Shaman has long been a class that has struggled with its identity. Shaman has cycled through various levels of playability, and for a long time Shaman was mostly known for RNG spells, such as Lightning Storm, Crackle, Elemental Destruction, and more recently Devolve.
The other consistent part of shaman's identity has been overload. The classic set has many overload cards, but only a few of them are strong, these being Lightning Storm which has seen play in many shaman decks over the years, and Lightning Bolt, which has seen play in both aggro and control shaman. Other classic shaman overload card have seen sparing play, such as Lava Burst.
Of late however, the overload mechanic seems almost forgotten. In the current standard sets, excluding classic/ basic there are only 4 overload cards, and 2 overload synergy cards. These are;
Shaman currently has one archetype, shudderwock shaman, which is questionably viable. And while it runs some overload cards, they are in no way a build-around. And before the witchwood, the only semi-viable archetype for shaman was evolve shaman. Evolve shaman threw all overload cards out the window, and with it, shaman's class identity.
I personally wish that blizzard would embrace overload for shaman, so that it can return to its classic identity and shake off things like murloc and freeze synergies.
And frankly, returning overload to a core part of shaman wouldn't really limit the cards blizzard can print. Blizzard simply need to print 2-3 overload cards each expansion, and some sort of overload synergy card every other expansion. Even with only the few overload cards that exist in standard currently, an almost viable deck (crusher shaman) exists that can leverage overload to create game winning board states. Printing a few more overload cards in the next set could give shaman a powerful archetype that rings true with the class identity, something that has been lost over time.
What are your thoughts about overload as a mechanic? Should blizzard continue printing about 1 card per set, return the mechanic to a core of shamans identity, or scrap the mechanic altogether?
The thing is, in the beginning of the game, when Overload was a major part of Shaman, Shaman was one of, if not the, weakest class in the game. If done right, I think that Overload Shaman could work and be a thing but Blizzard might be worried that they might mess up and make Shaman a weak class once again.
Shaman has long been a class that has struggled with its identity. Shaman has cycled through various levels of playability, and for a long time Shaman was mostly known for RNG spells, such as Lightning Storm, Crackle, Elemental Destruction, and more recently Devolve.
The other consistent part of shaman's identity has been overload. The classic set has many overload cards, but only a few of them are strong, these being Lightning Storm which has seen play in many shaman decks over the years, and Lightning Bolt, which has seen play in both aggro and control shaman. Other classic shaman overload card have seen sparing play, such as Lava Burst.
Of late however, the overload mechanic seems almost forgotten. In the current standard sets, excluding classic/ basic there are only 4 overload cards, and 2 overload synergy cards. These are;
Volcano
Drakkari Defender + Snowfury Giant
Crushing Hand + Lesser Sapphire Spellstone
Zap!
Shaman currently has one archetype, shudderwock shaman, which is questionably viable. And while it runs some overload cards, they are in no way a build-around. And before the witchwood, the only semi-viable archetype for shaman was evolve shaman. Evolve shaman threw all overload cards out the window, and with it, shaman's class identity.
I personally wish that blizzard would embrace overload for shaman, so that it can return to its classic identity and shake off things like murloc and freeze synergies.
And frankly, returning overload to a core part of shaman wouldn't really limit the cards blizzard can print. Blizzard simply need to print 2-3 overload cards each expansion, and some sort of overload synergy card every other expansion. Even with only the few overload cards that exist in standard currently, an almost viable deck (crusher shaman) exists that can leverage overload to create game winning board states. Printing a few more overload cards in the next set could give shaman a powerful archetype that rings true with the class identity, something that has been lost over time.
What are your thoughts about overload as a mechanic? Should blizzard continue printing about 1 card per set, return the mechanic to a core of shamans identity, or scrap the mechanic altogether?
The thing is, in the beginning of the game, when Overload was a major part of Shaman, Shaman was one of, if not the, weakest class in the game. If done right, I think that Overload Shaman could work and be a thing but Blizzard might be worried that they might mess up and make Shaman a weak class once again.
Shaman has no future the way the game is now. Either they will feast with op shit from expansions or be total shit when they don't get good cards.