Addon Spotlight: TourGuide (UPDATED)
by Sean Forsgren 
Jul 16th 2008 at 3:00PM
Amid the madness of yesterday's patch, there has been some desperate drama happening in the official UI & Macros Forums. It seems the massively popular leveling addon QuestHelper has encountered some troubles, with many users not able to use their beloved quest... helper. As with many crossroads in life, this presents an opportunity to consider a change, or at least a reason to try something else out while the developer of QuestHelper figures out the disconnect. Some time ago, I stopped using the memory-hogging giant in favor of one of Tekkub's creations. TourGuide may very well be Tekkub's greatest mod to date. It serves much the same function as QuestHelper, but it takes a different approach, one that doesn't eat up nearly as much memory. To me, it was sort of like selling my huge truck for a fast, agile Subaru. (Which I did in RL, yay!)
I've been promising to profile this bad boy for a couple of months now, as I've yet to finish my own work on it, but I felt like you all needed an alternative. Besides, you may end up swearing by TourGuide like I do, it was more my style. (I've been working on a guide for TourGuide, but my day job has been bogging me down.)
TourGuide is more akin to a traditional leveling guide than the so-called smart system of QuestHelper. With the "helper", I felt like I wasn't doing quests in the right order, at the right level and that I was missing out on some great quest chains.Basically, what TourGuide is doing for you, is stepping you through a leveling guide, along the lines of the much-loved guides of Jame or Joanna. Like the traditional leveling guides, TourGuide offers tidbits of advice and shows tips when you hover your mouse over the on-screen element. Tekkub does a pretty good job describing his addon:
"TourGuide is an interactive leveling guide addon. It is designed to provide the user with a streamlined order of quest completion with smart detection. It is also designed for easy creation of "guides" for users with little-to-no programming knowledge."
There are a number of built-in features that facilitate quick and easy leveling, here's a list!
- Automatic detection of objective completion
- Detect quest accept, completion and turnin
- Detect travel (by foot, flight, boat and stone)
- Detection of flight point discovery
- Detection of Hearth point change
- Conditionals based on class, level and item possession (only tell the player to accept the quest if they have the item that starts the quest)
- Small "lego block" style frame shows current objective, detailed tooltips on hover
- "Use item" frame, for those annoying quests where you have to use an item on a mob before you kill it, or you have to equip something, or you have to use an item to start a quest
- Pop out frame for detailed view of quest sequence
- OptionHouse-based guide config panels
- Automatic mapping of coordinates with TomTom or Cartographer
Thus far, there are a number of guides available for players, covering the 1-70 grind, plus some dailies. TourGuide also supports user-created guides, adding a huge bonus to players like myself who have a certain way of doing things and would like to have a more personal touch with the guides. (After leveling a few toons, you typically establish a certain way of doing things.) Tekkub has provided a page of instructions on how to edit TourGuide guides for those of you wanting to customize your own guide, or make changes to an existing one.
The memory footprint of TourGuide, even when partnered with TomTom, is significantly less exhausting than QuestHelper. So, if you're a current QuestHelper user and have found yourself up the creek with no proverbial paddle, TourGuide is your solution. If you're new to this type of addon, check out the TourGuide / TomTom duo, I'd bet you'll be pleasantly surprised. If your QuestHelper is functioning, try this out regardless; you never know when something might just make more sense to you.
That was it for me, TourGuide just worked for my playstyle. I use it, therefore it has my stamp of approval, for what its worth. Dismissed!
Tekkub just reminded me an important feature! If you are using Lightheaded, which I would personally advise, TourGuide will query Lightheaded for quest accept and turn-in locations. Together TourGuide, Lightheaded (with Doubewide) and TomTom form the Holy Trinity of Leveling. As many commentors have mentioned, this is really intended for players working on a second (or beyond) level 70 character. If you're working on your first toon (or one starting on the opposing faction) I would highy recommend that you read the quests, enjoy the lore and savor your experiences. Good luck with your alts!
Are you an addon-addict? Is your User Interface a living work of art? Welcome home, my friends! Every week, Addon Spotlight profiles a different addon, brings you mod-related news and dishes out free addon advice. See out what's been said and done in the addon community by checking out past features or our addon and UI directory.Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Tips, Add-Ons, Features, AddOn Spotlight, Leveling
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
MsBlonde Jul 16th 2008 3:12PM
This addon was the answer to my prayers! Thanks so much for this information! I thought I would perish without good old QH, and now I've got a non-glitchy replacement that kicked my FPS up a few notches with its non-hogging of my memory!
zenpunk Jul 16th 2008 4:44PM
I would never level another toon without carbonite. I even registered my copy at carboniteaddon dot com, not cus I needed the extra registered features, but cus I wanted to support their work so they are still doing it when I have to level from 70 to 80.
Lab Monkey Jul 16th 2008 3:13PM
"To me, it was sort of like selling my huge truck for a fast, agile Subaru. (Which I did in RL, yay!)"
Just stay clear of flannel, Sean.
Lab Monkey Jul 16th 2008 3:17PM
Oh, I see you opted for the Impreza, not the Forester. Never mind.
Naix Jul 16th 2008 3:19PM
Sure QH easts up some memory but when you have 4 gigs available to you you don't see to many slow downs. QH is the best addon hands down for new players to the game. I have had 4 RL friends join wow the last 2 months. When I showed the the power of QH I never got asked "How do I find the raptors" and "Where is this boat at?". So QH saved them time and me.
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 3:32PM
I actually do NOT recommend TG to new players. I feel that the first time playing thru content the player should use his own brain. Maybe throw in LightHeaded for those times you're stuck.
Now as for leveling alts, THAT is a brainless endeavor.
Nathan Jul 16th 2008 3:50PM
I agree that first time players should not be using Quest Helper. I also understand that some people could care less about reading the quests and the great storyline behind them and learning where stuff is on their own.
In my opinion though, more people should go through the first time without these "cheats". Now, as another one with several 70 alts, I have to say that these mods are amazing for that purpose. Most of the time I remember where stuff is anyway, but it still saves a bit of time.
This mod sounds like it has great potential and I'll have to try it out. The ability to have it link stuff together in a smart way instead of just randomly will be a great improvement.
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 3:28PM
Hrm... I need to fix my description, TG hasn't used OptionHouse since we got the nice new config GUI from Blue.
Jamesisgreat Jul 16th 2008 3:30PM
Is this addon able to read which quests you've already completed in certain zones, and which you haven't? This sounds useful for my level 30 who i'm about to start levelling again (with a mount - yay!) but I'd love an addon that let me know what quests my lvl 70 hasn't done yet. If this addon could do that then I'm sure I'd not run out of things to do prior to Wrath! If it doesn't, could anyone suggest one that can tell me which quests I've not completed?
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 3:33PM
No addon can find out what quests you've completed unless it is running when you turn them in. When you start a guide midway through you have to manually check off the quests you've done. There's simply no way around this.
here is a thought Jul 16th 2008 3:42PM
major major ditto... this is good for both leveling a friend (or wife's) alt, as well as getting that dang faction rep when you are so bored that maxing out all faction rep seems a good way to pass the time.
also, and i doubt it does this, but i would LOVE an addon that lets you know what quests others in your party are on. sure, you might all have to be running the addon (an acceptable price), but that information would be so very valuable. instead of constantly asking "can you link them again" (and even THAT no longer works since yesterday)
here is a thought Jul 16th 2008 3:48PM
@Tekkub: given a list of all avail quests for your faction/race/class/proffs/level (via something like wowhead) would it be possible to cross ref quest givers with npcs offering quests? if this test can be done then it may be possible to make an estimated guess at the completion of a quest based on if the npc still has it to offer. would require the player to get in range of npc i assume, but better than nothing.
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 4:02PM
"given a list of all avail quests..."
Well, first off you have to talk to the NPC to find out what quests they have. TG+TomTom+LightHeaded will map the NPC for you, so by the time you get to him you can see he doesn't have the quest, remember that you did it, and manually check it. If there were a way to know without interacting directly it could work, but there isn't a way and never will be.
Also, wel you have to load up a lot of data for this, and that data would need to be very accurate. I've seen a lot of bad or missing required levels on the DB sites... and there are a large number of quests with prereqs that aren't listed at all... good thing those sites let users post comments.
In short, it's a lot of data to load, you still have to talk to the NPCs... and really you only need to go thru a guide once when you first start. After you've done a level or so in TG it all flows quite nicely, unless you go off and do things before the guide tells you to.
JT Jul 16th 2008 3:35PM
The only thing i'm looking for is when i open up my map, it shows the locations of my quest objectives like in quest helper.
Does Tourguide do this as well?
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 3:36PM
Use TomTom + Lightheaded
Dotixi Jul 16th 2008 3:38PM
I have 4 gigs of memory so QH doesn't really slow me down but I hate that it ignores group quests and tries to run me through mountains and holes instead of down the roads.
I'll check out Tourguide.
One quest though, is TomTom better to use with Tourguide over Cartographer?
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 3:54PM
"I have 4 GB" is kinda a flawed argument, just because your pickup can haul 2 tons does that mean you should ALWAYS haul around 2 tons of crap? Besides that, it's not really the static memory use that matters (for example, the guides TG loads up and then just keeps around), but rather memory churn (use a variable once, toss it out) that is killer. It's not hard to make an addon that *appears* to have a small memory footprint, but in fact eats through memory at an alarming rate. In fact many new addon devs make common mistakes that cause this.
Now, I've not dug deep into QH, but the fact it gives you a setting for how much "CPU workload" it uses concerns me on many levels. It seems to me that when you need a setting to throttle back your addon, it's became WAY too big... and probably in need of a redesign so that it doesn't use that much power in the firt place.
Oh and re: TomTom vs. Carto... TomTom is the only one officially supported. Carto support may break (has at least twice now), and it won't get fixed until I'm given a patch from a user for it. So, Carto's kinda "use at your own risk"
jwbowyer Jul 16th 2008 3:42PM
Never have been a fan of quest helpers, I like to do the quests on my own, figuring out where things are. I guess it makes the game more realistic to me.
Tekkub Jul 16th 2008 3:46PM
As I said above, I believe in that too. Problem is that playing the content the second or third time, you already know where things are and what to do. At that point the fun of discovery is all gone and it's now more mindless repetition. TG's focus is to take all that and streamline it so you can burn thru levels quickly since you're most likely interested in just getting to 70 at this point.
The first time you play through a zone, you should read the quests and use your brain!
Brian Jul 16th 2008 3:49PM
Tour Guide is ok, so is Quest helper - for me thought the best Quest hand holding mod is Carbonite Quest.
http://www.carboniteaddon.com/
The free version of Carbonite Ques does all that Quest helper does but it seems slicker to me for some reason.