Hello guys,

I've had this idea and I wanted to check if it was okay. I'm not someone who wants to get peek performance, but rather enjoy the ride to 60.

My first idea was to go enchancement. I always enjoyed those windfury procs but I've been reading and my conclussion is that shaman are pretty good healers. So I thought; maybe I should level as elemental, and with the ele gear and spec, I could just go as healer. This for pre 60 dungeons of course.

I'm thinking about this mainly because I can not play very long sessions, and with having the healer option available, I do not have to wory about long waiting times for dungeons.

Is this switch worth it? Or are dungeons not that important as newer expensions? I'd like to hear your opinions.

Thanks !

You are going to be able to heal dungeons regardless of your spec, you just need to make sure you have a separate set of gear with intellect. Enhancement is typically considered to be cookie cutter for leveling simply because you are less reliant on mana.

Exactly what @rijndael said above. This is true for everything. No sense in playing as a tank spec before raiding, no sense in committing to a heal spec before pre BiS farming, just choose a dominant level spec and use that for everything til 60. Swapping out pieces of gear to perform different roles is more than sufficient.

Up to 50-55 you can heal with any spec. I’m healing with enhancement atm.

- make sure you always have healer gear in the bag (+int)
-use a separate main bar (2nd) and stack a few ranks of your main heals
- use lower rank heals as much as possible for mana efficiency
- use totems for extra utility; stoneskin near tank, mana/health regen, stoneclaw if mobs go crazy
- Don’t heal if it’s not needed. Let the mana regen kick in. If a dps took slight damage and the mob is now on the tank leave him. His health regen will kick in eventually. Most important is the tank.

So 90% of the time in vanilla, gear matters more than spec. This is especially true while leveling. An enhancement shaman wearing some int and spirit gear can heal just fine in leveling dungeons.

But this is pretty much the case for any class capable of healing. I could heal just fine on my feral druid if I threw on some int gear.

I did not know gear was more important than spec. Untill 50-55 I assume. Thanks everyone!

rijndael wrote: ↑

4 years ago

You are going to be able to heal dungeons regardless of your spec, you just need to make sure you have a separate set of gear with intellect. Enhancement is typically considered to be cookie cutter for leveling simply because you are less reliant on mana.

I couldn't agree more.

Caperfin wrote: ↑

4 years ago

rijndael wrote: ↑

4 years ago

You are going to be able to heal dungeons regardless of your spec, you just need to make sure you have a separate set of gear with intellect. Enhancement is typically considered to be cookie cutter for leveling simply because you are less reliant on mana.

I couldn't agree more.

One thing that often is surprising to people, largely from those who only played retail in the later expansions, is that in vanilla/classic, gear far outstrips spec 99% of the time. You can do anything with any spec if you have the gear. The same can't be said for the other way around.

Gensei wrote: ↑

4 years ago

One thing that often is surprising to people, largely from those who only played retail in the later expansions, is that in vanilla/classic, gear far outstrips spec 99% of the time. You can do anything with any spec if you have the gear. The same can't be said for the other way around.

yes, YES, YES! as a shaman tank I can tell you anything is possible with the right amount of dedication to get the best stuff out there.

Caperfin wrote: ↑

4 years ago

Gensei wrote: ↑

4 years ago

One thing that often is surprising to people, largely from those who only played retail in the later expansions, is that in vanilla/classic, gear far outstrips spec 99% of the time. You can do anything with any spec if you have the gear. The same can't be said for the other way around.

yes, YES, YES! as a shaman tank I can tell you anything is possible with the right amount of dedication to get the best stuff out there.

But just in general. A player could easily, easily be a closeted Ret Paladin, and just put on healing gear and pretend to be holy for a raid, and go back to his ret set for wpvp or whatever. Hell, I'm sure plenty of players probably will end up doing this, especially for easy-ass MC. And I say closeted, but tbh you probably wouldn't even worry about keeping it a secret. If I'm a GM in MC, that half my healers are dps specs isn't really an issue as long as they know what they're doing and have okayish 5 man gear.

If I end up sticking with my shaman, I'll probably be 31/0/20, elemental build, some points in resto primarily for the bonus crit and hit talents, but enough that, with some healing gear, I'll be just fine in 5 mans and MC.