Enhancement Shaman DPS Spec, Builds, and Talents — Shadowlands 9.2.5

Level	Choices
15	✓ Lashing Flames	✓ Forceful Winds	✓ Elemental Blast
25	✓ Stormflurry	✓ Hot Hand	✗ Ice Strike
30	? Spirit Wolf	? Earth Shield	? Static Charge
35	✓ Elemental Assault	✓ Hailstorm	✓ Fire Nova
40	? Nature's Guardian	? Feral Lunge	? Wind Rush Totem
45	✗ Crashing Storm	✗ Stormkeeper	✓ Sundering
50	✓ Elemental Spirits	✗ Earthen Spike	? Ascendance

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.

This section aims to provide you with a quick and easy set of builds for different situations that lets you get the most out of your Enhancement Shaman. Enhancement currently focuses on having every part of its build built together, as there is a lot of synergy between certain parts that alter the priority and the Covenant you are playing so there is not a single build that covers everything. Because of that, we have compiled everything together below based on the Legendary selected and the damage profile it brings:

This build sacrifices focuses specifically on dealing as much single-target damage as possible and makes use of the Witch Doctor's Wolf Bones Legendary effect. It does sacrifice AoE and flexibility to do so, but is absolutely the highest output in scenarios it excels at. This is usually paired with Night Fae.

• Level 15: Elemental Blast
• Level 25: Hot Hand
• Level 30: Player's Choice
• Level 35: Elemental Assault
• Level 40: Player's Choice
• Level 45: Sundering
• Level 50: Elemental Spirits

New in Patch 9.2, this makes use of the new Flame Shock spread and focuses on Lava Lash using Primal Lava Actuators. It can leverage this for funnel damage by focusing on a priority target, or maintain debuffs on multiple targets to convert it into AoE so is extremely flexible and strong when there are multiple enemies active. This is usually paired with Necrolord, but can use Venthyr as well.

• Level 15: Lashing Flames
• Level 25: Hot Hand
• Level 30: Player's Choice
• Level 35: Fire Nova
• Level 40: Player's Choice
• Level 45: Sundering
• Level 50: Elemental Spirits

This is the only build we have access to that has completely uncapped AoE, and has the advantage of being frontloaded burst using Doom Winds windows. This is more niche but very useful for certain Mythic+ dungeons and pull routes. This is usually paired with Venthyr, but is flexible with other Covenants.

• Level 15: Forceful Winds
• Level 25: Stormflurry
• Level 30: Player's Choice
• Level 35: Hailstorm
• Level 40: Player's Choice
• Level 45: Sundering
• Level 50: Elemental Spirits

The above builds are more broad options, but do not account for specific boss-by-boss encounters. If you are looking for specific advice, you can check our dedicated raid page below.

Mythic+ can potentially require a mix of certain AoE and Single-Target talents, depending on affixes and other variables. If you want advice that is specific to Mythic+, you should check out our page below.

A lot of the Enhancement talent choices add an additional ability or alter how you would play. We recommend you look at our rotation page linked below for more details on this.

✔ Lashing Flames

✔ Forceful Winds

✔ Elemental Blast

Tier 1 talents provide damage increases for different damage profiles.

• Lashing Flames causes your Lava Lash to leave a debuff on your target for 20 seconds, increasing the direct damage and DoT effect of your Flame Shock by 100%.
• Forceful Winds causes each successive Windfury Attack within 15 seconds to increase all Windfury damage by 35%. This effect does not refresh itself.
• Elemental Blast is an active ability with a 12-second cooldown and 40-yard range. This deals heavy Elemental damage, and increases your Haste or Critical Strike by 3%, or your Mastery by 6% for 10 seconds. This has a 2-second cast time, but damage can be increased and cast time reduced via Maelstrom Weapon.

Elemental Blast deals a significant amount of single-target damage, but has a higher requirement to use and falls off in AoE. This is the ideal pure single-target option without factoring in Legendaries.

Lashing Flames has the most ease of use in single-target, but to make use of it in AoE it can be quite demanding. Thanks to the Patch 9.2 change to allow Lava Lash to spread Flame Shock, this is now a good option for many different scenarios, and gets extra benefit from Hot Hand and Primal Lava Actuators to allow you to maintain it on multiple targets easier.

Forceful Winds is flexible in the type of damage it brings, but it relies on you playing the Doom Winds Legendary. Otherwise, it has no rotational or build requirements.

✔ Stormflurry

✔ Hot Hand

✘ Ice Strike

Tier 2 talents provide additional procs or active abilities that mix up the rotation.

• Stormflurry grants Stormstrike a 25% chance to strike your target an additional time for 40% damage. This effect can chain off itself and triggers all on-hit effects.
• Hot Hand grants your melee auto-attacks with Flametongue Weapon imbued a 5% chance to trigger an 8-second buff, reducing the cooldown of Lava Lash by 75% and increasing its damage by 100%.
• Ice Strike is an active ability with a 15-second cooldown (reduced by Haste). Deals moderate Frost damage, slows your target by 50% for 6 seconds and resets the cooldown of your Shock spells when cast.

Hot Hand provides a short burst window that creates a one-two cycle of Lava Lash-into-filler spell for huge damage. This is a strong option for pure single-target situations, and when paired with Lashing Flames and Primal Lava Actuators is strong for AoE and funnel situations as well.

Stormflurry is the most simple to play choice on this row, granting a solid single-target increase and also providing an extra boost in AoE. The additional hits triggered can proc the splash effect from Crash Lightning, but note that it does not generate the guaranteed Maelstrom Weapon charge from Elemental Assault.

Ice Strike is simply a bad pick in all current situations. The additional active ability and low payoff when cast makes it undesirable, and with it cluttering the rotation which in Patch 9.2 comes at a premium with our limited open GCDs this should always be avoided.

? Spirit Wolf

? Earth Shield

? Static Charge

Tier 3 talents provide utility tools for different scenarios.

• Spirit Wolf causes Ghost Wolf to grant an additional 5% Movement Speed and 5% damage reduction each second while active, stacking up to 4 times. These stacks are lost when leaving Ghost Wolf.
• Earth Shield applies a shield to your target with 9 charges, increasing all healing you do to them by 20%. If the target takes damage, a charge will be consumed and heal them a small amount. This can only be active on one target at a time.
• Static Charge reduces the cooldown of your Capacitor Totem by 5 seconds per target hit, up to a maximum of 20 seconds.

Spirit Wolf provides the most flexible use here. It can be awkward to make use of and requires you to shift into Ghost Wolf more than you may want to, but flat damage reduction and movement speed can be very strong.

Unfortunately for Earth Shield, it is now exclusive with Lightning Shield which has been made baseline for Enhancement. The Maelstrom Weapon the latter provides means that the overall healing from Earth Shield tends to be weaker in solo content. In situations such as raids, where you do not expect this to be happening, though, the extra self-healing boost this gives can be useful if you keep maintaining it. If playing Kyrian, this is a damage increasing tool as it is the best method to trigger Raging Vesper Vortex, making it mandatory.

Static Charge is extremely niche for situations where you expect to be frequently stunning large numbers of enemies on cooldown, which even in Mythic+ is rare. Can be an extra crowd control option if necessary.

✔ Elemental Assault

✔ Hailstorm

✔ Fire Nova

Tier 4 talents offer big, but specialized damage increase choices.

• Elemental Assault increases the damage of your Stormstrike by 15%, and causes it to always generate one additional stack of Maelstrom Weapon.
• Hailstorm causes each stack of Maelstrom Weapon you spend (on spells such as Lightning Bolt) to trigger a buff, causing your next Frost Shock cast to deal 15% additional damage and hit 1 extra target per stack.
• Fire Nova is an active ability with a 15-second cooldown, causing each of your active Flame Shocks to erupt dealing low Fire damage to up to 6 targets around them.

All three of these options are good and your decision is based on what damage profile you are looking for. This row is one of the most important to define your rotation.

Elemental Assault provides the best single-target damage increase, improving the damage of Stormstrike. The real benefit though is the extra Maelstrom Weapon which helps to cycle Feral Spirit thanks to the Witch Doctor's Wolf Bones Legendary effect, so is the pick for these situations.

Fire Nova is now a full-fledged AoE talent thanks to the Patch 9.2 Flame Shock spread being added, and can set itself up without needing heavy GCD investment. This deals good funnel damage without requiring extra effort, and at 5+ targets also brings the highest AoE available on the row.

Hailstorm excels at 3-4 targets, but is the most rotationally disruptive option on this row. The Patch 9.2 buff to Frost Shock brings this up as a good low target cleave option, but the builds it slots into are more specific as it is very GCD hungry.

? Nature's Guardian

? Feral Lunge

? Wind Rush Totem

Tier 5 talents provide additional movement and healing options.

• Nature's Guardian causes you to heal for 20% of your maximum health when you drop below 35% health. This effect has a 45-second cooldown.
• Feral Lunge is an 8-25 yard range charge that also does minor Physical damage. This is on a 30-second cooldown and a 0.5-second Global Cooldown.
• Wind Rush Totem summons a totem for 15 seconds that increases the speed of allies within 10 yards by 60% for 5 seconds. As long as allies remain in the area this will be refreshed. This has a 2-minute cooldown and can be placed up to 40 yards away.

In any situation where your group can capitalize upon Wind Rush Totem, it is the best choice by far. The refresh effect in the area is extremely powerful as it allows for unique benefits to the group to deal with mechanics. If this is not necessary, however, Feral Lunge provides a good amount of additional personal mobility and sticking power, so is a great choice in those circumstances.

Nature's Guardian, on the other hand, gives you a modest amount of additional self-sustain that will also automatically activate, keeping you healthy in situations where you are brought low. This is a solid choice for Raids and Dungeons, especially in the event that you are not in need of extra mobility.

✘ Crashing Storm

✘ Stormkeeper

✔ Sundering

Tier 6 talents focus on providing additional burst and AoE tools.

• Crashing Storm causes Crash Lightning to also leave an electrified zone on the ground for 6 seconds, dealing low Nature damage to any target within it each second.
• Stormkeeper is an active ability with a 1-minute cooldown that causes your next two Chain Lightning casts to be instant and deal 300% increased damage. This has a 1.5-second cast, but can be made instant via Maelstrom Weapon stacks.
• Sundering is an active ability with a 40-second cooldown that deals massive "FlameStrike" (Fire/Physical) damage in a line and incapacitates targets hit for 2 seconds.

Sundering provides a flexible choice in all situations, providing an extra burst AoE tool that Enhancement can sometimes be lacking in. It can also slot in to fill gaps in the single-target rotation as a high value cast without any cost. It can also trigger Windfury Weapon imbue procs, meaning it synergizes excellently with Doom Winds. It also has the lowest GCD requirement on the row which is very important in Patch 9.2.

Stormkeeper has no strong use cases currently. Since it does not scale with Maelstrom Weapon on the spenders, and requires 3 globals and some resource to make use of does not justify the damage it deals, so should be avoided.

Crashing Storm has little to no value in Patch 9.2 situations because of how GCD constrained we are. Crash Lightning as a filler has dropped in priority, and even with the damage this brings it struggles to even compete with Frost Shock. In AoE the story is even worse because Sundering deals more on average in sustained fights, while also being burst. Avoid this.

✔ Elemental Spirits

✘ Earthen Spike

? Ascendance

Tier 7 talents enhance existing burst windows, or grant new ones.

• Elemental Spirits reduces the cooldown of Feral Spirit by 30 seconds, and and causes you to spawn two wolves in any combination from a pool of 3 Elements that provide the following buffs to you for the 15-second duration:
  • Fire — Molten Weapon increases your Fire damage by 20% and causes Lava Lash to burn the target for an additional 35% of the damage dealt over 4 seconds. This effect accumulates much like Mastery: Ignite for Fire Mages.
  • Frost — Icy Edge causes all of your attacks to deal a fixed amount of additional Frost damage and slow the target by 30% for 3 seconds.
  • Lightning — Crackling Surge increases the damage of Stormstrike and Windfury Attack by 35%.
• Earthen Spike deals heavy Physical damage and increases the Physical and Nature damage you do to the affected target by 20% for 10 seconds. Has a 20-second cooldown.
• Ascendance deals massive Nature damage around you when cast. It provides a 15 second buff that for the duration converts Stormstrike to Windstrike with a 66% reduced cooldown, and your auto attacks into Windlash. These both ignore armour and a 30-yard range.

Elemental Spirits is a strong option especially if you are playing a Witch Doctor's Wolf Bones single-target build. Once you gain access to the Tier 28 set bonus however, this becomes a lock in no matter what scenario and is always played.

Ascendance provides a high power burst window both in AoE from the pulse when cast, and in single-target from the 15-second window. It does however come with a long cooldown, and due to the set bonus coming in Patch 9.2 it pushes strongly away from this talent.

Earthen Spike is single-target focused and for pure sustained damage it can work. It has synergy with both Doom Winds and Legacy of the Frost Witch, however the former has a preference for Ascendance, and the latter is currently too weak to consider. In Cleave and AoE, this value drops significantly meaning it does not serve an adequate niche to justify picking.

"War Mode" is an optional feature that enables open world PvP encounters that confers some benefits when active:

• Grants access to PvP talents in the open world.
• 10% increase in World Quest rewards at max level.
• 10% more experience gained while leveling.
• Earn Conquest Points which can reward gear every week.

With the benefits of 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 open yourself up to open world PvP, so be aware of hostile enemy players who could interfere with you, this is a risk you will have to decide on your own if you want take.

If you are interested in doing PvP as an Enhancement Shaman or want to look into how to deal with PvP encounters when playing it, please refer to our dedicated PvP guide.

Generally the selections are made to optimize your ability to kill enemies faster, increasing your pace when moving through content. In the Shadowlands update, the PvP crowd control reduction talents have been removed, and will be replaced by trinkets available at level 60

1. Ride the Lightning provides the largest damage increase option, adding additional effects to each Stormstrike cast.
2. Shamanism allows for more liberal Bloodlust / Heroism usage without having to worry about the 10-minute lockout. Great for solo and duo content.
3. Skyfury Totem provides a moderate boost when staying in the same area, increasing your Critical Strike damage and Healing by 20% for 15-seconds, with a 40-second cooldown that is low enough to be used liberally, and boosting allies within its range on top of that.
4. Counterstrike Totem replicates and reflects damage you take for 15 seconds, on a 45-second cooldown. This can be really strong when in dealing with lots of enemies to convert your health pool into damage.

Other options that are useful include Swelling Waves and Spectral Recovery as healing tools, increasing your sustain either while in combat or moving between encounters. Thundercharge can have some limited uses, increasing the recovery rate of your cooldowns between areas, but Enhancement does not have a lot of impactful tools to make use of this effect.

Ethereal Form, Seasoned Winds, Static Field Totem, Unleash Shield and Grounding Totem have very limited PvE uses, being more focused on in-combat control more suited to a PvP engagement, and as such are not really recommended for efficient enemy killing.