Shaman in Forever

Shaman is the class with the fewest genuinely new inventions and the most rearrangement. Only four of its 50 talents use a spell that does not exist in Classic Era, the lowest of any class but Mage. At the same time 24 of its talents changed tier, rank count or prerequisite, which is more than any other class. And the biggest change is not in the trees at all: it is that totems now cover 30 yards and last five minutes.

Game data from build 1.60.1.69913 against Era 1.15.9.69722. The trees are in the Shaman calculator.

26 Shaman abilities read differently in this build, and the pattern across them is consistent.

Three new abilities manage them. Call of the Elements at level 20, Call of the Ancestors at 30 and Call of the Spirits at 40 each place up to four totems from a saved set at once, and the second and third can hold different sets from the first. Totemic Recall at level 20 pulls your totems back and refunds 25% of the mana each one cost.

None of those four spells is in the Era build at all.

Era’s Fire Nova Totem summons a totem that sits for 4 seconds, can be destroyed before it goes off, and then explodes. Forever deletes that spell and gives the Shaman Fire Nova at the same levels (12, 22, 32, 42, 52), which instantly deals 48 to 56 damage at rank 1 to enemies within 10 yards of whichever Fire totem you already have out.

The Elemental talent that supported the old version followed it. Era’s Improved Fire Totems cut the delay before the Fire Nova Totem fired and dropped Magma Totem threat; Forever’s Improved Fire Nova adds 20% Fire Nova damage and takes 4 sec off its cooldown.

Nine of the thirteen talents that are not in the Era tree are built on spells the Era build already contains; only four use a spell Forever added.

The four that are genuinely new spells are Earthbound (Earthbind Totem immobilises for 5 sec when cast), Shamanistic Focus (45% off the mana cost of Shocks and Lightning Shield), Improved Stormstrike (Stormstrike grants casting-while-regenerating and has its cooldown reset by dodges and parries) and Mindfulness (up to 50% of mana regeneration continues while casting).

All three 16-point talents are Era talents moved. Stormstrike was the 31-point Enhancement talent and is now the 16-point one; Mana Tide Totem made the same journey in Restoration, and lost its Restorative Totems prerequisite. Call of Thunder went the other way: up from the 11-point row to the 16-point row, down from five ranks to one, and it now needs Elemental Fury first.

Elemental Fury made the opposite trade: one rank in Era, five in Forever, ending at the same +100% critical damage bonus.

Most are cosmetic. Two are not: Spirit Weapons kept the parry chance and added a 30% threat swing that depends on whether Rockbiter Weapon is active, and Rage of the Farseer is a different spell in Forever. Era’s reduces damage taken and returns mana to the raid, Forever’s is a haste cooldown.

Healing and damage tables came down in the same pass: Lesser Healing Wave rank 1 heals 142 to 164 against Era’s 162 to 186, Frost Shock rank 1 deals 64 to 68 against 89 to 95, and Earth Shock rank 3 deals 47 to 51 against 60 to 64.

Elemental lost Earth’s Grasp, which moved to Enhancement, and Elemental Mastery, which the 31-point slot gave up for Lava Burst. Enhancement lost Shield Specialization, Enhancing Totems, Two-Handed Axes and Maces, Improved Weapon Totems and Weapon Mastery. Restoration lost Nature’s Guidance and Totemic Mastery.

Two-Handed Axes and Maces leaving the tree is worth its own line: in Era it is a one-point talent at the 11-point row that unlocks a whole weapon class. The spell is still attached to the Enhancement skill line in the Forever build, but there is no talent for it and no level at which the class list teaches it.

The beta cap is 20, rising to 30 later (Blizzard: Beta Now Live). Fire Nova, Call of the Elements and Totemic Recall are all reachable at 20; Lava Burst, Riptide and the rest of the totem-bar spells are not. Nothing Shaman-specific appears in Blizzard’s Known Issues thread for September 17.

Dwarf Shaman is one of the six new race and class combinations (Blizzard: Deep Dive Panel Recap), and Horde-aligned Skyborne can be Shaman as well; see New race and class combinations.

Coming soon How Two-Handed Axes and Maces is meant to be learned in Forever. The talent is gone and the spell carries no learning level in the data we have, so we cannot say whether it is baseline, trained, or simply left over.

Coming soon The swing count on Flurry and the proc chance on Maelstrom Weapon. The game’s own text leaves both unfilled.

That these trees are the ones a Forever character spends points in is our reading of the beta build, not something we have confirmed in game. The reasoning is in Forever talent trees.