Guess Posted on BigHitBox
Considering the fact that I had never had a max level character until WOTLK, my first raid was Naxxramas 10 man. I am just going to go over some of the clumsy mistakes I made that first time, ways I improved after wards, and things I could have done differently the first time.
When I had leveled my first toon (a mage), I ran basically every dungeon possible so I was very familiar with what I needed to do as a mage in a dungeon. Now with my shaman, I had finally realized how much time it really takes to get a group together, so I rarely ran dungeons. Occasionally if I got a whisper asking, I would run one. Unfortunately as a shaman 95% of the whispers you will get is to ask you to heal (fyi I actually healed my way through too many dungeons).
So the day I turned 80, my guild was running 10 man naxx. Luckily I had farmed enough Knights of the Ebon blade for a decent offhand Unholy Persuader, and I had received a run through of H:COS, and was even lucky enough to have it drop my first run Greed.
I am in a 10 man raid with other people geared enough for 10 maly, and I am sitting on one epic and some green quest rewards. Needless to say I had studied enhancement in raids (thanks to EJ).
I keep forgetting to stand behind the bosses, luckily there were tons of other melee to remind me that I was standing in the wrong spot (when i was all alone). I always had chosen gear with more agil/crit/hit/ap than stam so here I am dying on almost every boss. I also (sadly and in hindsight regretfully) hadn’t studied a single fight so these guys are explaining each fight to me for 5 minutes, for me to unfortunately die anyways.
You see I learn visually, like Heigan, the RL explained multiple times something about green walls and they would kill me. Literally as soon as the first wall hits, I am at 20% health. Ok so that wasn’t a good job, but what just happened? I thought I was right next to everyone else *shrugs* ok here we go SS, ES, LL, o I got a 5 stack, LB, SS *DEAD*
So… I had about 7 minutes (had poor dps in my guild) to study the flooring in Heigans room, and I came to the conclusion that his tiles were imported from SWEDEN.
I had hit this raid without even being special hit capped, no exp, and not even close to spell hit capped. Mind you, I had told the RL to only take me if NO ONE else from the guild could go. I did however pull off an average of 2200 dps, and a maximum of 3100.
I do remember enjoying one thing. I was the only shaman in this raid, I was (at that moment) the only regularly raiding shaman. So I can not count on one hand how many times 3 or 4 people would be down and with 30-40% of the raid bosses health, I would get a Battle Res just to bloodlust (sometimes living long enough to dps more).
I found out some interesting information. I find it much easier to gear up a Resto shaman than an Enh shaman. Generally because the only other people rolling on your shields are Ele’s/Pallys, and your gear would be another mail caster (Ele), really only sharing; tokens, weapons, trinkets, rings.
Our guild used the basic ROLL system (main before off) and I still recieved more ups for Resto than Enh.
Improvements
I had to learn to drop totems with better timing, according to the boss.
Using Feral Spirits to achieve optimal uptime, as well as optimal “buffs”.
Using the 5 stack of MW…. IMMEDIATELY. When I leveled obviously some things are closer to dying than its worth, so Id save it for a CL on the next mob.
Remembering to reapply Lightning Shield in the “downtime” of my rotation. This is much easier when you first begin raiding, since you may be oom more often (apply water shield if SR is on CD) or your hit is so low you receive less MW stacks.
Sadly enough amongst all the commotion I forgot to keep my weapons enchanted.
Truly being a hybrid, learning to use my MW to heal if needed, learning to drop WOA if I was the only melee, or hell even dropping FT if there was no other shaman/ele.
And just generally understanding the timing of the bosses to maximize dps
Float Life a Butterfly, Sting like a Bee.
The Birds, the Bees, and the Butterflies. 