Addon Spotlight: Never miss reputation with Auto Tabard

Each week, WoW Insider brings you a fresh look at reader-submitted UIs as well as Addon Spotlight, which focuses on the backbone of the WoW gameplay experience: the user interface. Everything from bags to bars, buttons to DPS meters and beyond -- your addons folder will never be the same. This week: Shackleford.

It's Addon Spotlight time, ladies and gentlemen. As I sit here at death's door from the terrible PAX pox with which I have so unceremoniously been bestowed, I try to eek out words and phrases, maybe a quip or two, before death's cold embrace takes me. I feel as though my short time on this earth and in this existence was worth it, however, because I got to tell you about Auto Tabard.

Saving your sanity

I have never been more upset with myself then when I forget to equip a reputation tabard in heroics. In Wrath of the Lich King, stepping into a heroic sans tabard was a horrid offense. In Cataclysm, with gearing up slightly more difficult, reputations matter. You want to squeeze every single point of reputation out of your heroic runs that you possibly can until every little green bar is topped off because, like me, you hate empty bars.

Now, with all of my Cataclysm reputations at exalted, my bag is free of tabards that would have otherwise just been taking up space (except for the Ramkahen tabard, which is clearly the best tabard). My reputation days are (sadly) over until the next big patch or content push brings me more reputations to grind. No more bars to watch, no more agonizing over how much reputation is left to go. No, I am out of this particular game -- but I bring to you my secret weapon.

Auto Tabard

Auto Tabard is a genius little utility that automatically makes sure that you have a specified reputation tabard equipped when you enter a heroic dungeon. As long as you've got the tabard in your inventory, you should be set. Install the addon, type /AT, and select what reputation you want to be earning. Simple, easy, and effective. You can select your "main" Northrend faction (Alliance Vanguard or Horde Expedition for Alliance and Horde, respectively) to disable the addon and have no tabard on. If your currently selected faction is at exalted, the addon will prompt you to choose a new tabard, so as to not waste that precious, precious reputation.

Currently, the addon only supports Wrath and Cataclysm heroics for auto-equipping tabards upon zone entrance, not the race factions/vanilla dungeons. I'd love to see those added, however, since reputation gains in the new old world are pretty important these days. Suffice to say, for players hitting Cataclysm heroics, this is a pretty effective tool for making sure you never waste a single kill's worth of reputation in your heroics. They can already be painful as it is sometimes -- why not let Auto Tabard worry about reputation for you?

Download Auto Tabard at [Curse].

_Cursor lights up my life

What's that? A second addon approaches! Before I get to the recommendation, I need to tell the story that accompanies the addon suggestion _Cursor. Sit back, relax, and laugh at my misery.

_Cursor was a staple addon in my UI for a long, long time. After some nefarious crashing or breaking or something, this little addon found its way out of the cage a

nd escaped, free to roam the wilds and leave my cursor bland and boring. Was I happy? Not really, but as addons go, you get used to them or you don't, and _Cursor's influence faded away.

Smash cut to Sunday -- I am the Onyxia tank for my 10-man during the Nefarion encounter in Blackwing Descent. Our priest is nice enough to drop me a lightwell around Onyxia to facilitate easier breath healing and let my pet druid healer take some of the weight off. Well, the problem with Lightwells is that you have to click said Lightwell, and this particular Lightwell was in a very naughty place on Onyxia. My little Lightwell, font of healing prowess and lovely, happy healing energy, was under Onyxia. My cursor, however, was everywhere but near the lightwell, as Onyxia's massive frame took up a good portion of my screen, since I've got her in the corner.

Suddenly, I remembered _Cursor. After the fight, I went back and redownloaded the addon and gave it 30 seconds of configuring. I could easily track my cursor again, blue sparkles and all.

For those of you who are new to _Cursor, the addon simply attaches a mouse trail to your cursor, allowing you to easily spot where your cursor is on screen. This addon is great for helping you click Lightwells, finding your cursor in hectic fights, helping you click Lightwells, targeting and clicking during PvP, helping you click Lightwells, hitting utility bars or cooldowns, and helping you click Lightwells. There are tons of options, different types of trails and colors, but I always stick with regular old blue.

Are you the type of person who benefits from mouse trails? If so, _Cursor is for you. It saved my life, and when I move my cursor around real fast, I feel like an awesome wizard.

Download _Cursor at [Curse] or [WoWInterface].

Quick mailbag, shall we?

Thanks for the email, Ed. I admittedly have not played my shaman in a good long while, but when I did, I had three different ways to track my totems.

1. First, you can use a dedicated addon like TotemTimers. This addon works one very specific function: it times your totems.

2. Second, you could use a cooldown timer like Sexycooldown to time your totems, as well as other shaman abilities you wish to track.

3. Third, most unit frame mods have a shaman totem timer built in that you can activate. I know that SUF unit frames had a built-in bar, and I would sometimes just have that activated to check the time left on my totems.

Addons are what we do on Addon Spotlight. If you're new to mods, Addons 101 will walk you through the basics; see what other players are doing at Reader UI of the Week. If there's a mod you think Addon Spotlight should take a look at, email mat@wowinsider.com.