WoW Shaman PvP Guide

Introduction to the Enhancement Shaman

The dual wield (DW) enhancement shaman is a primarily melee damage PvP build that when played correctly will lay waste to all that stand in his or her way. With the correct PvP talent set and gear this build will lead the dps chart in groups above any other class. The strategy for this character is the old saying ‘a good offense is your best defense’. In a PvE scenario, this build will allow you to annihilate 2 or 3 mobs at a time no problem. In a PvP scenario, you will be 1 or 2 hit killing anything that wears cloth and should have no problem defeating plate wearers with ease.

Shaman PvP Equipment

The two most important shaman stats you want every piece of your gear to have are stamina and agility. Obviously stamina gives you more hit points (good for PvP) which when dual wielding is important because of your lack of a shield or a high armor rating. You will still want to have a decent shield at all times because you may be called upon to tank once in a while. Agility adds not only to your chance to crit and dodge, but with the shaman 1 agility = 2 armor. Since this shaman PvP build is lacking a shield, the higher dodge rating will pretty much make up for that lower armor stat. Strength is the next most important stat for a shaman in PvP followed by intellect and spirit. I consider strength less important than agility because it just raises your damage. Having more agility means more crits, which makes up for the slightly lower damage you will produce. Intellect and spirit are good to have on your gear but not nearly as important as stamina, agility and strength. Since you are a shaman, you have mana and health regeneration capabilities with you totems so just lay down the appropriate one when the situation calls for it. As for your weapon choice, this is mainly your personal preference. The quick attack speed of daggers allows for more crits in a shorter period of time. If you want to hit a little harder, chose maces or axes. The slower attack speed of these weapons does not allow for as many crits or procs of windfury, but when they do crit the enemy is going to feel it for sure!

Shaman PvP/DPS Talents

This set of shaman PvP talents will ensure maximum damage, crit, and defensive potential.

10: shield specialization 1/5
11: shield specialization 2/5
12: shield specialization 3/5
13: shield specialization 4/5
14: shield specialization 5/5
15: thundering strikes 1/5
16: thundering strikes 2/5
17: thundering strikes 3/5
18: thundering strikes 4/5
19: thundering strikes 5/5
20: anticipation 1/5
21: anticipation 2/5
22: anticipation 3/5
23: anticipation 4/5
24: anticipation 5/5
25: flurry 1/5
26: flurry 2/5
27: flurry 3/5
28: flurry 4/5
29: flurry 5/5
30: spirit weapons 1/1
31: elemental weapons 1/3
32: elemental weapons 2/3
33: elemental weapons 3/3
34: toughness 1/5
35: weapon mastery 1/5
36: weapon mastery 2/5
37: weapon mastery 3/5
38: weapon mastery 4/5
39: weapon mastery 5/5
40: dual wield 1/1
41: stormstrike 1/1
42: dual wield specialization 1/3
43: dual wield specialization 2/3
44: dual wield specialization 3/3
45: unleashed rage 1/5
46: unleashed rage 2/5
47: unleashed rage 3/5
48: unleashed rage 4/5
49: unleashed rage 5/5
50: shamanistic rage 1/1

At this point you have all the main shaman talents for PvP and you can start working your way back up the enhancement tree.

51: toughness 2/5
52: toughness 3/5
53: toughness 4/5
54: toughness 5/5
55: enhancing totems 1/2
56: enhancing totems 2/2
57: mental quickness 1/3
58: mental quickness 2/3
59: mental quickness 3/3

Now you can choose to keep putting into the enhancement tree or start putting into the elemental tree. At this point I chose to put into the elemental tree for convection and elemental warding.

Shaman PvP Gameplay Strategy

Once you get to the point that you are a dual wielding shaman you will want to be using the windfury buff on your weapons for sure. Although windfury does not add damage to every attack like rockbiter, when it procs (which when dual wielding is a 40% chance to proc) it hits very hard with the extra 2 attacks. With a slow attack speed weapon like an axe, a triple crit main hand proc will hit for over 1,200 damage at lvl 50! This is a huge amount of damage for a single strike and this is why you will leave plate wearing classes in a bloody heap on the ground shaking their heads and asking, ‘how did that guy just own me so hard?’. Your best friend will be the stormstrike/earth shock combo. Stormstrike gives your next 2 nature damage spells 20% enhanced damage. Hit the enemy with the stormstrike then instantly with the earth shock. Wait for the cooldown on the earthshock and hit it again. At this point you stormstrike cooldown is almost done, so when it is ready to go again rinse and repeat this combo. Since you won’t have much mana using this build, you will almost always want to have your mana spring totem out. If you subscribe to the ‘the best offense is a good defense’ strategy like I do, you want to have your strength of earth and grace of air totems going while in combat as well. These will not only jack up your damage and crit potential, since grace of air adds agility you will get a defensive bonus of more armor and a higher chance to dodge as well. You can choose to use an offensive totem like fire nova or magma totems, but I find that they use precious mana that you can be using for your stormstrike/earth shock combo. Since totems don’t move your target may move out of the range of these totems anyway and leave you wishing you had not invested the mana into that failed attempt at causing more damage. When you do find yourself low on mana, shamanistic rage is your best friend. The combination of shamanistic rage, mana spring totem, and 2 daggers will refill you mana to almost full in 30 seconds given you don’t spend much mana while you are in the process of gaining the mana back. When you get in over your head and pull too many mobs, earthbind totem can make the difference between life and death. Using this totem will give you a chance to escape and break the aggro so you can gain back health and mana and try for a more reasonable pull.

Shaman PvP Summary

Using this Shaman PvP talent build and the strategies contained within this shaman guide you should be able to play very successfully and with very few problems. Remember to always use totems that enhance your melee capabilities and mana regeneration unless you are in an instance or raid where the majority of players are casters. Your shaman should be able to PvP any class with ease with the exception of maybe a fear spamming warlock, but who can really kill a fear spamming warlock anyway. This would also be a good build to level a Draenei Shaman! Good luck, and have fun tearing apart some plate wearers.