A closer look at Enhancement Mana Efficiency in Patch 3.1

I talked a bit about this just after 3.1 hit, but that post was just based on quick testing of one spec. I’d like to take a closer look at the issue now, covering three slightly different specs.

Disclaimer: I wanted to test these specs with Replenishment, to give the best idea of how we’d be in a raid environment. While I did get one of my guildies (Thanks, Kk!) to help, being my Replenish bot for half an hour was hardly exciting, so uptime was not 100%. At most, I’d say you could add 5 or so seconds to the times listed below.

Core Mana Talents:

Not all of these are used in every spec, but I’ll explain each talent here so that it’s clear what each does.

Shamanistic Focus (SF) – A bargain of a talent at only one point, that reduces the mana cost of all shocks by 45%. An Enhancement Shaman should be using Earth Shock every 6 seconds (Maelstrom procs allowing), so you should see a lot of benefit from this.

Improved Stormstrike (ISS) – the biggest change to the Enhancement tree in 3.1. This provides a whopping ~880 Mana every time you use Stormstrike, which is roughly every 8 seconds (again, Maelstrom procs allowing), for a tasty 110 mana per second. In reality, it’s not worth quite that much, but still a hefty amount.

Mental Quickness (MQ) – Unlike the other two, this should be in every spec, due to the spell power boost. The 6% cost reduction is just icing – as far as I’m aware, this will affect everything that casts instantly. Shocks, Totems, Heroism, Wolves, you name it.

Shamanistic Rage (SR) – Like MQ, this is in every spec. This is your “press this and get mana back” button. It’s easy to get a full mana bar back every time you use this. You can only use this once every 2 minutes. With a 12 second duration, this means you can go OOM within 1:48 and have it ready.

Convection – this isn’t actually a talent any of the specs uses – I’m mentioning it because it’s another mana conservation talent. While it’s easy to take, I don’t really recommend you do so.

Ability Priorities:

Some classes have a spell rotation – Enhancement Shaman isn’t really one of them. Instead, we follow a priority system based on what abilities are currently off cooldown and how many Maelstrom procs we’ve had.

1. Lightning Bolt / Chain Lightning if you have a 5-stack of Maelstrom Weapon.
2. Stormstrike (If there isn’t already an SS debuff on the mob.)
3. Earth Shock (you can move this up to priority 2 if SS is already on the target and you aren’t pressed for mana.)
4. Lava Lash
5. Magma Totem – if you are having mana issues, skip this. More on this later.
6. Refresh Lightning Shield or any other totems that need refreshed.

Test results:

Ok, time to get down to the nitty gritty. First, some notes about the tests themselves.

Unless otherwise noted, all tests had Replenishment and Mana Spring Totem running. Replenishment was vital for replicating a raid enviroment, given Blizzard have said that encounters are tuned assuming you have it.

Gear level is entry-level to Ulduar (and even then, only barely!), thus my mana pool is not as big as it would be with Ulduar gear or 25 man Naxx gear. Obviously, the more mana you have, the longer you’ll take to go OOM. It’s also important to remember that buffs like Blessing of Kings and Arcane Brilliance will add a fair amount of Mana, so you can probably add a few seconds onto these times for that reason.

Due to the facts that A. I am impatient and B. My guildy can’t be expected to spend hours testing stuff exhaustively with me, each spec was tested three times, for how long it took to go out of mana (OOM.)

Test number one – 16/55 with SF.

This is my current spec, and I view it as a 5-man Heroic / 10-man raid utility spec. This spec takes a variety of Totem buffing and mana conserving talents. Both SF and ISS are included.

Average time to go OOM: Far, far too long. Seriously. Highly unscientific answer, but you are guaranteed to have SR off cooldown by the time you are OOM again.

Comments: With Replenishment, ISS and SF, you are pretty hard pressed to get anywhere near running out of mana before SR is ready.

Test number two – same spec as test #1 without Replenishment.

Self explanatory, really.

Average time to go OOM: A comfortable 1:59. SR will be more than ready to fill that little blue bar right back up.

Comments: This is kinda how I usually work in raids. Right now, we do not have a guaranteed Replenish every raid. This is hardly optimal since fights are tuned for having it, but it does work, though it’s a challenge.

Test number three – 16/55 without SF.

Another 5/10 man utility spec, but without SF. In this case, I’ve shifted the point over to Ancestral Knowledge for extra Mana and Attack Power, but feel free to put this point elsewhere.

Average time to go OOM: 1:41. While not optimal, this is very close to the 1:48 you’d be aiming for.

Comments: As you can see, dropping SF just barely dropped me into the realm of being completely OOM. I think raid buffs or better gear will make up those last few seconds.

Test number four – 20/51 without ISS.

I saw this mentioned briefly by Stoney over at Big Hit Box. The idea of a build lacking ISS intrigued me, so I thought I’d give this a whirl and see how it played out. According to the poster on EJ, they were not having mana issues, and this is a 25DPS gain over the typical 16/55 builds.

Due to dumping points from ISS, this build does take all the PvE totem enhancing talents. Windfury in particular is often skipped if there’s a DK with Improved Icy Talons.

Average time to go OOM: 1.18. Ouch.

Comments: 30 seconds of OOM time! That is simply not good. In a 10 man situation, I really can’t see this being a viable spec. However, I think that in a 25 man, with the better gear, variety of raid buffs, and high chance of having Judgement of Wisdom active on the mob, this may just be viable.

Conclusions:

If you are OOM, your DPS nosedives, hence testing these specs for mana efficiency as opposed to DPS – these are all capable of putting out 3k DPS in a 10 man as long as you have the gear and the skill.

With the above results, I can make a few recommendations with regards on how to spec:

5 man Heroics – I’d go for the 16/55 with SF spec. In a heroic, you really cannot be guaranteed Replenishment, and the utility offered by improving your totems is a great help.

10 man raids – 16/55 without SF unless you’re in the same situation as me without guaranteed Replenishment every raid, in which case you should grab SF. With Replenishment and raid buffs, you should be able to maintain mana neutrality (Using as much mana as you can gain within that 1:48 time)

25 man raids – Maybe the 20/51 spec. As I don’t do 25’s, I can’t say for definite, but from the EJ thread, I’d say this is certainly viable despite my limited testing. However, I’d definitely not write out a 16/55 spec. With Blizzard’s new Raid design philosophy, 25 DPS is not going to make or break a normal raid. If you are a min/max kind of person, go for it. If you’re not entirely sure on the spec, and want the “safety net” of ISS, go for that instead.

A note about Magma Totem:

Magma Totem is a major mana hog. On a fight where you can stand in one spot over the entire raid, you can work it in comfortably. If mobility is required, use discretion – can you constantly afford to replace the totem when the boss moves out of range? Or perhaps you’ll just drop it every 20 seconds and hope the boss stays close enough for most of that? Maybe you’ve got to move about so much that it’s simply not worth dropping – perhaps a Flametongue or Searing Totem in that case.

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