Shaman — Elemental
Elemental is a caster that generates Maelstrom with Lightning Bolt and Lava Burst and spends it on Earth Shock, Elemental Blast, and Earthquake, bursting under Stormkeeper, Ancestral Swiftness, and Ascendance.
World of Warcraft: Midnight · Season 1
Guide contents
How Elemental Shaman wins
Elemental is a caster that generates Maelstrom with Lightning Bolt and Lava Burst and spends it on Earth Shock, Elemental Blast, and Earthquake, bursting under Stormkeeper, Ancestral Swiftness, and Ascendance.
- Role
- Ranged DPS
- Stat lead
- Item Level / Intellect then Mastery
- Single target
- Farseer
- Cleave / AoE
- Stormbringer
Stat priority and consumables
Item level and effect strength still matter. Use this ordering to break close choices, then re-check it after major gear swaps.
- 1.Item Level / Intellect
- 2.Mastery
- 3.Farseer: Haste
- 4.Stormbringer: Critical Strike
- 5.Versatility
Farseer: Mastery > Haste > Versatility > Crit. Stormbringer: Mastery >= Crit > Haste > Versatility. Lava Burst naturally crits against Flame Shock targets, so profile-specific sims matter more than a generic caster order.
Flasks, food, potions, weapon oils, and runes for this build.
Opener and priority
Use these as decision priorities, not a rigid cast sequence. Re-evaluate whenever targets, resources, procs, or mechanics change.
Core principles
- Avoid Maelstrom waste: the resource enables your spenders - Earthquake and Earth Shock or Elemental Blast - so waste as little of it as possible.
- Always be casting: Elemental lacks mobility cooldowns, so know when you can pre-move or simply not move, use Spiritwalker's Grace and Nature's Swiftness for movement events, and ask your group to set up external tools such as Time Spiral.
- React to procs: Ascendance strongly buffs spells cast during it, so sync cooldowns and pool Maelstrom or Tempest procs into it, while Lava Surge procs grant Master of the Elements, which you spend on your highest-damage spells such as Tempest.
FarseerAncestors spawned by Stormkeeper and Ancestral Swiftness duplicate your casts; the burst window is Stormkeeper, Ancestral Swiftness, Voltaic Blaze, then Ascendance.
Single-target priority
- 1.Stormkeeper - on cooldown
- 2.Ancestral Swiftness - on cooldown
- 3.Ascendance - roughly on cooldown, but always after Stormkeeper
- 4.Elemental Blast - if you are less than 15 Maelstrom from capping
- 5.Elemental Blast - if Master of the Elements is active
- 6.Lava Burst - if you do not have Master of the Elements active
- 7.Lightning Bolt - to consume Master of the Elements
- 8.Voltaic Blaze - to refresh Flame Shock within the pandemic window (30% of its maximum duration) if you do not have Master of the Elements active
- 9.Lightning Bolt - as your filler
AoE priority
- 1.Stormkeeper - on cooldown
- 2.Ancestral Swiftness - roughly on cooldown
- 3.Ascendance - roughly on cooldown, but always after Stormkeeper
- 4.Earthquake - against 4 or more targets
- 5.Elemental Blast - against 3 or fewer targets
- 6.Lava Burst - if Purging Flames is active
- 7.Voltaic Blaze - on cooldown
- 8.Chain Lightning - as your filler - AoE starts at 3 targets, where Chain Lightning replaces Lightning Bolt
Opener
- 1.Cast Stormkeeper.
- 2.Cast Lava Burst.
- 3.Cast Ascendance.
- 4.Cast Ancestral Swiftness.
- 5.Cast Lava Burst.
- 6.Cast Lightning Bolt twice, then continue with the normal priority.
StormbringerPlays around Tempest and Master of the Elements consumption, with Voltaic Blaze handling Flame Shock upkeep.
Single-target priority
- 1.Stormkeeper - on cooldown
- 2.Ascendance - roughly on cooldown, but always after Stormkeeper
- 3.Voltaic Blaze - to refresh Flame Shock within the pandemic window (30% of its maximum duration) if you do not have Master of the Elements active
- 4.Lava Burst - if you do not have Master of the Elements active and will not overcap
- 5.Tempest - to consume Master of the Elements
- 6.Lightning Bolt - buffed by Stormkeeper, to consume Master of the Elements
- 7.Elemental Blast
- 8.Lightning Bolt or Tempest - as your filler
AoE priority
- 1.Stormkeeper - on cooldown
- 2.Ascendance - roughly on cooldown, but always after Stormkeeper
- 3.Earthquake - against 4 or more targets
- 4.Elemental Blast - against 3 or fewer targets
- 5.Voltaic Blaze - to refresh Flame Shock
- 6.Chain Lightning or Tempest - as your filler - AoE starts at 3 targets, where Chain Lightning replaces Lightning Bolt
Opener
- 1.Cast Stormkeeper.
- 2.Cast Lava Burst.
- 3.Cast Ascendance.
- 4.Cast Lava Burst.
- 5.Cast Tempest.
- 6.Cast Lightning Bolt, then continue with the normal priority.
Pre-combat checks
- Apply your weapon imbue: Flametongue Weapon if you run the talent. With Instinctive Imbuements this happens automatically when you cast Lightning Shield.
- Cast Skyfury to buff you and your party with Mastery and additional weapon strikes.
- Apply your shield: Lightning Shield with Lightning Capacitor, otherwise Earth Shield - or both with Elemental Orbit. Instinctive Imbuements applies them automatically.
Major cooldowns
Stormkeeper
- Your main short cooldown: the next 2 Lightning Bolts deal 150% more damage and trigger one additional Overload each, while Chain Lightning instead triggers an additional Overload on every target hit.
- The tier set upgrades it to 3 buffed casts - up to 175% for Lightning Bolt and an extra 25% for Chain Lightning - and grants Haste when you activate it.
- Sync it with Ascendance, which buffs the resulting Overloads substantially.
- As Farseer it also spawns an Ancestor, significantly increasing the cooldown's effective damage.
Ascendance
- On cast it applies Flame Shock to up to 6 enemies you are in combat with; while active it buffs your Overloads by 75% and makes every spell that can Overload do so exactly one additional time.
- With Call of Fire it also spawns a Fire Elemental that buffs Flame Shock duration and tick rate - the Elemental only appears after the initial Flame Shocks land, so recast Flame Shock in the global at the end of the Elemental's duration, after Ascendance expires.
- Use spells that add Overloads before entering it: Stormkeeper always, and Voltaic Blaze in AoE when specced into Purging Flames.
Advanced tips
Farseer Ancestors
- Ancestors duplicate your actual spell casts: Lava Burst for single-target casts, Chain Lightning for AoE casts - Overloads are ignored.
- The exception is anything that applies Flame Shock (Voltaic Blaze, Ascendance): Ancestors react by sending a Lava Burst at each target.
- Line the burst window up as Stormkeeper, then Ancestral Swiftness, then Voltaic Blaze, then Ascendance - keeping Voltaic Blaze outside the Ascendance window.
- Lava Surge procs roughly track one per Purging Flames without cooldown-reduction talents; with Crackling Fury you will need to hardcast some Lava Bursts.
How randomness works
- Most procs (Tempest, Routine Communication) use a deck-of-cards system with strong bad-luck protection, normalizing proc rates and limiting variance.
- Lava Surge is also strongly normalized: hold Maelstrom when you can feel a proc coming, and know that a fresh Lava Surge proc effectively cannot be overwritten for the first 3 or so seconds.
Purging Flames min-maxing
- Purging Flames echoes your next Lava Burst to up to 5 other targets with Flame Shock and can never hit your main target.
- If at least one extra target lacks Flame Shock and fewer than 6 Flame Shocks are active, casting Lava Burst at the unshocked target yields one more echo - at the cost of the guaranteed crit on the main cast.
- This is very situational and not something most players should play around.
Talents and hero trees
Use Farseer for the single-target profile below and Stormbringer when cleave or adds make its toolkit more valuable.
Recommended starting profiles
Single-target: Farseer
Farseer adds Call of the Ancestors for stronger single-target and sustained damage.
- Farseer hero tree
- Stat priority: Intellect > Critical Strike
- Interrupt: Wind Shear
Multi-target: Stormbringer
Stormbringer adds Tempest and Lightning synergy for the biggest AoE and cleave.
- Stormbringer hero tree
- Prioritize AoE and add-swap talents
- Interrupt: Wind Shear
Verified import strings
Start with the profile matching your content. Boss and dungeon tabs in the gear section show the exact loadout used for each ranked result.
Stormbringer - Raid
Overload- and Tempest-driven build for current raid damage profiles.
CYQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAzMbbzMzMzMLbbDMmZAAAAAgNzYYDWgZ0QjNAY2mZmZGbLz0CzALzMzMmhZZGLmZYmFAgBwMDMMMAComplete talent reference
Every class, specialization, and hero-tree talent from Blizzard game data. Active and choice talents stay open; passive nodes remain searchable and expand on demand.
Shaman class tree
Shared class talents, including throughput, control, defensives, and movement.
Active and choice talents
Passive talents
Elemental specialization tree
Every Elemental talent currently exposed by Blizzard game data.
Active and choice talents
Passive talents
Totemic
Totemic hero talents, including every active, choice, and passive node exposed by Blizzard.
Active and choice talents
Passive talents
Stormbringer
Stormbringer hero talents, including every active, choice, and passive node exposed by Blizzard.
Active and choice talents
Passive talents
Farseer
Farseer hero talents, including every active, choice, and passive node exposed by Blizzard.
Active and choice talents
Passive talents
Boss and dungeon loadouts
Switch between raid and Mythic+ to inspect the top player for every available encounter: exact talents, source link, item level, enchant and socket counts, and the player's gear.
Pulling the top Warcraft Logs result, exact talents, and equipment for each boss.
Enchants
Choose enhancements after your equipment is settled. Secondary-stat enchant choices move with your current stat mix and the content you are preparing for.
Gems
Socket into the current stat priority, then re-check after major equipment swaps rather than treating a gem choice as permanent.
Embellishments
Crafted effects are capped at two equipped embellishments. Lock these in only after deciding which crafted slots survive your next raid or Mythic+ upgrades.
Utility, defensives, and movement
Your Shaman toolkit is part of the rotation whenever it prevents lost uptime, lethal damage, or an enemy cast.
Bloodlust/Heroism plus situational totems make Shaman one of the deepest utility classes.
Interrupt: Wind Shear - grab a focus-interrupt macro on the Elemental macros page.
Interface and macros
Use interface changes only when they expose a decision sooner: resources, procs, defensives, dispels, interrupts, and encounter assignments.
Focus interrupt
#showtooltip Wind Shear
/cast [@focus,harm,nodead][] Wind ShearWhat improves results
- Do not overcap Maelstrom
- Keep Flame Shock up - it fuels Lava Surge procs
- Use Earthquake at its target breakpoint
- Pool a little Maelstrom before burst
Common mistakes
- Maelstrom capping
- Letting Flame Shock drop
- Hard-casting through movement instead of using Lava Burst and instants
- Using Ascendance before Stormkeeper
FAQ
1 quick answersWhich races are best?
Racial damage differences are small. Choose movement and defensive utility for the content you play; Dwarf's Stoneform and Goblin movement are useful practical options.
Talents by enemy class
Pick an opponent to see the pressure your PvP build must answer. The baseline comes from this spec's current arena build when one is published.
Grip setups, anti-caster pressure, and sustained melee uptime.
Mobility, anti-slow, and physical or magic mitigation.
Keep an answer for grip-based isolation and do not spend movement before the Death Knight commits their control chain.
Comments
Comments load when you reach this section.
Loading comments...