Thanks for checking out my guide to the Best Shaman Leveling Spec! While there are many ways of leveling in World of Warcraft depending on whether you’re going to be solo leveling or doing a lot of instances (which is very easy with the dungeon finder), I’ll be focusing on solo leveling through quests in this guide. To that end, I think that Enhancement is the easiest way to go because you aren’t so reliant on your mana pool and will spend a lot less time stopping to drink.
In my opinion, doing quests to level is the fastest way to level any class. The best way to make it even faster is to use a leveling guide that tells you exactly what to do and when, such as Zygor’s Leveling Guide, which can get you from 1-80 in as fast as 7 days.
Another tip I have is to begin doing 1 or 2 dungeons through the dungeon finder every 10 levels (starting at level 15). The items you get for doing the random dungeons are pretty nice blue gear
The Stats You’ll Need to Focus On:
Here are the stats you’re going to be looking for in your gear and weapons:
Agility – This stat gives you increased critical strike chance, 1 ap and 2 armor for every agility point. This will a good stat to have.
Attack Power – This is how hard you hit things and is usually derived through other stats, such as agility or strength. You will find a lot of gear that has Attack Power as a stat though, and it’s a good thing to have since you’re a melee class.
Stamina – More health lets you live longer when you’re being beaten on. Very helpful because it lets you live longer, especially on a PvP server.
Intellect – Increases your mana pool. While having mana is important to a Shaman, don’t worry about stacking it. Your other stats are more important until much higher levels.
Strength – This one isn’t super important to you as a Shaman, but you’ll be bound to find some gear with this as you level. It’s not the worst thing you can get though, as it increases your attack power for every 1 point of strength.
Focus on Agility, Crit Rating for the most part, then Attack Power over the others, but don’t neglect your Stamina.
For weapons, go with slow ones that have the highest possible max damage and ignore the dps.
Spec
You may want to follow along by using the talent calculator found at WoWHead
Levels 10-14: 5/5 Ancestral Knowledge Gives you more Intellect which means a larger mana pool. This is good because you do need mana to use your attacks, shields, etc.
Levels 15-19: 5/5 Thundering Strikes
Increasing your crit chance is great. More damage means the mobs will be dead faster.
Levels 20-21: 2/2 Improved Ghost Wolf
Instant Ghost Wolf! Good for running around.
Levels 22-24: 3/3 Improved Shields
Your main shield (that you’ll have up all the time) is Lightning Shield. This makes it cause more damage to your attackers.
Levels 25-27: 3/5 Flurry
Increases your attack speed after landing a critical strike. More damage!
Levels 28-30: 3/3 Elemental Weapons
Increases the damage from your weapon imbues.
Levels 31-32: 5/5 Flurry
Finish it off
Levels 33-35: 3/3 Mental Dexterity
This increases your attack power by 100% of your Intellect. This should be a decent attack power increase for you.
Levels 36-38: 3/3 Weapon Mastery
Another 10% damage increase. If you’re going to hit stuff, you may as well hit it hard.
Level 39: 1/1 Spirit Weapons
A nice talent, but what we’re really after is the next one…
Level 40: 1/1 Dual Wield
Two one handed weapons, this is a great addition to you damage output.
Level 41: 1/1 Storm Strike
A new attack that lets you hit the target with both weapons.
Levels 42-44: 3/3 Unleashed Rage
Increases your expertise with your weapons.
Level 45: Lava Lash
An instant attack with your offhand weapon that does 100% damage. Make sure you keep your offhand weapon imbued with Flametongue to take advantage of the bonus damage of this talent.
Levels 46-48: Dual Wield Specialization
Increases your chance to hit with your offhand weapon, which leads to more damage.
Level 49: 1/2 Improved Stormstrike
Nice trick for some mana regeneration. We’ll come back and max this out in a little bit.
Level 50: 1/1 Shamanastic Rage
30% damage reduction for 15 seconds that you can cast even while stunned.
Level 51: 2/2 Improved Stormstrike
Max it out for more mana regeneration.
Levels 52-54: 3/3 Mental Quickness
Reduces the mana cost of your instant cast spells and increases your spellpower by 30% of your attack
power.
Levels 55-59: 5/5 Maelstrom Weapon
Chance to reduce your cast time on a bunch of your spells. It can come in handy.
Level 60: 1/1 Feral Spirit
Yay! Your very own “I Win” button!
Now we’re moving over to the Elemental Tree!
Levels 61-65: 5/5 Concussion
Nice damage increase to your elemental spells.
Levels 66-68: 3/3 Elemental Devastation
Increases your crit chance with melee attacks after getting a critical strike with one of your elemental spells.
Levels 69-70: 2/3 Elemental Warding
Basically a filler, but I like having damage reduction.
Level 71: 1/1 Elemental Focus
Clearcast after dealing crit with a non-periodic damaging spell which reduces your next 2 spells mana cost by 40%.
Levels 72-76: 5/5 Elemental Fury
Increases the crit damage of your spells by 100%
Levels 77-79: 3/3 Static Shock
Honestly, you can really do whatever you’d like after 76. You’re going to want to respect at 80 to a raiding or PvP build (depending on what you want to do).
For more information on Raiding or PvP Specs visit the WoW Forums.
Leveling Glyphs
Major Glyphs
Glyph of Lightning Shield
Increases the damage of your Lightning Shield by 20%.
Glyph of Windfury Weapon
Increases the chance of Windfury proccing. This is good news, as you will always have Windfury on your mainhand weapon.
Minor Glyphs
Glyph of Water Shield
Increases the charges of your Water Shield by 1. This is useful when you need to replenish mana.
Other than that, just pick what you want for glyphs, there really aren’t any that are too useful while leveling an Enhancement Shaman.
Your Rotation
Up until level 40, all your rotation consists of is pulling with Lightning Bolt and shocking at every cooldown while keeping Lightning Shield up. Not too interesting.
After level 40 you’ll have dual wield and Stormstrike. Now you can run up to the enemy and cast Stormstrike followed by an Earth Shock. When you learn Lava Lash you’ll want to start casting that after your Earth Shock.
When you get Maelstrom you’ll switch your rotation to Stormstrike, Earth Shock, Lava Lash and use Lightning Bolt when you get five stacks of Maelstrom.
Weapon Imbues
You’ll want to use Rockbiter until level 30.
At 30 you’re going to want to start using Windfury and use Windfury on both weapons until you get Lava Lash.
Once you have Lava Lash you’ll want Windfury on your main weapon and Flametongue on your offhand weapon.
