Solo'ing the Outlands as a Shaman. Enh v. RestoFollow

It's a survivability vs. damage output tradeoff, and it is very noticable to go from 41 points in one to the other.

Resto really shines when you have a grinding partner/group, since you can impart your survivability to them (earth shield/heals), while they can do the bulk of the damage. Most of the talents in the resto tree are group-oriented since you use your heals much more often than while soloing. Totems benefit from economies of scale too, meaning they're better when you have more people in your party.

On the other hand, soloing as resto is a snorefest. You can easily do yellow/red quests, but your damage output is so gimped that it can take you more than twice as long to kill things. You pretty much can't die (Earth Shield was healing me for more damage than a single mob was doing in most cases), but you need to squeeze damage from whatever source you can. I got to the point where I was burning Nature's Swiftness on lightning bolts just to end some fights quicker.

If you plan on soloing, stay with enhancement. If you have a friend or two to consistently grind with, resto is the way to go.


Oh, and if you do go resto, keep your enhancement weapon. All the healing weapons in Outlands have really poor DPS (~40), even up to level 70. Since we can still do some halfway decent melee damage even without gear, I didn't find it worth using a healing weapon unless in an instance.

As Resto, you can still throw on spell damage gear and whip out 1k lightning bolts. You won't crit as hard, and you won't upload as much damage, but you'll have Earth Shield, Mana Tide, Nature's Gaurdian, Nature's Blessing and other goodies from the Resto tree that will make up for it.

I found Elemental to have quite a bit of survivability soloing basically because I could upload tons of damage before my enemy even got close to me.

I'd imagine that Resto would even out like that. They might not being able upload too much damage before the mob got in range, but would have enough staying power to make up for it.

Resto is a fun spec with the new talents. Enhancement didn't change all that much. Dual Wielding and Shammy Rage is nice but it's still weapon buff + auto attack, SS and Shocks. Elemental didn't change either. It's still spam casting Lightning Bolt and Shocks. Resto got lots of nice new features with the expansion and I think you'll enjoy the change of pace.

But keep your other set of gear around because you may find it's too slow for your liking ;D

I realy enjoy enhancement spec and i'm glad my guild does use enhancement AND resto shamans in raids.
Since we are very item dependent even enhancement can heal fairly well with proper equip. Flexibility ftw.

I don't have real problems with survivability except i get more than 3 mobs on me.
With high dps and burst damage one or two mobs mean nothing. Usually i can go nonstop without resting or running out of mana. Water shield and shamanistic rage provide enough mana for totems, heals and shocks.

Maybe the OP has an equipment problem. At least i wasn't equipped very well when i got to outland. So the first quests were a bit hard for me and i did die a few times.
But the quest rewards you get in hellfire peninsula make a big difference.
The OP just came to outland so i'd suggest try till lvl60 and if you're not pleased with enhancement by then respec and try resto.

Grinding and most quests can be done faster with enhancement spec if you want to play solo.

Regarding the WF "fix"...
It's not as bad as i thought. Yes, WF main and WF offhand lost its potential. I use FB on my offhand now which does very nice damage too and procs pretty often. A high max damage mainhand and a rather fast offhand weapon and that combination works very well for me.
Others rather use flametongue or rockbiter on the offhand but i'd say it depends on the weapon you use and even then it doesn't make much of a difference.

I just wish Blizzard would "fix" our real problems.

The end of the work day, and what will probably become the end of this thread. Thanks for the replies guys.

Here's my plan:

Continue with enhancement and see how I like it at 60. I will, however, start picking up healing or "resto" gear, so that when I do respec, I'll have decent gear to try it out with.

So far, I haven't been doing too bad out there, but last night was a mess with the dying. I guess I'll see how it goes. If it's not possible (and I doubt that will be the case) then I'll go resto and suck it up.

:) Thanks for the replies.

Speaking of resto. I am curious about something I witnesed last night in Tanaris.

I saw a level 48 Shammy beating up on a level 41 Scorpid. I swear to God, it took her 5 minutes to kill it, and she healed a few times. 5 minutes. People stopped to watch because like me I am sure they were stunned.

So, either she was leveling up some weapon skills (I hope this was it)

Or, please tell me this is not what a resto build would be like?

That toon in Tanaris was prob levelling a weap skill.

Just rolled a draenei shammy and got it to lvl 29. In you guys's ops can a shammy main heal outland instances? heroics?

Cheers!

you would be surprised hoiw good we are at healing in groupsYardstick, I keep 150 mana while casting in my healing gear and have over 1000 +healing with 9k mana, all unbuffed. shamans healing trees got huge upgrades when we where actualy given some high end talents worth shooting for. And with all th gear in outland we can pull off some awsome healing ability.

enh... usually I dont have problem with up to 3 mobs at a time. drop agi, stoneskin, pop in trinket, shamanistic rage. works well for me. can solo 2-man quests at times, sometimes 3 man. have many problems in instances though. lotta dps but lotta threat, with no way to really get it off. shamans got no fade, banish or anything like that... but true, I don't think shamans can really outheal other classes...mana problems... yeup. though enh sucks sometimes, i've stuck with it since i first made my shaman.