Segment 52: Deadly Boss Mods

So now you’re raiding, or at least running instances. It doesn’t matter if you’re raiding old “vanilla WoW” dungeons or Baradin Hold, or anywhere in between; you want to do the best you can, whether you are the tank, a healer, or DPS. That means you need situational awareness, because while a mage doing the safety dance in Naxxramas may be low on the DPS charts, a dead mage is zero DPS.

The NPCs have an advantage over you. They may not be as smart as you (let’s hope not!), but they are inside the computer; there’s no lag between events and their knowledge of those events. Deadly Boss Mods (“DBM”) will help you overcome that advantage.

Right now I have a total of 36 DBM modules installed, including the core module and a totally superfluous “victory sound” module. There are modules for world events, PvP, every existing raid instance, and general modules for Outlands, Burning Crusade, Wrath, and Cataclysm. Other features (cribbed from the DBM Web site) include:

* Boss mods for all raid bosses.
* Colored raid warnings (players will be colored according to their class) with icons – so you will know what’s going on without even reading the message.
* Auto-respond during boss fights. DBM will inform anyone who whispers you during a boss fight that you are busy. These messages contain the name and health of the boss as well as the raid’s status.
* Boss Health-frame: you can enable a simple frame that shows a health bar for all active bosses. This is enabled by default for multi-mob bosses like Four Horsemen.
* Bars can be enlarged with special “notice me!” effects when they are about to expire.
* Crash recovery: you had a disconnect or crash during a boss fight? No problem for DBM! It will request the timer and combat status information from other DBM users in your raid group and you get your timers back.
* Synchronization system for accurate timers.
* No dependencies, no embedded libraries (except for the optional LibDataBroker plugin that embeds LibDataBroker). This means you can use DBM without any other add-ons.
* Modular design – all boss mods are plugins and can be exchanged, removed or updated separately.
* Load on demand – all boss mods are separate AddOns and they will be loaded when they are needed, so they don’t use memory or CPU until you enter the corresponding instance.
* Efficient code: DBM uses less than 250 kb memory and the CPU usage is also very low.
* Special effects like the screen flash effect, huge warning messages and sounds will draw your attention to critical events.
* Bars can change their color over time and flash before they expire.
* Highly customizable: you can change the bar color, size, icon position etc.
* Support for SharedMedia, so you can use any texture for your bars.
* An option to create custom timers, so-called “Pizza Timers” for your pizza or whatever you prefer to eat while raiding. You can also send those timers to your raid group.
* Powerful object-oriented API – you can use it to write your own boss mods!

There are screenshots and a download link, as well as dedicated forums at DeadlyBossMods.com

And you can update DBM with any of the three popular updaters.

Do yourself and your party members a favor; get and use Deadly Boss Mods.

Music for this segment is from FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “Pushing It” by Eric Darken

Download the MP3: Deadly Boss Mods

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NOTE: The status of many add-ons post-patch 4.0.1 can be found at
http://www.wowpedia.org/Cataclysm_AddOn_status

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Segment 51: Old Friends Revisited

Let’s look at the pre-Cata add-ons covered in the Emporium once more, quickly, and see what’s still useful. Any dates referenced here will be 2011 unless otherwise stated.

From the top:
Omen3 – Outdated. I’ve personally moved to Skada.
Carbonite – Updated January 25th.
Decursive – Updated March 4th.
Grid – Use Healbot.
Mage Fever – Updated February 14th. Use Curse to get the latest version.
Lorack’s DK Optimizer – Out of date. Use SpellFlash with the DK module.
DeclineDuel – Out of date but still working.
AchievementSnap – Out of date.
DingRecorder – Out of date.
AuctionLite – Updated January 22d.
Advanced Trade Skill Window – Updated February 9th.
Free Refills – Updated March 7th.
InfiniteIgnore – Updated February 21st.
RankWatch – Outdated and obsolete.
EasySerum – Updated for patch 4.0.1 and should still work.
GoGoMount – updated March 9th, and GoGoPet updated for 4.0.1 in October 2010.
Add-on updaters are updated whenever you run them.
Outfitter – Updated January 8th.
_NPCscan – updated January 23rd.
Parrot – updated February 16th.
WetSpot – Obsolete.
SkillScore – obsolete. Use PlayerScore/GearScore instead.
RaidBuffStatus – Updated March 15th.
ArkInventory – updated February 26th
AutoEmote – still works even though it is long out of date.
AutoProfit is out of date, use AutoProfitX2, updated March 4th, instead.
LightHeaded was updated March 9th.
Leveling Guides – possibly no longer needed with Carbonite and Lightheaded. It’s up to you.
HealBot – updated March 6th. I’ve received email that there may be an issue with the slash command for HB, but I have not had time to investigate.
XtoLevel – updated January 25th.
AutoAspect – out of date. Consider SmartBuff as a replacement.
OmniCC – updated in December 2010 for WoW 4.0.3a
ControlFreak – updated January 4th 2009, but amazingly it still works.
Panda – updated March 5th.
Xloot – updated in December 2010 for Wow 4.0.3a
Talented – updated January 7th.

And at that point we started hitting add-ons by class.

Quick tip: Every add-on you have active uses some memory, so for best performance, only enable add-ons you intend to use.

Music for this segment is from Archive.org and is entitled “Nostalgia of Freedom” by Nicolas Panderis

Download the MP3

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Segment 50: Add-ons for Shaman

I have been informed that, during the per-class segments, I somehow contrived to miss the shaman. Let’s correct that right now.

The shaman is a hybrid support class, providing DPS via spellcasting or melee, or healing. In addition, the shaman can place totems to provide additional benefits to the party or deal additional damage to enemies.

To help your shaman in his chosen role, I’ve put together a list of some well-regarded add-ons. All of these are available from Curse.com – see the segment notes for direct links.

First, we have SpellFlash: ReSham, a module for the SpellFlash add-on. SpellFlash: ReSham will provide visual cues for appropriate spells or abilities duing combat and out of combat. You can easily disable certain talent trees, and also disable it when out of combat.

TribalEnhancement is a lightweight add-on supporting all shaman specs. It provides totem, buff, debuff, and shield tracking using a “least intrusive” philosopy.

Tyler is a Nub is a simple add-on to remind you to reapply your weapon buffs. It also works for rogue poisons and warlock buffs.

SmartRes2 provides intelligent and co-ordinated party and raid wipe recovery. You’ll want every class who can rez to run this add-on, and then hope you never need it.

Lastly, we have Shaman Friend. This add-on is specifically designed for the shaman and provides lots of useful functions for all shaman specs. There are too many to go over here; take a look at the add-on page, as linked in the segment notes.

Music for this segment is from Jamendo.com and is entitled “Deranged” by Fox.

Download the MP3

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Segment 49: AutoBar

AutoBar is a multi-bar add-on that automatically adds potions, water, food, quest items, and other usable things into buttons for quick access.

By default, it creates three new bars: Basic, with such things as your hearthstone, mounts, bandages, potions, trade skills, quest items and trinkets; a Class bar, with primarily non-combat spells and abilities; and Extras, with companion pets, fishing items, and miscellaneous other items on it.

You can move the bars around, change size and alignment, skin them, assign categories to various bars, add new bars, bind keys, and many other things, either using the AutoBar GUI or using the command line in the chatbar.

Since Autobar doesn’t use up any of the built-in action bar slots, it allows you to reserve those for combat abilities, hopefully making you more effective in groups and solo.

You can get AutoBar from WoWinterface.com or from Curse and support is provided at MuffinManGames.com

This segment was inspired by Psycaeda of Destromath.

Music for this segment is from Archive.org and is entitled “Dreamworld” by Brainstorm.

Download the MP3

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Segment 48: Pawn

You’re running 5-mans, trying to gear up so you can level even faster, or run heroics, or raid. You see other people clicking “need” on gear that you think you might want, but you’re not sure if it’s really an “up” for you, and you don’t want to be “that guy.” What do you do? Pawn.

Pawn is an add-on that uses values from Wowhead to quickly compare loot items (or quest reward items) with gear you have equipped, and lets you know if it’s really an “up.” In the case of quest rewards, it will also indicate which item to take to vendor, in the case where none of the items will improve your current outfit.

Pawn can be installed and used immediately without any configuration; or if you’re the hard-core theory-crafting guy who spends days building spreadsheets, reading Elitist Jerks, and who runs Rawr and Atlas Loot, you can customize it for your fine-tuned needs.

Pawn is built to detect your class and optimize gear scores for you; again, you can customize it heavily, but for most players it will be more than adequate as soon as you install it. You can also share your own customizations (called “scales”), and import customizations shared by other players. There’s even a Web site dedicated to sharing them, linked in the segment notes.  And you can set up multiple scales (quite useful for the dual-specced player) and have multiple scores displayed on gear items.

Comparing drops or linked items to your current equipped gear is easy: Just right-click the item’s icon. If you would like to compare items in AtlasLoot, you can set up hotkeys for that purpose (the square brackets are the default, but if you have already bound them to other purposes, you’ll need to choose others).

There’s a pretty comprehensive ReadMe file included with Pawn; it includes almost everything I’ve mentioned here, and more.

One final note, not in the audio segment: the Pawn suggestions for gemming and reforging are also incredibly handy.

You can download Pawn from Curse or install it using Wowmatrix. Other Web sites and add-ons mentioned in this segment are linked in the segment notes at Wowphiles.com.

Music for this segment is from Jamendo.com and is entitled “Pay Attention” by Dead Pawn Company.

If you have a favorite add-on, or you’re looking for an add-on for a specific purpose, please drop me a line via email to AddOns@wowphiles.com or hit me up on Twitter.

Download the MP3

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Segment 45: Custom sounds

Some players play with all of the World of Warcraft sounds turned off; others turn on everything; and some prefer to replace or augment the in-game sounds with custom sound files. This week we’ll look beyond music players, at a couple of add-ons that help you with customizing the sounds in WoW. This segment was inspired by John Trahan. Thanks for your suggestion, John!

Since all of these add-ons use normal MP3 files for their custom sounds, you could easily substitute replacements of your own choice – just put them in the appropriate folder in your add-ons directory tree (look in the folder where the add-on you’re customizing is found) and rename them to replace the ones that came with your add-on. A good source of sound effects MP3s is SoundFXnow.com

GodLike! is an add-on that plays a sound when your spell, heal or melee attack crits. NOTE: Some of the default sounds are definitely not safe for work or around small children. It comes with some Bart Simpson clips that could be used instead, however, and if you’re reading this, you can grab my personal replacement English choices at the bottom of this post.

ComeHere is for Death Knights, and plays Scorpion’s “Come Here” or “Get Over Here” sounds when you use Death Grip.

Chocobo will play one of four random chocobo theme songs when you mount on a hawkstrider of any type. You can also change it to play the song on any mount if you want.

CritSound plays a custom sound each time you crit. Customizing the sounds without replacing the files requires you to edit the LUA file; if you’ve never looked inside a LUA, this is a relatively safe place to get your feet wet. Personally, I’d simply replace the MP3 file.

CoolLevelUp replaces the level up system message by a complete Level Up animation with music and sound displaying what stats you have gained and the new skills you can now learn from your class trainer. It gives you more information than the vanilla WoW level-up message, as well as being more entertaining

Music for this segment is from Ska4U.com and is entitled “You Done Me Wrong” by the Upsessions.

Download the MP3

Replacement English Sounds

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Segment 44: Music Players

This week we’ll look at a few music players that run from within World of Warcraft. If you’ve ever died while tabbed out to change your music, or missed an important message on Ventrilo or TeamSpeak because the music was too loud and you couldn’t change the volume on WinAmp, you may find one (or more) of these to be a godsend. However, for those that require playlist makers, let me warn you NOT to use Curse’s installer; download the ZIP file and install manually, because Curse Client strips out EXE files – which includes the necessary playlist makers.

Music players that run within WoW require you to put your custom music into folders within the WoW directory tree (there’s a way around that, but having tried it, I recommend that you *don’t* try it). And it seems that no two music player authors agree on where you should put your music, so I recommend you settle on which one you want for playing MP3s and stick to that.

Van32′s CombatMusic plays custom MP3 files to (1) replace the in-game Fanfare music; (2) replace the in-game “you died” sound; (3) play your music when you enter combat and (4) play other MP3 files when you enter a boss fight. In my experience, you should probably pick 30-second “ringtone” MP3 files for the Battles list, or you will find yourself wanting to prolong combat. This is not a wise move when you’re solo, and won’t make you popular in groups. It doesn’t require a playlist generator, but the files you want to use must be placed in specific folders and renamed; and you’ll need to tell the player how many Battle songs and Boss songs you have. See the tutorial page for details.

EpicMusicPlayer really is Epic. It plays all of the in-game music as well as your own custom playlist, and includes two playlist generators, one in Visual Basic and the other as an EXE file (which, again, will be stripped out by the Curse client). The visuals are truly epic, as well. This is one worth having just to look at when you’re waiting in a queue. You don’t have to rename your files; if you don’t want to use your own MP3s, you won’t need a playlist at all. Install Guide

MusicPlayer (Sat, Oct 23 2010) is a fairly simple straight-up MP3 player. Unfortunately, it can’t be used without a playlist at all. Visually, it’s unattractive, but it’s simple and it works.

Music for this segment is from FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “Flash Pipe” by Thomas Schneider.

Download the MP3

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In the Wowphiles podcast #54, Modem mentioned three add-ons to help us archeologists, but they didn’t get linked in the show notes,  so here’s where you can get them:

Archy (pronounced like the perennial comic book teenager, “Archie”) is an assistant for Archaeologists that want information at their finger tips.

GatherMate2 and GatherMate2 Data collects Herbs, Mines, Gas Clouds, Artifacts, Fossils and Fishing locations and adds them to the worldmap and minimap. Updated for Cataclysm.

Archeology Helper Draws HUD with GatherMate2 pins, and shows Dig Sites on the Minimap and Battleground Minimap

If you find you need help getting Gathermate working, check out this thread on MMO-Champions.

Happy digging! Oh, and Modem – I wear adamantium-toed boots. No worries!

EDIT: Thanks to Chesterfield, 85 Worgen Druid on Drenden.

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Segment 43: Add-ons for Warlocks

First, let me apologize for being alphabetically-challenged last week, and getting Warrior ahead of Warlock in the add-on rotation.

Warlocks are generally called upon to provide DPS, along with some ancillary tasks like summoning soulwells, creating soulstones, and making coffee. No, wait, that’s mages who make the snacks and beverages. Well, whatever.

As a consequence, one very popular talent spec is Destruction. If you are a Destruction warlock, you’ll probably want Destruction for Dummies. Keeping in mind that this add-on is also meant as an aid for Death Knights, Druids, and Hunters, it provides a visual prompt to tell you what spell you should cast next for a good single-target DPS rotation.

Spellflash: Warlock is, of course, a module for Spellflash, and flashes the spell button for (what should be) your next cast. You may want to experiment and see which style, and which spell rotation, suits you better: Destruction for Dummies, or Spellflash.

Winns Drain Soul tells you when to cast Drain Soul (and nothing else). Useful if you find yourself running out of Soul Shards frequently.

DoTimer (“dot timer”) is actually four add-ons in a single package, for tracking Damage over Time spells, Cooldowns, and PlayerAuras, and managing Notifications. Each sub-add-on can be enabled, disabled, or customized individually.

And for you role-players and just generally chatty warlocks, we have SoulSpeak. SoulSpeak emits random chats and emotes appropriate to various Warlock actions, with messages you can edit for customization.

Music for this segment is from ska4u.com and is entitled “Whip Them Down” by Pauline Black and The Selecter.

Download the MP3

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Segment 42: Add-ons for Warriors

Warriors fall into that World of Warcraft category that can either tank or DPS; with that in mind, we’ll look at a few add-ons that lend themselves to these roles.

First up is TidyThreat, which is a plug-in for TidyPlates. TidyPlates modifies the nameplates you see over the heads of mobs, and TidyThreat makes it instantly clear, using color bars, which mobs are loose, which have aggro on you, and which don’t. It’s easy to switch the color scheme for Tank or DPS, and you can turn on a “detail” window which will tell you who has threat, and how much. If you only want to use one add-on for tanking,, it should be TidyPlates with TidyThreat. The default display is thermometer-like, and it’s incredibly simple; as stated by the author, “If you’re DPSing: Don’t go into the RED! If you’re tanking: Stay in the RED!”

SpellFlash: Warrior is a plug-in for SpellFlash which will flash above your ability buttons, to suggest your next move.

TankadinTps is a threat analyzer for several classes; this is especially useful for the theory-crafting players.

Nutty War Announce is a useful add-on with an unfortunate name; it will display chat text announcements of the warrior’s use of various abilities.

Please see the segment notes for links to the add-ons.

Music for this segment is the Dragon Warrior theme from Realm of Darkness.

Download the MP3

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Segment 41: Add-ons for Rogues

This week we’ll talk about some add-ons for the most versatile of melee DPS classes, the Rogue. In addition to simple DPS, Rogues are often called upon to provide crowd control, scout, open locks, and find traps.

Quick Rogue Info is a customizable set of information frames for rogues. Included are buff and debuff bars, combo points, poison stacks, threat, DPS, player health, target health, energy, and much more! Also, an icon suggests the next ability to cast based on simple rotation rules for all rogue specs. If you have Recount installed, QRI will also display DPS.

Sapper Enhanced is a somewhat less-comprehensive add-on for Rogues with a few different features. If you want something that’s lighter than QRI, give this one a try.

Poison Warner is unique to the Rogue class. It prints a warning in chat and plays a sound to warn you if you are missing a poison or if you have joined an arena or BG with a weapon unequipped.

Finally, we have SpellFlash: Rogue, a module for BigRedBrent’s Spellflash addon. Currently meant for the Mutilation Rogue, it will (as the name implies) flash the action button for the suggested next ability in your rotation.

Music for this segment is from High-Tech.com and is entitled “The Pink Panther” by Henry Mancini, performed by The Ventures.

Download the MP3

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Segment 40: Add-ons for Priests

I’m going to focus primarily on healing priests here, because you guys are the ones that stand back and make sure the rest of us can work. And, of course, sometimes you have to pick us up, dust us off, and send us back into the fight. That’s what Moms, Dads, coaches, and Priests do.

So, without further slobbering…

Healbot Continued is *the* quintessential add-on for healers. If you’re still using Grid, I strongly recommend you give Healbot a try. If you don’t use any other add-ons as a priest, you should use Healbot. There are intensive, in-depth tutorials and commentary for Healbot in multiple languages at healbot.info and even videos. As always, you should check the segment notes for direct links.

SmartRes2 helps you and your fellow healers to coordinate recovery from wipes, when someone gets in over their heads. I did NOT say DPS pulled aggro. Although maybe they did. Ask the tank.

PetTimeToLive lets you Shadow Priests know how much longer your Shadowfiend will be around to distract the mobs. Do you have time to escape, or should you just try to take down as much as you can before you die? PTTL will help you decide.

POM Assist tracks Prayer of Mending casts specifically. If that’s all you think you need to know, POM Assist will take care of that for you.

Music for this segment is from Audiostreet.com and is entitled “Zadok the Priest” by Johann Sebastian Bach, as performed by the WPHS Chorus.

Download the MP3

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This week we’ll look at a few add-ons for Paladins. Keep in mind that in many cases, add-ons are multi-class, so even if you don’t play a pally, it’s worth your time to check out the links in the segment notes to see if there’s anything for your favorite class.

SpellFlash: Paladin is a module for SpellFlash which will flash your action bar when procs happen, to remind you to cast your special abilities as soon as they are ready.

BuffBroker manages your group and personal auras. This add-on will help match your best buffs for your group, and help keep those buffs active on you and your party.

Movable Holy Power helps you track your holy power, moving (and improving) the graphics.

PallyPowerWarn provides warnings when you are missing blessings, seals, auras, or righteous fury. Combine this with BuffBroker and you should never have to worry about getting the right buffs on again.

Ardent Defender is an add-on designed to help Protection Paladins. It has around ten functions; if you are a prot pally, I’d recommend you check out the full description at Curse.

bitPala is a simple add-on to add three bars so you can easily track Beacon of Light, Judgement of the Pure, and Holy Power.

OptiTaunt informs you and your party or raid if your taunting abilites were resisted. It also announces your use of crucial abilities like Hand of Reckoning, Righteous Defense, Avenger’s Shield, and Divine Protection.

Retribution FCFS helper (clcret) is an addon similar to Lorack’s DK Optimizer; it provides visual cues to recommend the best spell or abilitiy for your Ret Pally to use next.

BOLT – Beacon of Light Timer is another add-on to help you keep up your Beacon of Light and Judgement of the Pure.

And for more Pally add-ons, check out this link.

Music is from YouTube.com and is the Theme from Paladin, performed by Johnny Western,  and the instrumental version by Duane Eddy.

For more information about “Paladin” take a look at TV Acres.

Bumpers provided by Scott Johnson of The Instance and Frogpants Studios.

Download the MP3

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This week we’re going to take a look at a few of the add-ons meant for mages, the glass cannons of the World of Warcraft. As always, be sure to get the latest version if you’re going to try these out; out-of-date add-ons may not work at all, or worse, they may do something completely different to what you want. Check out the links in the segment notes for add-on details and dates.

First up, we have ControlFreak. This add-on is meant for crowd control, and it does a very good job keeping you, the mage, focused on this aspect of your job.

Next is Decursive. Decursive is designed to help you cast Remove Curse on the proper target at the proper time.

Mage Fever is a proc and buff notifier for mages. If you have difficulty figuring out when to cast any of the spells that depend on another spell’s proc for maximum effect, Mage Fever will aid you to get the best effect from your rotation.

OmniCC is a simple, lightweight timer that puts impossible-to-miss countdown timers on your spells which are on cooldown.

SmartBuff helps you make sure your buffs are kept up, allows you to manage them for solo or groups, and even reminds you to scarf down that buff food.

Finally, WittyMage is a fun addon (which may annoy those around your toon, so make sure they’re cool with it if you plan to be around them often).

Music for this segment is from FreePlayMusic.com and entitled “Magic Evening” by Dean Barrett and Judy Whittaker.

Download the MP3

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This week we’re going to look at add-ons meant for Hunters and their pets. There are many of them available, and I’m not planning an hour-long segment, so this will just skim the cream off the top, covering one or two of the various types available. For the full list, take a look at Curse; there’s a direct link in the segment notes.

Now, let’s give your pet some love first. If you want to know about how many more boars you’ll have to kill before your pet levels, you’ll want XToLevel. It works for you, too, but I find I am usually wondering more about my spider (named Robinson) than I am about myself. Another useful item for newer hunters is Pet Ability List. It’s exaclty what the name says, but instead of having to Alt-Tab out to a Web site, this list is available in the game. And to avoid finding yourself and your pet suddenly kicked from a raid or other group because your pet pulled aggro off the tank, you’ll want BadPet, to help you remember to turn off Growl (and other taunts).

Now, for yourself, you will probably enjoy HunterHelper, which helps you keep track of Aspects in addition to a handful of pet-related functions. Hunter Got Focus attempts to maximize your DPS by helping you keep Focus, Serpent Sting, and your other abilities working to best effect. Semi Stance & Pet Bar will unlock your Aspect bar and Pet bar so you can put them where you want them; if you’ve been playing a hunter for over a year this may be a very welcome option. StableSnapshot will let you see what pets you have stabled (in case you can’t recall what’s in those 20 slots). TranqShotMonitor will notify you when your Tranquilizing Shot dispells a buff and it will also say which buff has been dispelled.

There are plenty of hunter add-ons; if you visit the Curse page, be sure you sort them by the last update when choosing new ones, so you don’t end up with something that’s already obsolete.

Music for this segemnt is from FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “Big Game Hunter” by Dave Greendale.

Download the MP3

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This week we’ll take a look at add-ons meant specifically for that most versatile of classes, the druids. You really need to look at the blog to get the full benefit of this segment; everything I talk about here is linked in the blog. Be sure, before you try out any add-on, that it has been updated to at least WoW version 4.0.1

Any discussion of druid add-ons must start with the Blizzard official forums, where we find the Druid UI Guide. The Guide includes generic raiding add-ons as well as druid-specific mods.

Also we have the venerable Allakhazam’s recommended druid addons. You will again find general raiding and party add-ons here.

Next up, Feral by Night for feral druids only.

Face Mauler Zwei is in progress, a spell and ability recommendation add-on for feral cat druids while soloing.

BadKitty is a debuff tracker.

DotTracker tracks damage over time spells and reminds you to renew them.

Destruction for Dummies suggests the next spell to cast.

Finally Opthimus Druid UI is a complete widescreen UI package for resto and feral druids.

Remember to try out your add-ons on the target dummies before going into a group situation! As with every class, druid add-ons are subject to errors that could be embarrassing when you’re facing a boss.

Next week, we will look at Hunter add-ons. See you then!

Music for this segment is from FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “Nature” by Tillman Sillescu.

Download the MP3

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Since patch 4.0.1 has been released I have tried out a variety of addons to get my UI to where I feel comfortable with it. It still continues to evolve as old favorites get updated and new addons are developed, but for now this is my current interface.

As you can see from my screenshot I’m a fan of the “put everything on the bottom” approach. I don’t like looking up and down and all around. I prefer to keep everything together at the bottom because for me it helps me focus better.

Now I’m going to break down my UI into pieces and tell you about the addons I’m using. Lets start from the top and work our way to the bottom.

Chocolate Bar

This is a new addon for me since 4.0.1. I had previously been using Fubar, but since it did not get updated I followed a recommendation and tried Chocolate Bar. It does exactly what I want in a simple and clear way: it puts icons for addons and useful information like durability, gold, frame rate and more in a clean bar at the top of my screen.

I love not having to use the Micro Menu for things like frame rate, or have a lot of buttons cluttering up my mini-map.

Some addons put an icon in the bar by default, but for those that don’t you can visit the Wowinterface List of Plugins for it.

Sexy Map

Another new addon for me that I recently added to my collection. It doesn’t look too sexy here because I changed the default look of the addon to a basic square map.

I like how you can only show certain mini map icons, and set it to show others when you hover over the map. I’m also a big fan of having coordinates right there in plain view near my map.

Vuhdo

This has been a main addon of my for over a year now. I use Vuhdo for my raid/party frames, as well as for an easy way to monitor the buffs I use.

The buff bar is vertical by default, but here I made it horizontal and ran it along my Chocolate Bar. You can see the buffs that you use with timers that change color as they are running low and when they run out. It makes raid and party buffing a no-brainer. You can also right-click on the particular buff, such as Blessing of Kings, and select from the available buffs in that category and easily switch it.

For raid and party frames, Vuhdo works very similar to other addons like Healbot, Grid, and now the default Blizzard raid frames. You don’t need to add Clique however, like with Grid or the Blizzard frames.

Using these types of frams is fantastic for all classes, not just healers. As a tank I have it set to show <AGGRO> in big red letters on a frame when someone pulls aggro. Then I can right-click on their frame, because I have right-click bound to Righteous Defense and instantly taunt the mob off of them.

Shadowed Unit Frames

Here’s another new addon to my collection since patch 4.0.1. I used to use Xperl but found it to be a bit heavier on system resources and buggy at times. Based on player recommendations I switched to Shadowed Unit Frames and I’m really happy with it.

Shadowed is fairly easy to configure, relative to other Unit Frame addons, and allows me to customize the look and placement of target, focus, boss, pet frames and more.

I also like the way Shadowed Unit Frames handles Buffs and Debuffs. I prefer to have them near my portrait rather at the top of the screen like the default Blizzard buff bar. Shadowed allows you to customize the size and placement of buffs and debuffs around portraits.

Bartender4

I received some recommendations on other Action Bar addons to switch to, but in the end I decided to keep Bartender. Bartender does exactly what I need for customizing my action bars.

With Bartender I can scale and move bars and customize them as much or little as I like.

Skada

I was looking for a replacement Threat meter since my favorite addon Diamond Threat Meter hadn’t been updated. I just found out that Diamond has recently updated however, so I may replace the threat frame in Skada back to Diamond,

But Skada is a great addon to give you a lot of useful information similar to Recount but allowed me an easy way to separate it into multiple panels such as Damage and Threat.

Diamond Threat Meter

I wanted to add Diamond to the bottom of this list because while I don’t currently have it reinstalled, it has long been my favorite threat meter addon. As a tank I found it easier to see quickly where I stood on threat visually and it worked great for me. I can almost guarantee that the next time I log in to WoW I will be updated and using Diamond once again for my threat meter.

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As I write this, it has now been almost a week since patch 4.0.1 went live. Anyone who has been through a major World of Warcraft patch before knows that this means instability, numerous server restarts and mini-patches, and broken add-ons for several days. For add-ons, it can be even longer, depending on how complex the changes are, and if the add-on developers are still maintaining their products. In this segment, I’m going to interrupt the series devoted to class-specific add-ons and talk about how to handle the current situation.

First, be patient. The World of Warcraft is a huge software undertaking, exceeding even your operating system in complexity. It is, after all, not merely an entire virtual world, but two such worlds, Azeroth and Outland. The mere size of the installation on your hard drive should tell you that much; my Windows 7 Ultimate install folder is less than 20 gigabytes, while my WoW 4.0.1 install takes up close to 28 gigs. Granted, I probably have more screenshots and add-ons than any normal person, but that’s still a huge amount of storage space.

Secondly, be prepared to abandon some add-ons, perhaps even your favorites. Some add-on authors are not going to keep up development. That’s just how life is. You may be able to find replacements, or you may learn to play without them.

Lastly, be very careful when choosing replacements for your add-ons. Sometimes what seems to be the perfect answer turns out to be a nasty surpise just waiting to happen. For example, while I was waiting for the update to AutoProfit, I found and installed LootMagic, which automatically deletes the “least valuable grey item” in your inventory when your bags are full, and you grab more loot. I uninstalled it when it deleted my Chilled Meat.

If you visit the WoWphiles.com Web site and find the Add-On Emporium Summarized, there’s a link at the top to WoWwiki, showing add-on statuses. Not everything is there, but it’s a huge help.

Finally, let me tell you what has been updated that I consider essential: Carbonite and Deadly Boss Mods, two add-ons I feel crippled without. For those who are still awaiting LUI4, you’ll be pleased to know that Xperl seems to be working.

Next week, we’ll move on to Druid add-ons. Suggestions – and update status – are welcome!

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Starting Over,” by D. DiFonzo

Download the MP3

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Segment 34: Add-ons for Death Knights

NOTE: I have not had the opportunity to test these add-ons with 4.0.1 and would appreciate comments from those who have tested them.

In this segment we’ll look at add-ons meant strictly for Death Knights. As you might imagine, most of them are for management of runes and diseases. Since those all perform pretty much the same function, my advice is to try them – one at a time, of course – and see which one provides you with the best fit for your play style.

The rune optimizers are, in no special order:

Lorack’s DK Optimizer
DKiRunes
RuneWatch
Engraved
Acherus
MagicRunes
FaceSmasher (WoWmatrix only)

There are also two which have been recommended by other sites in the past, and which I want to mention simply so you won’t try them and become too attached before Cataclysm is released (and yes, Jason, you’re right, it’s going to be on December 7th). Those are:

SimpleRune (discontinued)
EbonBlade (abandoned)

Finally, we have two that are just for fun; they add audio events for Death Knights:

ServantofArthas
ComeHere

Music for this segment is from FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled ”Flagship Commander” by Patrick Smith

Download the MP3

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Edited for Patch 4.0.1

If you have have made any effort at all to learn about the World of Warcraft achievement system, you are probably aware that there is an achievement for obtaining fifty mounts. There’s another for one hundred mounts. There are also achievements for fifteen pets and for fifty pets. Breanni has even created a guide to the vanity pet achievements over at WarcraftPets.com

But how do you manage all those mounts and pets? What’s the point of having dozens of them if you can’t show them off? Don’t worry! There are two add-ons which are designed to make it a real pleasure to have lots of mounts and pets.

GoGoMount allows you to bind a hotkey, or create a macro, that will randomly choose an appropriate mount and “get it out of your bag” for you. If you are in a no-fly zone, GoGoMount will put you on a ground mount. If you are in a flyable zone, you will mount up on a flying mount. And if you are in the water and have a fast water mount, such as the Sea Turtle, GoGoMount will bring her out for you. A second click dismounts you.

GoGoPet randomizes your vanity pets for you in the same way, choosing a different pet with each click.

While technically out-of-date, both add-ons continue to work and behave well in WoW 3.3.3 [Both have been updated for 4.0.1 now]

4.0.1 note: the macro below will give you the same function as GoGoPet.

You can get GoGoMount through the WowMatrix updater, Curse, or Wowinterface.

GoGoPet seems to be exclusive to Curse.

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Highway Patrol,” by Scott P. Schreer and Eric Roos.

Bumpers are from Frogpants Studios, by Scott Johnson.

BONUS NOTE:
Here’s a macro that will select a mount if you are in a mountable area, or a vanity pet if you are not:

MACRO 53 "GoGoMount" Spell_Magic_PolymorphChicken

/run CallCompanion("CRITTER", random(GetNumCompanions("CRITTER")))
/click GoGoButton

END

The only parts you need are the lines beginning with a slash – the rest are snipped right out of my macro cache file.

Download the MP3

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It’s very possible that Patch 4.0.1 may be going live for World of Warcraft players as soon as October 12. With the patch right around the corner I started thinking about my UI and how major patches tend to completely break it. So this seems to be an optimal time to consider making a complete overhaul to my user interface.

My UI has changed over the years but there are still some aspects of it that I’m not happy with, as well as some keybindings that I would like to change.

I’ve gotten comfortable with the use and layout of my game UI but since so much is changing with Patch 4.0.1, including abilities and rotations, and I will have a bit of a learning curve to get my feet back under me and get comfortable again, I might as well blow up my UI and start over.

Below are addons I am currently using or addons I plan to use strictly for the layout of my interface. Some of the addons I currently use are old and outdated and I would love recommendations for new addons to try.

Action Bars:

Bartender – Bartender is my must have addon. The ease of use and customization of my action bars makes it perfect for me.

Tool Tip:

TipTac – Up until now I’ve been using Tiny Tip, but Tiny Tip hasn’t been updated in a year and therefore might not work in patch 4.0. I’m strongly considering trying TipTac since people have been recommending it.

Buffs/Debuffs

Buffalo – Buffalo is my current addon of choice for a clean simple way to move buffs and debuffs around my screen and resize them to where I like them. But Buffalo also hasn’t been updated in a year. It still works great but I fear a day will come soon when it doesn’t. I’d love recommendations for a light weight simple way to move buffs and resize them.

Mini Map:

Squeenix – Squeenix is a favorite addon of mine for changing my minimap from circle to square and unlocking and moving it wherever I want it.

Detached Mini Buttons – This addon is great for unlocking all the buttons around your mini map and allowing you to move them freely wherever you want. I’m a bit worried about this one also because it hasn’t been updated in a couple years. In case it breaks I may need recommendations on something similar.

Unit Frames

Xperl – I basically only use Xperl these days to move my character portrait and my target’s portrait. I disable just about everything else and still manage to get errors when I try to do things like set focus frames. I’d love an alternative.

Vuhdo - I use Vuhdo like other players use Grid. I use it for raid frames and for an easy way click spells and abilities on players (not just heals). And I also use it as a great way to manage raid and party buffs. As a Paladin I much prefer the Vuhdo buff interface to Pally Power.

Other:
Fubar – I didn’t know exactly where to classify Fubar but this is an addon I have been using for a very long time. I really enjoy having information like durability, gold, location, experience and plenty of other options in a nice thin bar at the top of my screen.

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Segment 33: Essentials for all classes

Starting this week, we’re going to go over the “bare essential” add-ons for each class.

Now, let’s look at what every class should have, in no special order:

1. An inventory management add-on. I prefer ArkInventory.
2. Carbonite. Carbonite is the essential all-in-one add-on that provides so many different functions that the only toon you won’t need it for is your banker. If you play on a PvP server, the ability to detect any opposing-faction players within range is essential and is sufficient justification for this add-on all by itself. Carbonite also provides quest help, a locator HUD (Heads-up display), gathering assistance, data warehousing, data sharing, and much more.
3. _NPCScan detects rare NPCs. Possibly not essential, but if you love those achievements, you really do want this.
4. Speaking of achievements: AchievementSnap to automatically get a screenshot of each of them.
5. AutoProfit for quick and easy sale of grey items.
6. Buffet to auto-generate food and drink macros.
7. DeclineDuel if you have better things to do than duel.
8. DingRecorder while you’re leveling; this is another automatic screenshot add-on.
9. AutoGrats if you’re the social type, and in a Guild.
10. FreeRefills to help make sure you don’t show up to a party without things you really need.
11. Gatherer if you took at least one gathering skill – which you should, it’s like free gold just lying around.
12. GoGoMount once you get your mount.
13. HideBobberTip for fishing.
14. InIg (InfiniteIgnore) because Trade chat is horrible, but sometimes you need it.
15. LightHeaded for Wowhead quest comments in-game.
16. Omen (Omen3 actually) to track threat in parties (including just you and your combat pet).
17. Outfitter to help you quickly change outfits, and to create new ones.
18. Postal, the enhanced mailbox manager.

Now that’s eighteen add-ons. We’ve covered many of them individually in the Emporium already. All of them are easy to find using WoWmatrix or Google.

Next week we’ll start to take a look at each individual class, alphabetically. That means DKs get love first – next week!

Music for this segment is from Archive.org and is entitled “All I Need” by Mandy Thompson.

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“Does this armor make my butt look fat?”

Attention, Death Knights! This is your opportunity to suggest add-ons for the Emporium to look over next week that are specific to your class. I’m looking at you, Modem… And every other DK reading this blog!

Please use the Contact Us page to send me your list of “must-have” add-ons for Death Knights, with a short explanation of why you consider each one essential. Alternately, you may Tweet me @Icesnake1950 or contact me through Google.

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Segment 32: Talented

One of the most important character customization means in World of Warcraft is the Talents tree. While Blizzard’s default Talents UI is usable, it’s not possible to see all three branches at the same time, nor can it easily import or export talent builds. This is where Talented comes in.

Talented replaces the default Talent UI and adds a lot of useful features. The first is obvious; you get to see the entire Talent tree in a single frame. Most of the rest are not as obvious, and I advise you to look at the Talented page on WoWinterface for more hints. Here are some of the important features:

• View and easily switch to your alternate spec (requires that you purchase dual spec first, naturally).
• Use templates both for characters and for hunter pets.
• Create a template for a full talent build, and use it while leveling to reach your goal.
• Apply complete talent builds to a “blank slate” with a single click after one of Blizzard’s talent wipes.
• Share your talent builds and templates easily, and import and export from and to the major online talent calculators.
• Talented will show you another character’s alt spec (if they have one) when you inspect them.
• Talented has an independent Glyph frame.
• Talented allows you to compare two templates side-by-side

If talents are important to your character (and believe me, they are!) , Talented will help you get the most out of your talent tree build time.

You can get Talented through WoWmatrix, or from WoWinterface or Curse.

Music for this segment is provided by FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “It All Leads To This” by Franklin Enea and Tomas Cataldo.

Download the MP3

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Segment 31: Panda and Xloot

Xloot is a replacement for the default loot frame, with a few options. The one we are specifically interested in here prevents the loot window from appearing at all if you have autoloot turned on. The slash command is:

/xloot behavior swiftloot

Panda is another of the many add-ons from Tekkub. Originally mean for disenchanting, it has been expanded to include prospecting, gem cutting, herb milling, glyphs, flasks, and elixers, and a quick view of AuctioneerAdvanced prices. My tests were performed using the disenchanting function.

When you launch Panda, it will present a window the size of the Auction House window, containing everything (that will fit) that you can disenchant (or brew up, or whatever, depending on your professions). There is a checkbox to include soulbound items. Then you simply click on the items to disenchant. However, unless you have Xloot installed, the window will close each time; with Xloot, you can disenchant every item in the window, one after another. This is where you have to be very careful; if you have “show soulbound items” checked, you could accidentally shard your best gear if you aren’t paying attention.

You can get both Panda and Xloot from wowinterface.com

Music for this segment is from FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “China Wall” by Jim Klein and Scott P. Schreer.

Download the MP3

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ControlFreak is a small crowd control assist add-on. It provides a small frame for fast click-casting of CC spells onto the player’s focus target. It also provides visual cues of the focus’s status and audio cues of CC breaks.

ControlFreak is designed to be an “install and go” add-on for all classes with sustainable CC spells, but it also provides direct access to edit the macro used by the frame for players that want to extend it’s functionality. As of this writing, the latest version is still missing the Hunter “fear beast” and Warlock “fear” spells, but is still quite functional. I may take a stab at adding them myself, since the macro code in this add-on is readily editable.

Using ControlFreak is very easy, and it provides obvious visual clues as to status.

First, target the mob your plan to control. Click the ControlFreak button to set focus. The button turns green, and the word “ready” is overlaid on it.

You can now target something else for DPS, and when you click ControlFreak’s button again, your CC spell will be cast on the focus target; the button will turn blue and indicate “Controlled” with a countdown timer until your spell wears off.

If someone breaks control, the button will again change, and the word “Loose” will appear on it.

If your focus target is dead, the button turns grey and says “Dead.” You can clear focus by shift-clicking the button.

For users who want a macro instead of clicking on the frame, code is provided on ControlFreak’s Web page at WoWinterface, ready to plug right in.

ControlFreak is available from WoWinterface or from Curse. While the last update was in early 2009, this add-on is still working. The Curse version seems to be more out-of-date, however.

Music for this segment is from FreeplayMusic.com and is entitled “Sheep May Safely Graze” by Johann Sebastian Bach.

Download the MP3

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This week will be another “Twofer.” One of our add-ons this week, AutoAspect, is strictly for hunters, so if you don’t have a hunter or don’t care about hunter aspects, you may want to skip ahead. OmniCC, however, is for everyone.

Firstly, AutoAspect. AutoAspect is a fairly simple add-on for hunters that will remind you to switch between Aspect of the Hawk (or Aspect of the Dragonhawk for Level 75 or higher) based on the percentage of mana you have remaining. If you are out of combat, it will plant a big button right in the center of your screen, so you can’t miss it. It also plays the “raid warning” sound and throws up messages in the “error” frame, or optionally using SCT or Parrot. All of AutoAspect’s features can be toggled on and off very easily using slash commands.

You can get AutoAspect from WoWinterface.

Secondly, we have OmniCC. OmniCC adds text to the casting button for items, spells, and abilities that have cooldowns. It’s simple, requires no configuration to get started, and can make a lot of difference in your DPS when you’re waiting for your “nuclear option” to become available, by helping you anticipate the exact moment you can cast it.

OmniCC is also available from WoWinterface, through WoWmatrix, and from Curse.

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Hostile Hunter” by Scott P. Schreer and Pete Calandra.

Download the MP3

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This week I would like to tell you about an add-on that provides information only; it won’t necessarily improve your DPS, HPS, or even your mood, if you’re in a hurry to reach the next experience level. However, XtoLevel is a simple addon that will provides detail about the kills, quests, dungeons, battlegrounds and experience required to gain a level.

After each kill, quest, dungeon or battleground, the exact number required to level of that particular item is displayed on the screen, and optionally in the default chat window. Hunters can see the number of kills required for their pets to gain a level.

An optional small window displaying details about the kills, quests, dungeons, battlegrounds, experience and time remaining to gain a level is also available.

XtoLevel provides data to LDB front-end addons, such as TitanPanel and Fortress.

All of these display features can be configured via the configuration window, which is accessible by either right-clicking the “average” window or by using slash commands.

You can get XtoLevel from WoWinterface or from Curse.

Music for this week’s segment is from Archive.org and is entitled Hot Mittens by the Bucktown 5.

Download the MP3

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Healbot is now the essential tool for raid healers. It allows up to 60 keyboard-mouse combinations to simplify casting; these combinations can include usable items, such as scrolls, potions, trickets, etc., and existing macros. Healbot can also track aggro, buffs, and debuffs, and perform many other functions, including synchronizing incoming heals with other raid or party healers. Healbot can also be used out of combat with the “SmartCast” option, to rez, decurse, buff, heal, or perform a user-defined action. Even more functions are listed on Healbot’s Web page.

Healbot integrates with both Fubar and Titanpanel; optional plugins for both are included.

You can get Healbot Continued through Wowmatrix, from Wowinterface, or from Curse. The author’s page with forums, news, and tutorials can be found at http://look4me.endoftheinternet.org/healbot/

Music for this episode is provided by FreePlayMusic.com and is entitled “Universe” by Paul Andrews.

Download the MP3

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This week we’re going to look at leveling guides; specificly, Zygor’s Leveling Guide, and an alternative.

Let me start off by saying that I emphatically do NOT recommend Zygor’s Leveling Guide, and I’m not going to give you a link to the official Zygor site. If you still want it after listening to this segment, you can find it easily enough.

Zygor’s Leveling Guide is an in-game guide; that means it’s an add-on. It also is sold, not supported by voluntary donations. That means it’s in blatant violation of Blizzard’s terms of service for add-on developers.

I quote:

1) Add-ons must be free of charge.
All add-ons must be distributed free of charge. Developers may not create “premium” versions of add-ons with additional for-pay features, charge money to download an add-on, charge for services related to the add-on, or otherwise require some form of monetary compensation to download or access an add-on.

“Zygor” wants $80 (currently discounted to $60) for this add-on package. Frankly, that’s just too much even if it didn’t violate the TOS.

Zygor’s guide is technically beautiful; it has cute little animations to show that it’s doing something, it gives you waypoint arrows, and it does help you find the necessary quests for leveling. That said, however, it takes up as much add-on memory as the free alternatives which I will outline here, and tends to get in the way when you really don’t need it.

Enough said about that; here’s how you can get all the same functions without spending any money (although I do encourage you to donate to the add-on authors who accept donations):

1. Download and install Carbonite from the Carbonite add-on home page.
2. Download and install Lightheaded (see my previous review, Segment 25, for details) from WoWinterface or other sources.
3. Open your favorite Web browser (which I sincerely hope is not Internet Explorer) and go to Jame’s Leveling Guides.

Another option is to go to WoW-pro.com and get the WoW-pro leveling add-on.
You will still need Lightheaded and TomTom also.

In order for any leveling guide to be effective, you really need to start using it as soon as you create a new toon; but the Jame’s guides make it somewhat easier to start in the middle (after making a few levels) than Zygor does (another plus for freeware/donationware add-ons).

In conclusion: You can spend money to violate Blizzard’s terms of service, or you can go with free/donation-supported add-ons to do the same thing. It’s up to you. I know which I choose.

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Yarn of the Buccaneer,” by Pierre Langer and Scott P. Schreer.

Download the MP3

General leveling tips:

• Obtain bags as soon as you can. There are many quests that have you gathering items, and you need someplace to carry those items.
• …Members of The Gathering can get bags out of the Guild Vault, or whisper Valkillmoar or Leftbank. The rest of you are on your own.
• If you aren’t using a guide, pick up as many quests as possible when you get to a new zone
• … and complete as many as possible before running back to turn them in.
• Avoid dungeon quests unless you have a regular group with whom you’re leveling together.
• Avoid Sven in Duskwood unless you like traveling a lot and getting very little reward for the effort.
• Make a “bank toon” who will stand around in a capital city and handle auctions and banking for you. The mail system works well and your bank toon can make boatloads of gold from gathering profession items.

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This week we’ll look at a very lightweight add-on that adds speed and accuracy to your questing.

LightHeaded is a very simple add-on that displays quest information and comments from Wowhead in-game, eliminating the need to Alt-Tab when you get stuck on a quest. Data is only loaded when you first request it, so you can be sure you’re not using more memory than you need to.

Lightheaded supports TomTom, MapNotes, and Cartographer2 and Cartographer3; by clicking coordinates shown in LightHeaded, you can automatically add a waypoint to your map.

Lightheaded has a few slash-command options as well, which are detailed on the add-on’s WoWinterface page.

As of 28 March 2010, LightHeaded included comments for more than 8200 quests.

All in all, this is a very useful add-on that is essential for finishing quests quickly.

You can get LighHeaded from WoWinterface.

Music for this segment is from FreeplayMusic.com and is entitled “Between the Bookshelves,” by Michael Genato.

Download the MP3

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This week I would like to tell you about a mod that will help you keep your bags organized, and also let you check all your various storage spaces on the realm when you are pretty sure you have an item, but can’t remember where you put it.

ArkInventory (or “AI”) as it comes “out of the box” allows you to have one large virtual bag instead of the vanilla WoW default of a bunch of smaller bags. Without any custom configuration on your part, it also allows you to see everything in your alt’s bags, your bank, your alt’s banks, and even the Guild vault. However, in order for this part to work, you will need to log in to each alt once after installing AI and open your bags and bank. At least one toon will need to look in the Guild vault also. AI takes a “snapshot” when you open a bag or bank, so the Guild vault snapshot may not be up-to-date if you haven’t checked the actual vault lately; this is still better than having to travel to a capital city or beg a guildy to look for crispy spider meat, however.

AI also allows for customization of categories, and the creation of rules to further customize your bag display. For complete information, I recommend you download and extract the Local Help Files from the AI home page on Google.

In addition to the direct download from Google, you can get Arkinventory through WoWmatrix, from WoWinterface`, or from Curse.

Music for this segment is from FreeplayMusic.com and is entitled “White Mule Breakdown” by Kelly Weeks.

Download the MP3

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That will buff right out.

RaidBuffStatus is an add-on to check, show and report on the complete buff status (including flasks etc) of a party or raid. It shows the information on a dashboard much like XRS. It can report via whispers and to raid chat. In addition it provides a talent spec window which also shows any special abilities such as improved spirit.

However it is quite unlike XRS, Bigbrother and most other buff checking add-ons. It was the first released add-on to intelligently, in an automagic way, know what buffs to check for. For example only if there is a Mage will it check for intellect buff and it does not check the buffs of those not in the same zone. As much as possible is automatic.

add-ons like XRS require lots of initial configuration. RBS works with no configuration out of the box. However RBS now features a Buff Wizard to help new user non-raid leaders to configure only the buffs they need to be displayed.

RBS can do the buffing for you such as your self and party buffs with a quick alt-click.

RBS supports add-ons like Titan using LibDataBroker.

RBS even has a twitter account, so you can keep up with news about the add-on. There are a number of videos available demonstrating the use of RBS, and it is actively maintained.

You can get RaidBuffStatus from WoWinterface or from Curse.

Music for this week’s segment is from FreeplayMusic.com and entitled “Warriors and Knights” by Scott P. Schreer

Download the MP3

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SkillScore is a lightweight addon that will let you quickly check a player’s experience in specific raids.

SkillScore is a much more useful indicator of a player’s experience than GearScore, because it doesn’t depend on the luck of the Need or Greed roll. SkillScore will tell you how many times the player has completed ICC 10 and ICC 25, for example.

Similar to GearScore in the abbreviated mouseover display, SkillScore will give you a much more detailed tooltip by pressing . SkillScore caps the score for each raid at 1000.

You can download SkillScore from WoWinterface.

Music for this segment is provided by Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Virtuoso” by Akihiro Yamamoto.

Download the MP3

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Are you leveling or planning on leveling a new toon? Are you trying to plan ahead and get enough gold to get your riding skill and mount at level 20? Did you take two gathering skills so you can do that? Good plan! Did you take Herbalism and Mining? Not so good, since you can’t detect Herbs and Minerals at the same time!

There’s a solution for you (can I say “There’s an add-on for that?”) – as well as for hunter and druid tracking, and fish and treasure tracking. Unfortunately there is still no free beer tracking, so go AFK and get one out of the fridge when you need to. The add-on is “WetSpot.”

According to the author, spatton, if you are a herbalist and miner, while riding through a zone you can change between tracking for herbs and then tracking for minerals every 5 seconds. Or if you are a hunter in a battleground, you can switch between tracking humanoids, beasts, and hidden every 3 seconds.

You can choose whatever tracking methods you wish to look for – unknown spells will not be available to you. That means non-hunters won’t see the hunter stuff, and non-dwarves won’t be able to see the beer treasure method. If you have not learned the spell yet, the option will be disabled. WetSpot also detects when you are in a city, and will disable itself accordingly. When you exit the city, it will turn itself back on.

The options frame allows you to turn the on-screen bar on or off, and control the tracking methods used and the speed of rotation.

You can get WetSpot through WoWmatrix, or from Curse.

Music for this segment is provided by Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Candyflip” by Felix Miklik

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Some time before Patch 2.0.3, way back in the beginning of 2007, Blizzard incorporated the basic concepts of the add-on Scrolling Combat Text into “vanilla WoW.” Newer players probably have no idea that there was a time when you needed the SCT add-on to see combat hits scrolling up from the center of the screen.

While the now-built-in floating combat text is a big improvement, it could be even better. That’s where Parrot comes in.

Parrot allows you to adjust the start and end points of your scrolling combat text, make it scroll in an arc to the left or right, and add text triggered by specific events (such as the Warlock ability “Nightfall”).

This may not seem like a big deal, but try Parrot for a week and you’ll wonder how you ever played without it. The author’s notes list these features:

• Can change fonts
• Multiple scroll animations to choose from
• Choose what events you want to see and where
• Customize how you want to see your info
• Show spell or ability names and icons
• Create as many scroll areas as you want
• Suppress events you don’t want to see
• Create custom triggers

You can get Parrot through WoWmatrix, from WoWinterface, or from Curse.

Music for this segment is provided by Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Pirate’s Hook,” by Tillman Sillescu.

(Link for the MP3 to be added here)

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Have you spent hours flying aimlessly around Storm Peaks, trying to find the Time-Lost Protodrake? Wasted days in Sholozar Basin, looking for Loque’nahak? This week’s add-on detects rare mobs for you, alerting you when you get within detection range.

Before installing _NPCScan, you’ll want to clear your game cache. The add-on’s Web page explains how in detail, but the short version is “delete your cache folder.”

When a rare mob is found, _NPScan wil alert you with audio, flashing the screen, and providing an animated targeting button. There’s a “test” button in the add-on’s main interface so you can see what it looks and sounds like before it detects any of the rares.

There are several customization options, also, allowing you to add your own alert sounds, and add or remove NPCs from the detection list. Other options are available, which I won’t go into here; you can find them in the add-on’s menu.

All in all, if you want the rare achievements, or if you are a hunter hoping to tame a rare mob, you want this add-on.

_NPCScan can be installed though WoWmatrix, or downloaded from its own site on Google, or from WoWinterface or Curse.

Music for this segment is provided by Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Wild Discovery,” by Simon Brewer.

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Bonus material:
While looking up pictures of NPCScan for this post I stumbled across NPCScan Overlay. _NPCScan.Overlay is an addition to _NPCScan that adds map overlays for rare mob patrols. When you search for a rare in _NPCScan, _NPCScan.Overlay will show where it patrols until you find it. It works similarly to keithgabryelski’s Rare Spawn Overlay, but supports the minimap and has a much smaller download size, along with a few new features.

You can get _NPCScan.Overlay through WoWmatrix or from WoWinterface or Curse. Be sure to keep both add-ons up to date! The easiest way to do that is to use WoWmatrix.

Happy hunting!

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Let me start by saying “Thank you!” to Tonkah for the tip regarding the “freeze on training” bug. Disabling the Wowhead Looter add-on fixed it for me. However, it didn’t work for a friend who runs Fubar; possibly that’s difference that matters.

This week we’re going to talk about an add-on that may seem redundant; in patch 3.1.2, Blizzard introduced the equipment manager. The equipment manager “can… be used to just swap weapons or trinkets or put on that tuxedo to strut around town. It will not automatically switch your gear when you change your talent spec, but it will allow for an easy gear change between them,” according to Ghostcrawler on the official forums.

If you have a serious memory limitation, you can get by with the equipment manager. However, if you want more functionality, and finer control over your outfits, I recommend Outfitter.

Outfitter provides some automation, as well; for example, it will automatically switch between gear sets when you mount or dismount, and can be set up to change your “Tracking” skill with different outfits, such as Track Minerals when riding, or Track Fish when you have your fishing gear equipped.

Basic setup of Outfitter is very easy, although the advanced functions may not be immediately obvious. It’s reliable, stable, and well worth the small memory footprint it requires.

You can get Outfitter through Wowmatrix, or from WoWinterface or Curse.

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Rambling River” by Steve Glotzer.

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By this time you probably have a slew of add-ons helping you level up, keep your bags organized, make a killing at the Auction House, and make a fast getaway when your latest AH victim realizes that wool cloth really isn’t worth 35 gold a stack. You’d probably like an easy way to keep all those add-ons up-to-date, wouldn’t you? I knew you would.

Other than manually checking every add-on at the site where you originally got it, there are several effective methods of checking for, and even installing, the latest versions of your add-ons. There was a time when you could do it with just one simple package, but we aren’t going to dredge up old feuds this week.

First, if you get your add-ons through WoWmatrix, Curse, and WoWinterface – the three places I always recommend – life is going to be a lot simpler for you. Why simpler? Because they each have semi-automated updaters.

Curse.com provides the Curse Client. Of the three, it’s my least favorite, because of two things: It requires you to have a curse.com account (and as a computer professional, I am always suspicious about what information might be collected in this way), and secondly, you can only update one add-on at a time if you don’t pay for a premium Curse account. However, the client is functional, although slow and riddled with ads (which you won’t see if you use an ad blocker like Hostsman or the MVPS.org hosts file, thank goodness).

WoWinterface provides (or possibly just works with; I’m a little unclear on who actually owns it) the MMOUI Minion. Since the Minion is written in Java, it will work on Windows, OS X, or Linux; but it is also slightly slower than a native application would be. However, it’s still faster than the Curse client, and it will let you update all available add-ons with a single click. The Minion is still in beta as of this posting, but it seems stable and reliable.

Lastly, WoWmatrix. The WoWmatrix updater is available for Windows, OS X, and Linux, and it’s pretty fast, and again allows for a single-click update of all add-ons. It’s also got a couple of ads, but again, like the Curse client, they will be blocked if you use Hostsman or the MVPS.org hosts file. They’re not as annoying or intrusive as the Curse client ads, though. You will find that there are a number of add-ons that WoWmatrix can’t update, due mainly to a dispute with the Curse site. Overall, however, I like WoWmatrix best of the three.

All three updaters have the ability to mark an add-on as “ignored” and thereafter will not try to look for updates for that add-on.

And now, how to run them? Well, I run all three. First, WoWmatrix; then MMOUI Minion; and lastly the Curse Client. I run them in this order so that, if WoWmatrix or the Minion has updated an add-on, I can mark it as “ignored” in the Curse Client, and save myself the trouble of updating individual add-ons one at a time whenever possible. For the same reason, if WoWmatrix gets an update, that add-on will get marked “ignore” in the Minion; there’s no point in updating it twice, and the Minion can be a little finicky about versions. Because updating in this way is so much faster than the old methods, I check for updates every day before playing WoW.

One huge warning: NEVER EVER let a third-party program run WoW for you. If you do, that program may stay resident, and that’s how keyloggers work. You don’t want your WoW account stolen, so feel free to trust everyone, but ALWAYS cut the cards (if I may throw a poker metaphor out there).

And now I have to go update my ninety add-ons. Boy, this is a lot easier than it was back when I had a hundred thirty-seven add-ons, and no updater package!

Music for this segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Sporting Update” by Phil Garrod, Reed Hays, and Scott P. Schreer.

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EasySerum is an add-on to help you do the daily quest Troll Patrol: The Alchemist’s Apprentice in Zul’Drak which gives Argent Crusade reputation and is one-quarter of the lead-in quest. It is a great quest for leveling as well, because there’s no risk of dying. EasySerum has been tested by yours truly and works perfectly under patch 3.3.3

Although Carbonite does have a built-in helper for this quest, EasySerum does it better. Where Carbonite gives you a waypoint arrow and tells you which shelf and item to look for, EasySerum tells you exactly which case to go to, numbering them 1 through 4 in a clockwise direction, looking down on the room. Shelves are numbered top-to-bottom. EasySerum avoids the top shelf (“shelf 1″) because it’s hard for Gnomes, Dwarves and Elves to reach, and also “prefers” the right-hand store room, because it’s closer to the Alchemist’s cauldron.

One caution: When you’re getting an item off the shelf, make sure it’s actually in your inventory before you move!

You can get EasySerum from WowInterface or Curse.

Music for this week’s segment is from Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Majestic Brilliance” by Steve Kornicki.

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Are you dual-specced? Have you recently leveled? Do you raid? If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, you may find RankWatch to be a useful add-on.

RankWatch will monitor the spells cast by you and other members of your party or raid and warn you (or them) if you or they are using a downranked spell. It will also tell you what new spells you can train each time you gain a level.

Except for reducing threat, there’s no longer any advantage to using downranked spells, so you will most likely want to get the highest rank you can on your action bars. While Blizzard “fixed” the action bars long ago, so that the highest rank of a spell appears on your hot bars automatically, this does not work reliably for dual-specced toons; if you aren’t getting the DPS or HPS you expect, you may be using downranked spells without knowing it. RankWatch will let you know.

You can get RankWatch throgh Wowmatrix, from WowInterface, or from Curse.

Music for this week’s segment is provided by Freeplaymusic.com and is entitled “Leather and Steel” by Tillman Sillescu.

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Infinite Ignore
Tired of watching all the spam in trade chats, but your ignore list is full? This is for you then. Infinite Ignore is exactly that, an ignore list that has no limit.

Features
+ No cap on the number of people ignored.
+ Hooks directly into ignore/unignore commands
+ Ability to import your existing list from WoW
+ Ignore list carries across all toons on the realm
+ If you are sick of the little voices in your head, you can ignore yourself too =D

Slash Commands (/inig)
import – imports your ignore list from Blizz
reset – clears your ignore list
list – lists the names of people you are currently ignoring

To Do
TAKE OVER THE WORLD!!!…. I mean, take over the ignore screen (social frame)
- or -
Create a GUI from the ground up. Haven’t decided how I’m gonna go about doing this yet.

You can get InfiniteIgnore from WoWinterface, or from Curse.

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There’s no excuse for it. Seriously. Even if you can’t cook, you can buy food items from vendors in every city, town, and 1-shack settlement all over Azeroth, Outland, and Northrend, and you don’t even have to think about restocking; get the FreeRefills add-on and spend fifteen seconds setting it up.

FreeRefills does not, as the name imply, make your goods free of cost, but it does make stocking up free of the need to think about it. Here’s how, in easy step-by-step form:
Open the vendor window where you will buy whatever it is you need.
Open the chatline and type “/fr addstack” and then shift-click on the item you want to keep stocked, followed by the quantity of stacks you want to always have on-hand.
Hit “enter.”
Done! FreeRefills will now, every time you open a vendor window, check to see how much of your items you have, and if it is below your desired quantity, buy enough to refill your supplies. If, however, the vendor sells in stacks of 5 and you have, say, 57 and want to keep 60 on hand, FreeRefills won’t buy any, thus avoiding the problem of bags full of consumables in excess of the number you really want.
If, in the future, you no longer need the item in question, you can just use the same “/fr addstack [item]” with a quantity of zero.

FreeRefills will also restock out of your bank. This can be turned off, although I can’t see why I would ever do that. One terrific way to make use of this feature is to keep potions that you use a lot of stacked high and deep in your bank, but only carry the one or two stacks you expect to use in an instance. Then when Auction House prices are low for your potions/scrolls/flasks/beverage-of-choice you can stock up and refill the bank.

FreeRefills will work with anything sold by vendors; candles, food, drink, Arcane Powder – anything at all. And it’s excellent for keeping your lower-than-raiding-level toons stocked up so you don’t find yourself low on health, out of food, out of water, out of bandages, and having to run through a gauntlet of Fel Orcs to get to the nearest friendly town without at least filling up your health (and mana, if you use mana).

So, in summary, FreeRefills can help you stay alive, help your healer keep you alive, and make other players think you’re more courteous than you really are, because you always show up with food, drink, and reagents.

You can get FreeRefills from Curse.
Music for this week’s segment is from FreeplayMusic.com and is entitled “Just Enough” by Stephen A. Love and Scott P. Schreer.

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Guest voice by Victoria Tietjens

Advanced Trade Skill Window (which I herinafter refer to as “ATSW”) is a complete replacement for Blizzards tradeskill window with more overview and special functions.

This replacement, which works for all tradeskills, including enchanting, provides you with:

- a better overview
ATSW is bigger than the standard window, resulting in a much better overview over the thousands of items you can produce. Additionally, it lets you sort your recipes either by groups (as in the standard window), alphabetically or by difficulty. Alternatively, ATSW even lets you create your own groups and sort the recipes the way you like!
ATSW also has a filter function: enter something into the filter line and ATSW hides all recipes that don’t contain the text you entered. But this filter function can do more: it’s a powerful search function that can filter for minimum/maximum level requirements, producable item counts, item rarity (color) and reagents necessary. If, for example, you wanted to search for recipes for items made from iron, at least level 20 but no higher than 40, and green or better, you could enter a simple formula (explained in the radme.txt file) and have just those recipes displayed.

- more comfort
ATSW has a production queue: you can queue several different items and have them all produced automatically by just clicking one button. If you’ve ever had to wait for a number of parts to be made before you could make the item you really wanted, you’re going to love this.

ATSW is able to consider items you have to produce in order to use them as reagents in the production of other items. So: if you need item A to produce item B, you don’t have to manually produce first item A, then item B. ATSW does that for you: you just tell it to produce item B and it automatically queues the production of item A and – afterwards – item B. If you are missing some reagents to produce both items you get a message telling you exactly which reagents you need.

ATSW helps you when telling your friends what reagents you need for a specific item: just click on a recipe with your shift-key pressed and the chat line opened and the reagent info will be added to the chat line.

ATSW shows you what reagents you need to process the whole production queue. It even tells you how many of each reagent you have in your bank, on alternative characters on the same server (in this case, it can even tell you on which characters) and which reagents are buyable from merchants. In case of buyable reagents ATSW can automatically buy all missing and available items from a merchant when you are speaking to him.

Most of ATSW’s functions are available from buttons in the Gui and are self-explanatory. There are also some commands you can enter from the chat line:

You can enable (or disable) a specific trade skill; for example, if you don’t have a toon that knows blacksmithing, you’d probably want to disable blacksmithing in ATSW.

The “reagents” command will display a reagent window that displays all reagents needed for all saved queues on all characters. It also allows you to fetch all necessary reagents from your bank. This window can also be set to appear automatically whenever you are at your bank in the ATSW options. Imagine not having to take notes about what to buy for your engineer when you’e on your bank alt!

And you can delete all your saved queues. This might come in handy if you have, for example, saved a queue with a character you deleted.

You can download ATSW from WoWinterface.com or Curse.com, or get it with WoWmatrix.

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This week we’re going to look at an add-on that will help you dominate the economy on your Realm. AuctionLite is the add-on for the day traders of World of Warcraft. While not as comprehensive as the bettter-known Auctioneer, AuctionLite has a lot of functions that make working the Auction House a lot less of a chore.

AuctionLite adds some new tabs to your Auction House interface. Instead of being limited to searching for all gems, or blue gems, for example, if you know the name or part of the name of an item you want to buy, you can use AuctionLite to search on that name or partial name, and it will list all matching auctions, complete with prices per item and per auction. If you’re buying, then you can bid on one, several, or all of the auctions, or buy them out. AuctionLite will also track historical prices so you can see at a glance, after a little history has been built up, if you’re overpaying or getting a bargain.

If you are selling, you just drag the item to be sold into AuctionLite’s “sell” interface, and it will search for all current auctions for that item. You can choose how many stacks, and how many items per stack, you wish to sell. AuctionLite will automatically undercut current auctions, or, if there are no current auctions, and no history, triple the vendor price. You can adjust prices to suit yourself before placing the auction.

AuctionLite will also add tooltips to items, with vendor and auction prices, and disenchant values. You can also instantly view your own auctions on the Auctions tab.

AuctionLite even has a “favorites” feature to help you find items you want to buy faster.

AuctionLite is also multilingual; as of this post, it is available in English, French, German, Korean, Chinese, and Russian.

You can get AuctionLite through WoWmatrix, or from WoWinterface or Curse.

Music for this segment was provided by FreeplayMusic and is entitled “Sly Jackal,” by Hal Goldstein.

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Guest voice by Rakeleer Frostfyre

Continuing in our not-necessarily-for-raiding vein, this week I’ll tell you about not one, but two add-ons: AchievementSnap and DingRecorder.

I’m sure that everyone has heard the old “screenshot or it didn’t happen” taunt. Some people won’t go look up the facts on the Armory, but you can post a screenshot on Flicker and they’re perfectly happy to accept that as proof. AchievementSnap makes sure that you will have a screenshot of every achievement you earn after installing it, and, thanks to the way WoW creates filenames for screenshots, you’ll have a nice timestamp for the achievement as well.

DingRecorder does exactly the same thing when you level; it automatically takes a screenshot, so you will not only have proof (as if being level 80 isn’t enough to prove you were level 15 at some point, or 55 for DKs), you’ll have a timestamp to prove *when* you leveled.

There’s not much to the configuration of these mods; for AchievementSnap, you can toggle it on or off, and set minimum and maximum levels between which it will be active, although why you would ever want it turned off is beyond me. DingRecorder allows you to show or hide the User Interface, show your /played information (or not) and send a message to Guild chat that you’ve leveled.

AchievementSnap is available from WoWInterface.

DingRecorder is available from WoWinterface, Curse, and through WoWmatrix.The Curse version seems most up-to-date.

Music for this segment is provided by Freeplay Music and is entitled “Witches Approaching” by Patrick Smith.

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DeclineDuel, or “DD,” does exactly what the name tells you: When someone challenges you to a duel, DD will decline it. If you’re the kind of player who prefers to limit her dueling to specific places or times, then you’ll want to have DD installed.

DD has a few options, invoked using the /dd command, including setting the add-on active or not (so you can accept duels when you want to), setting specific messages to send to the challenger, and setting “PMS mode,” which can be downright brutal when it auto-declines.

Overall, this has to rank as one of the simplest yet most useful add-ons I have used. If you don’t want to have to spend all day declining duels from the second-best warrior or warlock on your server, then DeclineDuel is the add-on for you.

DeclineDuel is available from Curse.

Music for this segment was provided by FreePlay and is entitled Backforce, by Tillman Sillescu.

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According to the author’s description, Loracks DK Optimizer will help you to optimize health regen, DPS, and threat. I know from my own use of it that my DPS has at least doubled, and my health at the end of each melee is a great deal higher than it was before I installed this addon, so I am confident that it does, indeed, perform “as advertised.”

Loracks DK Optimizer adds a “click-through” window (that is, it won’t get in the way of your mouse when you’re trying to click on something in the field of play) which will suggest, using spell icons, which spell or attack you should use next. The main icon is largish, in the center of a rectangular area, and lesser spells will appear near the corners as smaller icons, to help you remember to cast such things as Death and Decay. The main icon changes according to how much runic power you have available, distance from your target (e.g., melee or ranged), and which aspect you are currently using. Some of the suggestions change so quickly that you have very little time to react, so it’s a good idea to be very familiar with the locations of your hot keys. Of course, that’s probably a good idea anyway.

Loracks DK Optimizer is a lightweight add-on; if you’re playing a Death Knight on a computer with limited memory, this is *the* must-have mod for your DK.

Loracks DK Optimizer is available from Curse and through WoWmatrix (and the comment shown in WoWmatrix is hilarious!).

Music for this segment is provided by Freeplay Music and is entitled Army Angels.

Bonus image

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