Is Shaman Dead? 1.20 Aftermath Discussion

So it's been a good amount of time since 1.20 came out. We've had plenty of time to test the tweaks to Shaman and to all the classes regarding CCI. So now that we have experience, we can actually answer the question.

Is shaman dead to a hilarious extent? Have you guys had trouble with facing endgame content with Shaman where other classes wouldn't have?

Toxo players have not been affected by cci as far as I'm aware. Melee players not as much I believe. However, spell shaman seems like it has been run into the ground and then spat on by boss CCI. Previously good shaman mythics like Fantasia and Hadal have been destroyed. But to what extent is the question. Is it unbearably destroyed? Or is it balanced now?

My thoughts are that Shaman is now far weaker than the other classes. It's basically the warrior of 1.20 except Warrior is still here. To be really honest, I think warrior might actually be better than Shaman now, which would've been SHOCKING to say an update ago.

This wouldn't be a productive post if we didn't have any suggestions to fix it. So how do we fix Shaman?

Shaman was really goddamn Boring
Every Shaman player that has leveled it up to higher levels knows the strat of 1.19 shaman. Totem, circle strafe around the totem, and aura the boss until it died. That was the most boring gameplay that wynn has ever had. Worst thing is, it was the most effective. So let's make Shaman more interesting and fit better with the other classes.

1. Totem changes

Shaman's weak defense means it relies on its totem to survive. All of its spells revolve around the totem in some way, and uproot isn't even good without totem.

I propose that totem act like Meteor, so it emerges from the ground where the player looks. It should also have a low cooldown time, meaning totem could be activated during battle extremely quickly. To compensate for this, totem's radius should be drastically reduced.

2. Aura

One of the things that stuck out to me about Shaman was its damage spell. It was completely stationary, and couldn't move around with the player. This is what is putting Shaman down in this update. I propose that Aura should be able to be cast FROM the player. Not just from the Shaman, from the PLAYER. Now obviously, Aura would have to be changed.

Aura subchange: Auras cast from the player would not bring enemies towards the player. However, auras cast from totem should bring enemies towards the totem.

If the totem is out, then Auras would be cast from both the totem and player, dealing double damage. You know what this means? This means that Shaman would actually be a COMBO class. Not a forced combo class where its spells rely on other spells. A real combo class that is stronger the more combos it does.

3. Uproot

So how does Uproot fit into this mobility-centered new Shaman? Well, the totem idea I proposed basically negates the need for uproot. So, in order to fit Shaman into a more combo based class, I propose:

When hitting the totem, Uproot upgrades the totem's powers for 3 seconds. Strength II becomes Strength III, totem damage tick is doubled in speed, and aura comes out faster. However, while in this state, totem no longer heals the player, so using uproot takes some semblance of strategy.



Lately I've seen a massive decrease in shaman players and it's really sad to see. It was super exciting in 1.19 to finally have a new class after years and now it's already dead. I really hope something is done about this.

 

Two words: Panic. Zealot.

I do agree that the reliability on the totem is quite annoying though, especially if I want to move around fast. Like, casting totem then haul is always extremely annoying and costs so much mana.

 

cryoseism still exists u know

 

Spell shaman is ridiculously bad against CCI, worse than even Warrior by quite a bit. Melee shaman hasn't taken a huge hit, but melee shaman was in a bad spot before already. Poison shaman is the only good shaman left. This is one of many, many reasons why CCI was a mistake.

 

Over been ok playing with fast hybrid shaman so far. Not spellspam by any extent but it’s still very strong. I walked through li with my build and was pretty decent against eo. It shined in TCC too. I think spellspam players need to adapt to adversity now that the class isn’t a mindless RLL fest

 

i dunno why no one has talked about this or if its just me but my auras literally cannot hit tcc boss (eyes, ears), making it also mega bad there
The only good place is like in orphion controlling all the mob spams but good luck trying to hit orphion unless your team is coordinated

But yea, shaman's single target dps is dog, and most endgame is based around a single boss, so I think that's another reason why shaman is pretty dead. You kinda become -1 people on raids.
As a shaman player I think aura is too slow in its cast time, and also apparently uproot just does not hit any of the flying orphion mobs for some reason, limiting spell shaman users to just aura spam
One fix I propose is that maybe aura execute time could scale with your skillpoints in intel, so spell based shaman users can pump out more damage, but that kinda just buffs their aoe capabilities
To be fair every other class has pretty good aoe too, so idk if that would be a good fix

But regardless if you play spell shaman you literally cannot play raids which is major sucky

 

Oh boy, 1.20 Shaman problems

Point 1: Totem Reliability​

Complaining about totem reliability makes no fucking sense at all, especially after everyone was fine with it all of last year. IIRC Shaman was supposed to rely on combos from that start, so doesn't it make sense for most spells to be reliant on another? (The answer is yes.) You could argue that the system is poorly designed and having most spells be locked behind a single other spell is stupid and uninteresting but wtf are you gonna do with a 4 spell system? Having to cast Totem before Aura and Haul isn't a valid thing to complain about, neither is Totem reliance in general.

Point 2: Get Good
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Shaman was fucking broken in 1.19, and 1.20 started off right by bringing it back down to Earth. CCI was implimented (I'll talk about that in a minute) and Shaman got some specific nerfs, Totem time dropped to 15s, the radius was reduced, and (I think) the healing was reduced as well. I may have missed something there, idk. Point is Shaman got a much needed nerf. However this nerf combined with CCI proved a bit extreme, as such the CT foolishly revised the nerf because they missed the actual problem.

Basically Shaman requires more skill to use, and since the average player would rather just incinerate everything usage declined. Shaman has been made a skill based class, like it was always supposed to be. And players I guess just suck at the game idk. However this doesn't mean the new system is perfect, or even good.

Point 3: Crowd Control Whaaaaaaat?
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Shaman is a crowd control class, thus, it makes sence that it is seriously hurt by Crowd Crontrol Immunity right? Kindof. It doesn't help that CCI is the most poorly implimented feature since Fabled Items. A great idea on paper botched horribly. You see, CCI is always 100% effective on mobs that have it, which means no slowness, blindness, knockback or stun, which is very very wrong (except in the case of stun, because fuck stun). CCI also applies to standard mobs sometimes.

For example take Temple of Legends. Corrupter of Worlds has no CCI, but some of the trainers in the grind spot inside ToL do. What the fuck? I recently tried out the quest and grind spot both at level 68 and I determined that surving the grind spot was harder than beating CoW. How fucking sad is that?

Normal ass mobs shouldnt have CCI. It makes sence that most bosses have CCI because mobs that aren't generally part of crowds being immune to Crowd Control makes sence right? But bosses having 100% immunity is too much. Only a select few bosses should have complete CCI, like the most canonically strong ones. Other than that different bosses should have different levels of immunity. That being said bosses having immunity (various levels or resistance) doesn't make Shaman bad, it just makes it harder to use. Which is a good thing.

Point 4: So How Do We Fix This?
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Well, it imvolves a couple steps.

Subpoint 4.1: Fix CCI​

CCI was the main problem when Shaman got destroyed when 1.20 came out, by just making normal mobs not have CCI and reducing the effects of it on most bosses would help things dramatically, infact so dramatically that you need to nerf it again.

Subpoint 4.2: Bring Back Shaman Nerfs
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When Shaman was first announced there where 3 big points,

#1 Combos, the combo system may be underwhelming right now, but that isn't a problem with this class, it's a problem with the current spell system being limited to 4 spells.

#2 Crowd Control, already talked about this, fix CCI

#3 Skill Based, When Shaman was announed it was said that it was a "more skill based class", so by logic, it should be harder to use than other classes, but ultimately, not less powerful, having a smaller totem radius and a shorter timer definitely keeps you honest and requires you to be more aware. Before you could just sit at the edge of your radius, suck mobs in with aura and spam your aura and melee while sitting a comfortable distance away from whatever poor bastard had the misfortune of touching your aura. Speaking of which.

Point 4.3: Fucking Aura Prison
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Melee mobs without CCI are a total fucking joke against Shaman, just stick them in thier little cell and the fight is over before it begins, You could even do this with bosses in 1.19 too. Aura should pull mobs towards your totem but not lock them in the middle, the more CCI they have, the weaker the pull. This way, you can still control crowds very well, but it doesn't make melee mobs completely invisible.

Conclusion
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Shaman is still good, but in a very bad way. It finally requires skill to use, but this was brought on in the worst way possible. It's not broken anymore, but it's still broken in a whole new way. Basically Shaman is just cursed.

 

They should just give shaman more base defense. Not being able to crowd control bosses is not a problem as long as you dont get 2 or 3 shotted by them. A good base def for shaman would be 1(same as archer) or 2.

 

True, I’d like shaman and archer’s defence to swap.

Shaman has to get close to their totem to viably play the game, and even closer if they want to use their melee attack.

Also Archer should be a ranged class for a reason :P

 

I 100% disagree with this, Shamans low defense playstyle is what makes it harder to begin with, which as I have stated is the entire point of the class. The problem is that to counter this, Shaman has very high damage and excells at CC. It's takes much more skill to win as a glass cannon than a tank, which is why Shaman was made this way. The problem is CCI severely limits one Shamans main strengths.

Like I stated in my first post, nobody needed a Defense buff in 1.19, so why do we need it here? By buffing defense it contradicts the entire point of the class.

 

They're probably going to nerf it because the spell costs are kinda op

 

CCI was a colossal mistake, it completely defeats the point of crowd control spells and should only be given to mobs that are supposed to remain in place (E.G the Eye's hitbox mob). Seriously, if CoW has CCI (which I haven't checked) he's impossible at level for mages. The only reason I was able to solo him at level is because of ice snake. I've done a bunch of new bosses and it is my instinct to ice snake fast bosses such as Orphion. It just does nothing now. It's not just a problem for shamans, but for a lot of other classes.

The whole point of Shaman is that it's glassy and it needs to aura trap enemies so that they can't get them. Being unable to do that has ruined it as a class. My level 103 shaman died to the FUCKING GROOTSLANG WYRMLING in the beta because of how weak it has become.

 

From what I've seen the problem isn't shaman, is cci, the worst feature of the game by far, even implemented more poorly than tomes, just wonder how many consecutive braincells the staff spent doing cci, 3?

 

That feeling when the class entirely built around zoning loses it's only way to actually zone...

Honestly, I think the buff shaman needs right now is the ability to place multiple totems, if you're going to mess with a class at least make it interesting.

Unrelated, but I also don't get why they want the totem uptime to be so low, isn't the whole point of shaman to always have the totem up?

 

I just want shamans mobility spell to not take so long to cast, the totem - haul time thing makes the movement spell take longer and so if you are in a dangerous situation that split second could mean life and death. All other four classes have instant movement spells. Maybe if you made it so if there was no totem around and a shaman was shifting and they used haul it would spawn a totem and haul them all in that one spell cycle (costing a bit more mana). It would make it so shamans movement spell isn't the "slowest" to cast of all classes and add more "skill" to Shaman as it isn't just a speed clicking simulator if you ever want to move.

 

Imo, Shaman wasn't THAT broken. I had a fanta and it wasn't the best, even though people said that Fanta was a good Shaman weapon. Sure you could cheese bosses, but that was neither fun or a good strategy. Shaman's lackluster damage and stationary playstyle coupled with its low defenses meant that its gameplay was slow and uneventful.

 

He doesn't. Done it with archer and mage. It was evident when CoW was still triggering arrow shield. (because yes CCI means arrow shield won't actually work until the rain activates.)

 

they buffed

 

1. Or you could get better at shooting it
2. Why? Totem reliance is the backbone of shaman. To make aura emanate from both you and the totem would absolutely destroy that, make aura as broken as pre CCI aura, and really mess up the still ok playstyle of shaman. By doing this you basically turn on shaman baby mode.
3. Uh what!? Uproot buffing totem buffing aura? That is like max level cringe forced spell combo. Absolutely no.

YES you stole the words right out of my mouth, just remove aura cage and make it a different upgrade (maybe even change the second wave to something else too because it sucks rn)

Multiple totems... why. The only way you should be able to do that is with sorcery (and that still is overpowered). Totem uptime is meant to be a spell cycle force, to prevent people from sitting at the edge and aura spamming they make you cast either totem or uproot to maintain it, at least adding some level of complexity.

 

Ice Bear really likes this. If there is any class that really needs a nerf it is archer and shaman getting a bit of extra defense is a nice boost.