[RG2] Adax Enhancement Shaman

[Adax]

Who is your character?
Adax, Shaman, Enhancement
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/d ... dax/simple

Who are you?
Espen Sjoberg
30 years old
From Norway, living in Oslo, doing a PhD in Psychology.
I live with Rachael (Elentia), who is also applying. We would like to raid together, and so therefore our applications should be considered jointly.

To which Raid Group are you Applying?
RG2

Experience
Vanilla: Raided Molten Core and Onyxia’s Lair, mostly. All full clear.
Characters: Warrior (Tank/DPS) and Warlock (Destruction)
TBC: Raided Kharazhan, Gruul’s Lair, mostly. All full clear.
Characters: Warlock (Destruction) and Shaman (Resto)
WOTLK: AFK. Was not playing WoW during this expansion.
Cata: Did all of the raids, but primarily cleared Blackwing Descent, Firelands (except Ragnaros), and Bastion on Normal. Partial clear on HC Blackwing Descent.
Characters: Warrior (Tank/DPS) and Shaman (Elemental)
MoP: Did all of the raids, but had a hiatus in the middle of the expansion, and therefore played very little Heart of Fear, Vaults, and Terrace. Cleared Throne on Normal, and Siege on HC (Ahead of the Curve).
Characters: Warrior (Tank/DPS) and Shaman (Elemental)
WoD: Highmaul HC clear (Ahead of the Curve). BRF Normal clear except Blast Furnace and Blackhand. BRF HC 6/10 (missed Blast Furnace, Kromog, Maidens and Blackhand). Took a hiatus after guild collapse, so further progress was never made. Returned recently, and have not raided HFC aside from pugging with Raven Council.
Characters: Shaman (Enhancement)


Raid Role
I tend to adapt my raiding role to the requirement of the team, which is why in WoD I changed spec from Elemental to Enhancement to better combat the current meta, as well as BFR AOE-spam. I am happy being a supportive character who follows tactics, even if it means dying in the process (I will gladly absorb a lethal in order to prevent a wipe).
I learn primarily through practice, but in preparation for bosses I have little or no experience with I watch videos such as Fatboss and Two Minute Tips, so that I know what to expect. I mostly evaluate my performance based on my DPS, as well as damage taken (if I have high damage taken compared to everyone else, then I am probably doing something wrong… death counter is another clue).
I sometimes compare my performance with others on sites such as Mr. Robot. In this respect, I was on some occasions top 1% of Enhancement Shaman players during Normal BFR raiding. In one instance (train boss), I was Top 100 EU. Normally, though – if I recall correctly - I am in the 80th percentile or higher on AOE bosses, and 70th percentile on single-target bosses. I do not dare to say that my dps is still that high, as I have only recently returned to gaming, so my rotation is not 100% optimal yet.

Your Spec
The rotation largely depends on the nature of the boss, so I will only give a general rotation:

Single-target boss:
If the boss doesn’t have a considerable amount of adds, the rotation involves stormstrike, lava lash, and frost shock. At the same time, flame shock is kept up to trigger instant lava lashes, and flame totem is placed. Feral Spirits are used continuously, and are always triggered before Stormstrike (so as to reduce their cooldown). Liquid Magma is used on cooldown, or timed with Warsong procs for increased dps. Lightning bolt is used whenever 5 Maelstrom stacks trigger. On rare occasions, lightning bolt can also be used as a hard cast filler.
Glyphs: Ephemeral Spirits, Frost Shock, and third Glyph is usually Lightning Shield, but depending on situation it can also be Fire Elemental Totem, Shamanistic Rage, or Shocks.

Multi-target boss:
The rotation for the boss is largely the same as above, except that more emphasis is placed on Fire Nova and Lava Lash. Lava Lash spreads the flame shock to multiple targets, which are then decimated by Fire Nova. Furthermore, this kind of rotation requires better timing of Liquid Magma so that more adds are affected by its AOE potential.
Glyps: Fire Nova, Lava Spread, and optional third Glyphs (usually Frost Shock or Lightning Shield, but in some cases Flame Shock is useful).
You might find it odd, but I rarely change talents between bosses. Since EH Shaman benefit so much from haste, I find that Ancestral Swiftness is invaluable in all approaches, because it reduces the overall cooldown of all abilities. I find this better, even in multi-targets, and in my experience my dps is higher. The only talent I sometimes change is Unleashed Fury, which is a great talent, but on bosses that require massive burst damage I sometimes switch to Primal Elementalist. Other than that, talents largely stay the same regardless of boss (though Glyphs change).

Off-specs and Alternative characters
Until WoD, my main was Elemental, so I am comfortable in this spec as well. In fact, it’s awesome! I am happy to change to Ele Shaman if necessary, although my item level will be somewhat lower (somewhere around 680 I should think).

I also have a Warrior I play on frequently, which can be either DPS or Tank, though some gear is needed (he is around 650).
Armory: http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/d ... las/simple

Finally, I have an old old Warlock, which is a character that has survived since Vanilla.
Anyways, I don’t play on him as much, but would be more than happy to go on any spec with him. Again, it would require some gear as he is only about 630.
Armory: http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/character/d ... ain/simple


Communication
Aside from having a mellow voice, I am quite comfortable chatting using a microphone. I don’t mind giving out alerts if it feels necessary. I am perfectly happy checking the forums often for tactics, etc.


Combat Logs
I found some older logs from Mr. Robot and Wowlogs, although the information is somewhat limited:
http://www.askmrrobot.com/wow/player/eu ... rhood/adax
https://www.warcraftlogs.com/rankings/c ... /7/#boss=0


Your UI
Here is one: http://imgur.com/FF88ygb
Although note that lately I have had some trouble with raid frames and Tidy Plates. Annoyingly, I cannot seem to fix it, so at the moment I am using standard enemy plates.

Guild History
Vanilla: Need Before Greed
TBC: Oroganu Order
WOTLK: N/A. I quit gaming just before WOTLK came out in order to seriously pursue studies. I did not start again until after I met Rachael, and we began playing shortly after Cata’s release.
Cata: Viri Fortuitus. Great guild, but largely disbanded near the end of Cata.
MoP: Inceptio
WoD: Inceptio
Moving from Inceptio to TRC is a result of several guild members going inactive. TRC seems like a great guild, with a good atmosphere. I liked what I saw and heard during our “trial” run in Wednesday’s RG2 raid.

Raid availability
The raid schedule is great!


References
Rachael found out about you, and then told me.

About you
I am Norwegian, and currently living in Oslo. In 2009 I moved to England to study, and this is where I met Rachael. In 2013 we moved to Norway.
Currently I am doing a PhD in Psychology. Specifically, I review animal models on human psychiatric conditions (like ADHD). I run a science blog where I occasionally write posts about different psychological and/or scientific issues: http://iamalivep05.com/
I am quite into movies and gaming, although lately I mostly play WoW and Hearthstone. In my late teens and early twenties I was very active in the Counter-Strike scene, and was internationally known for my gaming movies. Type in “Zaknafein” into YouTube and you will find most of my work, mostly uploaded by others. I made a few WoW movies, but their links have mostly expired, although you can see an Arena video of me and Rachael here:


Miscellaneous
A man walks into a bar and sits on a stool. Turns out it was a gnome. The end.

[Elentia]

Oh no! How could you! That arena video is embarrassing x'D

[Jimmble]

One more shaman!

Oh my! Many shamans!

And shawomans. *nod*

[Yogá]

Hi there!

As another enhancement shaman (we're a rare breed), this app was enjoyable to read!

Although, I do have a few questions (do note that this is out of curiosity more than anything, I am rg1, not rg2 hence have no relevance to this app other than it's fun to read.)

1. Looking at your armory, you have enchanted your weapons with 2x haste. And while I understand that haste is our strongest stat (although only in single target situations) I do wonder why? I am under the impression that having 1x Haste and 1x Mastery enchant is a bigger perfomance increase due to mastery being stronger than haste in multi-target situations (of which there are many in HFC, BRF and Highmaul) and due to the nature of the haste enchant proc compared to other procs. I'd really like to know the reasoning behind the double haste enchant.

2. I see you have chosen the Unleash Elements talent as level 90, which I agree is a great talent (given my gear, it's the only real choice, sadly) yet you have forgotten to mention what that does to your rotation (a quite major and rather important priority change) is this intentional?

3. Glyphs, I see you hold the glyph of Ephemeral spirits and frost shock in high regard for single target. I'd like to know why, as in my opinion Ephemeral spirits has never been used (although I did consider it in BRF but ended up not doing so) and especially without the brf 4 set never should be used as the spirit wolves don't really do anything damage-wise but the healing from glyph of feral spirit is very useful in some circumstances. Regarding glyph of Frost Shock, it's techincally a dps increase in very few situations where you find yourself having to use your filler on cooldown, but in most single target situations, you would be able to either cast a lightning bolt at 3x MW stacks (more damage for me, 20k LB vs 9k Frost shock, granted that I do have HFC 4-set) or have SS/LL off cooldown so you won't use frost shock every 5 seconds making it less useful compared to other glyphs (e.g. spirit walk, FET, Capacitor, Flame Shock, most has uses).

Lastly it's not so much a question. Ancestral Swiftness, I wonder about this as it's generally considered the worst talent of that tier as it does absolutely nothing, the 5% haste is decent, but it simply just is worse than the others (generally). Have you played around with Echo of the Elements or EM?

I look forward to answers to my questions! and good luck with your application!

-Yogá

[Adax]

Hey Yoga

Thanks for the questions. I will try to answer them through the best of my knowledge.

1. In my experience, having double haste has its advantages. With single-target bosses we are talking about an absolutely ridiculous dps opening, due to the double proc. Liquid Magma will give at least 5 more ticks, and lightning bolt is practically instant cast for 10 seconds. In addition, having double haste makes at least 1 haste proc more often, making it easier to time with longer CDs like Liquid Magma. The overall increase in haste will, overall, decrease cooldowns of all abilites, making it very rare for me to use any fillers such as hard casting.
I haven't done a direct statistical comparison aside from training dummy comparisons, where I found that double haste gave around 3-5k more dps, although this was single-target.
I think the two enchant types are roughly equal, and their effectiveness depend somewhat on the situation. I personally prefer double haste, although the haste+mastery combo is something I've seen a lot of, so I am not opposed to changing if it is evidently more effective.

2. You are absolute right about Unleash Elements here. I simply neglected to mention it, partially due to some rustiness since I've been absent a few months, and also because it has become automatic to time lightning bolts/Fire Nova to the buff for increased damage.

3. I found that Ephemeral Spirits were invaluable with 4 BRF set items, as it basically meant that the wolves were never on cooldown. While it is true that their damage is minimal, having the set bonus as well as the talent meant the wolves lasted 15 seconds, but were triggered around every 40 seconds. This more than doubled their dps. Of course, I only yesterday removed two items in favour of some LFR gear (I haven't raided since BRF HC, and so I am slightly outdated gearwise). In this respect, I can agree that now that the 4-item bonus is gone, this Glyph is due to be changed.

In terms of Frost Shock, it is indeed a minimal dps increase, and lightning bolt is prioritized. I find that this slight damage increase is preferable to the (usually) minor health gain from Flame Shock, often-unnecessary sprint from Spirit Walk, and Capacitator is largely just useful on trash or stunable mobs (which if tanked properly, do not usually move from the totem). FET is a perfectly viable, and perhaps better, replacement, that I will consider.

Regarding Ancestral Swiftness (AS) I have experimented between all three tier 75 talents in different raids. Their effectiveness varied, but I eventually settled on AS and have not looked back since. The 5% haste buff is nothing to sneeze at, as it increases melee damage and reduces all cooldowns. This it the main reason for choosing this talent, and the extra free lightning bolt to time with Unleash Elements is just an added bonus.
I could perhaps mention that, as an example, on Operator Thorgar in BRF, I had a stable dps of 75k, and that is with double haste and AS. When I tried with Echo, the AOE was easier to control, but overall dps dropped by about 6k.

[Jimmble]

Your application has been accepted. Please poke an officer for guild invite.

[Jimmble]

<recruited>