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Your Addons vs Patch 2.4
Once again, we find ourselves anxiously waiting for the World of Warcraft servers to come back up. However, today stands out as the best (and worst) variety of Tuesday downtime. Today we see the release of patch 2.4 and, for your addons, it is a day of reckoning. The majority of you are familiar with new content patches and the havoc they wreak on addons, but for those of you new to this; many of your addons could very well be broken. There are a number of philosophies on how one should approach this. Some would suggest disabling your addons and waiting a few days until the storm subsides. Some have even said you should clear out your Addons folder, or your WTF folder. Clearing out the Addons folder gets rid of the addons, while deleting your WTF folder will clear all player and character settings. I personally go this route when I find that most of my addons are acting "buggy" or weird, or when I want to start with a clean slate.I recently wrote an article on how you can automate the updating process, which I would recommend you take a look at, the servers are down anyway! Alright, really I would recommend reading through the comments of that post, as some of your fellow readers have some great advice and insight you may find helpful. Also, the folks over at WoWInterface contacted me in regards to their own addon updater, which looks promising as well. They have been busy testing it and have released a Windows version as well as a Mac/Linux version, both of which merit a look in my opinion. WoW Interface also released their Patch 2.4 Survival Guide, which I profiled recently. All this just screams that you've got options, so keep reading!
Addon Spotlight: Quartz
Welcome back, my friends, today we are going to inspect Quartz, a cast-bar addon. Let me start this off by noting that this addon not only changes the default cast bars, but also adds some great features for those of you who want more feedback from the World of Warcraft client. If you check out any of the major addon sites, you will more than likely find an older version, one that still functions, so it might suit your needs. If you want the most recent version, the WoW Ace Files site has the continuously updated version. To open the configuration window for Quartz, use the following slash command:/quartzThis will open up the options interface, where you can change the cast bars to your liking. One feature I found nice was the Merge Tradeskill option, which will take multiple casts of the same tradeskill and puts them into one cast bar, with a countdown timer. I like to know how much time I have to run and grab a beer when creating what seems like a thousand bandages.
Breakout in World of Warcraft
One of the things I really don't like about World of Warcraft, or any other MMORPG, is the waiting that is involved in getting a group together. This can be a real problem in raid environments, where it often times can take half an hour or more just to get the group set. I've been a raid leader before, so I know that they are busy and there isn't much they can do about the time we all just sit there on vent chatting with each other.One of things that I've recently came across to help ease the wait is a little in-game game of bricks, a.k.a. breakout. Breakout is the game that I used to play back in elementary and middle school on the old Macs* where you'd bounce a ball around, breaking (you guessed it) bricks. The ball is bounced off a small platform that you move with your mouse. Pretty simple, and mindlessly entertaining. Lately I've been enjoying a version of this game called WoWonid, which is an Ace2 addon I found via my addon updating with the WoWAceUpdater. It's a good enough implementation of the game (and quite impressive when you consider that it's done in LUA and built using an interface that's designed for game addons). The controls are simple enough, and just like the old Mac controls: move the mouse left or right to move the platform, bounce the ball, pwn.
Addon Spotlight: Align
WoW Insider fan Morduk sent in a tip about an add-on that may tickle many of you. Align is a little gem for User Interface control freaks. What this add-on actually does is lay down a grid overlay on your UI, allowing you to align (hence, the name!) your add-ons and other UI elements into an orderly array. I have to admit that at first I was skeptical about the value of such a thing, but I have seen the light. This program has a minimal memory footprint, is simple to use and makes my sometimes-cluttered UI look so, well, dress-right-dress. Being an old Army sergeant, I can immediately appreciate the control I have over my add-on placement. Many of you eyeball your UI into what looks like order, but Align can be the decisive element in your battle for a centered Totemus sphere.Activating and deactivating the grid is controlled by one easy command:/alignTo change the size of the grid squares, simply put in a value. An example would be "/align 64". These values round to the next multiple of 32 and stop at 256. A lower value produces larger grid squares, while a larger value creates smaller squares.For players using add-ons that change the action bars or allow one to move the minimap, Align may just be the thing you've been looking for. One feature that I think would come in handy would be the option to snap UI elements to the grid, which would just tickle my controlling nature. Give this one a run around the block and let me know what your thoughts are!
Scattered Shots: Pets at level 10
Every week, Brian Karasek and David Bowers bring you help, tips and advice for the leveling Hunter in Scattered Shots. For those veterans looking for high end Hunter goodness, BRK is back on active duty. This post is part of the Hunter Leveling Guide. You probably know by now that Big Red Kitty refers to himself as "we" in all his articles. For the longest time I thought this was just him being silly, but with his return to WoW Insider after a long hiatus, he explained that this is actually a kind of philosophical statement as to the oneness of hunter and pet.You needn't worry that we (being Brian and I) will start trying to mimic him, but he really does have a good point. When a hunter reaches level 10 and gains his or her first pet, your pet becomes an extension of yourself, and an incredible source of power. The game suddenly gets very easy, and enemies start dying very fast. In effect, with a pet at your side, you become your own tank-damage-healing group all by yourself, able to finesse the control over your character and pet alike to achieve all sorts of neat stuff.
Bringing addons into the default UI
We've written about Totemus before here on WoW Insider-- even though it does a lot more than just time your totems as a Shaman, that's mainly what I used it for. Not only did it provide me with a visual representation of what my current totem situation was like, it also gave me a heads up whenever my totems were failing, reminding me to put them down again. But of course since that's mostly what I used it for, I may not have a need for it after patch 2.4-- along with the other UI changes, Blizzard is going to be putting a totem timer into the default UI.It's not the first time they've "stolen" addon functionality, and it definitely won't be the last. And while a few reports are coming in from the PTR, it remains to be seen whether this change will actually replace more complicated addons (my guess is no, considering how simple Blizzard's timer looks).But expect more of this in the patches to come-- everyone heard that Blizzard wants to implement a threatmeter into the default UI, and a "DamageMeters" type of tool would likely be appropriate for the default UI as well. Blizzard has always had the luxury of a great and hardworking addon community, and I wouldn't be surprised to see them start taking advantage of that luxury more often.
Ping faster with Faster Ping
Recently members of my guild have been using a tool called Faster Ping to achieve better ping rates in game. My guild is a West Coast based guild, and attracts a lot of people from Hawaii and Australia, so they naturally have higher ping rates than those of us in the States. Faster Ping seems to be working wonders for them. It is not so much of an addon as it is a tool for Windows (though lots of people mistakingly call it an addon).My first reaction to this was what thinking this sounded like something out of the mouth of Cliff Clavin. I mean, how can a piece of software impact something that is mainly due to physical limits? Well, after thinking about it for a bit, and reading up on what the tool does, it can. WARNING! This paragraph will be the only one that contains technical content! Faster Ping works by removing the acknowledgement delay from TCP packets. This delay happens inside the kernel's TCP stack, and is a necessity for a lot of functions that go on inside a TCP stack. The other modification Faster Ping does is to remove delay in sending small packets (think anything less than a dozen or so bytes). These changes, at least theoretically, should not impact system stability if the Windows kernel has proper TCP/IP stack implementation. Okay, end technical content.
Using Auctioneer's AskPrice to answer "what's this worth?"
I always love hearing tips I've never heard about something I use all the time, and Nibuca at Mystic Chicanery posted exactly that. Auctioneer apparently has a listening module called AskPrice (enabled by typing "/auctioneer askprice on" when the addon is loaded up) which will allow other players to use a trigger (? is the default, as in "? [Wolfrunner Shoes]") to find out your Auctioneer's price via whisper. And you can set it to listen in guild chat as well, so as a guild officer or leader, you could easily and quickly answer all those "what's this worth again" questions.I'm not sure how exactly it gets around the no-spam requirements on sending so many messages at once (although spamming is "allowed" in some whispers and chats), but if this is something that pops up in guild chat or among your friends really often (and there is someone online enough to be around whenever this question is asked), this is handy little tip for something that you probably already have installed. Very nice.
Addon Spotlight: QuestHelper
We love quests, but they can be excessively frustrating sometimes. Usually they annoy you most when they make you wander all over, back and forth, without seeming to accomplish things efficiently. The fastest levelers will tell you to try to "stack quests," or do all the quests in a small area first, then gradually move around the map to other areas. But often the best way to do this isn't clear -- you may not even know exactly which area a quest is asking you to go to.Addons to the rescue! First, there was LightHeaded: an in-game database of comments from Wowhead.com that could help you when you get confused. Now, there's QuestHelper: an in-game guide which can tell you which direction to go, what to do, and what order to do everything in, all before you even get confused in the first place. QuestHelper isn't always right -- you still have to use your own brain, for sure -- but using this addon you'll be much less likely to make silly mistakes in your questing that slow you down and waste your time.
Raiding without addons
Raiding is notorious for the number of addons necessary. Just off the top of my head there's ora2, Omen, Deadly Boss Mobs, Recount, and WoW Web Stats logging. If you're like me you're an addon addict to boot and probably have dozens, if not nearly a hundred, other addons to make life easy.But in all honesty, are these addons really necessary for raiding? There's some interesting arguments both ways.One of the most convincing that I've heard is that if Blizzard really wanted you to use things like Omen, they would have built a threat meter into the game itself. That does make sense in a lot of ways. The rebuttal to this argument is that Blizzard provided a huge Addon API for programmers to make things like Omen.
AddOn Spotlight: Ace
Last week on AddOn Spotlight, we discussed the damage meter (and more!) mod Recount -- and there was some commenting suggesting we should cover the Ace family of addons, so here you are. Ace isn't a specific addon, but instead a code library on which addons are built -- and you can get countless different mods in Ace format.Ace was created because many different mods have to use the same types of basic functions. With ordinary mods, these basic functions would be written and included with each addon. With Ace, this basic functionality is packaged into a single library that all Ace mods use. What this means to non-programmers is that Ace mods use fewer system resources, because they all use a the standard Ace code, which is loaded once for all of the Ace mods you have. If you're using non-Ace mods, these basic functions are loaded seperately for each addon you have -- and the more addons you have, the more this adds up. (On the flip side of this, if you only use one Ace addon, you don't gain any benefits, but if you use all Ace addons, a little efficiency improvement in each can result in a big difference.) For the programmers in the audience, Ace means you can write your addon quickly, because you have immediate access to basic Ace functionality (you don't have to reinvent the wheel -- you only have to write code for what you want to do).Want to get started with Ace? Read on for a list of some of the best Ace addons out there.
RP Spotlight: Pets can be more than decoration
In WoW social situations, combat and non-combat pets alike usually just take up space looking pretty. Hunter and warlock pets have many actions they can perform to help fight an enemy, of course, and for a normal gamer there's no reason they would need to do anything more. But sometimes, as a roleplayer, if you pat your pet wolf on the head, you might expect it to look up at you with those adorable puppy eyes; or if someone else pats its head, you might expect it to bite their hand off. However, with the emote system as it is, we can only type out custom emotes with our own character's name at the beginning of the sentence, never the pet's.There's a way around this problem, which is actually quite obvious once you think of it, yet roleplayers rarely use it, so far as I have seen. If you write the possessive apostrophe-S as the first part of your character's custom emote, you can make your pet seem to do something on its own: "Isabeau 's pet wolf growls and bares his teeth." It takes a little bit more typing, and it leaves a space between your characters name and the apostrophe-S (since that's built into the emote system), but effectively it lets you roleplay two entities at the same time. Hunters and warlocks can use the PetEmote addon to help make this a little more streamlined. Our reader Ellyndia, for instance, roleplayed a very introverted character that normally would not introduce herself to others, but using such custom emotes, she could have her Jubling walk up and interact with people first to get conversations going. Pets can reflect what your character is thinking but not saying out loud (by hissing or purring perhaps), or they can do anything that such pets in real life might do. Special non-combat pets such as the Children's Week kids, the interactive Animatronics, or even the magical Mojo, could all be especially fun to animate a little now and then. Certainly this technique would become very annoying if overused, but in moderation it can add a extra spice of humor, entertainment and even a touch of realism into the game.
Folklore keeps telling tales with two new DLC packs
The developers of Folklore are really going carpe diem with the downloadable content, which keeps the sleeper title in our faces and compels us to keep writing about it. The game that can be described simply as "Pokémon for adults" is getting two new add-on packs in the near future on the PlayStation Network called The Alchemist Pack and The Origin of Belgae; the packs are priced at $4 each or bundled for $6.Folklore's The Alchemist Pack follows protagonist Ellen as she goes to the Undersea City to find her mother, while The Origin of Belgae sees her traveling to the Netherworld during the time of the original adventure. If nothing else, these constant add-ons for Folklore help build a cult following and certainly keep us talking about a title that would have otherwise been long-forgotten by now.
AddOn Spotlight: Recount
Damage meters in World of Warcraft can be both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, they can give you detailed information about incoming and outgoing damage in order to help you decide on the best gear, the best talents, and the best spell or ability rotations to get the most out of your character. On the other hand, their list format can turn instance groups into a competitive game where the person at the top "wins" -- a dangerous thing when a DPS chart can't tell you anything about threat or deaths, nor utility abilities such as crowd control or dispels. However, I always like having Recount -- not only because it collects a metric ton of data about you and anyone you group with -- but because the information it tracks can help put DPS in the broader perspective. To the right you see Recount's main window. Right now it only lists two items -- my Rogue alt and the elemental pet of someone I was grouped with before taking this shot -- but in a large group there will be a line item for every group member and pet, showing total damage, DPS, and what percentage of the group's overall damage they've done. If you mouse over anyone on the list, you will see the pop-up to the right, listing the top three attacks, top three attacked, and the damage done to each.But Recount goes in to much more depth than this. Want to know the wealth of information that awaits you? Keep reading!
AddOn Spotlight: Comix - The Return
Blizzard's loremeister Chris Metzen admitted to a love of comics in an hour long podcast back in August, going so far as to admit that certain aspects of World of Warcraft were inspired by the comics he read as a kid. Hyping up the new series from Wildstorm Studios, Metzen effused about how they were forging new lore for the game. The first issue of the comic came out last November, with a preview of the second that you can check out before it hits the newsstands. Of course, millions of players are forging lore of their own everyday, even if they don't all make it to the comic pages. But if you're a fan of comics like I am, you might want to check out Comix - The Return, to make your adventures in Azeroth and Outlands more epic -- or should I say, comic. It's a bit of a memory hog as far as AddOns go, and doesn't really improve gameplay to any degree, but it sure is a hell of a lot of fun. Boing! sounds every time you jump, classic video game music when you die or enter zones, and of course -- Bam! Thwack! and Ka-pow! visual effects in the tradition of Adam West's Batman every time you hit or crit someone in melee. Updated for Patch 2.3, Comix - The Return is the perfect AddOn for comic book geeks who want to feel like they're playing a comic book hero -- without having to play another game, that is.
Addon Spotlight: WhoDrop
Lots of us have encountered those wide-eyed and eager WoW players who walk up to anyone with epic gear and say, "WoW! Where'd you get that? That's uber-cool lol!" We may even be that sort of player from time to time, if we see a piece of gear we think looks really wonderful or seems particularly useful. WhoDrop answers that question for you before you even ask. Whenever you inspect another player (I'm using Examiner for that in the screenshot above), WhoDrop will insert a line at the bottom of the tooltip for each item you examine, telling you where exactly that item can be found. It'll tell you which boss drops it, whether it's crafted or not, or even how many Honor or Arena points it'll cost you to buy. Another addon which has a similar function is called Mendeleev, but I found that it overloaded me with too much information, so I went with WhoDrop instead. (Incidentally, the other two tooltip-info addons prominent in this screenshot are RatingBuster, with the stats, and Auctioneer, with the price information.)Additionally, if you're approaching a certain boss fight, grinding a certain reputation, or PvPing for certain rewards, WhoDrop also features an expandable list of the items you can get from these various sources. It was also recently updated to include the Arena Season 3 gear, so you can now drool over that any time you wish. If you want a prettier interface just for looking at boss drops and such, you might consider AtlasLoot, which has most the same information and is easier to browse through (but it has no tooltip info -- you'll still need WhoDrop for that). AtlasLoot is a plugin for Atlas maps, which can help if you ever get lost in instances.You can get WhoDrop at IncGamers, but I prefer to get mine direct from wowace.com, and keep it up-to-date with the WoW Ace Updater for the Mac.
A new way to search for WoW mods
You know how it is. One of your favorite addons breaks down completely after a patch, so you go looking for the updated version, but then you realize you don't remember where you downloaded it. You check your favorite mods website, only to find that they only have the out-dated version. You end up having to check several different websites in order to find the update, and you wish there were a better way.KitKatsFTW over in Europe has developed a simple solution: a site called "WoW Mod Search," which uses Google's custom engine to search through the four main WoW mod sites: WoW UI, WoW Interface, Curse, and WoWAce. The site is simple, unobtrusive, and aside from some google text ads, there's absolutely nothing to get in your way.I use Inquisitor on Safari to quickly use shortcuts of any search engine without actually visiting the website itself first. If any of you out there are also using Inquisitor, or any similar search plugin, you should be able to just copy and paste this search url into your plugin preferences as a shortcut for quick access to WoW Mod Search later. (The "%@" in that link represents the space that will be replaced with your searched keywords when you use the plugin.)
Auctioneer ready for 2.3
Reader V3T sends word that the folks behind Auctioneer did a long testing session last night, and they say that the latest builds of all the Auctioneer addons are now working under 2.3. They are, we're told, still in alpha, but V3T says they are stable enough to use and that all functions are working-- including BottomScanner, an awesome little addon that finds bargain auctions for you as they happen.That cheering you hear is frugal and money conscious players everywhere happy to have a new build of Auctioneer under 2.3. Preview versions of the addons can be found on Auctioneer's Preview page. V3T also says they're looking for more usage and feedback, so if you do download it, make sure to report any bugs or errors and let them know what works or what doesn't.
AddOn Spotlight: For the timid
Addons; they can do everything from seemingly changing nothing at all to creating what would appear to many to be total chaos. They can enhance the gaming experience so greatly that to be without them can seem downright apocalyptic. I know that I bond with my addons, and when I finally find "the one" that will do that thing I've been wishing the game would do for months, I feel renewed excitement for playing.At the same time, I understand all too well the hesitation that many harbor about delving into the user customization world. Worries that they'll be difficult to install, require a doctorate to use, and give you a migraine, are all very valid concerns. This week is dedicated to those who are timid or reluctant about using addons, as well as those who have had bad experiences with them. No matter what your playstyle or your level of l33t UI sophistication, I guarantee that there are addons out there that you'll love.
Don't mash in 2.3!
Your character can be less effective if you mash buttons in 2.3, according to Altitis. You can also stop using the /stopcasting command in most macros. In the 2.3 PTR patch notes, "client spell cast requests are now sent to the server even if your player is already casting another spell. This eliminates the need for /stopcasting in macros to compensate for latency." What this means in English is that outside of global cooldown, your computer will try to send a new cast command to the server when you press a button, no matter what.
