What are a shaman's weaknesses?

* No Crowd Control. A shaman has no crowd control or the ability to temporarily remove enemy mobs or players from combat.

* Hybrid healing. While a shaman can heal, the class does not have the level of heals that a druid or priest has access to. Unlike a priest, a shaman has no insta-cast heals or shields and has no aggro-minimizing spells or talents.

* Mana usage. Shaman are one of the worst class for mana efficiency. A shaman's heals are less efficient than other healers' and the damage spells burn more mana per damage than other casters. As well, shaman generally have smaller mana pools than casters at the same level. Therefore, mana conservation is a key to playing a shaman well.

* Totems. Totems, while the source of the shaman's uniqueness and strength, is also a weakness. Totems are easy for mobs and players to kill. Totems left behind can aggro mobs which will attack the totem's creator. Totems will also indirectly increase the aggro radius of a shaman because each totem has its own aggro radius.

* Cost. A fully trained shaman at level 60 has spent 226g20s10c according to the numbers on Thottbot. That's higher than a druid (215g2s71c), who has three forms worth of training to purchase. (I don't know if this is different now after a few patches ago, but I don't feel like checking).