Addon Spotlight: Replacing your broken addons
This is a continuation of the ongoing work in progress that always takes place around a big patch such as 5.0.4. Last time we had a few reader emails, asking some questions about certain aspects of the 5.0.4 addon changes and how to deal with them, and this week we're doing much the same, except that we're focusing exclusively on broken addons and some alternatives that do work in the current patch, and therefore may well work when Mists arrives in two weeks' time!
Raeli's Return!
First, ladies and gentlemen, I have some great news! A while back, my esteemed ex-colleague Mat McCurley wrote a piece on replacing Raeli's Spell Announcer (RSA). He referred to the Raeli's Apocalypse, which it appeared took place when 5.0.4 dropped a couple of weeks back. Mat did find some alternatives, so if that's what you're after, have a look at the original article.
But just the other day, I received an email from Raeli himself with the great news I was talking about: Raeli's Spell Announcer is back! Raeli isn't the guy holding the reins any longer, he has handed that hefty responsibility over to Xadurk and stapler2025. And the updates are coming in thick and fast! There's already been over 12 beta versions for 5.0.4 added in the past 2 days, and the new developers have stated that they are determined to have a stable version up and running for the launch of Mists, if not before. A release version has recently become available. If, like me, you're thrilled to hear this news, get on over to the RSA project page, download the latest version and do some testing for the new developers!
Dtail asked:
The addon BagSync doesn't appear to have any updates. It tracks the items on your characters and displays the information in item tooltips. Do you know of any other addons doing the same, or whether it will be updated?I'm using 5 alts for bankers, so I'm completely lost when I can't see who has what. (Yes, I really should make myself a Guild bank. However, the population on my server is lower than low, so it's impossible to find people to sign the charter :D)
Well, Dtail, don't give up hope just yet! While the addon itself hasn't had an update in some time, the author has recently been active on the addon's forum. He's said he is very busy with work, so give him a chance!
In the meantime, I heartily recommend Altoholic. It's not as lightweight as BagSync, but has a ton more functionality, including, for your specific purposes, the ability to go through your characters' inventories on any server from any character to see exactly what they've got on them, and it uses the DataStore library system to maintain a database of all your alts' items, and adds that information to the item's tooltip. For your specific purposes, it is rather using a big hammer for a small nail, but it will certainly help you out!
Armory is another option that does a similar task to Altoholic, and perhaps the most recent update will fix the problems it's had in the past with addon memory -- it's quite the heavyweight! Carbonite suffers from a similar resource consumption issue, and offers far more functionality than you said you needed!
The closest thing I've found for you would be a combination of Bagnon and Bagnon_Accountsearch. The account search part is a fan addon for Bagnon, which adds an account-wide search function and tooltip update to the standard addon. Both are updated, and don't provide you with much more than you needed in the first place.
Additionally, I'll be happy to roll an alt and find Dtail to help him with his Guild Charter, now all we need is two other EU-based readers to do the same!
Nicole asked:
I'm looking for an addon that will notify me when a cooldown becomes available again, preferably something that will flash close to my character or my raid frames. I primarily heal, but would like something that can possibly track dots as well. I like add ons that are minimal, and I like to use as few as possible. Do you have any suggestions on what would be good to use?
This has come up quite a bit in emails from people wondering what to use for their cooldowns, as apparently a lot of cooldown addons disappeared at 5.0.4.
I'm a fan of SexyCooldown myself, I find the bar display, which can be moved to anywhere on your screen, combined with the splash works brilliantly. You can set it to have a bar to the side, followed by an icon above your character's head when the cooldown's ready. However, the updates are rather confusing -- it states that the last update was carried out on August 29, but that update asserts to be for 4.1 rather than 5.0.4. Despite that, I've downloaded the latest version and it seems to work just fine for me, for the new abilities as well as the old ones.
It can be used to track any ability's cooldown, and you can also use it to track the expiration of your DoTs on a target -- the countdown bar simply gets adjusted to be a debuff bar. It's one of my favorite ways to monitor DoTs!
OmniCC is another perennial favorite, which alters all your pie chart cooldowns on your bars to numerical cooldowns. However, unless you've got your bars by your raid frames or by your character, it doesn't offer an additional icon near your raid frames or near your character.
Looking at addons that you can customise for your needs, IceHUD may be exactly what you're after, although I don't think it really fits in with the remit of being minimal in its default guise. It allows you to create bars for every cooldown, centered around the character, as well as replacing your health, mana and power bars. For me personally, it was too much of a shift away from the standard look of the UI, but I know several people who love it!
Lastly, a word about WeakAuras and PowerAuras. Both have been updated for 5.0.4, but PowerAuras' official version is currently under development, so the update available here is a fan update to patch the previous version for 5.0.4. Both of these addons allow the user to create completely customisable notification icons for just about anything, including cooldowns. They aren't the very easiest addons to use, but once you've got the hang of them they're incredibly powerful. I'm planning a column comparing the two in the near future!
Arydyss asked:
I love Chinchilla but hate the clock appearance. Monkey clock now gets bewildered by the crossrealm zones and the time switches time zones without warning. Are there any other simple clock addons out there that may handle this better? Or another map addon?
There are so many map addons out there that it's really a matter of looking through them and picking one up that you like the look of! Without knowing exactly what you dislike about Chinchilla's clock it's hard to recommend one, but as far as stand-alone maps go, I really like the look of Light'n'Stylish Minimap. This is purely a matter of taste, of course, so I suggest having a look at something like WoWInterface's database of map addons to see if something takes your fancy.
As far as standalone clocks go, Broker uClock is a great little clock addon that allows you to view various other UI elements and offerns good customizability. If you prefer a more classic look, then perhaps Minimap Clock is the clock addon for you! Both are updated and stable in 5.0.4.
Thanks for all the questions, if you are having trouble replacing any addons then do let me know via email at olivia@wowinsider.com!
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 olivia@wowinsider.com.
