1. Spells

Useful Damaging spells for a shadow priest:

• Vampiric Touch (VT, dot)
• Devouring Plague (DP, dot)
• Shadow Word: Pain (SW:P, dot)
• Mind Blast (MB, direct damage)
• Mind Flay (MF, Channeled)
• Shadow Word: Death (SW:D, Instant Cast hurts self if it doesn’t kill target)
• Shadow Fiend (SF, dps CD and mana return)
• Mind Sear (MS, AOE, All your faces will melt)

Utility Spells for a shadow priest:

• Dispersion (DS, Damage Reduction and Mana return)
• Vampiric Embrace (VE, health returned as a % pain you dish out)
• Inner Fire (IF, boost to spell power and armor)
• Divine Spirit (DS, Boost to Spirit)
• Power Word: Fortitude (PW:F, boost to Stamina)
• Prayer of Shadow Protection (SP, shadow resistance)
• Shadow Form
  (SF, the whole reason to play this class, we look frickin baddass and so do our mounts CAUTION: TOOLTIP MAY BLOCK OUT SUN)
• Silence (For advanced players only)
• Psychic Horror (PH, for extremely advance players only and fun comes with a personal FU tag for opponents in PVP)

I’ll assume you’re at 80 for this discussion. If you’re not quite there yet, I can build a leveling guide as well, but it basically sounds like this: get spirit tap, get shadow form, attack everything on your screen and race someone to 80. You should win.

2. Builds:

Basic 80 Raiding Build
Maximizes dps with one extra point to place in desired spot. Most choose Focused mind for mana effeciency, some choose Inner Focus minor mana effeciency and crit boost, Few choose Psychic Horror entertainment

Pro Face Melter Build (4P tier 10 + comparable gear)
Thanks to the 4P t10 bonus MF produces roughly equal amounts of damage as MB, sometimes more, sometimes less depending on buffs and haste level. Its usually about the same. Regardless, with the value of them being roughly equal, you are free to pick up utility spells that may help you in raiding

I play with shitty tanks build:
Consider including this.

To be continued…

Please note: This page is a work in progress. I’ll be updating it over time.

Key

K: Kitty | T: Tank | R: Resto | B: Balance

Ice Crown Citadel | The Lower Spire:

Lord Marrowgar [?]

K | T | R | B :: Marrowgar’s Scratching Choker (neck)
K | T | R | B :: Shawl of Nerubian Silk (cloak)

Lady Deathwhisper [?]

K | T | R | B :: Soulthief’s Braided Belt (belt)
K | T | R | B :: Scourgelord’s Baton (off hand)
K | T | R | B :: Whispering Fanged Skull (trinket)
K | T | R | B :: Chestguard of the Frigid Noose (chest)
K | T | R | B :: Boots of the Frozen Seed (boots)

Gunship Battle [?]

K | T | R | B :: Abomination’s Bloody Ring (ring)
K | T | R | B :: Cord of Dark Suffering (belt)
K | T | R | B :: Midnight Sun (dagger)
K | T | R | B :: Muradin’s Spyglass (trinket)

Deathbringer Saurfang [?]

K | T | R | B :: Leggings of Unrelenting Blood (legs)
K | T | R | B :: Mag’hari Chieftain’s Staff (staff)
K | T | R | B :: Saurfang’s Cold-Forged Band (ring)
K | T | R | B :: Scourge Stranglers (hands)
K | T | R | B :: Soulcleave Pendant (neck)

Ice Crown Citadel | The Plagueworks:

Festergut [?]

K | T | R | B :: Abracadaver (Staff)
K | T | R | B :: Plague-Soaked Leather Leggings (Legs)
K | T | R | B :: Wrists of Septic Shock (bracers)
K | T | R | B :: Cloak of Many Skins (cloak)
K | T | R | B :: Precious’s Putrid Collar (neck)
K | T | R | B :: Signet of Putrefaction (ring, Alliance)

Rotface [?]

K | T | R | B :: Chestguard of the Failed Experiment (chest)
K | T | R | B :: Choker of Filthy Diamonds (neck)
K | T | R | B :: Lockjaw (1h mace)
K | T | R | B :: Shaft of Glacial Ice (staff)

Professor Putricide [?]

K | T | R | B :: Discarded Bag of Entrails (head)
K | T | R | B :: Pendant of Split Veins (neck)
K | T | R | B :: Unidentifiable Organ (trinket)

Ice Crown Citadel | The Crimson Hall:

Blood Prince Council [?]

K | T | R | B :: Hersir’s Greatspear (pole arm)
K | T | R | B :: Taldaram’s Soft Slippers (feet)
K | T | R | B :: Heartsick Mender’s Cape (cloak)
K | T | R | B :: Cerise Coiled Ring (ring)

Queen Lana’thel [?]

K | T | R | B :: Ivory-Inlaid Leggings (legs)
K | T | R | B :: Shoulderpads of the Searing Kiss (shoulders)
K | T | R | B :: Seal of the Twilight Queen (ring)

Ice Crown Citadel | The Frostwing Hall

Valithiria Dreamwalker [?]

K | T | R | B :: Sister Svalna’s Aether Staff (staff)
K | T | R | B :: Skinned Whelp Shoulders (shoulders)
K | T | R | B :: Sister Svalna’s Spangenhelm (head)
K | T | R | B :: Lich Wrappings (slot)

Sindragosa [?]

K | T | R | B :: Bleak Coldarra Carver (dagger)
K | T | R | B :: Vambraces of the Frost Wyrm Queen (bracers)
K | T | R | B :: Icicle Shapers (hands)
K | T | R | B :: Rimetooth Pendant (neck)

Ice Crown Citadel | The Frozen Throne:

The Lich King [?]

K | T | R | B :: Halion, Staff of Forgotten Love (staff)
K | T | R | B :: Valius, Gavel of the Lightbringer (Staff)
K | T | R | B :: Tainted Twig of Nordrassil (Staff)

Defense Min:

defense rating to become uncritable
Druid : 0. 3/3 Survival of the Fittest reduces chance to be crit by 6%

All other classes :
For raids (level 83 mobs): 689 rating gives 140 defense skill for 540 total defense.
For heroics (level 82 mobs): 665 rating gives 135 defense skill for 535 total defense.
For dungeons (level 81 mobs): 640 rating gives 130 defense skill for 530 total defense.
For trash mobs (level 80 mobs): 616 rating gives 125 defense skill for 525 total defense.

NOTES: mob chance to crit = 5 + (.02 * #levels above yours). Player base defense = 5 * level. Each point of defense skill above base reduces chance to be crit by .04%. ~4.921 defense rating = 1 defense skill. 82 resilience rating = 1% crit reduction (but does not increase dodge, block, and parry, like defense does)

Block Cap

102.5% (Miss + Parry + Dodge + Block)
(Notes: base chance to miss is 5%. Agi contributes to dodge. 39.35 Dodge rating = 1% dodge. 16.39 Block rating = 1% block. 49.18 Parry rating = 1% to parry.)

Raid Hit Cap (level 83 mobs):

Casters: 446 hit rating
(removes 17% miss rate)
Mages, Warlocks, Shadow Priests, Moonkin, Elemental Shaman, Ehancement Shaman

Melee: 263 hit rating for single weilding
(removes 8% miss rate). Includes using 1 2H.
Prot/Arms Warriors, Ret Paladins, Druids and Hunters

Melee: 919 hit rating for dual wielding
(removes the 28% miss rate)
Rogues, fury Warriors**, DW Deathknights, Enhancement Shaman

Heroic Hit Cap (level 82 mobs):

Caster: 158 hit rating
(removes 6% miss rate).

Melee: 197 hit rating for single wielding
(removes 6% miss rate).

Melee: 820 hit rating for dual wielding
(removes 25% miss rate).

Dungeon Hit Cap (level 81 mobs):

Caster: 132 hit rating
(removes 5% miss rate).

Melee: 181 hit rating for single wielding
(removes 5.5% miss rate).

Melee: 804 hit rating for dual wielding
(removes 24.5% miss rate).

Trash and PVP Hit Cap (level 80 mobs):

Caster: 105 hit rating
(removes 4% miss rate).

Melee: 164 hit rating for single wielding
(removes 5% miss rate).

Melee : 788 hit rating for dual wielding
(removes 24% miss rate).

(Notes: for melee: 32.8 hit rating = 1% miss removed. For casters: 26.23 rating = 1% miss removed. when you mouse over your HIT number on your character screen it will show you your HIT percentage gained from hit on gear. It does not take into consideration hit gained through talents)

Expertise Cap

214 expertise rating to remove the 6.5% dodge rate (equal to 26 expertise skill)
Note: 8.2 expertise rating = 1 expertise skill. 4 expertise skill = 1% dodge removed.
This is a melee only stat. It may make sense for tanks to go above this cap, as expertise will also reduce parry chance. Since each boss has a different parry %, the “cap” for tanks will be different for each boss. This does not apply to dps, since they should always be behind the boss, where there is 0% chance for parry.

Prot Warr: Vitality gives 6 expertise skill (~32 rating)
Fury Warr: Weapon mastery gives 8 expertise skill (~64 rating)
Druid: Primal Precision gives 10 expertise skill (~80 rating)

Hit Rating

The most important stat for an elemental shaman (and most raiding classes period) is Hit Rating. The cap for hit rating on level 83 (raid boss mobs) is 17%, or 446 rating. You should have spec’d into Elemental Precision, which means you only need 14% hit on your gear, or from other raid buffs. The following buffs give you hit rating:

Heroic Presence – 1% (Alliance only, All draenei)
Misery – 3%** (Shadow Priests)
Improved Faerie Fire – 3%** (Balance Druid)
** Misery and Improved Faerie Fire DO NOT STACK!

If your raid contains these buffs/debuffs, this leaves 263 hit rating on gear for Alliance, and 289 hit for horde. Until you are hit capped, you should gear, gem, and enchant mainly for +hit rating (26.232 hit rating = 1% hit). As a base reference, these are your stat priorities for gear and enchants.

Stats

Hit > Spell power > Haste > Crit > Int

Hit: HIGH to NO priority- Ss the best stat point to point until it caps, then becomes useless. Try to hit as close to cap as possible without going under.

Spell power: HIGH priority- Gives most DPS per point. Prioritize this on gear above other DPS stats, no questions asked. Gives a return to ALL spells at any gear level.

Haste: MEDHIGH to HIGH priority- Haste starts out as a good stat and becomes an amazing stat as your gear gets better. Haste is always a better stat point for point than crit UNTIL your bread-and-butter nuke, Lightning Bolt, hits the one second cap. Until then, it is always better to gear for haste above crit.

Crit: MEDIUM priority- The lowest of our true DPS stats. It gives returns to all but one spell but doesn’t stack nearly as well as spell power and haste do. Only prioritize this above haste assuming your Lightning Bolt is capped at or below a one second cast time.

Elitist Jerks and other resources are saying you need 20% haste rating to get those rotations just right. Haste is starting to be the number 2 spot, right after hit for the “must have in stats”, so it goes – 17% Hit, 20% Haste, and then stack up for +spell damage. What they are saying is, the faster or more dps you dish-out, you will have a greater improvement…And you don’t want to forget about your Wrath of Air Totem, this grants you 5% spell haste.

Rotations:

Fixed Rotations

The fixed rotation is based on a set number of spells in a set order. An example of this would be the 8/1 Fireball/Scorch rotation of Fire mages (or Frostfire/Scorch for the Frostfire builds). Generally the rotation will be FS, LvB, CL/LB filler, LvB, CL/LB filler, and repeat. CL can be used 2-4 times in this rotation, depending on cooldown management. CL is useful here in that it can help reduce that “filler” time to allow the next LvB to be cast sooner. Also, with a fixed rotation you are likely to clip 1-2 ticks of the Flame Shock dot.

Waiting for Cooldowns

There are two methods of handling the cooldowns in a fixed rotation. The first (No-Wait) is to simply ignore the fact that cooldowns may be coming up soon, and use the best spell available. The advantage is that there is no wasted time, but you may be pushing the next LvB use out past the 8 second cooldown, reducing DPS. Whereas the second method involves waiting for the next cooldown (be it CL or LvB). The downside of waiting for cooldowns is that it is a fine line between wasting too much time, and letting cooldowns go unused. Ideally, the best solution is to swap between the two based on your own judgement.

Priority Rotation

In a priority rotation, there is no set cast order (this is a concept that has been used by Shadow Priests for some time now). All you do is use the highest priority spell that is available. Generally, this will be FS>LvB>CL>LB, although it should be noted that Flame Shock should be recast, and clip the last tick, if Lava Burst will be off cooldown and the cast finishes after the DoT expires.

Earth Shock

There are some people suggesting that Earth Shock be used in rotations as well, with the ES glyph that reduces the GCD when it is used by 1 second. Currently however, this is not functioning correctly, and reduces the GCD to 1 second instead. Even with this fixed, it is still somewhat dubious as to how much of a gain it will be, especially with the 25 yard range (with talents).

Chain Lightning

CL can be used in single target rotations, as it has a slightly higher DPSC (or Damage Per Second Casting) figure than LB. The trade off is that the mana cost is much higher (and disproportiantly so compared to the dps gain). There is also suggestion that using it in place of LB just before the LvB cooldown is up can increase dps as well, and while this is a good point, you would either have to be running a fixed rotation, or be able to discern which spell to use at which point. Generally, I would recommend using a CL in every LvB cooldown that you don’t cast FS in, for either fixed or priority rotations, if you want to do this.

Enchants and Gems:

Enchants:

The following enchants are considered to be the best available in game assuming you are hit capped (Profession based enchants are NOT included here. Most professions [Engineering and Tailoring, I'm looking at you] are direct increases from another enchant or to a previously unenchantable slot)

Cloak – Greater Speed (23 haste rating)
Chest – Powerful Stats (10 to all stats)
Bracer – Superior Spellpower (30 spell power)
Gloves – Exceptional Spellpower (28 spell power)
Boots – Tuskarr’s Vitality (15 stamina and 8% run speed increase)* OR Icewalker (12 critical strike and 12 hit rating)
Weapon – Mighty Spellpower (63 spell power)
Shield – Greater Intellect (25 intellect)
Legs – Sapphire Spellthread (50 spell power and 30 stamina)
Head – Arcanum of Burning Mysteries (30 spell power and 20 critical strike rating) Requires Revered with Faction: Kirin Tor
Shoulder – Greater Inscription of the Storm (24 spell power and 15 critical strike rating) Requires Exalted with Faction: The Sons of Hodir

* It is well debated that the less time you spend moving, the more time you are spending casting. The 8% run speed gives you that little bit of a boost to get you back and DPSing faster.

If you are short of the hit cap, these enchants may be of help with you:

Gloves – Precision (23 hit rating)
Weapon – Accuracy (25 hit and 25 critical strike rating)*

*Enchanting your weapon with hit+crit over spell power can generally be counter productive as the spell power gained from Mighty Spellpower generally outweighs it. I would only recommend this enchant as a last ditch for hit cap. Consider regemming or switching a few pieces of gear around (check those spreadsheets!) before re-enchanting your weapon with Accuracy.

Gems and Gemming:

Meta – Chaotic Skyflare Diamond (+21 Critical Strike Rating and 3% Increased Critical Damage. Requires two blue gems to activate)
Blue – Glowing Dreadstone (12 spell power and 15 stamina) OR Royal Dreadstone (12 spell power and 5 mana every 5 seconds)*
Red – Runed Cardinal Ruby (23 spell power)
Yellow – Reckless Ametrine (12 spell power and 10 haste rating)**

* For DPS, Royal is a slightly better choice in long fights due to the minor increase in MP5 leading to more Chain Lightning casts, though if survivability is your problem then Glowing should be your only option.
** Runed Cardinal Rubies gem better in yellow slots if the socket bonus does not warrant a DPS increase.

Totem relics:

There are only a few relics out there for elemental shaman but I’m going to help you pick up only the best.
A few relics look amazing on paper but are hindered by a high internal cooldown (Totem of the Elemental Plane).
These are your best totems that are readily available to any shaman just hitting 80!

Totem of Electrifying Wind
Totem of Hex
Thunderfall Totem
Totem of the Void (level 70)

Totem of Electrifying Wind comes out above Hex and Thunderfall due to having a low internal cooldown which allows it to be up nearly 100% of the time. Totem of Hex comes up second due to Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning being a much larger percentage of your total damage than Lava Burst. Thunderfall is the third and lowest of the top end totems. Totem of the Void even comes up above the afforementioned Totem of the Elemental Plane due to the maximum possible uptime of it being 33%.

* My Preference would be Totem of Electrifying Wind, the haste you get from this totem is great for your rotations and DPS.

Glyphs:

Major (BiS):

Glyph of Flame Shock – The periodic damage dealt by your Flame Shock can now be critical strikes.
Glyph of Lightning Bolt – Increases the damage dealt by Lightning Bolt by 4%.
Glyph of Totem of Wrath – When you cast Totem of Wrath, you gain 30% of the totem’s bonus spell power for 5 min. (84Spell Power at maximum rank)
Glyph of Lava (Lava is a good option if you already have the tier 9 bonus Conqueror’s Worldbreaker Hauberk) – Your Lava Burst spell gains an additional 10% of your spellpower.

Minor:

Glyph of Thunderstorm – Increases the mana you receive from your Thunderstorm spell by 2%, but it no longer knocks enemies back.

Ideas for Spec:

Most PVE spec’s rarely put points into Improved Ghost Wolf.

Most common spec (Good if you’re still having mana problems on long fights):
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?shaman#169vE8iNOttz,,10894

If you are not having any problems with mana, I would use this spec:
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?shaman#L6d407dD7rZz,,10894,

Don’t max out Convection, Instead add points into Elemental Warding. This will help out the healers in the situation in raid damage or when you make a mistake.

This could be a good PVP spec, if anyone is interested:
http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?shaman#9fZINnO-yM11,,10894

References:

* Elitist Jerks
http://elitistjerks.com/f79/
* MMO Champion
http://www.mmo-champion.com/class-shaman/elemental-shaman-wotlk-faq-and-basic-mechanics-updated-for-3-2!/