Enhancement Shaman DPS Rotation, Cooldowns, and Abilities — The War Within (11.1.7)

Enhancement Shaman plays with a priority list that focuses on rotating your main abilities on cooldown while managing your stacks of Maelstrom Weapon. Enhancement tends to take a bit of time to build up muscle memory, so you know what to prioritize and what to ignore in a given moment.

1. Cast Surging Totem.
2. Cast Flame Shock if it is not active.
3. Cast Feral Spirit.
4. Cast Primordial Wave to trigger Splintered Elements.
5. Cast Doom Winds.
Cast Doom Winds - Click for Notes
• Aim to have Legacy of the Frost Witch active before entering into this window, and maintain it throughout.
6. Cast Primordial Storm with 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
Cast Primordial Storm with 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks - Click for Notes
• Make sure Legacy of the Frost Witch is active, or will activate from the cast.
7. Cast Lava Lash with Hot Hand active.
8. Cast Sundering.
9. Cast Windstrike on cooldown during Ascendance.
10. Cast Ascendance.
Cast Maelstrom Weapon spenders with 9+ stacks - Click for Spend Rules
• Treat Elemental Blast and Tempest with the same rule - if either are at 2 charges and you may potentially waste a use, it becomes the priority spender. A general rule is:
• Cast Tempest if it has procced;
• Cast Elemental Blast;
• Cast Lightning Bolt otherwise.
Cast Maelstrom Weapon spenders with 10 stacks - Click for Spend Rules
• Cast Elemental Blast;
• Cast Lightning Bolt otherwise.
11. Cast Lightning Bolt with 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
12. Cast Lava Lash.
13. Cast Primordial Wave if at 4 or less Maelstrom Weapon.
14. Cast Stormstrike if at 2 charges.
15. Cast Crash Lightning.
16. Cast Lava Lash with Hot Hand active.
17. Cast Voltaic Blaze.
18. Cast Stormstrike.
19. Cast Crash Lightning.
20. Cast Voltaic Blaze.
21. Cast Ice Strike.
22. Cast Lava Lash.
23. Cast Sundering.
24. Cast Lightning Bolt with 5+ Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
25. Cast Crash Lightning.
26. Cast Flame Shock or Frost Shock to fill.

Enhancement has a strong ebb and flow that you will slowly get used to when playing, as the general "feel" of Maelstrom Weapon and ability cooldowns is a pattern you learn. Reacting to key procs is important, and as Stormbringer you will need to be aware of Stormsurge resets on Stormstrike, and refunds from Static Accumulation. as Totemic you will need to be especially aware of Hot Hand procs as they make up a major part of your damage. Quick notes (populated based on tool choices) are:

• Stormbringer aggressively spends Maelstrom Weapon as much as possible to cycle through Tempest procs, which are your highest priority spender. Remaining Maelstrom Weapon is spent on Lightning Bolt, but with Elemental Blast taken we keep that recharging as a higher priority.
• Primordial Wave is used as a backup cast to refill Maelstrom Weapon if taken as a single point, but is usually best served for any cleave.
• Primordial Wave is cast on cooldown to activate Splintered Elements, ideally aligning with other cooldowns for the follow-up Primordial Storm cast.
• Make sure to always be primed to Lightning Bolt before entering into Ascendance. While it is active, cast Windstrike as aggressively as possible.
• With the Season 2 4-piece, Stormbringer single-target builds opt into Crash Lightning as its secondary filler strike. This is kept on cooldown so long as Stormstrike is kept recharging.
• Ice Strike is taken for Stormbringer as a last ditch generation filler due to it being both a main-hand strike and generating 2 Maelstrom Weapon. This is your backup when all other higher priority tools are unavailable.
• While playing Totemic, make sure to cast Surging Totem immediately and on cooldown. Keep it near your target via Totemic Projection or its own recast. You should also ideally consume Whirling Air in your first 1-2 after each drop, so try to pool just before it is ready again.
• Hot Hand procs are your number 1 priority, and whenever it triggers you should weave Lava Lash with every other GCD.
• Your burst cooldowns are every 30-seconds and 1-minute, using Primordial Wave and Doom Winds. Aim to overlap these on every cycle, and make sure to have Legacy of the Frost Witch active before using Doom Winds or casting the Primordial Storm follow-up.
• With Witch Doctor's Ancestry taken, your goal is to overlap every Doom Winds cast (and by extension Ascendance). As generation is high you can often squeeze extra casts in between, but pay attention to the cycle speed as the highest value comes out overlapping these effects.
• With Witch Doctor's Ancestry taken, your goal is to overlap every Primordial Wave and follow-up Primordial Storm with Feral Spirit using the CDR. Extra uses can be squeezed in if your generation is very high, but avoid desyncing it as most of the value comes out of Doom Winds overlaps.

Enhancement AoE gets very busy due to the number of different tools we have. While there are a lot of additions based on Hero Talents chosen, they share the core focus of maintaining Crash Lightning for additional Maelstrom Weapon, and spending that on Chain Lightning.

1. Cast Flame Shock if it isn't active and Primordial Wave is ready.
   Cast Lava Lash to spread Flame Shock after - Click for Notes
   • Only needs to be up when Primordial Wave is available, don't worry otherwise.
2. Cast Surging Totem.
3. Cast Flame Shock if it's not active on any targets.
4. Cast Feral Spirit.
5. Cast Primordial Wave with Flame Shock spread to all nearby targets.
6. Cast Doom Winds.
Cast Doom Winds - Click for Notes
• Aim to always have Legacy of the Frost Witch active before casting.
7. Cast Primordial Storm with 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
8. Cast Lava Lash with Hot Hand active.
Cast Sundering - Click for Notes
• Aim to always have Legacy of the Frost Witch when casting.
9. Cast Tempest with 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
10. Cast Ascendance.
11. Cast Windstrike.
12. Cast Chain Lightning with 8+ Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
13. Cast Crash Lightning.
Cast Maelstrom Weapon spenders with 10 stacks - Click for Spend Rules
• Cast Elemental Blast;
• Cast Chain Lightning otherwise.
14. Cast Chain Lightning with 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
15. Cast Crash Lightning.
16. Cast Voltaic Blaze.
17. Cast Chain Lightning with 5+ Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
18. Cast Stormstrike.
19. Cast Sundering.
20. Cast Lava Lash.
21. Cast Stormstrike.
22. Cast Ice Strike.
23. Cast Flame Shock or Frost Shock to fill.

Our AoE priority can may be overwhelming at first glance, but most of our priorities can be simplified to core rules. Generally, casting Crash Lightning frequently for damage and to maintain the buff is core, while spending Maelstrom Weapon on Chain Lightning when we reach 10 stacks. The remaining priority is strongly influenced by your hero talent choice, which also alters the loadout you pair with it. Key notes based on your rotation tool selections are:

• Stormbringer has a heavier focus on Maelstrom Weapon spending, which you should use on Chain Lightning whenever possible at 10. This cycles you through to Tempest, which is a top priority when it procs.
• Crash Lightning is also a very high priority. Aim to always have these casts buffed by a Chain Lightning cast in between them, and be aware of the cooldown reduction that comes from Thorim's Invocation. With Converging Storms, you want to weave this between every two Windstrikes for additional priority damage.
• Primordial Wave is cast on cooldown for burst Maelstrom Weapon generation, and it needs Flame Shocks set up in AoE to apply Conductive Energy. Make sure to hit as many targets as possible to max out Splintered Elements strength. With Primordial Storm, cast it with 10 Maelstrom Weapon as a follow-up. Aim to align every other cast with Doom Winds.
• Ascendance is your big 2-minute burst window, and Windstrike remains very strong due to Thorim's Invocation, so is cast aggressively. Doom Winds is your mid-range cooldown, cast as close to every minute as possible. Aim to overlap this with other cooldowns taken. Cast it after Primordial Wave, and before Ascendance when taken.
• Totemic needs to make sure to keep Surging Totem active at all times, using it at the start of each pull and on cooldown after. This also gives the advantage of starting each pull with Whirling Earth, letting us set up Flame Shocks instantly.
• While Hot Hand is active this is your top priority, as every cast triggers Reactivity and in turn can proc AoE Windfury Weapon. Weave in between its cooldown, and be aware Whirling Fire will guarantee a proc.
• Maelstrom Weapon is less important, but still needs to be spent at 10 stacks on Chain Lightning.Similarly, maintain Crash Lightning and cast it as a secondary AoE strike.
• Primordial Wave is your 30-second burst cooldown, which needs to be set up in advance with Flame Shock. Make sure to have it on as many targets as possible to optimize Splintered Elements, and follow up the cast with Primordial Storm when you reach 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
• Doom Winds is your secondary cooldown, which should be overlapped with other tools. Aim to cast Primordial Storm during this, and fill it with as many AoE main-hand strikes as possible ( Crash Lightning, Sundering, Reactivity or Primordial Storm). Aim to have Legacy of the Frost Witch active when you use this.
• With Witch Doctor's Ancestry taken Totemic also wants to always overlap each Primordial Wave window with Feral Spirit as a priority, especially during Doom Winds.
• If playing Stormbringer with Witch Doctor's Ancestry, also aim to overlap Doom Winds and especially Ascendance with Feral Spirit. Pay attention to cooldown reduction to avoid wasting them in a low damage window.

Our opener changes quite a lot depending on build and target count. Use the tool below to adjust the display based on the fight style, and it will populate depending on your choices in the rotation tool.

Due to Totemic having a lot of opener flexibility, the tool above has options for both a standard simpler sequence, and a more advanced one in single target.

In AoE, Stormbringer's opener is massively influenced by you having any Tempests pooled or not. The tool above has options to switch between a standard non-pooled opener, and one that should be used if you have charges available.

Opener Style
Standard	Tempest pooled

1. Cast Surging Totem 1 second before the pull.
2. Cast Surging Totem 5+ seconds before the pull.
3. Cast Totemic Recall to reset Surging Totem.
4. Pre-cast Lightning Bolt 2 seconds before the pull.
5. Cast Flame Shock on the way into melee.
   • At the same time, Totemic Projection your Surging Totem under your target.
6. Cast Feral Spirit.
7. Cast Stormstrike.
8. Cast Primordial Wave.
9. Cast Lava Lash to trigger Hot Hand.
10. Cancel your active Surging Totem, then recast a new one to re-trigger Whirling Elements.
Cast Lava Lash - Click for Notes
• This extends the initial Hot Hand and guarantees a double Sundering activation.
11. Cast Elemental Blast with your opening Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
12. Cast Lightning Bolt with your opening Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
13. Cast Lava Lash ➜ Doom Winds ➜ Lava Lash ➜ Stormstrike ➜ Lava Lash in that order.
14. Cast Primordial Storm with 10+ Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
15. Cast Elemental Blast once you reach 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
    • Cast Stormstrike a second time before this if you are not at 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
16. Cast Lightning Bolt once you reach 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
    • Cast Stormstrike to generate instead if you are not at 10.
17. Cast Sundering until it does not reset.
Cast Doom Winds - Click for Notes
• Aim to have Legacy of the Frost Witch active when this is used.
18. Cast Lava Lash to trigger Hot Hand. Cast this every other GCD while active.
19. Cast Feral Spirit.
20. Cast Crash Lightning.
21. Cast Primordial Wave.
22. Cast Chain Lightning at 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
23. Cast Elemental Blast at 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
Cast Doom Winds - Click for Notes
• Aim to have Legacy of the Frost Witch active when this is used.
24. Cast Sundering until it does not reset.
25. Cast Lava Lash to trigger Whirling Fire. Repeat every other GCD until Hot Hand expires.
Cast Primordial Storm once you reach 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks - Click for Notes
• Weave this in between Lava Lash casts, ideally half way through Doom Winds to refresh Legacy of the Frost Witch.
26. Pre-cast Elemental Blast 2 seconds before the pull.
27. Cast Flame Shock on the way into melee.
28. Cast Lava Lash to spread Flame Shock.
29. Cast Feral Spirit.
30. Cast Primordial Wave.
31. Cast Doom Winds.
32. Cast Crash Lightning.
33. Cast Ascendance.
34. Cast Windstrike twice.
35. Cast Crash Lightning if below 5 Maelstrom Weapon.
36. Cast Feral Spirit.
37. Cast Primordial Wave.
38. Cast Tempest.
39. Cast Ascendance.
Cast Windstrike (Optional) - Click for Notes
• This will consume the opening Arc Discharge and give needed CDR on Crash Lightning.
40. Cast Crash Lightning.
41. Cast Tempest.
42. Cast Doom Winds.
43. Cast Windstrike on cooldown.
Cast Tempest whenever it procs at 10 Maelstrom Weapon stacks - Click for Notes
• Whenever this triggers, use Crash Lightning to snap generate Maelstrom Weapon if needed.
44. Cast Primordial Storm 1-2 seconds before it expires with 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
Cast Stormstrike - Click for Notes
• This is to generate Maelstrom Weapon to max out your first Thorim's Invocation proc. This is to generate to 5 Maelstrom Weapon to dump the second charge of Elemental Blast before Ascendance .
45. Cast Ice Strike.
46. Cast Feral Spirit.
47. Cast Elemental Blast with 5+ Maelstrom Weapon.
48. Cast Primordial Wave.
49. Cast Doom Winds.
50. Cast Ascendance.
Cast Windstrike twice - Click for Notes
• This guarantees Legacy of the Frost Witch.
51. Cast Primordial Storm once you reach 10 Maelstrom Weapon.
52. Continue with normal ability priority.

Depending on your build and fight type, Enhancement has a few things to set up once it enters combat. Once its major cooldowns are rolling however, you can transition smoothly into the regular priority list. Key notes based on your selections are:

• Stormbringer's opener in single-target is incredibly simple, and it only really has one goal: get into Ascendance as quickly and smoothly as possible.
• Casting a single Stormstrike guarantees enough Maelstrom Weapon to fully trigger Thorim's Invocation from your first Windstrike, getting you to Legacy of the Frost Witch faster.
• With Primordial Wave, a cast of this before Ascendance will give you more than enough Maelstrom Weapon to fully trigger Thorim's Invocation, so does not need any setup GCDs.
• Feral Spirit is cast in the GCD before Doom Winds, which leads straight into your Ascendance window.
• Stormbringer in AoE has a few things to set up before Ascendance to make it as explosive as possible.
• Flame Shock as your first GCD into a Lava Lash will set you up instantly for Primordial Wave, and enough Maelstrom Weapon to kickstart your cycle.
• Doom Winds is best before Ascendance, followed by a Crash Lightning cast to get the buff active early and get it on cooldown.
• Once you get into Ascendance, two Windstrike casts to activate Legacy of the Frost Witch followed by a 10 Maelstrom Weapon stack Primordial Storm provides the strongest opening burst sequence if you have no Tempests pooled.
• The Totemic opener in single-target is quite hectic, as there are a lot of variables at play when getting things set up.
• It always makes sure to activate Primordial Wave to get a burst of Haste from Splintered Elements to accelerate the pace it can set up.
• Once you trigger Hot Hand from Whirling Fire, you will be casting Lava Lash every other GCD while it is active, weaving other priorities in between.
• Your secondary goal is to build 10 Maelstrom Weapon to activate Legacy of the Frost Witch. Once you have 10, cast Elemental Blast Lightning Bolt and move on. Weave Stormstrike between Lava Lash if you have not reached 10 yet.
• Once Legacy of the Frost Witch is active, you can cast Feral Spirit and begin Doom Winds, spending the next 10 Maelstrom Weapon generated on Primordial Storm.
• Opening with Totemic in AoE is much simpler, as Maelstrom Weapon is more predictable. Once we have Surging Totem, Flame Shock and Primordial Wave set up, an initial Crash Lightning should get us to 10. This lets you cast Chain Lightning to activate Legacy of the Frost Witch.
• With Witch Doctor's Ancestry this makes the opening Maelstrom Weapon generation more consistent by being cast as early as possible, as it will still last into the full upcoming Doom Winds window.
• Once it is up, cast Doom Winds and cast Sundering repeatedly until you do not get a reset, followed by Lava Lash to begin Hot Hand.
• As soon as you reach 10 Maelstrom Weapon, cast Primordial Storm, making sure this is inside Doom Winds. This should refresh Legacy of the Frost Witch and set you up to move onto the regular priority.

Feral Spirit summons two wolves to fight with you for 15 seconds on a 90-second cooldown. When this is cast, you instantly generate one stack of Maelstrom Weapon and gain an additional Maelstrom Weapon stack every 3 seconds for their duration. Each wolf active also increases the physical damage of your abilities (not including auto-attacks) by 15%, stacking multiplicatively - meaning the baseline cast before other stacking buffs is 32.25% increased physical damage. With Alpha Wolf taken, any Feral Spirit you spawn will also pulse for uncapped physical damage for 8 seconds following a Crash Lightning or Chain Lightning cast.

The follow-up choice node significantly alters the way you access Feral Spirit casts, and are both extremely strong:

• Witch Doctor's Ancestry - provides 4% increased chance to all Maelstrom Weapon triggers. Each individual Maelstrom Weapon generated reduces the cooldown of Feral Spirit by 1 second. This generally averages out to a 20-30 second cooldown, but can go all the way down under 10 during heavy generation periods. This allows us to overlap casts and stack multipliers.
• Flowing Spirits - grants a 6% chance on any active ability to spawn one Feral Spirit wolf for 8 seconds, but you can no longer cast the baseline ability. This includes all special attacks such as Windfury Weapon, leading to a large amount of spawns. While this is listed as a flat chance, it is actually a "deck of cards" system on a 3/50 deck cycling with each ability cast. This mean that any amount over 6 is functionally impossible due to the difficulty of cycling that many events in 8 seconds.

Elemental Spirits alters all wolves spawned via Feral Spirit, causing them to spawn randomly as either Fire, Frost or Lightning wolves. These increase your Physical damage by 10%, and also the magic damage you deal with the corresponding spell school by the same amount. As of Patch 11.1 these have now been normalized to be completely random regardless of the talent you pair with it.

Ascendance has two methods of activation — either with the active ability on a 3-minute cooldown for 15 seconds, or through procs triggered by spending Maelstrom Weapon for 6 seconds. While this is active, Stormstrike's cooldown is significantly reduced and both it and your auto-attacks are replaced with 30-yard range, armor-ignoring alternatives in Windstrike and Windlash. While active we generally aim to cast Windstrike as often as possible, but without supporting Follow-up talents the effect is quite weak. Instead, a lot of value is from the follow-up talents.

Whenever playing these nodes, it is highly recommended to complete the entire talent row with both follow-up talents. This is especially true when playing Stormbringer due to the extreme synergy with Static Accumulation.

• Static Accumulation — each point causes you to generate one Maelstrom Weapon per second while Ascendance is active, and spending Maelstrom Weapon on Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning has a 10% chance per point to fully refund the amount spent. This is an enormous source of resource generation and often alters our priorities. With Stormbringer taken, this shifts our Maelstrom Weapon spending heavily toward lightning spells, due to the dual chance to refund with this and Supercharge.
• Thorim's Invocation — reduces the cooldown of Ascendance by 1 minute, and extends the duration of Deeply Rooted Elements procs by 2 seconds. Also increases the damage of Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning by 20%, and causes Windstrike to also spend up to 5 Maelstrom Weapon to discharge either Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning, depending on your most recent cast. With this taken it means no matter your build you will want to cast Windstrike on cooldown, as it both generates and spends Maelstrom Weapon at the same time.

There is a lot of complex parts of Thorim's Invocation when it comes to how it interacts with other specific talents, and what changes its priming state between Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning. Below are key details to bear in mind, in particular for AoE scenarios:

• Any Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning, regardless of Maelstrom Weapon spent, will set Thorim's Invocation manually to the respective spell.
• Tempest is dynamic, meaning the number of targets hit dictates what it is primed to. If it hits only one, it will be set to Lightning Bolt, While if it hits two it will change to Chain Lightning
  • Thorim's Invocation will consume Tempest procs if you are primed to Lightning Bolt, but will not consume it if you are primed to Chain Lightning.
• Primordial Storm is dynamic, and will prime two whichever of the two spells it casts at the end of its sequence. This is decided by the number of targets hit by the initial 3 strikes.
• You want to make sure before each Ascendance cast, you are primed to the correct spell:
  • Single Target - Lightning Bolt
  • AoE - Chain Lightning

Primordial Wave has seen a significant rework in Patch 11.1, making it much simpler to use. It requires at least one active Flame Shock to cast, and when you do it will generate 5 Maelstrom Weapon and launch a bolt of Elemental damage at all targets currently affected by your Flame Shocks. Each target hit will also have Lightning Rod applied via Stormbringer's Conductive Energy effect.

Splintered Elements provides 5/10% Haste for 12 seconds when you cast Primordial Wave, plus an additional 2/4% for each extra target hit beyond the first - effectively giving it a cap of 15/30% at 6 targets. We often use this Haste boost to overlap with other cooldowns to empower our burst windows.

A new capstone added in Patch 11.1, this is a combo skill we can cast after using Primordial Wave. When cast this triggers a 4 step attack that always happens in the same order, triggering a Fire, Frost and Lightning strike and finish with either an empowered Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning depending on the number of targets hit. All of these strikes are AoE main-hand hits, and can trigger imbues on all enemies. This also consumes Maelstrom Weapon to amplify the damage of all hits.

Stormbringer uses this as a snap Maelstrom Weapon generation tool, and to apply Conductive Energy to enemies in AoE. Splintered Elements is used to blanket Ascendance for massive dmage, and Primordial Storm is ideally always aligned with your Doom Winds windows.

Totemic treats this as a primary damage window, using Splintered Elements to speed up its Hot Hand windows. Due to the higher imbuement damage, it wants to always align Primordial Storm with Doom Winds, so is placed on a strict 30-second cooldown cycle.

Doom Winds triples your chance to trigger Windfury Weapon for 8 seconds while cast, and while active will deal Stormstrike damage every second to nearby enemies. This is not an increase to the number of Skyfury proc triggers. Some key notes are:

• While Doom Winds is up, the value of main-hand strikes rises as these can trigger Windfury Weapon. Attacks that fall into this category are Stormstrike / Windstrike, Ice Strike, Crash Lightning, Sundering / Reactivity, and all 3 Primordial Storm strikes.
• Each enemy hit by the initial cast of Crash Lightning or any target hit by Sundering / Reactivity counts as a main-hand strike, and will trigger an "AoE Windfury" hit that is truly uncapped.
• When combined with Primordial Storm, you ideally want to overlap every other cast with Doom Winds for a big burst of damage and Maelstrom Weapon generation.

Stormbringer casts this strictly on cooldown, aiming to align it with Ascendance for burst Maelstrom Weapon and Stormsurge procs. That means every other cast will be used in tandem with Ascendance. If paired with Primordial Storm, align every other use of this with Doom Winds as well.

Totemic treats this as its big cooldown moment, and aims to cast it strictly on cooldown every minute. Ideally, you want to have Hot Hand active and fill every GCD with an activator, while making sure to fit Primordial Storm into each cast.

Maelstrom Weapon management is crucial if you intend to play Enhancement at a competitive level. This has a 20% chance to trigger from any melee hit and stacks up to 5 times (or up to 10 times with Raging Maelstrom). Each stack reduces the cast time of your next Lightning Bolt / Chain Lightning cast by 20%, and also increases the damage of affected spells by 25% when using Improved Maelstrom Weapon and Raging Maelstrom. At 5 stacks, ability casts that consume this become instant, and only 5 stacks can be consumed at once. When talenting into Overflowing Maelstrom, this is increased to 10 stacks to increase the damage multiplier.

While it is tempting to cast these spells as soon as you hit 5 stacks, you should train yourself to make use of the 10-stack limit granted by Raging Maelstrom. If you are not at risk of overcapping your Maelstrom Weapon stacks, then it makes more sense to focus on keeping your other abilities on cooldown as much as possible. Spending rules are as follows:

• Stormbringer builds aim to spend at 9+, but can often find themselves spending lower depending on the situation to fish for Static Accumulation and Supercharge triggers if they run out of active buttons to press.
• During Ascendance, Windstrike will naturally spend 5 every second, siphoning it off. This is often more valuable than a higher stack spend.
• Tempest breaks these rules, wanting to be cast with as much Maelstrom Weapon as possible, ideally at 10. During Ascendance however, the value of a Windstrike cast outdoes this, so do not pause your cycle to cast it manually.
• Totemic aims to spend at 10 stacks despite Totemic Rebound due to how busy its GCDs are.
• It also wants to follow each Surging Totem with a Maelstrom Weapon spender as soon as possible to trigger Whirling Air and amplify the rest of the totem.
• With Elemental Blast taken, it wants to weave these in with as much Maelstrom Weapon as possible while making sure at least 1 charge is always on cooldown.

Due to the passive refund proc on Static Accumulation, when playing this talent it removes Lava Burst (if you are not playing Elemental Blast) from your rotation. It also slightly raises the value of Lightning Bolt spenders even at 5 stacks, as the chance to refund here is higher than any other source of generation.

It also means that during Ascendance your generation is extremely high, so spending aggressively in between Windstrike casts is often necessary, in particular for Stormbringer.

Crash Lightning looks simple on the surface but has many moving parts and is an essential aspect of Enhancement gameplay in AoE. There are some core components to bear in mind with how it works:

• The Crash Lightning buff is triggered for 12 seconds whenever it strikes two targets or more, and should be maintained in any multi-target situation.
• While active, Stormstrike, Lava Lash and Ice Strike will trigger a separate damage splash event called Crash Lightning.
• All Crash Lightning damage, both active and splash component, can trigger Maelstrom Weapon individually, while only the active cast hits can proc Stormsurge.
• The initial cast of Crash Lightning can trigger individual Windfury Weapon events on targets hit.

The above means that any time we can get more than one target together, we want to get this active for a free additional boost to our primary strikes, which also leads to additional resources. In AoE situations, this causes a flood of extra Maelstrom Weapon which confers a number of benefits to both builds allowing for extra cooldown access, AoE and funnel. Windfury Weapon can also trigger on each target hit by the initial cast, giving it even stronger AoE synergy. In Patch 11.1, the initial damage was significantly buffed, meaning that we generally want to use it on cooldown as much as possible. We also ideally want to cast it as much as possible during Doom Winds.

Chain Lightning also has two interactions to both increase access to, and amplify the damage of Crash Lightning:

• Each target hit by Chain Lightning reduces the cooldown of Crash Lightning by 0.5 seconds (up to a maximum of 2.5 with Crashing Storms)
• Each target hit by Chain Lightning increases the damage of your next active cast of Crash Lightning by 10% per target hit (up to 50% with Crashing Storms).

This creates a generate-spend relationship between the two that leads to both extra access to the resources to activate it, and increased frontloaded power of the ability, encouraging us to spend at least once in between each Crash Lightning cast.

Converging Storms can be taken which causes each target hit by the initial Crash Lightning cast to increase the damage of your next Stormstrike cast by 25% per target hit, stacking up to 6 for a maximum of 150%. This activates even on a single-target, giving a good boost to funnel on priority targets when taken.

Unrelenting Storms allows us to use Crash Lightning as a primary single-target strike, so long as no other targets are nearby. This causes Crash Lightning to have a reduced cooldown when it only hits a single target, and guaranteeably procs Windfury Weapon on your target. This is considered an independent proc, so your cast can technically trigger it twice. When played, this raises the priority of Crash Lightning, and allows us to hybridize cleave builds for a single talent point.

It is often mentioned that Enhancement has a unique ability to "funnel" damage into priority targets, using extra enemies as fuel to amplify its single-target damage. There are a number of effects throughout the tree that enable this.

Crash Lightning is the primary driver, due to the additional Maelstrom Weapon mentioned in the Crash Lightning section. With the improvements to Stormstrike damage in Patch 11.1, the value of Converging Storms is significantly higher in particular for Stormbringer, and builds that can fit it in can use Crash Lightning as an additional enabler to deal priority damage.

Alongside this, Ashen Catalyst when played significantly increases in stack rate allowing for more frequent, empowered Lava Lash casts. Due to how much damage Lava Lash deals in Patch 11.1, and the amount of AoE effect triggers it causes, your "anchor" target often takes significantly more damage when you can leverage this.

With Stormbringer, there is also the added benefit of Conductive Energy. This allows you to make use of tools such as Primordial Wave and Arc Discharge to hit multiple targets with Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning, and convert that into more primary target damage in the process.

Your Weapon Imbues should always be active as they confer a strong benefit. Some notes on each are:

• Windfury Weapon - only applied to the main-hand, these additional strikes are considered special attacks and, as such, can generate Maelstrom Weapon and trigger procs such as Stormsurge.
• Flametongue Weapon - only applied to the off-hand, this causes all weapon attacks to trigger an additional hit of fire damage and doubles the damage your Lava Lash deals while active.

For Totemic, there is additional synergy with Imbuement Mastery which links the two procs together. This causes Windfury Weapon procs that cause Flametongue Weapon to have a chance to trigger an additional AoE pulse, dealing uncapped AoE damage to all nearby targets. The value of Flametongue is also significantly increased when taking Supportive Imbuements.

While Weapon Imbues do block you from using temporary weapon buffs such as Ironclaw Whetstone, the extra mechanical effects these provide to the Enhancement toolkit make them significantly more valuable and as such we always use them. This is made even more mandatory by the locked-in talent Elemental Weapons, and you should never use double Flametongue Weapon - this confers no benefit.

Lightning Shield should always be kept active in solo content thanks to the additional Maelstrom Weapon it generates, but has little value in group contentand also confers damage reduction for Stormbringer with Nature's Protection taken. Generally, Earth Shield is played and maintained for the minor additional sustain it provides, so pick up Elemental Orbit to use both.

Enhancement also brings a small package of extra effects that help the party or specific members of your raid group:

Skyfury, granted by any Shaman provides a flat increase to Mastery rating to all Party and Raid members. It also has additional benefits for melee characters, granting them a 20% chance to proc an additional auto-attack when swinging, with a 0.5-second internal cooldown per player, does not trigger from missed attacks, and can miss itself. These extra attacks count as regular auto-attacks, meaning they proc all on-hit effects, but they do not affect Hunter auto-shots, pets, or guardians.

Mana Spring allows us to convert Stormstrike casts into Mana for healers. This is more potent if you are playing a Stormstrike heavy build, but the overall value is fairly limited even in a raid setting. Since points are not very tight on our class tree in raids however, this is an option for some additional value.

Flame Shock is more of a secondary component of your tree in The War Within (and the degree of its importance depends on talent selections). It plays as a passive, low-maintenance damage source in single-target and an AoE enabler, meaning that it will be a part of your rotation in almost every situation in most builds. There are some additional details to note when using it that are not quite as intuitive on the surface:

In single-target situations, you want to make sure that you keep Flame Shock active whenever possible when playing Lashing Flames, and you can refresh it based on the pandemic window whenever the damage over time effect has less than 5.4 seconds. With Molten Assault, Lava Lash will reapply Flame Shock if it is active on the target of the Lava Lash cast, meaning that it often maintains itself with regular gameplay.

Molten Assault allows the Shaman with an active Flame Shock on their target to apply Flame Shock to nearby targets via Lava Lash casts. This enables a lot of other parts of our AoE kit, such as Fire Nova, Primordial Wave, and Ashen Catalyst. When you cast Lava Lash, it does not just apply the damage over time effect to other targets; rather, it casts an extra Flame Shock on them, dealing the direct damage at the same time.

Voltaic Blaze also grants an extra way to apply it in AoE, though with a 6 RPPM chance to trigger from spenders it is not reliable enough to be your only method of supporting talents such as Primordial Wave. Totemic also has the benefit of the Whirling Earth mote that allows Flame Shock casts to apply the debuff to 6 targets at once, making setup significantly easier following each Surging Totem cast.