Project Lore

Every time I read something new about Wrath of the Lich King, I can't help but get a little more excited for it. I recently came across a list of Shaman glyphs from the current beta build. What are glyphs? They are customizations for your character that will alter the way certain abilities work in some way. The example I like to give is that druids will be able to make their bear form look like a polar bear. Fun, right? Well, looking good is one thing, but check out what glyphs have been uncovered for the best class (shaman for those of you who don't know).

• Glyph - Water Shield - Your Water Shield has 3 additional charges.
• Glyph - Chain Heal - Your Chain Heal heals 1 additional target.
• Glyph - Lesser Healing Wave - Your Lesser Healing Wave heals for 20% more if the target is also affected by your Earth Shield.
• Glyph - Earthliving Weapon - Increases the chance for your Earthliving weapon to trigger by 5%.
• Glyph - Healing Wave - Your Healing Wave also heals you for 20% of the healing effect when you heal someone else.
• Glyph - Mana Tide - Your Mana Tide Totem grants an additional 1% of each target's maximum mana each time it pulses.
• Glyph - Earth Shock - Reduces the global cooldown triggered by your Earth Shock ability by 1 sec.
• Glyph - Frost Shock - Increases the duration of your Frost Shock by 2 sec.
• Glyph - Strength of Earth - Your Strength of Earth Totem also grants 1% melee and ranged critical strike chance.
• Glyph - Windfury Weapon - The attack power bonus on the additional attacks granted by Windfury Weapon is increased by 40%.
• Glyph - Stormstrike - Increases the nature damage bonus from your Stormstrike ability by an additional 8%.
• Glyph - Flame Shock - Increases the range on your Flame Shock ability by 10 yards.
• Glyph - Lightning Shield - Increases the damage from Lightning Shield by 20%.
• Glyph - Chain Lightning - Your Chain Lightning strikes 1 additional target.
• Glyph - Fire Nova Totem - Increases the radius of Fire Nova Totem's effect by 2 yards.
• Glyph - Flametongue Weapon - Increases spell critical strike chance by 2% while Flametongue Weapon is active.
• Glyph - Totem of Wrath - Your Totem of Wrath also grants 1% spell haste.
• Glyph - Lightning Bolt - Reduces the cost of your Lightning Bolt ability by -10%.
• Glyph - Earth Elemental Totem - Reduces the cooldown of your Earth Elemental Totem by 3 min.
• Glyph - Fire Elemental Totem - Reduces the cooldown of your Fire Elemental Totem by 3 min.
• Glyph - Healing Stream Totem - Your Healing Stream Totem heals for an additional 20%.

Now, all of those are pretty awesome, and it will be hard to choose which six to have inscribed (you can have two of each type: minor, lesser and major). I'll leave the theorycrafting to those smarter than myself and just look at the ones that jump out at me. Resto shaman always get love, but adding a fourth target to chain heal would be awesome. Healing wave healing myself while I heal others? Another win. My current love, enhancement, should see huge boosts from an additional 40% AP bonus on Windfury, and strength of earth totem becomes even more buffed by adding an additional 1% physical crit chance. That's on top of the agility it's already getting in WotLK! And of course my rekindled love in Wrath, elemental, is not forgotten. An additional target for chain lighting is situational, but will be fun! A 2% spell crit bonus with flametongue, the new elemental imbue of choice, is much appreciated, as is the extra 1% spell haste for Totem of Wrath. Stacked with the Wrath of Air totem haste, casters will love shaman. It will be difficult to pick glyphs for Juggynaut, but I can't wait!

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...but so is Elemental. I've logged into the beta once or twice in order, of course, to test out Wrath of the Lich King and to provide Blizzard with bug testing and feedback. In my time on the beta server (PvP, natch), I've respec'd a few times to check out all of the new talents and changes to itemization. Enhancement seems like it will play like much more of a hybrid between melee and casting than it currently does. The itemization for Shaman has changed significantly, with Intellect giving Attack Power and Strength's effects reduced. Luckily, with my current gear, I actually gained some AP, though I lost a bunch of crit chance. All in all, I'm happy that Blizzard finally decided to make gear designed for hunters a little bit more viable for us. With the newly changed Maelstrom Weapon along with Lava Burst, spell rotations should be a little more complex than "Stormstrike and shock whenever they're ready." Unfortunately, Lava Burst isn't quite what I had initially expected. Also, the spirit wolves that get summoned with Feral Spirit are not yet implemented (NYI). For now they're just a pair of spirit wolves who do some pretty disappointing DPS. According to the beta forums, these wolves will have some special abilities, like snares and stuns. With Spectral Transformation, they will be even more powerful. It will be fun to check those out once they actually get implemented. Once I had my fill of a full on Enhancement build, I switched to Elemental. Now, while I was testing out Elemental, I used my old Restoration set. I must say, I was pretty happy with the way the team at Blizzard changed healing and damage into spell power. I a little over 1800 bonus healing just from my gear, and my spell power in the WotLK beta was in the mid 900s when I spec'd elemental. As I may have said before, I leveled from mid 60s to 70 as elemental, and stayed that way for a while. So I know how much fun it is to throw Lightning Bolts over and over, watching Lightning Overload proc with devastating results. Thunderstorm is a lot of fun, since it can be used as an extra interrupt, keeps melee at range, and returns mana. Paralysis and Storm, Earth and Fire give even more options for keeping enemies away in order to throw even more Lightning Bolts. In Northrend, I think I'll use an elemental spec to level for a while, because it's just so much fun. As for Restoration, I haven't check it out yet, since its top tier talent also isn't implemented. I also haven't had a chance to group with anyone, which is sort of necessary in order to get the full feel of a healer. We'll have to see if that ends up happening. All in all, I've tried to avoid leveling too much, since I don't want to have to go through it again (and again for Xeno). I will give all of those Alliance out there one tip in case you decide to go out and buy WotLK once it is released. Take the boat to Northrend from Menethil Harbor, not Stormwind.

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