Builds
Table of Contents
- Welcome, read First
- Class Tree
- Hotfixes applied on 28/02/23 (NA) and 01/03/23 (EU):
- Primordial Surge Builds
- Wildfire Builds
- Lightning Builds
Welcome, read First
This page aims to display and discuss the recommended and most widely-used Builds available to Elemental. This is not an exhaustive list of all options and does not imply that any build not shown here is automatically terrible/unplayable.
In practical terms we cannot account for every build variation and effort has been largely focused on the highest performing / most popular builds. If you find something that you feel works or performs better than what is listed here feel free to contact the team on Storm, Earth & Lava Discord or Earthshrine #Elemental Channel
Class Tree
It is also important to note that Shamans’s class tree does not include DPS increase except for:
- Fire and Ice and Nature’s Fury
- Totemic Recall and Call of the Elements with Liquid Magma Totem talented in the spec tree.
- Frost Shock with Icefury talented in the spec tree. Frost Shock is recommended in all builds anyway just as a movement global.
That’s it. All other talent are purely defensively and utility oriented, making our tree very flexible in the actual choices we get.
Here is a list of some talents that are recommended to get in every situation :
- Astral Shift and Planes Traveler, our defensive CD.
- Spiritwalker’s Grace and Graceful Spirit for movement.
- Gust of Wind or Spirit Walk for movement.
- Ancestral Guidance for party wide healing support.
More situational talents picks:
- Defensive:
- Nature’s Guardian and Ancestral Defense and Elemental Warding are good sustain passives.
- Earth Elemental is a bad defensive since its CD is so long, but it’s a defensive CD nonetheless and has good value in many situation.
- Earth Shield is a good sustain talent, just remember to refresh it when it falls off. It’s also annoying to get since we almost never press Chain Heal.
- Brimming with Life is a terribly designed talent that incites us to save Reincarnation for more max HP. It is still better than nothing for an increase in survivability and overall Reincarnation uses.
- Healing Stream Totem, paired with Swirling Currents, is a fire and forget heal assistance on the GCD. It’s not bad but certainly not great.
- Movement:
- Thunderous Paws is great for small burst of mobility and slow dispel, Spirit Wolf is a great “long-distance” movement tool.
- Wind Rush Totem is a good group movement talent.
- Nature’s Swiftness is great to get an extra movement Global. Best used on Elemental Blast in ST, Chain Lightning in AoE and Healing Surge when low on health.
- Utility:
- Totemic Focus is great for both Wind Rush Totem duration and Liquid Magma Totem width.
- Mana Spring Totem is better in raid content than it is in party, but good nonetheless.
- Purge and Cleanse Spirit are perfect examples of good talents that are purely situational and can be skipped in many builds, and picked only when needed.
- Capacitor Totem, Hex, Earthgrab Totem or Thunderstorm are situational Crowd Control talents.
Hotfixes applied on 28/02/23 (NA) and 01/03/23 (EU):
First and foremost, they do not appear to have any impact on rotational priority from initial testing. This includes but is not limited to:
- Icefury buffed Frost Shocks in AoE and Single target, for the builds that take Flux Melting you should continue to treat it like a filler only. (Note: when playing Electrified Shocks it produces the same result in single target to care or not care about Icefury buffs, this was consistent across the most popular build types that include it)
- Stormkeeper usage. Despite the buff to Lightning Bolt there has been no change to how we consume Stormkeeper buffs on varying target counts.
- For those using Mountains Will Fall builds remember the priority has not changed, the build just has less sources of Lava Surge procs relative to the alternative Windspeaker’s Lava Resurgence build.
- Some players were already including Icefury with Electrified Shocks into the Wildfire builds (trading for them), this choice gained some ground with the buff to baseline Frost Shock damage and the maelstrom gains of Icefury buffs.
Primordial Surge Builds
Most notably aimed more at the Single Target profiles these variants are used when you need to focus on boss damage by using the inherent strength of combining Primordial Surge and tools like Deeply Rooted Elements and/or Windspeaker’s Lava Resurgence to increase the value and frequency of Lava Surge. Turning your Elemental Blast and Lava Burst into powerhouses.
Click on a build banner to expand it.
Primordial Surge with Windspeakers
What does this build do?
This build works around the damage of Lava Burst and Elemental Blast, supported by the idea of Primordial Wave ‘windows’. As the name suggests this is predominately aimed at single target but due to taking Lava Surge, Magma Chamber and Primordial Wave it will naturally benefit from a couple of additional targets.
What does it look like?
Standard build
Elemental Equilibrium is usually the best single point to get for a Single Target fight. Be sure to sim for your best option.
LMT Variant
Liquid Magma Totem can be used on fight with some adds to gain some cleave but where the only thing that matters is Single Target (such as Sennarth).
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Mastery / Haste » Versatility = Crit
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- Straightforward loop: cast your cooldowns, use Lava Burst, use Elemental Blast, Icefury and Frost Shock become improved filler spells.
- Don’t forget that Windspeaker’s Lava Resurgence provides a Lava Surge proc after each Elemental Blast! Use these immediately afterwards in all cases!
- Icefury and Frost Shock become movement-enabling globals when more than one target is present.
- Due to elements like Primordial Surge and its supporting talents you should continue to utilize Lava Surge procs even if you end up facing multiple targets.
- Earthquake replaces Elemental Blast at 4 or more targets.
- Deeply Rooted Elements procs do not impact rotation priority and should be read the same regardless. In practice this means ‘filler’ spells like Icefury and buffed Frost Shock are eliminated when Deeply Rooted Elements procs happen unless you have to move because Lava Burst will always be available during them. You will also continue to spend maelstrom on Elemental Blast as usual.
- If talented, use Liquid Magma Totem on CD if no adds are going to spawn soon.
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from pull
1 Target Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active, even if this would make you overcap maelstrom!
- Elemental Blast if you have Lava Burst on at least one charge, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Frost Shock if you have Icefury buff active
- Icefury
- Lightning Bolt
2 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 2 or more targets it is less than ideal.
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on both targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast if you have Lava Burst on at least one charge, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
3 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 3 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast if you have Lava Burst on at least one charge, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
4 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 4 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
5+ Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 5 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
Primordial Surge with Further Beyond
What does this build do?
This build works around the damage of Lava Burst and Elemental Blast, supported by the idea of Primordial Wave ‘windows’. As this build takes Deeply Rooted Elements and extends to Further Beyond a fair amount of its power comes from maximizing Lava Burst usage, particularly Lava Surge, to have the most chances at gambling Deeply Rooted Elements which Primordial Surge naturally assists with.
What does it look like?
Standard build
Elemental Equilibrium is usually the best single point to get for a Single Target fight. Be sure to sim for your best option.
LMT Variant
Liquid Magma Totem can be used on fight with some adds to gain some cleave but where the only thing that matters is Single Target (such as Sennarth).
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste » Mastery > Versatility = Crit
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- This variant includes Further Beyond which will inevitably increase the pull-to-pull variance in your damage that you see in-game and is not simulated with movement in mind when using default Patchwerk sims, this means it may not be the proper choice in real raid scenarios if you’re looking to do the most damage and more importantly if you need to do that damage consistently and reliably! It is however extremely fun to manage procs and highroll, best of luck to you!
- Straightforward loop: cast your cooldowns, use Lava Burst, use Elemental Blast, Icefury and Frost Shock become improved filler spells.
- Icefury and Frost Shock become movement-enabling globals when more than one target is present.
- Due to elements like Primordial Surge and Deeply Rooted Elements with its supporting talents you should continue to utilize Lava Surge procs even if you end up facing multiple targets.
- Earthquake replaces Elemental Blast at 4 or more targets.
- Lava Beam replaces Lava Burst at 4 or more targets.
- Further Beyond makes you value maelstrom generation very highly during AoE, which displaces regular Lava Burst casts entirely at 4+ targets. This is predominately a single-target build so AoE is not its main function.
- If talented, use Liquid Magma Totem on CD if no adds are going to spawn soon.
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from pull
1 Target Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active, even if this would make you overcap maelstrom!
- Elemental Blast if you have Deeply Rooted Elements proc active to extend duration
- Elemental Blast if you are approaching ~135 maelstrom after your current cast to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst
- Frost Shock if you have Icefury buff active
- Icefury
- Lightning Bolt
- Elemental Blast is only listed when Deeply Rooted Elements proc or maelstrom overcap would happen because you want to enter these procs with as high maelstrom as possible due to Further Beyond, in an ideal world you would only spend during Deeply Rooted Elements procs but inevitably you will need to avoid overcapping outside of these procs as well.
2 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 2 or more targets it is less than ideal.
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on both targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast if you have Deeply Rooted Elements proc active to extend duration
- Elemental Blast if you are approaching ~135 maelstrom after your current cast to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
- Frost Shock if you have Icefury buff active and need to move
- Icefury if you expect to move soon and Spiritwalker’s Grace is not available, otherwise do not use.
3 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 3 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast if you have Deeply Rooted Elements proc active to extend duration
- Elemental Blast if you are approaching ~135 maelstrom after your current cast to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
4 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 4 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Beam if Deeply Rooted Elements proc is active and you will finish the cast
- Chain Lightning
5+ Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 5 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Beam if Deeply Rooted Elements proc is active and you will finish the cast
- Chain Lightning
Primordial Surge with Mountains will Fall
What does this build do?
This build works around the damage of Lava Burst and Elemental Blast, supported by the idea of Primordial Wave ‘windows’. This build effectively swaps Windspeaker’s Lava Resurgence or Further Beyond for Mountains Will Fall, which reduces the perceived complexity from this build allowing you to focus more completely on the Lava Surge provided by Primordial Surge and effective spending of maelstrom.
What does it look like?
Standard build
Elemental Equilibrium is usually the best single point to get for a Single Target fight. Be sure to sim for your best option.
LMT Variant
Liquid Magma Totem can be used on fight with some adds to gain some cleave but where the only thing that matters is Single Target (such as Sennarth).
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste / Mastery > Versatility = Crit
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- Straightforward loop: cast your cooldowns, use Lava Burst, use Elemental Blast, Icefury and Frost Shock become improved filler spells.
- Icefury and Frost Shock become movement-enabling globals when more than one target is present.
- Due to elements like Primordial Surge and Deeply Rooted Elements with its supporting talents you should continue to utilize Lava Surge procs even if you end up facing multiple targets.
- Earthquake replaces Elemental Blast at 4 or more targets.
- Deeply Rooted Elements procs do not impact rotation priority and should be read the same regardless. In practice this means ‘filler’ spells like Icefury and buffed Frost Shock are eliminated when Deeply Rooted Elements procs happen unless you have to move because Lava Burst will always be available during them. You will also continue to spend maelstrom on Elemental Blast as usual.
- If talented, use Liquid Magma Totem on CD if no adds are going to spawn soon.
- Liquid Magma Totem’s periodic damage scales dynamically with haste, therefore it can be used to setup a pull by applying Flame Shock before gaining the Splintered Elements haste buff without losing out on too much potential damage. You should still aim to use Liquid Magma Totem while having the Splintered Elements haste buff or Bloodlust/Heroism if possible, but don’t lose setup time for it.
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from pull
1 Target Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active, even if this would make you overcap maelstrom!
- Elemental Blast preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Frost Shock if you have Icefury buff active
- Icefury
- Lightning Bolt
2 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 2 or more targets it is less than ideal.
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on both targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
- Frost Shock if you have Icefury buff active and need to move
- Icefury if you expect to move soon and Spiritwalker’s Grace is not available, otherwise do not use.
3 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 3 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
4 Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 4 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Beam if Deeply Rooted Elements proc is active and you will finish the cast (if you will not, revert to Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
5+ Targets Priority
If you find yourself using this build on 5 or more targets it is less than ideal
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lava Beam if Deeply Rooted Elements proc is active and you will finish the cast (if you will not, revert to Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
Primordial Surge with Stormkeeper
What does this build do?
This is a Single Target build that allows Regular AoE Burst. It is best used on fights like Eranog or Dungeon like Court of Stars. This build works around the damage of Lava Burst and Elemental Blast, supported by the idea of Primordial Wave ‘windows’. But it also uses Stormkeeper and Surge of Power to empower our burst potential, both in ST and in AoE. This build can be harder to play effectively as it requires you to play around both Primordial Wave ‘windows’ and the combination of Surge of Power with Stormkeeper.
What does it look like?
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste / Mastery > Versatility = Crit
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
- Mastery has very good synergy with both Mountains Will Fall and Lava Burst.
Rotation
Key Notes
- This build is best used on single target fights with regular Adds spawns or burst windows.
- Surge of Power is there to amplify what you’re already aiming to do at different target counts which can be quite handy, whilst it is appreciable that Elemental Blast reduces the value gained from Surge of Power due to being more expensive and producing less buffs overall - this is only true for the 1-4 target range and the value added is still positive, AoE value from Surge of Power is unaffected at 6+ targets.
- 1-2 Targets = Lightning Bolt (or Lava Burst on Deeply Rooted Elements procs)
- 3-5 Targets = Flame Shock if and only if you need to move and Surge of Power buff happens to be up and no Icefury buffs remain
- 6+ Targets = Chain Lightning whenever possible
- Surge of Power will also make you want to delay casting Stormkeeper on 1-2 targets or 6+ targets in order to benefit from their combined effects.
- Due to elements like Primordial Surge and Deeply Rooted Elements with its supporting talents you should continue to utilize Lava Surge procs even if you end up facing multiple targets.
- Earthquake replaces Elemental Blast at 4 or more targets.
- Liquid Magma Totem is included for its raw damage, don’t start to spread Flame Shock unless you have to move - in which case it remains a good movement global.
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~4.5 seconds from pull
1 Target Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Stormkeeper if you have an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Primordial Wave if it is available (maintain Flame Shock at all time)
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active, even if this would make you overcap maelstrom!
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buffs are active
- Elemental Blast if you are approaching ~85 maelstrom after your current cast to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst
- Elemental Blast, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Lightning Bolt if Stormkeeper is active
- Lightning Bolt
2 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Stormkeeper if you have an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Primordial Wave if it is available (maintain Flame Shock on both target at all times)
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Elemental Blast if you are approaching ~85 maelstrom after your current cast to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst
- Elemental Blast, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper is active
- Chain Lightning Note:
- Playing around Power of the Maelstrom procs is dps neutral, but generally it will be easier and less likely to negatively impact your performance if you ignore them - sometimes you will get lucky and have one during your Stormkeeper burst though!
3 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one and Surge of Power spreads it!
- Stormkeeper if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Elemental Blast, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
4-5 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one and Surge of Power spreads it!
- Stormkeeper if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
6+ Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Maintain Flame Shock as many targets as possible, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one (Do not use Surge of Power to spread it!
- Stormkeeper if it is available and you have at least enough maelstrom to cast Earthquake after to Surge of Power buff the charges!
- Chain Lightning or Lava Beam when Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Surge of Power buff
- Chain Lightning or Lava Beam if Surge of Power buff is active
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
Wildfire Builds
Predominately aimed at M+ content these build variants focus on the power of Flame Shock and its supporting talents to deal AoE damage, all variants include Deeply Rooted Elements by default as the build spends a lot of its time using the Lava Surge procs it generates so it provides a lot of value on average but is not the focus of the build - if desired you can swap this point to a more consistent option.
Click on a build banner to expand it.
Wildfire "Full" AoE
What does this build do?
We heard you like Flame Shock and Lava Surge so this build is entirely committed to the idea of maintaining Flame Shock on multiple targets and utilizing all the benefits associated with consuming Lava Surge.
Staples of wildfire as a M+ include Skybreaker’s Fiery Demise, Splintered Elements, Stormkeeper. There are more swaps you could make within this archetype like Surge of Power swapped for Aftershock which significantly simplifies your perceived gameplay, but in reality is weaker in most ways so all the variants below use Surge of Power.
What does it look like?
There are multiple possible variants of this build that do not include rotational priority changes, these will all play similarly and you can choose between them based on personal preference and/or sim results. The 4 builds linked below are, at least in my opinion, the ‘standard’ setups with one taking Improved Flametongue Weapon with Power of the Maelstrom, another opting to go for Flow of Power and Swelling Maelstrom, another one playing Searing Flames instead of Echo Chamber and the last one simply taking Icefury and Electrified Shocks.
Standard build without Elemental Blast
The standard build for a non-Elemental Blast build.
Swelling Maelstrom Variant
Swelling Maelstrom will give you more room to effectively use your Surge of Power and pool Maelstrom.
Searing Flames Variant
For better overall Maelstrom generation.
Icefury Variant
Icefury gives use some cleave in low target count and flows nicely for Maelstrom generation.
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste / Crit > Mastery / Vers
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- If targets will survive for a while you will want Flame Shock ticking on them, don’t forget to monitor this particularly on higher keys where you can get real value!
- Liquid Magma Totem’s periodic damage scales dynamically with haste, therefore it can be used to setup a pull by applying Flame Shock before gaining the Splintered Elements haste buff without losing out on too much potential damage. You should still aim to use Liquid Magma Totem while having the Splintered Elements haste buff or Bloodlust/Heroism if possible, but don’t lose setup time for it.
- Surge of Power is there to amplify what you’re already aiming to do at different target counts which can be quite handy
- 1-2 Targets = Lightning Bolt
- 3-5 Targets = Flame Shock if and only if you need to spread Flame Shock, otherwise ignore and waste Surge of Power buffs.
- 6+ Targets = Chain Lightning whenever possible, if you have to move then using a buff on Flame Shock is fine too
- Surge of Power will also make you want to delay casting Stormkeeper on 1-2 targets or 6+ targets in order to benefit from their combined effects.
- Deeply Rooted Elements procs do not really change the priority of what you’re doing, they mainly act to provide value from not having to manually refresh your current Flame Shock dots and that translates into more Chain Lightning casts which leads to more Earthquake casts. Note: Lava Beam replaces Chain Lightning in the priority when Deeply Rooted Elements procs are active but you should ensure you have enough time to finish the cast inside the Deeply Rooted Elements buff otherwise the cast will cancel.
- It can be tempting to try and use every Lava Surge proc during mass AoE but generally you’re going to use them when you have to move when AoEing or when you’d have enough maelstrom to Earthquake afterwards which benefits from Master of the Elements. This strikes a better balance between fishing for Deeply Rooted Elements procs and reliably good AoE damage. Feel free to prioritize Lava Surge more if a priority target is up and needs to die fast!
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from boss pull
AoE openers are less rigid than boss openers. Keep in mind that these will change simply based by what cooldowns you have available on a pull-by-pull basis and you should aim to maximize the value from what is available at that time. Here are some general rules:
- Pool maelstrom at the end of a current pull to have resources available at the start of the next pull, this dramatically improves the consistent performance from pull-to-pull and eases the feeling of ‘ramp’ time in the rotation.
- Though spreading Flame Shock to multiple targets is good, it should not be viewed as a requirement to reach 6 before doing damage in all cases. In cases where you have Liquid Magma Totem and Totemic Recall available, this is quite achievable, in cases where you don’t you should be prepared to trigger Splintered Elements’s effect with 4-5 targets. If you have maelstrom left from a previous pack (and you should!) this process becomes more fluid and you can spread Flame Shock whilst the tank is gathering mobs.
- On pulls that include 6+ targets it is ideal to have Surge of Power active for both charges of Stormkeeper and given the maelstrom generated you can cast Earthquake twice between them, this means that if you do not have maelstrom from a previous pack you may need to hold Stormkeeper until slightly later in the pull or simply forego this value in favor of using Stormkeeper without Surge of Power.
- Avoid placing Liquid Magma Totem prematurely, if the tank does not have sufficient aggro then its possible for it to be killed directly by mobs which greatly reduces its value
1 Target Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 83 maelstrom (without Power of the Maelstrom or 80 with Power of the Maelstrom). This ensures you can buff both charges.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Primordial Wave if it is available and no additional targets will be available soon
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not
- Lava Burst if Deeply Rooted Elements proc is active. Note: if you have to move you will still cast Earth Shock as below, and continue to follow the priorities above!
- Earth Shock preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Icefury
- Lava Burst
- Lightning Bolt
- Refresh Flame Shock or cast Frost Shock when moving
Note: You do not play around Power of the Maelstrom procs in single target.
2 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on both targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 83 maelstrom (without Power of the Maelstrom or 80 with Power of the Maelstrom. This ensures you can buff both charges.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Primordial Wave if it is available and no additional targets will be available soon
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom buff is active
- Icefury
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
3-5 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Stormkeeper if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not (Note: do not do this against 5 or more targets unless moving)
- Icefury (Note: do not do this against 5 or more targets unless moving soon)
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
6+ Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Stormkeeper if it is available and you have at least enough maelstrom to cast Earthquake after to Surge of Power buff the charges!
- Chain Lightning or Lava Beam when Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Surge of Power buff
- Chain Lightning or Lava Beam if Surge of Power buff is active
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
Wildfire with Elemental Blast
What does this build do?
We heard you like Flame Shock and Lava Surge so this build is entirely committed to the idea of maintaining Flame Shock on multiple targets and utilizing all the benefits associated with consuming Lava Surge. These variants of Wildfire also include Elemental Blast for its high power in single target and low target scenarios with relatively minor impact on total AoE value.
Staples of wildfire as a M+ include Skybreaker’s Fiery Demise, Splintered Elements, Stormkeeper. There are more swaps you could make within this archetype like Surge of Power swapped for Aftershock which significantly simplifies your perceived gameplay, but in reality is weaker in most ways so all the variants below use Surge of Power.
What does it look like?
There are multiple possible variants of this build that do not include rotational priority changes. They will all play similarly and you can choose between them based on personal preference and/or sim results. The two variants shown above are the common builds that include Elemental Blast in a Wildfire setup - this is not the only way. The structure is similar to the variants without Elemental Blast so learning how Elemental Blast changes the rotation is the only real barrier. You might also want to include Nature’s Swiftness in the class tree if the cast time of Elemental Blast is a hindrance to you.
Standard build
The standard build.
Icefury Variant
Icefury gives use some cleave in low target count and flows nicely for Maelstrom generation.
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste / Crit > Mastery / Vers
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- If targets will survive for a while you will want Flame Shock ticking on them, don’t forget to monitor this particularly on higher keys where you can get real value!
- Liquid Magma Totem’s periodic damage scales dynamically with haste, therefore it can be used to setup a pull by applying Flame Shock before gaining the Splintered Elements haste buff without losing out on too much potential damage. You should still aim to use Liquid Magma Totem while having the Splintered Elements haste buff or Bloodlust/Heroism if possible, but don’t lose setup time for it.
- Surge of Power is there to amplify what you’re already aiming to do at different target counts which can be quite handy, whilst it is appreciable that Elemental Blast reduces the value gained from Surge of Power due to being more expensive and producing less buffs overall - this is only true for the 1-4 target range and the value added is still positive, AoE value from Surge of Power is unaffected at 6+ targets.
- 1-2 Targets = Lightning Bolt
- 3-5 Targets = Flame Shock if and only if you need to spread Flame Shock, otherwise ignore and waste Surge of Power buffs.
- 6+ Targets = Chain Lightning whenever possible, if you have to move then using a buff on Flame Shock is fine too
- Surge of Power will also make you want to delay casting Stormkeeper on 1-2 targets or 6+ targets in order to benefit from their combined effects.
- Deeply Rooted Elements procs do not really change the priority of what you’re doing, they mainly act to provide value from not having to manually refresh your current Flame Shock dots and that translates into more Chain Lightning casts which leads to more Earthquake casts. Note: Lava Beam replaces Chain Lightning in the priority when Deeply Rooted Elements procs are active but you should ensure you have enough time to finish the cast inside the Deeply Rooted Elements buff otherwise the cast will cancel.
- It can be tempting to try and use every Lava Surge proc during mass AoE but generally you’re going to use them when you have to move when AoEing or when you’d have enough maelstrom to Earthquake afterwards which benefits from Master of the Elements. This strikes a better balance between fishing for Deeply Rooted Elements procs and reliably good AoE damage. Feel free to prioritize Lava Surge more if a priority target is up and needs to die fast!
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from boss pull
AoE openers are less rigid than boss openers. Keep in mind that these will change simply based by what cooldowns you have available on a pull-by-pull basis and you should aim to maximize the value from what is available at that time. Here are some general rules:
- Pool maelstrom at the end of a current pull to have resources available at the start of the next pull, this dramatically improves the consistent performance from pull-to-pull and eases the feeling of ‘ramp’ time in the rotation.
- Though spreading Flame Shock to multiple targets is good, it should not be viewed as a requirement to reach 6 before doing damage in all cases. In cases where you have Liquid Magma Totem and Totemic Recall available, this is quite achievable, in cases where you don’t you should be prepared to trigger Splintered Elements’s effect with 4-5 targets. If you have maelstrom left from a previous pack (and you should!) this process becomes more fluid and you can spread Flame Shock whilst the tank is gathering mobs.
- On pulls that include 6+ targets it is ideal to have Surge of Power active for both charges of Stormkeeper and given the maelstrom generated you can cast Earthquake twice between them, this means that if you do not have maelstrom from a previous pack you may need to hold Stormkeeper until slightly later in the pull or simply forego this value in favor of using Stormkeeper without Surge of Power.
- Avoid placing Liquid Magma Totem prematurely, if the tank does not have sufficient aggro then its possible for it to be killed directly by mobs which greatly reduces its value
1 Target Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 75 maelstrom and did not take Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff. This will enable you to buff one of your Stormkeeper charges.
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 124 maelstrom with Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Primordial Wave if it is available and no additional targets will be available soon
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Elemental Blast preferably with Master of the Elements buff active, to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Lava Burst if Deeply Rooted Elements proc is active.
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not
- Icefury
- Lava Burst
- Lightning Bolt
- Refresh Flame Shock or cast Frost Shock when moving
Note: You do not play around Power of the Maelstrom procs in single target.
2 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on both targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 75 maelstrom and did not take Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff. This will enable you to buff one of your Stormkeeper charges.
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 124 maelstrom with Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Primordial Wave if it is available and no additional targets will be available soon
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Elemental Blast preferably with Master of the Elements buff active, to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not
- Icefury
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom buff is active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
3 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon
- Stormkeeper if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Elemental Blast preferably with Master of the Elements buff active, to avoid overcapping
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
4 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon
- Stormkeeper if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is active and Electrified Shocks debuff is not
- Icefury
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
5 Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon
- Stormkeeper if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use
- Chain Lightning if Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Master of the Elements buff active!
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
6+ Targets Priority
- Fire Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Maintain Flame Shock on all targets at all times, don’t forget Primordial Wave applies one!
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon
- Stormkeeper if it is available and you have at least enough maelstrom to cast Earthquake after to Surge of Power buff the charges!
- Chain Lightning or Lava Beam when Stormkeeper buff is active, preferably with Surge of Power buff
- Chain Lightning or Lava Beam if Surge of Power buff is active
- Primordial Wave if it is available
- Lava Burst if Lava Surge buff is active
- Earthquake preferably with Master of the Elements buff active
- Chain Lightning if Power of the Maelstrom and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Beam if Master of the Elements buff is active and you will finish the cast
- Lava Burst if Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Lava Burst
- Chain Lightning
Lightning Builds
Exactly what it says on the tin, for the friends with a penchant for Lightning! Lightning offers a great way to cater to multiple damage profiles, rarely sacrificing single target for AoE. It also plays differently to the fire builds, placing much more emphasis on Chain Lightning to generate quickly at high target counts.
Click on a build banner to expand it.
Lightning with Mountains will Fall
What does this build do?
This build focuses on the power of Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning and Elemental Blast with Echoes of Great Sundering. It seeks to empower these effects with supporting talents like Electrified Shocks, Storm Elemental, and Lightning Rod. This build will be for you if you are not a fan of Flame Shock dot management or random effects that can swing your damage like Deeply Rooted Elements, effectively being a solid and consistent way of dealing damage that is flexible to all target counts - the more targets the better!
What does it look like?
Note:
- You can build this without Elemental Blast instead taking Flash of Lightning, if you do not like Elemental Blast.
- You may also prefer to include Nature’s Swiftness in the class tree if the cast time of Elemental Blast is a hindrance to you.
- Liquid Magma Totem is preferred over Tempest (gained via Primal Elementalist) because of its overall value being far higher over the course of a key, Primal Elementalist is only preferable on single target.
- You may substitute Surge of Power for Aftershock for comfort but it is substantially worse on single target (which is still relevant on bosses in M+!) and worse on 6+ (reliability is key, the gap alters as you add more targets in favor of Aftershock. If you make this substitution simply ignore any line that shows Surge of Power; Aftershock has no impact upon priority!
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste / Crit > Mastery / Vers
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- Master of the Elements is mainly to path to Liquid Magma Totem, once you hit 3 targets any sort of gaming the Master of the Elements buff becomes extremely bad, in practice this also makes the points spent in Power of the Maelstrom near worthless however they are also needed for Echo Chamber & Mountains Will Fall
- Lightning Rod applies to your current target when it does not have an active buff. Earthquake has some ‘smart’ applications to apply to off-targets but results can vary. It is suggested when you are comfortable enough to do so to incorporate target swapping after each spender to increase the value gained from Lightning Rod. If done poorly (i.e. too early in the learning process) this can produce negative results, master the basics then add complexity!
- Liquid Magma Totem is included for its raw damage, don’t start to spread Flame Shock unless you have to move - in which case it remains a good movement global when Icefury buffed Frost Shock aren’t available.
- Surge of Power is there to amplify what you’re already aiming to do at different target counts which can be quite handy, whilst it is appreciable that Elemental Blast reduces the value gained from Surge of Power due to being more expensive and producing less buffs overall - this is only true for the 1-4 target range and the value added is still positive, AoE value from Surge of Power is unaffected at 6+ targets.
- 1-2 Targets = Lightning Bolt
- 3-5 Targets = Flame Shock if and only if you need to move and Surge of Power buff happens to be up and no Icefury buffs remain
- 6+ Targets = Chain Lightning whenever possible
- Surge of Power will also make you want to delay casting Stormkeeper on 1-2 targets or 6+ targets in order to benefit from their combined effects.
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from boss pull
AoE openers are less rigid than boss openers. Keep in mind that these will change simply based by what cooldowns you have available on a pull-by-pull basis and you should aim to maximize the value from what is available at that time. Here are some general rules:
- Lightning Rod is a rather significant buff to your AoE burst via Stormkeeper, where possible try to ensure at least one Lightning Rod buff is running on a target prior to using Stormkeeper charges!
- Pool maelstrom at the end of a current pull to have resources available at the start of the next pull, this dramatically improves the consistent performance from pull-to-pull and eases the feeling of ‘ramp’ time in the rotation.
- On pulls that include 6+ targets it is ideal to have Surge of Power active for both charges of Stormkeeper and given the maelstrom generated you can cast Earthquake twice between them, this means that if you do not have maelstrom from a previous pack you may need to hold Stormkeeper until slightly later in the pull or simply forego this value in favor of using Stormkeeper without Surge of Power.
- Avoid placing Liquid Magma Totem prematurely, if the tank does not have sufficient aggro then its possible for it to be killed directly by mobs which greatly reduces its value
1 Target Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Flame Shock if the debuff has faded or will in ~5 seconds
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 124 maelstrom with Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is up and Electrified Shocks debuff is not active or will fade before next cast
- Icefury
- Lava Burst if you have 63 or more maelstrom and Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Elemental Blast if Master of the Elements buff is active
- Lightning Bolt
Note:
- You do not play around Power of the Maelstrom procs in single target.
- You do not play around Echoes of Great Sundering buffs in single target.
2 Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 125 maelstrom with Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Flame Shock on one target if the debuff has faded or will in ~5 seconds
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is up and Electrified Shocks debuff is not active or will fade before next cast
- Icefury
- Lava Burst if you have 50 or more maelstrom, Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active but Master of the Elements buff is not
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Burst if you have 63 or more maelstrom, Echoes of Great Sundering and Master of the Elements buffs are not active
- Elemental Blast if Master of the Elements buff is active and Echoes of Great Sundering is not
- Chain Lightning
Note:
- Playing around Power of the Maelstrom procs is dps neutral, but generally it will be easier and less likely to negatively impact your performance if you ignore them - sometimes you will get lucky and have one during your Stormkeeper burst though!
3 Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is up and Electrified Shocks debuff is not active or will fade before next cast
- Elemental Blast if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is not active
- Icefury
- Chain Lightning
4-5 Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active
- Elemental Blast if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is not active
- Chain Lightning
6+ Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if you have 50 maelstrom and Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active or 75 maelstrom and Echoes of Great Sundering is not active
- Chain Lightning if Surge of Power is active
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active
- Elemental Blast if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is not active
- Chain Lightning
Lightning with Skybreaker's Fiery Demise
What does this build do?
This build focuses on the power of Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning and Elemental Blast with Echoes of Great Sundering. It seeks to empower these effects with supporting talents like Electrified Shocks, Storm Elemental, and Lightning Rod. This variant of Lightning includes Skybreaker’s Fiery Demise to further empower your Liquid Magma Totem per-use value in addition to increasing the uptime of Storm Elemental which gets more relevant when pulling high target counts as the majority of your time is spent pressing Chain Lightning when you hit 5 or more targets. This means that movement globals or Surge of Power buffs between 3-5 targets can be very beneficial despite Flame Shock not being the main focus.
What does it look like?
Note:
- You can build this without Elemental Blast instead taking Searing Flames, Primordial Wave or even Echo of the Elements (to improve its 1-2 target profile).
- You may also prefer to include Nature’s Swiftness in the class tree if the cast time of Elemental Blast is a hindrance to you.
- Liquid Magma Totem is preferred over Tempest (gained via Primal Elementalist) because of its overall value being far higher over the course of a key, Primal Elementalist is only preferable on single target. Whilst this build does utilize more Flame Shock than other Lightning variants it will generally not be worthwhile to run Primal Elementalist simply because it is opportunity costed against Liquid Magma Totem.
- You may substitute Surge of Power for Aftershock for comfort but it is substantially worse on single target (which is still relevant on bosses in M+!) and worse on 6+ (reliability is key, the gap alters as you add more targets in favor of Aftershock. If you make this substitution simply ignore any line that shows Surge of Power; Aftershock has no impact upon priority!
Stats
Always remember to sim your current options appropriately
- Raidbots
- For more information How Does Elemental Sim?
Simplified
This is quick and dirty, your sims will take priority in your gearing process.
- Haste / Crit > Mastery / Vers
- Remember that generally Haste will make the rotation easier to execute and further improve your ability to adapt to movement so will always be a solid stat to go for, and more flexible than Mastery given Haste is also very good in all AoE-focused builds
Rotation
Key Notes
- Master of the Elements is mainly to path to Liquid Magma Totem, once you hit 3 targets any sort of gaming the Master of the Elements buff becomes extremely bad.
- Lightning Rod applies to your current target when it does not have an active buff. Earthquake has some ‘smart’ applications to apply to off-targets but results can vary. It is suggested when you are comfortable enough to do so to incorporate target swapping after each spender to increase the value gained from Lightning Rod. If done poorly (i.e. too early in the learning process) this can produce negative results, master the basics then add complexity!
- Liquid Magma Totem is included for its raw damage, don’t start to spread Flame Shock unless you have to move - in which case it remains a good movement global when Icefury buffed Frost Shock aren’t available.
- Surge of Power is there to amplify what you’re already aiming to do at different target counts which can be quite handy, whilst it is appreciable that Elemental Blast reduces the value gained from Surge of Power due to being more expensive and producing less buffs overall - this is only true for the 1-4 target range and the value added is still positive, AoE value from Surge of Power is unaffected at 6+ targets.
- 1-2 Targets = Lightning Bolt
- 3-5 Targets = Flame Shock if and only if you need to move and Surge of Power buff happens to be up and no Icefury buffs remain
- 6+ Targets = Chain Lightning whenever possible
- Surge of Power will also make you want to delay casting Stormkeeper on 1-2 targets or 6+ targets in order to benefit from their combined effects.
Opener
Follow the cast sequence below for your opener. A red arrow indicates the time the boss is pulled. Please note that openers are a very minor and nit-picky increase (or sometimes decrease!), and adapting to the fight is much more important.
~3.5 seconds from boss pull
AoE openers are less rigid than boss openers. Keep in mind that these will change simply based by what cooldowns you have available on a pull-by-pull basis and you should aim to maximize the value from what is available at that time. Here are some general rules:
- Lightning Rod is a rather significant buff to your AoE burst via Stormkeeper, where possible try to ensure at least one Lightning Rod buff is running on a target prior to using Stormkeeper charges!
- Pool maelstrom at the end of a current pull to have resources available at the start of the next pull, this dramatically improves the consistent performance from pull-to-pull and eases the feeling of ‘ramp’ time in the rotation.
- On pulls that include 6+ targets it is ideal to have Surge of Power active for both charges of Stormkeeper and given the maelstrom generated you can cast Earthquake twice between them, this means that if you do not have maelstrom from a previous pack you may need to hold Stormkeeper until slightly later in the pull or simply forego this value in favor of using Stormkeeper without Surge of Power.
- Avoid placing Liquid Magma Totem prematurely, if the tank does not have sufficient aggro then its possible for it to be killed directly by mobs which greatly reduces its value
1 Target Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon. (using Totemic Recall is dps neutral in single target, and could be considered a good movement global if none are available and it would not negatively impact the next use)
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 124 maelstrom with Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Flame Shock if the debuff has faded or will in ~5 seconds
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is up and Electrified Shocks debuff is not active or will fade before next cast
- Icefury
- Lava Burst if you have 63 or more maelstrom and Master of the Elements buff is not active
- Elemental Blast if Master of the Elements buff is active
- Lightning Bolt
Note:
- You do not play around Power of the Maelstrom procs in single target.
- You do not play around Echoes of Great Sundering buffs in single target.
2 Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if you have at least 125 maelstrom with Swelling Maelstrom or an active Surge of Power buff and at least 46 maelstrom. This will enable you to buff both of your Stormkeeper charges if you cast Lava Burst before your second Elemental Blast cast.
- Lightning Bolt if both Stormkeeper and Surge of Power buffs are active
- Lightning Bolt if Surge of Power buff is active
- Flame Shock on both targets if the debuff has faded or will in ~5 seconds
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is up and Electrified Shocks debuff is not active or will fade before next cast
- Icefury
- Lava Burst if you have 50 or more maelstrom, Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active but Master of the Elements buff is not
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering and Master of the Elements buffs are active
- Lava Burst if you have 63 or more maelstrom, Echoes of Great Sundering and Master of the Elements buffs are not active
- Elemental Blast if Master of the Elements buff is active and Echoes of Great Sundering is not
- Chain Lightning
Note:
- Playing around Power of the Maelstrom procs is dps neutral, but generally it will be easier and less likely to negatively impact your performance if you ignore them - sometimes you will get lucky and have one during your Stormkeeper burst though!
3 Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Flame Shock to maintain debuffs if Surge of Power buff is active (see note below)
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active
- Frost Shock if Icefury buff is up and Electrified Shocks debuff is not active or will fade before next cast
- Elemental Blast if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is not active
- Icefury
- Chain Lightning
Note:
- Flame Shock maintenance is dps neutral on 3 targets, and only when Surge of Power buffs are utitlised for it - the opportunity cost of not casting Icefury buffed Frost Shock or Chain Lightning is high!
4-5 Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Flame Shock if Surge of Power buff is up and you can refresh/apply two
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active
- Elemental Blast if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is not active
- Chain Lightning
Note:
- Icefury becomes a dps loss at 4 or more targets, you can use it when you know movement will be needed and it serves as a reduction in loss incurred by movement. Try to utilize Spiritwalker’s Grace where possible.
6+ Targets Priority
- Storm Elemental if it is available and there is no reason to hold its use.
- Liquid Magma Totem if it is available and no additional targets soon.
- Stormkeeper if you have 50 maelstrom and Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active or 75 maelstrom and Echoes of Great Sundering is not active
- Chain Lightning if Surge of Power is active
- Earthquake if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is active
- Elemental Blast if Echoes of Great Sundering buff is not active
- Chain Lightning
Note:
- At these target counts ignoring Flame Shock was better than playing around it, given Surge of Power buffs are far stronger with Chain Lightning - rely on Liquid Magma Totem and movement globals to apply Flame Shock.