MoPping it up as Enhancement

I can honestly say I love being enhancement.  I’m still not 100% sure where I stand on the damage meters, but I’ve definitely been in more groups where I have been the top 1 or 2 in dps.  And I still have 8 or so gear pieces to upgrade to heroic before I feel like I know where I stand.

So today I will mostly be looking at some pre-raiding gear options for enhancement shamans, a shopping list if you will.  Truth be told I just want to have a list that I could reference but also I need to hash out a few ideas so I can try out some things with talents. On with the wish list!  Note that I’ll be listing mostly heroic dungeon gear and that I will try and include a couple extra options in case the RNG has a vendetta against you and just will not relinquish that last piece you need.

 

Head
[Swarmcall Helm] – Commander Ri’mok Gate of the Setting Sun
[Crest of the Clan Lords] – Clan Lord fight, Mogu’shan Palace

The first two options are solid choices with only a slight difference between the crit and mastery stats. 

Shoulders (the most recognizable piece of any set)
[Harlan’s Shoulders] – Armsmaster Harlan, Scarlet Halls (Don’t worry they actually fit in with the general set!)
[Shadowspine Shoulderguards] – Taran Zhu, Shado-Pan Monastery

Once again two solid choices for gear with Harlan’s shoulders sporting Mastery instead of Haste.  Now there is still a lot up in the air about mastery vs. haste as it stands for us enhancers, but I think that also depends a lot on what we choose for talents.  If we are using Echo of Elements and Unleashed Elements then mastery is still our highest secondary stat.  On the other hand if we are using Elemental Mastery and Empowered Elementals then haste is going to be really strong and be nice for those high burst damage fights.  I haven’t played around with it much yet, but I’m still working on getting some better gear before I mess around with re-forging and testing different specs.

Back
[Quick Strike Cloak] – Leatherworking
[Aerial Bombardment Cloak] – General Pa’valak, Siege of the Niuzao Temple
[Wind-Soaked Drape] – Wise Mari, Temple of the Jade Serpent

Quick Strike Cloak is a great starter piece if you are a leatherworker or know of one.  I have not personally checked the AH for this item but the mats include a Spirit of Harmony and 20 exotic leathers which isn’t too bad for a 450 cloak. The Aerial Bombardment Cloak is nice if you still need some more hit while the Wind-Soaked Drape has some more crit and mastery for us.

Chest
[Galedodger Chestguard] – Wing Leader Ner’onok, Siege of the Niuzao Temple
[Azure Serpent Chestguard] – Gu Cloudstrike, Shado-Pan Monastery
[Chestguard of Earthen Harmony] – Leatherworking (Honored with Golden Lotus)

The Earthen Harmony leatherworking piece is the one to be had out of this selection.  But clocking in at 3 Magnificent Hides and 8 Spirits of Harmony it might be a tad expensive.  Especially considering that leatherworkers have to grind some rep with the Golden Lotus faction to even buy the pattern.  Out of the other two I would recommend the Galedodger Chestguard due to the much needed expertise that will give you a nice head start to 2550 rating that you need for 7.5%.  But as always you can re-forge and gem into expertise as necessary, but wouldn’t you much rather have some shiny Agility gems instead?

Bracers
[Bladed Smoke Bracers] – Sha of Violence, Shado-Pan Monastery
[Groundshaker Bracers] – Xin the Weaponmaster, Mogu’shan Palace

Once again we have a nice expertise option with the Bladed Smoke Bracers, and the Groundshakers provide some hit.  Either way good options.

Gloves
[Archer’s Precision Grips] – Commander Vo’jak, Siege of the Niuzao Temple
[Hopecrusher Gauntlets] – Sha of Doubt, Temple of the Jade Serpent
[Gloves of Earthen Harmony] – Leatherworking (Honored with Golden Lotus)

The Earthen Harmony gloves are like the chest, ilvl 476 but the leatherworker need to be honored with Golden Lotus.  however they only need 2 Hides and 6 Spirits to create so they should be slightly cheaper. As for the other 2 the Archer’s precision Grips is definitely a solid choice with more of that needed expertise.  If for some reason you find yourself overflowing with expertise you can always re-forge it. 

Waist
[Impaler’s Girdle] – Striker Ga’dok, Gate of the Setting Sun
[Bindburner Belt] – Flameweaver Koegler, Scarlet Halls

 

Legs
[Hopping Mad Leggings] – Hoptallus, Stormstout Brewery
[Legguards of the Crimson Magus] – Thalnos, Scarlet Monastery

 

Feet
[Treads of Fixation] – Raigonn, Gate of the Setting Sun
[Bone Golem Boots] – Rattlegore, Scholomance

 

Rings
[Anji’s Keepsake] – 1250 Valor (Honored with Golden Lotus)
[Signet of Dancing Jade] – Liu Flameheart, Temple of the Jade Serpent
[Pulled Grenade Pin] – Saboteur Kip’tilak, Gate of the Setting Sun
[Seal of Hateful Meditation] – Taran Zhu, Shado-Pan Monastery
[Seal of Ghoulish Glee] – Headless Horseman (Seasonal)
[Mark of the Dancing Crane] – 1250 Justice Points (Shado-Pan)

I’ve listed a couple of valor/justice point rings here because its always nice to have options for rings.  Plus currently neither requires any rep requirement to buy them from the faction vendors.

Trinkets (Trinkets yes. Pretty Trinkets! Ak!)
[Searing Words] – Darkmaster Gandling, Scholomance
[Windswept Pages] – Lorewalker Stonestep, Temple of the Jade Serpent
[Flashing Steel Talisman] – High Inquisitor Whitemane, Scarlet Monastery (NOT FOR DEATH KNIGHTS!)
[Coren’s Cold Chromium Coaster] – Coren Direbrew (Seasonal)

Trinkets with Hit, AGI, Crit and haste will be the norm.  If you can manage to get a good deal on the Tiger Deck for Darkmoon Faire you could even pick up a really nice [Relic of Xuen]. Oh to dream…

Weapons
[Gao’s Keg Tapper] – Yan-Zhu the Uncasked, Stormstout Brewery
[Crescent of Ichor] – Sha of Violence, Shado-Pan Monastery
[Claws of Gekkan] – Gekkan, Mogu’shan Palace
[Ner’onok’s Razor of Katar] – Wing Leader Ner’onok, Siege of the Niuzao Temple
[Inelava, Spirit of Inebriation] – Yan-Zhu the Uncasked, Stormstout Brewery
[Ka'eng, Breath of the Shadow] – Taran Zhu, Shado-Pan Monastery

The last two weapons in this list are rare drops in heroics off the last boss.  They are epic quality 476 weapons, so they will be hard sought after.  Personally I would not mind a couple Ka’Eng fist weapons for that delicious expertise.  All of these have varying bits of secondary stats but I have to admit I’m partial to the model of the Keg Tapper.  Nothing like toting around a barrel of ale on a stick.

Weapons are always what I look forward to the most.  Especially when it comes to fist weapons.  I’ve always liked the recent efforts put into the look of various fist weapons, unlike the basic never-ending same model they used for virtually every fist weapon in vanilla.  I think it was the [The Bladefist] that first got me really interested in fist weapons.  Never got it back in BC but was able to obtain it no long after most main hand fist weapons turned into one-hand (very handy for transmog)  There are too many good ones to list here so go over to wowhead.com and check them all out.  The best part is the current end game weapons for us enhancement shaman are Fist Weapons!  Now I won’t want to race change to an Orc to get that extra expertise for axes like the last 2 expansions. Truth be told, I’ve always liked how shaman gear looks on Taurens better than Orcs.  It’s the same reason I didn’t roll a Tauren monk.  If you want to see something horrid check out what a male Tauren looks like in the Monk raid set.

*As a side note, running scenarios will sometimes reward you a nice piece of 463 gear form your Cache of Treasures.  They all have random suffixes which determine the secondary stats, but there are quite a few that would be good to round out your set if you get lucky with the cache.

My new word for idiots…Death Knights

I’m not much for ranting usually, but I just needed to get some thoughts out there before it boiled up into and uncontrollable rage which might lead me to doing something stupid.  That’s part of the reason I use Shamanistic Rage all the time; if I let it all build up there is no telling what my shaman might do.

I’ve decided that from this point forward, at least until I feel the issue has been resolved (which might be a long long time), anytime I think someone is an idiot I shall call them a death knight.  Now I know most of you are thinking but isn’t that what huntards are?  But I beg to differ knowing that most hunters just get a bad rap.  Plus with them needing expertise now Blizzard has effectively brought them closer to being ranged enhancement shamans which in my book isn’t all that bad.  I think the main reason they get such a bad rap is they spend so much time with their pets that they kind of forget how to interact with humanoids from time to time.  When out in the wild is totally ok to feign death and let your pet die a horrible death if it means that you get to live.  In a group setting this isn’t always as acceptable.

Death Knights on the other hand are just plain idiots.  In fact you don’t even need to come up with some sort of creative name to imply that they are somehow less intelligent than a warriors gear, you just need to call them by their name.

You may be wondering where all this is coming from, or maybe you are reading this and saying “That’s what I’ve been thinking since day one!”  This stems from a situation in which I was in a LFD group where a trinket drops from the last boss, a trinket that is probably one of my top 3 pre-raiding trinkets, and the death knight won the roll on it.  Now an intelligent Enhancement shaman would wonder why would a Death Knight and an Enhancement shaman be rolling on the same trinket?  What stats could possibly overlap other than maybe hit and expertise between the two classes?  Here is the trinket that I’m talking about [Flashing Steel Talisman].

Notice anything peculiar about that trinket?  Last time I checked Agility is basically the worst stat for Death Knights in relation to all the other stats.  Especially since Agility is considered a core stat and couldn’t be re-forged. It’s like strength for shammies, we shouldn’t touch it even if it is a possible slight upgrade over our green questing trinket.

Now maybe I’m being a little harsh on the death knight community; maybe the death knight didn’t know better.  They were wearing  [Mithril Wristwatch] which although spell power is helpful because they do cast spells, there are much better options for them out there that have something we like to call strength.  If they truly didn’t know better then I’ll let it slide, but considering if they took 2 seconds to look at every other piece of gear that they got when leveling up to 90, they would notice a strange lack of agility and a strange abundance of strength on everything.  Agility at most could be used to give them some more crit.  Why use up useful stats on something that ranks as your lowest?

I’m not going to name any names here as I have already looked up their guild leader and sent a simple note indicating that they may want to check in on a certain death knights gearing choices.  Best part is it’s a death knight on the same server as me.  So conceivably I could run into them out and about.  But at least it makes them easy to add to my ignore list. (Strangely enough on my old server there was a death knight that needed on some tanking plate against my warrior tank and won the roll).  But for the time being, idiots = death knights in my mind.