.1.4. Tier 4 (Level 60) Talents

• Master of the Elements increases the damage of your next Nature or Frost spell by 20% after casting Lava Burst.
• Storm Elemental replaces Fire Elemental. It summons an elemental for 30 seconds that deals significant damage and reduces the cast time of and the global cooldown 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, this is always selected for PvP. With Flame Shock now lasting 24-seconds, we can maintain 4 up at one time allowing for frequent procs. Using this talent along with Skyfury Totem and stacking Critical Strike stat, significantly multiplies our damage, with Earth Shock and Stormkeeper.

Storm Elemental is not the preferred option of this tier mainly since Storm Elemental does not provide additional Maelstrom, this comes from the Fire Elemental. This allows for more Earth Shock which is currently the main damaging ability for Elemental Shaman. Fire Elemental also has Meteor, which is an on use ability which does between 10,000-15,000 damage, further enhancing Elemental's burst damage.

Liquid Magma Totem is not a viable option for arena game-play due to the uncontrollable area-of-effect damage which could break crowd control. Though this talent could be viable for heavy team fight battlegrounds like Battle for Gilneas, Warsong Gulch, or Twin Peaks.

7.1.5. Tier 5 (Level 75) Talents

• 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 is the default pick, as it provides significant healing even when in a stun, acting as another defensive.

Ancestral Guidance can potentially be useful if the Elemental Shaman is not being focused in arena and needs to have another tool to heal his teammates. Using this talent and bursting will provide healing to your teammates which could save them, even when you are out of mana. This is also viable for Battleground to support the healing of your team when you are not being focused.

Wind Rush Totem is not viable for Elemental Shaman in PvP, mainly due to the short duration and 2-minute cooldown.

7.1.6. Tier 6 (Level 90) Talents

• 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 Overload: 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 the Elemental Shaman's damage taken by 40% for 10 seconds. It also grants new damage abilities to your other elemental pets.
• Icefuryhurls frigid ice at the target, dealing high damage and causing your next 4 Frost Shock to deal 200% increased damage, and generate 8 Maelstrom. It generates 25 Maelstrom, has a 2-second cast time and a 30-second cooldown.

Surge of Power is the highest burst pick on this tier. This does mean you will only have one defensive cooldown since you will not have Harden Skin from the Primal Elementalist talent choice. Using this talent means you will have huge burst potential when combined with Stormkeeper's 150% increased damage Lightning Bolts. Using this talent with the correct burst rotation will deal incredible single-target damage.

Primal Elementalist is the defensive option on this teir, this is selected against team compositions which have significant setup and burst, where you will be able to see the damage coming and use the Earth Elemental's Harden Skin as another defensive ability to prolong your life and the match.

Icefury is a viable option, especially paired with Earthen Rage. This should be taken for overall pressure instead of the burst damage from Surge of Power. This also allows for mobility, as the empowered Frost Shocks now provide 8 Maelstrom each, which allows for Maelstrom generation while moving. Icefury itself provides 25 base Maelstrom, and 37 total if it overloads. This allows for more Earth Shocks more often. This is our favorite for battlegrounds, but not Arenas.

7.1.7. Tier 7 (Level 100) Talents

• 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 to deal 150% more damage, and also causes your next 2 Lightning Bolts or Chain Lightnings to be instant cast and trigger an additional Elemental Overload on every target hit. It also affects Lava Beam.
• 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 requires significant casting and uptime to build stacks, since the buff only lasts for 10 seconds. Due to this, and the fact our main damage is coming from Earth Shock makes this talent not viable for PvP.

Stormkeeper is the preferred talent; this deals significant single target damage with the empowered Lightning Bolts, and should no longer be used to generate Maelstrom. Combining this burst with Earth Shock with Lava Shock and Surge of Power deals incredible burst damage.

Ascendance is not viable in the current state of Elemental Shaman in PvP. There may be certain circumstances you could take this into battlegrounds if you are not being targeted. The short duration and clear animation make it generally easy to counter with a single interrupt or stun.

7.2. PvP Talents for Elemental Shaman

Generally you want to play Gladiator's Medallion especially if the other team has a stun.

• Lightning Lasso is the most important PvP talent. This currently does significant damage, as well as a 5-second stun which is not dispellable. This currently provides significant pressure, while crowd-controlling, and providing time for the Elemental Shaman to move away, or reposition.
• Skyfury Totem is a default pick. This talent increases the critical damage by 20% of only spell casts or heals. Although this is highly dependent on how often your spells critically hit, if a critical strike happens the damage is significantly higher due to the multipliers of Master of the Elements, and the combination of Surge of Power and Stormkeeper. This also affects Lightning Lasso now.
• Grounding Totem is a default selection against caster or Hunter teams. This can stop crowd-control from the enemy team, as well as stop large damaging spell casts from casters.
• Purifying Waters is very strong against Restoration Druids and the heal provided from the Purge is useful to outlive the other team.
• Spectral Recovery can be useful. This can be a strong talent as provides healing while in Ghost Wolf, but also raises the ghost wolf speed to 110% of movement speed even when slows are applied. This can be taken if you know you are against heavy melee teams and know you will need to kite for a considerable portion of the match. This can also be useful in battlegrounds for more mobility works well with Spirit Wolf for mobility and defensives.
• Swelling Waves is a great defensive pick if you expect to be targeted. Since this talent only effects the heals you use on yourself this talent is very situational. If you are against a class you know you will not be able to kite using Frost Shock or Ghost Wolf, like Demon Hunters or Windwalker Monks, then this is a good option to be able to self-heal to help during stuns on your healers or stay self-sufficient.
• Elemental Attunement is not a necessary talent, as pooling Maelstrom does not provide for significant burst compared to Stormkeeper with Surge of Power.
• Traveling Storms is not taken in any circumstance in arena as there are better selections to increase pressure on the other team. This can be taken in Eye of the Storm battleground if you will be sitting in the middle defending the flag and want to knock off opponents.
• Counterstrike Totem is a situational talent. This can be useful as a small peel for your teammates or as a surprise against enemies in arena. In battlegrounds this can be used as considerable damage option, but will not lead to kills. Generally teams are aware of this Shaman ability to use this totem and will stop attacking once it is on the ground.
• Control of Lava is a viable selection if the enemy does not focus you and if there are 4 targets to maintain Flame Shock on. This is primarily a Battleground selection but can be useful in Arena against 2-caster 3v3 teams. This talent will reduce your mobility significantly.

8. Elemental Shaman PvP Rotation

Elemental Shaman are dependent on combining the benefits of multiple talents to kill their opponents, which requires Maelstrom and preparation. Elemental Shaman will either be one of three states during PvP:

1. Building up Maelstrom and Lava Shock stacks by using moderate to low damaging abilities.
2. Dealing large amounts of damage by spending Maelstrom, Lava Shock stacks, using Stormkeeper, and Lightning Lasso.
3. Playing defensively.

8.1. Sustained Damage

Building up Maelstrom and Lava Shock stacks is done using moderate to low damage abilities. The objective of this is to maximize your Maelstrom bar, which goes to at least 80 with the Call the Thunder talent, or 100 with Totem Mastery talent.

1. Maintain Flame Shock on up to 4 enemies on cooldown (including pets).
   • This generates the maximum amount (20) of Lava Surge procs, and providing maximum Maelstrom generation through Lava Surge procs.
2. Use Lava Burst if you have a Lava Surge proc, on a target with Flame Shock active to guarantee a critical strike.
3. Cast Icefury.
4. Use Frost Shock, if empowered by Icefury.
5. Cast Lava Burst.
6. Cast Lightning Bolt if single target or Chain Lightning if 2 or more targets are close to each other (including pets).
7. Use Fire Elemental, if casting is too challenging.

8.2. Burst Damage with Surge of Power or Primal Elementalist

The burst is some of the highest in the game at this point. Spending Maelstrom to deal massive damage requires you to have maximum 20-stacks of Lava Shock, and at least a 80% full bar of Maelstrom. When this This combination can potentially one shot opponents if they do not use a cooldown.

1. Use Fire Elemental or Storm Elemental.
2. Use Skyfury Totem.
3. Cast Stormkeeper.
4. Use Lava Burst to empower you with Master of the Elements.
5. Use Blood of the Enemy, or other Major Azerite Essence on your kill target.
6. Use Lightning Lasso.
7. Use Earth Shock, with 20 Lava Shock stacks, to activate the Surge of Power talent. Also use Meteor if you have Primal Elementalist selected.
8. Use Lightning Bolt, with Stormkeeper buff.
9. Use Earth Shock to re-activate the Surge of Power talent.
10. Use Lightning Bolt, with Stormkeeper buff.
11. Use Earth Shock, if you have sufficient Maelstrom.

8.3. Burst Damage With Icefury

Taking Icefury changes and decreases the burst window to be dependent on Master of the Elements instead of Surge of Power. The conditions to burst are the same but require including Lava Burst between the Stormkeeper's empowered Lightning Bolts.

1. Use Fire Elemental or Storm Elemental.
2. Use Skyfury Totem.
3. Cast Stormkeeper.
4. Use Lava Burst to empower you with Master of the Elements.
5. Use Lightning Lasso.
6. Use Earth Shock.
7. Use Lightning Bolt, with Stormkeeper buff, and use Eye of the Storm if you have selected Storm Elemental.
8. Use Lava Burst to empower you with Master of the Elements.
9. Use Lightning Bolt, with Stormkeeper buff.
10. Use Earth Shock, if you have sufficient Maelstrom.

8.4. Playing Defensively

8.4.1. Healing or Crowd-Controlling the Opposing Team

Healing Surge is a spammable heal, which provides significant side-healing. This should be used if your healer is stunned or crowd-controlled.

Hex is a curse 7-second crowd-control which can be broken by damage. In general you do not want to damage a target that has been hexed. That player does still have control of their character to move out of line of sight. This is best used on the enemy team when their have used an offensive or defensive cooldown, or the healer as part of a crowd-control chain.

Earthbind Totem this is a placed totem which slows any enemies within the radius. This totem is incredibly useful and should be used on cooldown. This helps you team's positioning. This totem can also help you land Capacitor Totem.

Thunderstorm knocks back all enemies around the Elemental Shaman as long as they are not rooted or have an immunity to knock-backs or magic effects active like Anti-Magic Shell from Death Knights. This is incredibly useful and can be used to save your teammates on arena maps with ledges, Dalaran Sewers and Blades Edge Arena. This is also a great ability for battlegrounds in Eye of the Storm or certain areas of Twin Peaks and Arathi Basin, which can kill the enemies from fall damage in these cases.

Purge can be used defensively to purge off your opponents offensive cooldowns or Mana back cooldowns which are purgeable. One very important use is during a Priest's Mind Control of your teammate. When a Priest does this it is better to use purge on your Mind Controlled teammate, and not use your Wind Shear interrupt. This is because Purge has no cooldown, while Wind Shear is on a 12-second cooldown.

8.4.2. Defensives Abilities

Astral Shift this is the main defensive for Elemental Shaman which is on a 1.5 minute cooldown. This ability decreases damage taken by 40% for 8 seconds and is not usable while stunned. It is best to communicate with your healer and use this cooldown at high health when your opponents are using their offensive cooldowns and your healer needs help keeping you alive.

Ghost Wolf is an underrated ability; it allows the Shaman to stay at 100% movement speed with any slowing debuff active. This can further be enhanced to 110% base speed using the Spectral Recovery PvP talent. This is the way Elemental Shaman can kite melee opponents and stay very mobile. If you are moving beyond a very short distance, ghost wolf is worth the global cooldown it incurs. Ghost wolf can be purged, which is one of the reasons why the Spirit Wolf talent is not as good as it could be.

Harden Skin is a 40% reduced damage with a 10 second duration, activated if taking the Primal Elementalist talent, from the Earth Elemental. This is a stronger defensive cooldown than even Astral Shift due to the longer duration, though the 5-minute cooldown means this will likely only be available once per arena. This ability can only be cast on the Elemental Shaman, though it can be cast on the Elemental Shaman while stunned, as long as the Earth Elemental is not stunned. The main way to use this ability is through a "/cast Harden Skin" macro.

9. Racial Bonuses for Elemental Shaman

Racial bonuses can provide interesting PvP benefits. Here are the best races to choose for each faction.

9.1. Horde

In this section, we list the Horde races in rough order of strength.

9.1.1. Orc

Orc is the best race for Elemental Shaman, thanks to the passive Orcs have ( Hardiness), which reduces all stuns and greatly improves survivability.

• Blood Fury provides on-use damage, is off the global cooldown, and allows for increased burst.
• Hardiness' reduction of stuns is one of the best racials for Elemental Shaman, because stuns lock us in place and do not allow us to kite or stay mobile. Against Rogues, Retribution Paladins, Warriors, Monks, this is a huge benefit to keep us alive.
• Command increases damage of pets by 1%, and is a good damage increase for our burst which currently includes the pet damage.

9.1.2. Pandaren

• Quaking Palm is a great 4-second incapacitate crowd-control on a 2-minute cooldown which can be extremely useful against melee that may be focusing you, or even used as another interrupt for casters or healers. This does share diminishing returns with your Hex ability.
• Pandaren are the only race to be able to use consumables in Arena PvP, or Rated Battlegrounds. They are allowed to eat a specific food providing 144 Versatility, since Pandaren receive two times the benefit from Epicurean. This food, Pre-Mixed Pot of Noodles, can be found in Ashran, Warspear, or Stormshield (Warlords of Draenor areas).

9.1.3. Goblin

• Rocket Jump provides significant mobility that can help further enhance Elemental Shaman's mobility. This ability can be used while in Ghost Wolf form as well, not pulling us out. This can allow for getting out of trouble, and also to chase and score a kill.
• Rocket Barrage deals damage, though it puts Rocket Jump on cooldown. We strongly recommend holding the 90-second cooldown for Rocket Jump instead.
• The Haste buff from Time is Money is good for overall damage as well.

9.1.4. Highmountain Tauren

• Bull Rush can be useful for mobility and a stun on a 2-minute cooldown. This will contribute to the stun diminishing return but could be helpful when kiting or playing against teams where you want one more interrupt. Only downside of this ability is that it is on the global cooldown and is a fixed animation, meaning once you start you will have to finish the 1-second charge.
• Highmountain Tauren have defensive racials for Elemental Shaman, though they are slight with the 1% Versatility for damage reduction, and Rugged Tenacity which reduces a flat amount of damage taken.

9.1.5. Tauren

• Brawn increases Critical Strike damage by 2% and is useful mainly with Lava Burst, since this always critically strikes when Flame Shock is on the target.
• War Stomp is an area-of-effect 2-second stun which is off the global cooldown. This is a shorter cooldown than the Highmountain charge, and is also off the global cooldown making it the superior choice.

9.1.6. Troll

• Berserking provides significant Haste, but overall Haste is more significant for Elemental Shaman than burst Haste. Since we are mainly looking for Critical Strike in our burst windows, this is not very significant in PvP.
• Health regeneration from Regeneration and reduced movement impairing effects by 20% from Da Voodoo Shuffle could be useful but are not significant currently.

9.1.7. Mag'har Orc

• Their racial, Ancestral Call is a random secondary stat which is not reliable or as significant as damage racials. The decreased duration of poisons, diseases, and curses by 10% is not significant enough to take.

9.2. Alliance

9.2.1. Dark Iron Dwarf

• Fireblood is a great defensive ability for clearing all poison, disease, curse, magic, and bleed effects especially given Elemental Shaman's weakness to Rogues. This racial also provides a significant amount of primary stat which can be used within Elemental Shaman's short yet significant burst windows.
• Forged in Flames is not very significant since even most melee have abilities which are not physical.

9.2.2. Dwarf

• Stoneform provides a cleanse of all poison, disease, curse, magic, and bleed effects and a good defensive against physical damage. Though even most physical-focused classes have abilities which do not deal physical damage. This is less useful than the Dark Iron Dwarf variety.
• The increased critical strike damage by 2% is useful mainly with Lava Burst since this always critically strikes when Flame Shock is on the target.

9.2.3. Draenei

• Gift of the Naaru can further contribute to the great hybrid healing ability of an Elemental Shaman, though on a 3-minute cooldown.

10. Best Team Compositions for Elemental Shamans

Now that you have the correct talents and understand your damage rotation, it is time to step into the arena with your team. Elemental Shamans have multiple burst cooldowns with unrelenting sustained damage. In addition to great damage, they are also very difficult to kill.

10.1. 2v2 Arena

Elemental Shaman are currently one of the best casters for 2v2, due to its multiple burst windows, and Lightning Lasso's crowd-control and damage.

The general strategy is to use crowd-control on the healer while using Lightning Lasso on the DPS target to create significant pressure. Using the above burst rotation, into Lightning Lasso will force the enemy team to use cooldowns and eventually lead to a kill. Lightning Lasso can also be used as a defensive cooldown, and help you kite and reposition.

Here is a list of the best team compositions for 2v2:

• Elemental Shaman + Elemental Shaman
• Elemental Shaman + Mistweaver Monk
• Elemental Shaman + Holy Paladin
• Elemental Shaman + Restoration Druid
• Elemental Shaman + Discipline Priest
• Elemental Shaman + Outlaw or Assassin Rogue
• Elemental Shaman + Fire Mage

10.2. 3v3 Arena

Elemental Shaman's role in 3v3 Arena is to line up crowd-control on the enemy team with the use of Lightning Lasso. This provides pressure, and crowd-control on the kill target which cannot be dispelled. Elemental Shaman also have their burst through the use of Stormkeeper along with Surge of Power to line up damage with their teammates. We also provide utility to your team of interrupting the enemy with Wind Shear, and using your totems to stop the enemy team from crowd-control, through using Grounding Totem and Tremor Totem.

Here is a list of the best team compositions for 3v3:

• Elemental Shaman + Any specialization Warlock + Holy Paladin
• Elemental Shaman + Windwalker Monk + Holy Paladin
• Elemental Shaman + Fire Mage + Restoration Shaman / Holy Paladin
• Elemental Shaman + Frost Mage + Restoration Druid
• Elemental Shaman + Demon Hunter + Discipline Priest
• Elemental Shaman + Shadow Priest + Restoration Druid
• Elemental Shaman + Arms Warrior + Restoration Druid
• Elemental Shaman + Assassination / Outlaw Rogue + Discipline Priest
• Elemental Shaman + Elemental Shaman + Resto Druid
• Elemental Shaman + Balance Druid + Any healer

11. Useful Elemental Shaman Macros

11.1. Arena Targeting

This macro allows you to target each of the enemy team players without clicking with your mouse. This is a more efficient method of changing targets. You should replace "arena1" with "arena2" and "arena3" for subsequent macros.

• /target arena1

11.2. Arena Target Interrupts

This macro will use your Wind Shear interrupt on the specific enemy team player without changing targets. Again, replace "arena1" with the desired enemy.

• /cast [target=arena1] Wind Shear

11.3. Targeting Teammates and Self

As following macro works like the enemy targeting macros above. To target your teammates insert "party1" or "party2", to target yourself, replace with "player".

• /target party1

11.4. Cursor Macros

Cursor macros reduce the number of times you have to press a key or mouse click by casting the specific spell or placing the totem where your cursor is pointed with a single press of the macro. This applies to only 3 abilities for an Elemental Shaman: Earthbind Totem, Earthquake, and Capacitor Totem.

• /cast [@cursor] Earthbind Totem

11.5. Focus Cast Macros

Setting and monitoring your focus target is critical to being aware of when crowd control is coming and when cooldowns are being used. In response, the following macro uses your abilities on the set focus target instead of on the active target of the player. Replace Wind Shear with Hex, Earth Shock, or Purge.

• /cast [target=focus] Wind Shear

11.6. Cleanse

This is one of the most important macros, as this will instantly dispel your friends from Curses, without having to switch targets.

• /cast [target=PLAYERNAME] Cleanse Spirit

Alternatively, you can make the macro target the generic party members, as used in earlier friendly team targeting macros.

• /cast [target=party1] Cleanse Spirit

11.7. Earth Shield Friend Macro

If you select the Earth Shield talent, you want a way to easily apply this ability to your teammates without having to switch targets or click their nameplates. The below options for this macro should allow you to maintain a high uptime on Earth Shield and maximize one of the best Elemental Shaman utilities for their team.

• /cast [target=PLAYERNAME] Earth Shield

Alternatively, you can make the macro target the generic party members, as used in earlier friendly team targeting macros.

• /cast [target=party1] Earth Shield

11.8. Purge Friendly Target Macro

This is one of the most important macros, as this will help free your teammates from Mind Control instantly without switching targets and is a must.

• /cast [target=PLAYERNAME] Purge

Alternatively, you can make the macro target the generic party members, as used in earlier friendly team targeting macros.

• /cast [target=party1] Purge

11.9. Healing Teammates

This is for healing teammates without having to switch targets. We use macros for targets specifically by their name to make sure we heal the correct target without a doubt. This approach is more precise but takes time to maintain the macro if you play with various players.

• /cast [target=PLAYERNAME] Healing Surge

Alternatively, you can make the macro target the generic party members, as used in earlier friendly team targeting macros.

• /cast [target=party1] Healing Surge

11.10. Earth Elemental Special Defensive Ability

This is a significant defensive cooldown which provides the Elemental Shaman with 40% reduced damage taken. You will need to press this macro twice to make the special effect work. The first press summons the elemental, the second press will use the ability on the Elemental Shaman.

• /cast Earth Elemental
• /cast [talent:6/2] Harden Skin

11.11. Fire or Storm Elemental Special Offensive Ability

This is a significant offensive cooldown which can be integrated into your burst if using Primal Elementalist. You will need to press this macro twice to make the special effect work. First press summons the elemental, the second press will use the ability on the Elemental Shaman.

• /cast Fire Elemental
• /cast Storm Elemental
• /cast Call Lightning
• /cast [talent:6/2] Eye of the Storm
• /cast [talent:6/2] Meteor

12. Elemental Shaman Addons

12.1. Arena Addons

Gladius / Sarena provide most of the necessary information needed to track health, use of trinkets, dispels, and tracking diminishing returns of the different schools of crowd-control. I strongly recommend sArena as it tracks diminishing returns for Lightning Lasso while Gladius does not.

Omnibar is critical for arenas, as it will tell you when interrupts and major offensive and defensive cooldowns are coming available for the opposing team to use. This addon requires you to set each of the abilities you would like to track, which means you can define if you want to track more or fewer. We would recommend tracking the least amount of abilities as you can. We would also recommend to disable this when going into battlegrounds as it tracks the cooldowns from the entire other team, meaning 10 to 40 people which lists too many abilities.

Quartz (or alternative custom castbar addon) allows you to re-size or re-position your player, target, and focus casting bars and can help you more easily see when the enemy team is casting to be able to interrupt.

12.2. Battlegrounds Addons

BattleGroundEnemies provides the list of enemy team members, their trinket status, death timers, and other information easily available on your screen. This allows players to easily target enemies, as well as identify healers. This allows players to see where around the map enemies are by selecting them with enemy nameplates turned on (default keybind to turn this on is ALT + V).

H.H.T.D (Healers Have To Die puts a plus sign icon about the head of the healers of the opposing team. This can be particularly useful in battlegrounds, when there are many enemies and you want to be able to identify the healer from the group.

We review these and some of my other addons in a video we have put together, including how to configure and set these up, here.

13. Tips and Tricks

Like most things in PvP, these are general rules of thumb. If there are kill opportunities if you ignore these advice then definitely go for the kill to win the match.

• Elemental Shaman can crowd-control two targets on the enemy team at once by using Hex on one target, preferably one which has an interrupt, and casting Lightning Lasso on the kill target. This single move repeated will score kills and setup your team to win Arena games.
• Learn when to kite targets and when to stand still and cast. Elemental Shaman is very good at kiting with Ghost Wolf and slows. This sometimes leads to players kiting too much, or too little. The following can be used as general guidance for kiting and slowing enemies in 3v3 arena:
  • Against a Melee team, if the Melee opponents are focusing you, then you can and should spam them with slows from Frost Shock and Earthbind Totem and kite them to reduce the damage you take from them. You want to come out of Ghost Wolf to cast Flame Shock, Earthbind Totem, Frost Shock, Earth Shock, or use an instant cast Lava Burst, otherwise keep kiting. You should stop and cast only when you are far enough to take minimal melee damage.
  • If the Melee opponents are focusing your teammates, then as a first priority keep them Frost Shocked or under the effects of Earthbind Totem. This will considerably help your team kite and also decrease enemy damage. This also means you should not be moving much and casting your damaging rotation to maximize your pressure while your team is being focused. If your team communicates they need harder peels, you should crowd control with Capacitor Totem or Hex to peel DPS off your team.
• Maximize Flame Shock on targets. Over the course of an arena or battleground, Flame Shock will most likely be your highest damaging ability. Flame Shock will also provide the instant cast Lava Burst proc, which is one of our main Maelstrom generators. Flame Shock has a 6-second cooldown and 24-second duration meaning there can be maximum of 4 on enemies at a time. Due to these factors, it is critical to use Flame Shock on cooldown on any available target. This includes any enemy team member, which is not in a damage-breaking crowd-control ( Sap, Polymorph, Blind, Gouge, to name a few). This also includes putting Flame Shock on enemy pets, which can be an easy way to maintain up to 4 Flame Shocks for maximum damage and procs.
• Side-healing with Healing Surge to help healers. Elemental Shaman have some of the best hybrid healing in the game. In arena if your healer is stunned or crowd-controlled, side healing can often be the difference between life and death for your teammate. If you find yourself not knowing what to cast next, using a heal can never hurt. We recommend using specific targeting healing macros which are detailed in the macro section.
• Using Earthbind Totem on cooldown. This totem provides an area-of-effect slow, which can be extremely helpful to your team's ability to move away or slow enemies. Earthbind Totem should be used using a cursor macro, and places around the enemy team, or around a pillar where your healer may be kiting.
• If using Primal Elementalist use the Fire, Storm, Earth-empowered skills, These abilities have to be used within a macro to be able to be used appropriately. Each of your pets have significant offensive and defensive abilities, and you need to use each during each arena match or battleground.

14. Frequently Asked Questions

14.1. What Happened to Elemental Shaman in 8.1?

Elemental Shaman received significant changes in 8.1. Specifically to the talents and PvP talents, which has helped increase Maelstrom generation and overall damage for the Elemental Shaman. It is recommended you review all the changes, though the guide here includes all changes related to PvP.

14.2. What are the Stat Priorities for Elemental Shaman?

Check the Stat priority section of the guide.

14.3. What happened with Lightning Lasso in 8.2?

Lightning Lasso received a change as part of Patch 8.2 which changed the spell from doing 40% maximum health points over 5-seconds to doing damage scaling from your Intellect and the ability can now critical hit. This is currently a buff, as health pools have not raised significantly in Patch 8.2. This may change as the average item level of players continues to increase though.

15. Changelog