Ailis in Hunterland

I just realized I covered Totem Changes and JC changes but not my very own class changes.

/headdesk

It’s been a long week…

So, for you, dear readers, at 3.30am, I have your Shammy changes complete with a bit of commentary.

Shamans

• A customizable totem bar will now be available for shamans allowing the storing of 4 different totems. These totems can be placed on the ground at once in one global cooldown for the combined mana cost of all 4 totems.  - Now with pictures!
• All Shocks now have a default range of 25 yards, up from 20 yards.  - Being melee, this change really isn’t a huge deal, unless you use Frost Shock while out soloing or PvP’ing.  But Casters will like this one a lot.
• Base health increased by approximately 7% to correct for shamans having lower health than other classes.  - All I have to say is, it’s about damn time.
• Chain Heal: Jump distance increased to 10 yards. In addition, the amount of healing now decreases by 40% as it jumps to each new target, instead of 50%.  - Nice buff.  Maybe I’ll see my hps go up a little.
• Ghost Wolf: Can now be learned at level 16. While in this form, snaring effects may not bring the shaman below base normal run speed.  - Mainly done in relation to the mount changes, this is still fantastic for leveling.  With the new heirloom shoulders, you should hit 16 in no time flat and then zoom around as a translucent puppy dog.
• Talents
  • Enhancement
    • Shamanistic Rage: Cooldown is now 1 minute, down from 2 minutes. Successful melee attacks now have a chance to generate mana equal to 15% of the shaman’s attack power, down from 30%.  -  Not a huge deal here.  With the changes to Imp. SS and Mana Totem, I rarely run out of mana unless it’s a particularly long, drawn-out fight.  But it is nice to know I can pop it more often should I need it.
  • Restoration
    • Ancestral Healing: The buff from this ability now reduces the physical damage taken by the target by 3/7/10% instead of increasing the target’s armor.
    • Cure Poison and Cure Disease: Combined into a single spell, Cure Toxins.  - I’m all for combining things.  Can we just skip to the end where you give us the all-in-one totem?
    • Earth Shield: Dispel effects will now remove charges of Earth Shield rather than the entire aura.
    • Healing Way: Redesigned. Rather than providing a chance of increasing Healing Wave spells on a friendly target, this talent now innately increases the effectiveness of the shaman’s Healing Wave by 8/16/25%.
    • Mana Tide Totem: Totem health now equal to 10% of the shaman’s health.
    • Nature’s Guardian: Redesigned. Now has a fixed 100% proc rate, has a 30-second internal cooldown and increases the shaman’s maximum health by 3/6/9/12/15% for 10 seconds.
    • Nature’s Swiftness: Cooldown is now 2 minutes, down from 3 minutes.
    • Tidal Waves: No longer reduces the cast time of Lesser Healing Wave by 30%. It instead now provides +25% critical strike chance to Lesser Healing Wave, along with the previous 30% cast time benefit to Healing Wave.
    • Improved Water Shield: This talent now has a 10/20/30% chance to be triggered by Chain Heal, and the charges of Water Shield are no longer consumed by this talent.

For the rest of the Resto changes, I would like to call upon the Resto shammies to comment on them.  Like?  Dislike?  Meh?

In reality, not a TON of changes and nothing earthshattering but some good buffs.  The totem interface is a lot of fun and definitely a welcomed (and long overdue) change.  Given these changes, I’m not seeing a need to reglyph or respec – life for Shamans will pretty much go on as normal.

Or will it…