I Leveled Enchanting.

Goodbye 3KG.

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Daft Punk is Awesome.

I Really Like One More Time

And Technologic.

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Wrote a Long Paper

Ok, Was Just 5 pages.

But it was Shakespeare

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Tamora- Not Cool.

Lavinia is a Doormat.

Word Sucks at Pages

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In The Deep Darkness

One Light Finally Appeared

The Stapler Worked.

What I was not expecting was this:

Screenshot by Shadowxtz o nthe Moonrunner server!

Note some of the pretty things in this image:

A) It’s a 2.6 speed mace! Luvluvluvluvluv.

B) It’s BoE! So even if you don’t manage to see this QT in the next week (it drops off Mr. Direbrew in Blackrock Depths, but he’s shy and only comes out once a year), you should be able to buy one, albeit for a pretty penny.

C) It’s iLevel 226. For those of you for whom the word “iLevel” sounds like a foreign language (my dad included!), iLevel 200 items drop out of Naxx10/Coren Direbrew. ILevel 226 items drop off 25 KT/Reg Uld 25 bosses, meaning that this item is as well itemized as Calamity’s Grasp(and with Agi, Haste, Ap, Crit, to boot!) Because of this, not only are the stats nice, but it also has a whopping 171.5 dps, meaning no more farming H ToC for your dual Aledar’s Battlestar, which is only iLevel 219.

D) It looks preeeeeeetty.

Photo by same person as above photo. I'm unoriginal!

Yes, I want it. Minus the fact that it’s a downgrade.

However, I’m so going after it on my Death Knight Tank’s offspec-but-sometimes-main-spec-depending-on-my-mood. (Remember, Threat of Tharassian DW death knights follow the same weapon speed rules as us!) I’m totally looking forward to being a Femcow with mugs for hands.

This is Elam, signing off from Panera, as I finished my soup before typing (it was so good!) and I think I’m getting weird looks from the other patrons from salivating over this weapon.

Cheers to all who get it!

I think, to any raiding/pvping/anything Enhancement Shaman, the awesomeness that is Shamanistic Rage is readily apparent. Between our regular mana heavy rotation, dropping magma totem every twenty seconds, and situational mana uses (Purge and Wind shear are both 329 mana each- I spend a good 4-5k mana minute on just those on Jaraxxus), we’re mana hogs. Being able to replenish our mana from nearly 0 to full every minute is awesome.

You know what else is awesome? Not dying. Shamanistic rage helps us with that. While we’re pewpewing our lives away, we might notice the scary boss man is unleashing his lightning nova of doom. We somehow missed the gigantic pedowolf voice telling us to run away. What do we do? (Well, I don’t know about you, but I have enough HP now- a tier later- to survive Emalons lightning nova with 1.5k hp to spare. That’s besides the point, though.) We shamanwall!

Heroic Training Dummy begins casting Lightning Nova?

And herein lies the problem- what happens when both happen at different times? What happens if we know the boss is a heal check, like XT-Deconstructor pre-nerf, and we know that Shamwalling the tantrums will lead to an easier time for the healers, which in turn leads to more mana for healers, which might mean  downing the boss. Do we take a dps hit of possibly going oom because we used shamanistic rage at a suboptimal time?

Or, on another note, what happens when an unforeseeable large hit of doom comes up, and you just popped shamanistic rage 20 seconds ago to regain mana. What can we blow when the Vezax trash warrior comes spinning towards us with his 15k bladestorms? Our fingers might twitch to our Shamanistic Rage button, but since we needed that cooldown to continue dpsing we lost out on our one possible “get out of death free card.”

And, all of this is only pve. There is a myriad of situations in pvp where using Shamanistic Rage is a huge choice- “Do I think my healer can keep me up while I try to live through this rogues vanish-opener? I’m pretty low on mana.” “Do I think now is a safe time to use SR, or is his burst cooldown going to come back up within the next 60 seconds?” Etc.

So, we have in Shamanistic Rage a kind of spec-defining attribute/flaw/cool thing- combining dps and survivability cooldowns into the same thing. (Much like the RP generation aspect of Anti-magic shell!) We see this in Feral Spirits: Dash, Spirit Walk, and their healing ability all make wolves a survivability cooldown, but their beast damage makes them our ONLY burst cooldown as well. Maelstrom Weapon gives us the potential for high damage attacks, but also allows us to heal at the cost of damage. Shamanistic Rage allows us to continue bringing the pain, or helps us avoid having the pain brought to us. (If you’re like me and like to stand in Lightning Nova when at low mana and hit SR to maximize time on target, it helps you do both! But shh, don’t tell my healers. They might get mad.)

I love the design philosophy behind Shamanistic Rage. I love the hybridized feel it lends to the Shaman Class. Part of me even loves the fact that it requires thought and choice to use.

I’m just not sure it works.

(Totally unrelated note, I went into ToC10 tonight and got myself a…caster staff! Because, that makes sense. It’s now a part of my badass walking around/log off set. It’s also better than my spectral kris+shield of assimilation combo, but seeing as I don’t have a resto spec currently we’re going to ignore that. But srsly, look at me, being badass:)

Using a Staff on a Shaman is like eating the second slice of chocolate cake: Possibly socially unacceptable, definitely fattening, but it just feels so right!