Post by AKFrost on Mar 16, 2015 4:20:32 GMT -5
(Part of A Series on "Jobs I've played with.")
(Please note I will be referring to things in the Overall DOMO Guide without noting it).
Overview
Shaman was my first job, and, as you should know, it's a magic-based class, and as such it is strong in the earlier levels but taper off due to the tyranny of the Damage Formula. It is a dimorphized job, so you can use it as a sub, but there's some synergy between the trees to make it a reasonable main. Shaman's main strength is that it is one of the cheapest jobs to play with due to its inherent fragility, which ensures the prospective shamans should avoid getting hit at all costs, thus minimizing armor costs. It also costs no consumables.
Qualification, Life Quests, etc.
All this stuff's on the wiki. You can thank SSF and co for keeping it up to date.
Stats
POW
The interesting about this stat is it's not as dumb as you'd think. Attack doesn't grow with levels, and shaman has abysmal weapon proficiencies. This makes POW rather attractive if you want to level Shaman with physical weaponry such as bow or even fan dances. Do note that Shaman's POW growth is one of the lowest in the game at 1.9 attack per point, so it is inadvisable to rely on it for anything other than leveling. You might want to go this route if you have a good physical weapon to equip, and you're only interested in using Shaman as a sub.
PHY
PHY might be advisable if you have a lot of Percentage Max HP increasing gear and having this amount of HP is important to you (for PVP perhaps?) Note that Sacrificing the equivalent of 100 base magic attack is not a small price to pay for most situations, but perhaps you can already hit magic cap without that wisdom? If so, then it makes perfect sense to invest those stat points elsewhere.
WIS
WIS is, of course, Shaman's primary stat. For most purposes, your shaman should have wis. How much wis is another question.
For every 2 wis points you miss, you lose 1 magic attack. This is generally not a big deal, because at shaman starts out with 25 and up to 22 from a level 10 wand, meaning 1 magic attack is at most 2% damage increase, which, while still more effective than AGI's ~.5% for 2 points, is still more or less under "doesn't matter." You'll need a lot of wisdom or agility to see a major difference, and you may very well find that wisdom isn't that useful after all - the most valuable stat it gives, healing efficiency, can be perfectly offset by AGI's lowered cooldown, and MP regen can fall under "not enough without necks" for both builds.
Nevertheless, unless you enjoy dumping money into low-level gear, it may very well be more advisable to focus on wisdom first, only switching to AGI in the higher levels.
AGI
AGI is the game's most useful stat by far, but then again, AGI is OP in nearly every game it features in, I wonder why...
The analysis for AGI mostly just falls under:12, 58 or 102? And that's also usually a PVP vs PVE build kind of thing. AGI is both an offensive and a defensive stat, as it allows you to evade more and cast more spells. The problem is it's a very gear-dependent stat - without good or nearly godly gear to drive it, it might very well under-perform wisdom and so you might not want any at all.
DEX
For the most part, dex does not serve you any purposes. Shaman is not a solo-AoE capable job, and in teams you should always have Song of Concentration and your wand's own MACC bonuses to sustain accuracy. For soloing, I don't remember the last time I missed a single-target spell on something that's not a Dancer, and as such, it is completely inferior to WIS in every way.
Of course, if you want to play Concentrated Fury Shaman, then by all means put your points into DEX.
DUR
If there's one use for DUR, it's pure pet musing. Using DUR pretty much signals that you give up on trying to damage monsters yourself. Might as well grab HA+Shield and wait for your cat to do all your dirty work. Trying to tank for people might earn you some strange looks since you'd have a 20% penalty on mock monsters, but if you love tanking that much, why not?
Do note that like POW, Shaman's defense growth from DUR is also on the low side.
Skill List
Go Here
Skill Trees
Seasonal Magic
Seasonal magic is possibly the most boring tree in the game. It's essentially just two spells each copied 5 times. Unlike Fencer's level cycle of 3, Shaman's have a comfortable level cycle of 6, meaning that for the most part, you can skill all of them without much fear of running out of skill points. Whether it's a good idea or not is another story.
If you do a simple division of both DPS and DPM, Seasonal Magic's damage potential is pretty abysmal compared to Wizard's, due to the fact that they cast fast and cost no consumables. This becomes less of an issue when players get more money, because let's face it, at the most expensive scrolls are 5k for a stack of a thousand at Benny's, and they last far longer than the time you'd spend farming 5k. It's useful, but you'll find it outclassed later.
Shaman AoEs have nearly no positives compared to Fencer/Dancer, and even less usage considering the dearth of good AoE leveling spots later. It's not even too efficient for farming. Nevertheless if you don't like Nature, then by all means invest some into them.
Nature Magic
Nature Magic's interesting in that the debuffs are all % based, which allows you to know exactly how much more damage you'll be causing. The bad news is the ones you'd think are most useful, Summer Sun and Deep Heat, are nearly always outclassed by Soup of Self-Preservation on Doctor (doubly so if you also level your Doctor with wand)
Some things to consider are that Summer Sun at least casts fast (which is useful for PvP, maybe), and that it stacks with Hoar Frost, which is useful if you happen to have physical dps on your team (something soup actually hurts because soup increases enemy defense). Hoar Frost also has a fast cast, making it useful in PvP as well.
Points into Deep Heat or Frostbite only increases its duration, and it is already 30/30 Duration/CD at level 1. This means there's not much reason to push it past level 1 as the damage is not super for a 30-second nuke.
Another thing to consider is that percentages take precedence in buff/debuff priority, and that these four buffs will also generally wipe out opposing def/mdef buffs, something soup is not guaranteed to do.
Spring Cleaning is an interesting spell. You get it fairly early on, so you can have some MP support at its most crucial. The problem is because of that, it costs more skill points than Cataclysmic Converter for the same regen level. You can say it's the same as inner magic's if you count the 5 levels for Regeneration, but most people find Regeneration actually useful in its own right, so Spring Cleaning remains one of the worst MP recoveries, pound for pound, considering both skill points and recovery.
However, Spring Cleaning can still work very well for Shaman due to the limited amount of sub slots available. You'd have to sacrifice something useful to have Cataclysmic Converter or Inner Magic or any of the other stuff, so even though Spring Cleaning isn't as good, it's not so bad that it's unusable either, and may be worth the skill points into just for that.
Malicious Mirror is a PvP spell. It's one of those that would be super useful if it was more powerful at lower levels, when you had good shaman-class exp monsters to level on. As it would reflect spells, it'd be an effective source of DPS and shielding against those spellcasting-only monsters, but at level 30 where it can be bought, it's a measly 12%, which basically doomed it to PvP only.
Heavy Frost is problematic in that most things you'd want to use it on resists it, or can just spam spells in response instead. It can offer some easy protection at your fragile lower levels, but you will find it sharply declining in usefulness in PvE later on. Because it's a fast-casting spell, it remains useful in PvP, especially as a precursor to a devastating Choking Climber.
Choking Climber suffers from the same problem. It can root monsters for basically forever, and it's an AoE spell, but most interesting things you'd want to root resists it. For kiting, a max-level toppling Tremor is usually a better deal, especially if enemies don't all spawn at once.
In PvP though, getting hit by this spell practically spells your doom. Even at level 1, 8.3 seconds would be considered super-OP in a MOBA. However, with the current state of arena...
Heatstroke and Swarm suffers from basically the same problem: why bother if witch doctor exists? Well, if it existed, then these two are nearly useless, not even good for powerleveling because it will take next to forever for you to efficiently poison anything down to 1 HP. To add to the kicker, Swarm also deals magic damage, which will sap the exp bounty remaining in the mob.
Shaman Skills
Equip Wand is easily one of Shaman's most useful abilities, because unlike other equip craps, Wand opens you to the skills of not one but three skill trees. However, if you have little desire to use wand on other jobs, (if not even to sub wizard's elemental spirits on doctor), then it's a skippable upgrade.
Note that for classes with a low MP pool, equipping a wand is one of the easiest ways to "jump-start" a buff chain, as they usually will last long enough for you to not have to hang onto the wand for actual leveling.
Mega Magic is fairly controversial for a skill. while it being a passive is really nice, a larger MP pool usually doesn't do much as it doesn't noticibly increase MP regeneration. Its opponents usually also point to the doctor skill mega magic boost, arguing that in situations where it might be necessary, you might as well save your points and depend on the doctor to save you. For me, if I'm gonna have to choose between Shaman AoEs or Mega Magic, I'd choose Mega Magic. Nature would be a harder sacrifice, but overall having mega magic is better if only because it allows me to take longer sit breaks and longer fight sessions.
Yin-Yang Transform is free, but it also doesn't do much. It requires the corresponding mega magic level to be skilled, so it's the exact same consideration as mega magic. Being fused for 12% more is usually nice, but it's not such a super bonus to justify taking mega magic if you don't like it.
Gear
Armor
Heavy Armor reduces magic attack, which means it's usually not considered for shaman. Most defense-oriented players will consider light armor + shield, but the problem is it eats both passive slots and leave you with no equip syringe. Defensively, once fortification and modding enters the scene, you'll want to stick with robes, if only for the 5% magic damage bonus.
Weapons
Wands are basically divided into seven families.
Other weapon types depend on what you want to do with the Shaman, but the most popular weapon selections for shaman are sword, syringe and fan, for more AoE power and buffs generally.
(Please note I will be referring to things in the Overall DOMO Guide without noting it).
Overview
Shaman was my first job, and, as you should know, it's a magic-based class, and as such it is strong in the earlier levels but taper off due to the tyranny of the Damage Formula. It is a dimorphized job, so you can use it as a sub, but there's some synergy between the trees to make it a reasonable main. Shaman's main strength is that it is one of the cheapest jobs to play with due to its inherent fragility, which ensures the prospective shamans should avoid getting hit at all costs, thus minimizing armor costs. It also costs no consumables.
Qualification, Life Quests, etc.
All this stuff's on the wiki. You can thank SSF and co for keeping it up to date.
Stats
POW
The interesting about this stat is it's not as dumb as you'd think. Attack doesn't grow with levels, and shaman has abysmal weapon proficiencies. This makes POW rather attractive if you want to level Shaman with physical weaponry such as bow or even fan dances. Do note that Shaman's POW growth is one of the lowest in the game at 1.9 attack per point, so it is inadvisable to rely on it for anything other than leveling. You might want to go this route if you have a good physical weapon to equip, and you're only interested in using Shaman as a sub.
PHY
PHY might be advisable if you have a lot of Percentage Max HP increasing gear and having this amount of HP is important to you (for PVP perhaps?) Note that Sacrificing the equivalent of 100 base magic attack is not a small price to pay for most situations, but perhaps you can already hit magic cap without that wisdom? If so, then it makes perfect sense to invest those stat points elsewhere.
WIS
WIS is, of course, Shaman's primary stat. For most purposes, your shaman should have wis. How much wis is another question.
For every 2 wis points you miss, you lose 1 magic attack. This is generally not a big deal, because at shaman starts out with 25 and up to 22 from a level 10 wand, meaning 1 magic attack is at most 2% damage increase, which, while still more effective than AGI's ~.5% for 2 points, is still more or less under "doesn't matter." You'll need a lot of wisdom or agility to see a major difference, and you may very well find that wisdom isn't that useful after all - the most valuable stat it gives, healing efficiency, can be perfectly offset by AGI's lowered cooldown, and MP regen can fall under "not enough without necks" for both builds.
Nevertheless, unless you enjoy dumping money into low-level gear, it may very well be more advisable to focus on wisdom first, only switching to AGI in the higher levels.
AGI
AGI is the game's most useful stat by far, but then again, AGI is OP in nearly every game it features in, I wonder why...
The analysis for AGI mostly just falls under:12, 58 or 102? And that's also usually a PVP vs PVE build kind of thing. AGI is both an offensive and a defensive stat, as it allows you to evade more and cast more spells. The problem is it's a very gear-dependent stat - without good or nearly godly gear to drive it, it might very well under-perform wisdom and so you might not want any at all.
DEX
For the most part, dex does not serve you any purposes. Shaman is not a solo-AoE capable job, and in teams you should always have Song of Concentration and your wand's own MACC bonuses to sustain accuracy. For soloing, I don't remember the last time I missed a single-target spell on something that's not a Dancer, and as such, it is completely inferior to WIS in every way.
Of course, if you want to play Concentrated Fury Shaman, then by all means put your points into DEX.
DUR
If there's one use for DUR, it's pure pet musing. Using DUR pretty much signals that you give up on trying to damage monsters yourself. Might as well grab HA+Shield and wait for your cat to do all your dirty work. Trying to tank for people might earn you some strange looks since you'd have a 20% penalty on mock monsters, but if you love tanking that much, why not?
Do note that like POW, Shaman's defense growth from DUR is also on the low side.
Skill List
Go Here
Skill Trees
Seasonal Magic
Seasonal magic is possibly the most boring tree in the game. It's essentially just two spells each copied 5 times. Unlike Fencer's level cycle of 3, Shaman's have a comfortable level cycle of 6, meaning that for the most part, you can skill all of them without much fear of running out of skill points. Whether it's a good idea or not is another story.
If you do a simple division of both DPS and DPM, Seasonal Magic's damage potential is pretty abysmal compared to Wizard's, due to the fact that they cast fast and cost no consumables. This becomes less of an issue when players get more money, because let's face it, at the most expensive scrolls are 5k for a stack of a thousand at Benny's, and they last far longer than the time you'd spend farming 5k. It's useful, but you'll find it outclassed later.
Shaman AoEs have nearly no positives compared to Fencer/Dancer, and even less usage considering the dearth of good AoE leveling spots later. It's not even too efficient for farming. Nevertheless if you don't like Nature, then by all means invest some into them.
Nature Magic
Nature Magic's interesting in that the debuffs are all % based, which allows you to know exactly how much more damage you'll be causing. The bad news is the ones you'd think are most useful, Summer Sun and Deep Heat, are nearly always outclassed by Soup of Self-Preservation on Doctor (doubly so if you also level your Doctor with wand)
Some things to consider are that Summer Sun at least casts fast (which is useful for PvP, maybe), and that it stacks with Hoar Frost, which is useful if you happen to have physical dps on your team (something soup actually hurts because soup increases enemy defense). Hoar Frost also has a fast cast, making it useful in PvP as well.
Points into Deep Heat or Frostbite only increases its duration, and it is already 30/30 Duration/CD at level 1. This means there's not much reason to push it past level 1 as the damage is not super for a 30-second nuke.
Another thing to consider is that percentages take precedence in buff/debuff priority, and that these four buffs will also generally wipe out opposing def/mdef buffs, something soup is not guaranteed to do.
Spring Cleaning is an interesting spell. You get it fairly early on, so you can have some MP support at its most crucial. The problem is because of that, it costs more skill points than Cataclysmic Converter for the same regen level. You can say it's the same as inner magic's if you count the 5 levels for Regeneration, but most people find Regeneration actually useful in its own right, so Spring Cleaning remains one of the worst MP recoveries, pound for pound, considering both skill points and recovery.
However, Spring Cleaning can still work very well for Shaman due to the limited amount of sub slots available. You'd have to sacrifice something useful to have Cataclysmic Converter or Inner Magic or any of the other stuff, so even though Spring Cleaning isn't as good, it's not so bad that it's unusable either, and may be worth the skill points into just for that.
Malicious Mirror is a PvP spell. It's one of those that would be super useful if it was more powerful at lower levels, when you had good shaman-class exp monsters to level on. As it would reflect spells, it'd be an effective source of DPS and shielding against those spellcasting-only monsters, but at level 30 where it can be bought, it's a measly 12%, which basically doomed it to PvP only.
Heavy Frost is problematic in that most things you'd want to use it on resists it, or can just spam spells in response instead. It can offer some easy protection at your fragile lower levels, but you will find it sharply declining in usefulness in PvE later on. Because it's a fast-casting spell, it remains useful in PvP, especially as a precursor to a devastating Choking Climber.
Choking Climber suffers from the same problem. It can root monsters for basically forever, and it's an AoE spell, but most interesting things you'd want to root resists it. For kiting, a max-level toppling Tremor is usually a better deal, especially if enemies don't all spawn at once.
In PvP though, getting hit by this spell practically spells your doom. Even at level 1, 8.3 seconds would be considered super-OP in a MOBA. However, with the current state of arena...
Heatstroke and Swarm suffers from basically the same problem: why bother if witch doctor exists? Well, if it existed, then these two are nearly useless, not even good for powerleveling because it will take next to forever for you to efficiently poison anything down to 1 HP. To add to the kicker, Swarm also deals magic damage, which will sap the exp bounty remaining in the mob.
Shaman Skills
Equip Wand is easily one of Shaman's most useful abilities, because unlike other equip craps, Wand opens you to the skills of not one but three skill trees. However, if you have little desire to use wand on other jobs, (if not even to sub wizard's elemental spirits on doctor), then it's a skippable upgrade.
Note that for classes with a low MP pool, equipping a wand is one of the easiest ways to "jump-start" a buff chain, as they usually will last long enough for you to not have to hang onto the wand for actual leveling.
Mega Magic is fairly controversial for a skill. while it being a passive is really nice, a larger MP pool usually doesn't do much as it doesn't noticibly increase MP regeneration. Its opponents usually also point to the doctor skill mega magic boost, arguing that in situations where it might be necessary, you might as well save your points and depend on the doctor to save you. For me, if I'm gonna have to choose between Shaman AoEs or Mega Magic, I'd choose Mega Magic. Nature would be a harder sacrifice, but overall having mega magic is better if only because it allows me to take longer sit breaks and longer fight sessions.
Yin-Yang Transform is free, but it also doesn't do much. It requires the corresponding mega magic level to be skilled, so it's the exact same consideration as mega magic. Being fused for 12% more is usually nice, but it's not such a super bonus to justify taking mega magic if you don't like it.
Gear
Armor
Heavy Armor reduces magic attack, which means it's usually not considered for shaman. Most defense-oriented players will consider light armor + shield, but the problem is it eats both passive slots and leave you with no equip syringe. Defensively, once fortification and modding enters the scene, you'll want to stick with robes, if only for the 5% magic damage bonus.
Weapons
Wands are basically divided into seven families.
- The "Wooden" family, existing at levels 10, 30 and 50, are your generalist wands. They're reasonable in every way.
- The "Buddhist Scepter" family, existing at levels 18, 38 and 58, are your magic attack specialists ones. They have the highest magic attack for comparable levels, but little of anything else.
- The "Fire" and "Water" families are similar in that both have a lot higher macc than the wooden family. They're different in elements only to each other, which is not a big deal because elemental attack doesn't do anything for caster nukes. Fire exists at 20 and 40, Water 23 and 43.
- The "Snake" family, existings at levels 33 and 53, have abnormally low magic attack, but compensates it with a hefty mp pool and macc bonus. If there's dancer mobs you absolutely hate and must destroy, the snake family is your friend. It is also useful for enlarging the initial MP pool of low-mp jobs.
- High Level Alchemy, existing at levels 60, 65 and 70 (even though only 60 ones are craftable), even though they are recycled designs of other families, they are closer to the Fire/Water family because of their hefty macc bonus. However, there's no other, similar-level wands to compare to.
- Platinum and Golden, as Item mall gear, they offer yet a different set of bonuses, this time being the rather useless HP and accuracy stats. Their magic attack is reasonable, but the macc bonus is only that of the wooden family. Still, you might find it useful for PvP.
Other weapon types depend on what you want to do with the Shaman, but the most popular weapon selections for shaman are sword, syringe and fan, for more AoE power and buffs generally.