Dwarf shaman

At a glance

• Confirmed as a new race and class combinationConfirmed
• Gives the Alliance shaman in the vanilla era for the first timeConfirmed
• Wildhammer dwarves have long-standing shamanic tradition in Warcraft loreConfirmed
• Alliance raids gain access to totems — windfury in particular reshapes melee groupsSpeculative
• Whether it is framed as Wildhammer specifically or dwarves generallyUnknown

How to read these labels. Confirmed — Stated by Blizzard at BlizzCon or in official material. Strong signal — Datamined, or consistent across every previous Classic launch. Usually right. Speculative — Our read. Reasoned, but not fact, and we will say so when it turns out wrong. Unknown — Nobody has said. We are not going to pretend otherwise.

Windfury changes Alliance melee

The practical consequence is one totem. Windfury Totem has been the reason Horde melee groups out-damage Alliance ones for the entire history of Classic, and it has never been available to the Alliance in this era. Putting shaman on dwarves quietly removes the biggest PvE argument for playing Horde.

If you are choosing a faction for raid performance rather than for friends, this and the Forsaken paladin change are the two facts that matter — and they largely cancel the traditional asymmetry out.

The lore is easy here

Unlike Forsaken paladins, dwarf shaman need no explanation. The Wildhammer clan has practised shamanism in Warcraft lore for decades; the only surprise is that it took this long to become playable in a vanilla-era client.

What we need from beta

Whether dwarf racials — historically Stoneform, and a fear-resistance niche — combine well with the rebuilt shaman trees, and whether the class arrives with all three specs intact or with the enhancement rework the class has always needed.

Related

• Forsaken paladin
• Skyborne shaman