Adding On

In a recent interview with the Girls Gone WoW podcast, I mentioned (all too briefly) that I like to use addons when I play, and mentioned a couple. Raven (if I recall correctly) didn't really agree with everything I said, but what I really wish is that I'd actually gotten more time to discuss the topic at hand ("casual hardcore" raiding, which is the subject of this entire blog) and the addons I use. That's not their fault though, and the show was really a lot of fun.

But since this is my blog and I do have the ability to do so, I will go into addons a bit more. First of all, I've used a replacement for Blizzard's raid frames since, I think, 2009, long before I started to actually raid. My current favorite raid frame replacement is actually a full UI replacement, ElvUI. I cannot recommend it enough. In addition to the base UI mod, I use the following addons, which I install through the TukUI client rather than Curse (which I use for all my other addons besides ElvUI and its mods):

• Cecile Meter Overlay
• Dragon Overlay
• ElvUI Autolog
• ElvUI Channel Alerts
• ElvUI Color Tags
• ElvUI Extra Action Bars
• ElvUI Priest AoE
• Location Plus
• New Openables
• Raid Buffs Checker

I also download ElvuiStillEnhanced (WoD) from Curse because for some reason it's not maintained on the main site.

None of these, or even ElvUI itself, is anything I would consider necessary for successful raiding. I just really like the UI and I like a lot of the mods as they make my (playing) life better personally. Raid Buffs Checker is really great though, since I can see at a quick glance what raid buffs I do and don't have, and (if I'm playing MM Hunter, as is often the case) I know if I need to provide a specific buff with Lone Wolf.

Following is a list of addons (I use Curse to download them) that I consider useful for raiding, in order of importance, along with a short description:

• Deadly Boss Mods/DBM (all modules) - unless you really, really, really know the fight cold, including knowing when to tell OTHER people to do things, you should have DBM installed, and in fact many raid leaders require it. DBM tells you when when something is happening that you have to pay attention to, both with voice warnings and text on your screen, and it's highly configurable. If you're the tank and/or raid leader, you get even more options, such as pull countdowns, countable interrupts, and so on. It's useful in situations out of raid too, but for raids I consider it imperative.
• GTFO - Stands for Get the F Out, and what it does is play a (configurable) annoying sound when you're standing in stuff, or close to stuff, or taking damage from stuff. Not absolutely necessary, but very helpful.
• Omen Threat Meter - Gives you a graphic and/or plays a sound if your threat is getting high. Mostly useful if you're always grabbing aggro, or think you might, or want to make sure you DO have it.
• Weak Auras 2 - highly configurable interface for letting you know when you have to do something. It's not all that easy to use, but there are tutorials, plus it's easy to find scripts to import. So for instance you can have a set of icons on your screen to show you how long you've got till a certain buff/spell wears off, or a bar showing you cast time for a spell on your target, or whatever. For the latter, it's true that DBM has a lot of the same functionality, but sometimes more warnings are better than not. 
• Bitten's Spellflash (all modules) - flashes the next spell or spells you should cast for optimal performance, based on SimC theorycrafting. Hitting the flashing buttons has certainly improved my deeps on my hunter, plus on classes that I don't know as well, has helped me learn them.
• OmniCC - This is probably duplicated in something in ElvUI, actually, but I've had it installed for a long time, and if you don't use ElvUI it's definitely useful. Puts the cooldown for your spells on your action buttons so you know how long you've got till CD. 
• MikScrollingBattleText - Cool looking and configurable, easy to see, scrolling text for buffs and debuffs and such. As a bonus, comes with configurable sounds for when cooldowns pop. Can sound quite hilarious but the point is to alert you to something you might have missed. As I said above, the more of that the better.
• Pet Attack - for classes with pets, lets you know if your pet is not attacking. 
• Pet Selector - for hunters, tells you what pet will provide the most useful buffs for your party. 
• Recount (and/or) Skada - I have both installed but use only Skada currently as it's less of a resource hog. Gives you a report on how much damage or healing party members are doing, with various configurable types of reporting and so on. I've put it lower on the list simply because it doesn't provide any utility itself; it's mainly useful so you know how well or badly you (or others) are doing. If you're the raid leader you definitely want to have it up. As a healer, I use the DPS meter so that I know who to rez if several DPS have died. 
• Who Pulled? - Mainly useful so you know who to blame.
• Decursive - I actually use this a LOT, because my healing class doesn't have a mass dispel so I can only dispel one at at time anyway. Allows you to remove curses, poison, diseases, and so on if your class is able to do so, with a click (or you can macro-ize it). Saves action bar use. I put it low on the list because it's only really important to have if you're a healing class.
• BonusRollPreview - In the last two expansions, there have been "bonus tokens" that you can spend on an extra roll for gear (or gold). This addon gives you a drop-down menu to show you what all the possible gear is, if you don't happen to know.
• Afterlife Crowd Control - Warns you when crowd control is about to break. 
• AskMrRobot - Allows you to import your current gear profile into the AskMrRobot site so that you can maximize your gear (according to their theorycrafting method). 
• Pawn - if you're not sure whether the drop you just got is better than what you're wearing, Pawn can help you decide. 

Following is an audio clip of my husband and I discussing the addons we use for raiding. My husband, Ouro, is our guild's raid leader and one of the tanks, and while he hasn't been playing as long as I have, he's really good with his Paladin.