Arcane Brilliance: 6 essential Mage add-ons for PvE
by Christian Belt 
Aug 1st 2009 at 8:00PM
Welcome to another Arcane Brilliance, the weekly Mage column that celebrates everything Mageworthy and thinks Warlocks smell funny.
I have a buddy who doesn't use addons.
I know, I know. And before you ask: yes, he is a moron. It's a flaw I've learned to overlook during the years we've known each other. His rationale for not using addons seems to be a combination of mistrust for anything that isn't part of the game right out of the box and a misguided belief that addons somehow equate to a form of cheating.
Now, I'll never convince him he's wrong--even though he clearly is--but I chalk that up to the fact that he is a moron. We both know and accept the fact of his moronitude, acknowledge that after 20 years of friendship, he probably isn't going to become any less infuriating, and move on to other topics.
You see, addons are awesome. I frequently assert to anyone who cares to listen (earning me more than a few strange looks, believe you me) that believing addons are cheats simply because Blizzard didn't program them into the default UI is pretty much the same thing as considering indoor plumbing a cheat because God didn't program it into the Earth when he originally created it. Addons are the community's way of grafting functionality into the game that Blizzard should have included from the start, and that's simply how it is. And yes, I am indirectly rebuking deity for not providing mankind with toilets from the beginning. I mean, how does it make sense that we had to go thousands of years without the option of peeing indoors? That's just poor design. I fully expect to be struck down at any moment as an example to smart-asses everywhere.
Disclaimer: I am in no way asserting that not using addons makes you a moron. I'm certain there are a great many of you out there who prefer not to use addons, and I'm sure you're by and large wonderful, fully functioning human beings. All I'm saying is that my buddy isn't one of those people. Also addons are awesome. That's all I'm saying.
Ahem.
The last time we discussed Mage addons, we focused on the PvP side of things. This week: PvE.
As with the last addon column, I'll add the caveat here that these are by no means the only useful PvE addons out there. These are simply those that I consider most essential. Raiding as a Mage without them is possible, but I'd compare it to performing surgery with your eyes closed: the results will be messy, and somebody is probably going to end up dead.
Omen
Yes, Blizzard has recently integrated a rudimentary threat warning system into the default interface. Omen is so much better that it's insulting to even compare the two. Every class should absolutely never raid without it (and indeed, a lot of guilds require it), and it's especially important for we Mages. As you may be aware, when you deliver a consistent stream of giant crits to a boss's face, as Mages tend to do, that boss tends to take more notice of you. Omen lets you know how close you're getting to having said boss forget all about the tank and wander over to eat you. If you don't have Omen or some other threat-meter alternative, get it. If you have it, pay attention to it. Make sure your Mage's name is never at the top of the list it provides. Your tank will thank you, your healers will love you, and maybe the boss will end up eating the Warlock instead.
Scorchio2/Power Auras Classic
These two mods are absolutely wonderful, and which one you use is really just a matter of personal preference. Both do essentially the same things, and they do them well. Scorchio is more tailored specifically to Mages, but Power Auras is incredibly customizable. Both mods keep track of buffs, debuffs, CCs, and every proc known to man.
In my opinion, these are the best options out there for tracking things like the Improved Scorch debuff, Hot Streak, Missile Barrage procs, and everything else Mages absolutely must be aware of.
MiksScrollingBattleText
Aside from being the single greatest run-on word in the English language, MiksScrollingBattleText is also my favorite combat text mod. I extolled its virtues in the PvP addons column, but It's just as awesome in PvE. It provides a wealth of combat information in an easy-to-follow presentation, and is so ridiculously configurable, you can probably figure out a way to get it to complete your math homework, tell you a bedtime story, and then sing you softly to sleep. This mod will allow you to know far more about any fight as it's going on than you have any right to know, and is indispensable when it comes to figuring out how you screwed up the Yogg fight yet again. There are other good options out there, but this is the combat text mod I like the best.
Quartz
Another mod I already mentioned for PvP purposes, this cast-bar addon is also essential for PvE. It takes latency into account, letting you know exactly when you can begin your next cast, improving spell rotation efficiency. Also, I just like the Quartz bar (which you can tailor to meet your needs) a whole lot more than the tiny default one.
Hit Assist for Casters
I only recently discovered this mod, but it has already become my new favorite addon. What it does is very simple, but now that I've discovered it, I have no idea how I got along this far into the game without it. With this mod, when you mouse over a target, your tooltip will tell you what percentage chance you have to miss it, and if that chance is zero, right below that, it tells you how much hit rating you can stand to lose before you stop being capped against that mob. If you already have this mod, you're nodding your head right now, going "yep, this mod is awesome." If you don't, your eyes are widening as you realize how helpful that would be. Or they should be. It's difficult to describe how infinitely nice this mod is to have around. Go get it now. I'll wait.
Decursive
I think as Mages, a lot of us forget that we have a little spell called Remove Curse. It's in our spellbooks, under the Arcane tab, wedged in between some croissants and a mana gem or something. I don't know. It's in there somewhere. Trust me.
You should be using this spell. A lot. It's one of our most valuable abilities, and I think we sometimes get so caught up in keeping our names on top of whatever damage meter mod we're running that we forget we can often keep the raid from dying by removing a few curses.
This little beauty of an addon makes doing so an almost unspeakably simpler task. I firmly believe no Mage should ever enter a raid without it. In a nutshell, what this mod does is keep track of all debuffs on every member of the raid, and provide you with an audio or visual cue whenever a teammate is afflicted with a curse you can remove. It's simple and elegant, usable right out the box without the need for any configuration, and has enough options to please even the most hard of the hardcore. Hardest of the hardcore? Most hardcorest? Eh, whatever. Get this addon.
For fun, I'm going to list a few other excellent quality-of-life addons you might also consider:
Ratings Buster
This converts combat ratings into percentages, so you can more easily tell how an item will benefit you.
Livedamage
Excellent little mod that tells you your current spellpower as it fluctuates during combat.
Opie
Gives you a little circular actionbar for portals and Mage armors such and looks like the menus in Secret of Mana, which makes it awesome.
Pitbull4
The most ubiquitous of unit frame mods, Pitbull can do almost anything if you configure it hard enough. Seriously, I'm pretty sure my Pitbull mod is about three more log-ins away from becoming self-aware and ending humanity in a nuclear hellstorm.
So if you use addons, you're probably nodding your head right now, thinking how similar our tastes are, or else you're furiously typing about some incredible mod I forgot to mention. If you don't use addons, at least now you know what you're missing. Or you read the column title and stopped reading. Either way, at least I tried.
Every week Arcane Brilliance teleports you inside the wonderful world of Mages and then hurls a Fireball in your face. Check out our recent three-part guide to PvP for each Mage spec, or our look at what hit rating means to Mages. Until next week, keep the Mage-train a-rollin'.Filed under: Mage, Analysis / Opinion, Add-Ons, Features, Raiding, Guides, Classes, (Mage) Arcane Brilliance
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 7)
poggg Aug 1st 2009 8:05PM
Why do people who use addons feel the need to insult those who don't...?
Daniel Aug 1st 2009 8:14PM
exactly, why do they? It's never the reverse.
The person who thinks a mod is cheating is as silly as the person who thinks you must have a mod to raid. The only question is whether you can do the job assigned to you. Who cares how you get that done. If you can do it without a mod, fine. If you need a mod, fine.
mibluvr13 Aug 1st 2009 8:15PM
For the same reason that people who play unconventional or "bad" specs. Yes, it's their money and their playing experience, but WoW is an MMO. How players choose to play the game directly effects everyone else who has to depend on them. Refusing to play with addons, like playing a generally underpowered spec, reduces the dps, healing, tanking, leveling capacity, what have you, of the player. Any caster who has played with and without Quartz can tell you how much of an impact addons can make on your dps.
I understand the argument of "If I can play as well as everyone else without addons, what does it matter?" but my response is "If you can play that well without addons, imagine what you could do with them!" So, it's the player's choice if they want to play without addons, but you can't expect me to give them equal respect as someone who understands how much higher quality of playing one gets out of addons, or even choose to regularly raid with them. Blah blah blah, it's just a game, but *I choose* to play with players who do whatever it takes to be the play the best that they can. That includes staying current on patches, reading EJ regularly, and having appropriate addons.
I see the whole "cheating" argument, but addons are not botting, not even comparably. They only reduce frustration or enhance someone's existing skill. If you're terrible, no ToS-compliant addon is going to change that.
...Sorry for the wall of text. I'm kinda passionate about this.
Alexander Krizak Aug 1st 2009 8:54PM
You assume too much in thinking that using addons will increase one's DPS. Indeed, my DPS goes down if I use any addons. Why? Because they use my computer's resources, reducing WoW's framerate even more on my old computer than it normally sits around. And a low framerate will reduce my DPS far more than not having addons will; with a low framerate, it's impossible to get your timing right for casting, especially if you have abilities that proc when debuffs are applied to your target.
Dreamer Aug 1st 2009 9:09PM
@ Alexander Krizak
I find it hard to belive that your computer suffers so much from using addons. I run Recount, Omen, FuBar, and Bartender and have all of a ~10fps difference. I dont know if its your computer, but 10fps isn't going to change your dps.
mibluvr13 Aug 1st 2009 9:20PM
Yeah, I use 80 or so addons and there still is only a 10 fps-ish difference.
Alexander Krizak Aug 1st 2009 9:28PM
@ Dreamer and mibluvr13
A 10-fps difference is a lot when than means you're going from 12-13 fps to 2-3, as happens with my computer.
Wolftech Aug 1st 2009 9:58PM
@Alexander Krizak
What kind of chip do you have in there? A Dorito?
Seriously, just a few hundred dollars will get you some decent gaming upgrades. Hell, my old AMD Socket 754 (2.2ghz) with 2 gig of ram and and AGP HD3850 video card still keeps 30-40 frame rates in ulduar (and occasionally drops to 15 during really graphic intensive fights, although I cant seem to get better than 15 in Dalaran :D) and I run like a billion addons.
If you still have an older system with AGP video, I suggest getting the Sapphire HD3850 video card from New Egg (its like 100 bucks) at the very least. A decent video card will fix your frame rates.
ziggler Aug 1st 2009 10:43PM
yet bashing mr alexander a little more... just said this in another collum, but im using a computer so bad that raid leaders dont allow anyone in our guild raids to use non combat pets because that will destroy even a little more my amazing 26fps 800x600 resolution...
and guess what, my dps stays pretty much the same when i have the chance to use my wifes computer (top notch system). yes, it has taken me a lot more to run away from anything (causing wipes form this), but, dps-wise, its pretty much the same.
(btw, running a 6 year old computer with 1gb ram and whatver was the worse the manufacturer could get their hands on that year, seriously, it takes me litteraly 15 min to run from the fp in dalaran to one of banks in there)
danawhitaker Aug 1st 2009 10:58PM
Because we're tired of people who don't use addons calling us cheaters and implying that we're morons for wanting the game experience to be smoother. Most of them seem to take a very elitist attitude about it too, I've found, especially when it comes to questing addons. I had that argument one day with a guild member who was complaining about having to look up something up on wowhead. My obvious suggestion was to use the Cartographer quest addon, which is fairly minimalistic but still reasonably good at directing you where to go. They went into some diatribe about how it removes the immersiveness of the game (yeah, because alt-tabbing out doesn't remove the immersiveness at ALL) and how they like the challenge of finding things - subtly implying that anyone who uses them is lazy and a bad gamer. Another day, someone who didn't have a coordinates addon was asking where to find some stuff in old world. I looked it up on the map and told them coordinates. "I don't know what those are, describe it". So of course, I had to spend - literally - five minutes explaining how to get to one point in Stranglethorn Vale. Now, I'd ignore these people if they were whining about it in general chat. The problem is, they're complaining about it in guild chat, and as a higher up in the guild, it's hard for me to actually ignore them without coming across as rude.
I don't care if someone wants to run no addons or a hundred of them - until they start to negatively impact my gaming experience in guild chat by QQing about something that a very simple addon solves. If you don't want to be told a solution to something, then keep your mouth shut.
To use the plumbing analogy by the author - imagine you had a neighbor with no indoor plumbing who constantly was ringing your doorbell asking you to use your toilet. Wouldn't you get pissed off after a while, especially if they could easily afford to get their own indoor plumbing and their own toilet?
nonentity Aug 2nd 2009 2:21AM
Why do people who don't use addon's insult those who do?
They telling you they don't use addons because they consider it cheating is indirectly insulting everyone who uses addons because it pretty much accuses them of cheating.
Nevermind the fact that Blizzard themselves implemented the addon-compatibility functionality etc. and after years and hundreds of thousands of addons Blizzard doesn't say anything against them and actually tries to copy the best of them....
Drop the retarted "it's cheating" argument and no one will insult you.
Note, I called the argument retared, and I stand by that, and not the people. They are just wrong. ;)
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I pretty much agree with and use most of the ones Christian mentioned, except Scorchio (I use PowerAuras), LiveDamage (don't really see the need for it), Hit Assist for Casters (didn't know about it, gonna give it a try) and Opie (same as Hit Assist, but I use Fubar_Portals, so probably not gonna use it).
ZomgBuffz has a ZomgPortalz module that is also very awesome. Depending no whether you're alone or in a group/raid you get a really nice transparent HUD view of all ways of teleportation you have. Portals for Mages, Hearthstone for everyone, the Teleport-thingies for Engineers etc.
Bouillestfu Aug 2nd 2009 5:43PM
Because it's like driving a car without power steering. Nuff said.
Minimagicma Aug 2nd 2009 5:57PM
I'm highjacking this a little, but there is an addon that i consider essential that you didn't list.
DrDamage
Its a great addon that tells you for any spec how much crit/haste/hit/spellpower will increase your damage for each spell as well as how much hit rating u have against targets of X (preset controllable level), and it works for any class and any spec for those of you who aren't into the magic side of life.
nieboh Aug 3rd 2009 2:55PM
@danawhitaker
I used to get exasperated by people who didn't have coordinate addons too. Then I realized how easy coordinates are even if you don't have an addon. If someone asks me for a location, I'll reply with something like "35, 62" Then they reply with something like "I don't use cheating coordinate addon, can you explain in plain language"
I don't say something like "if you don't want to cheat, why ask for directions? go find it yourself"
Now I say "open your map and start in the upper left hand corner. Go 35% of way from left to right and 62% of way from top to bottom. That should be 35, 62. maybe you'll really be at 30, 66 since you're estimating, but that should be close enough. look around when you get there."
If they still can't figure it out, there's a simple macro they can use:
/script px,py=GetPlayerMapPosition("player")
/script DEFAULT_CHAT_FRAME:AddMessage(format("( %s ) %i,%i",GetZoneText(),px *100,py *100))
(this is taken from this wonderful site right here)
http://www.wow.com/2007/10/25/easy-macro-for-getting-your-coordinates/
AlmtyBob Aug 3rd 2009 8:08PM
@the OP:
In a raid enviroment (and even a PuG) It can be very frustrating when people refuse to admit that addons can drastically improve their gameplay. Everyone I've ever told about Quartz initially tells me their castbar is fine and doesn't understand the use. I have to make an impassioned plea to them to try it (and I'm a prot warrior). For those who don't know, Quartz accounts for latency in your cast bar. It's worth more than any single gear upgrade you can get. If you're casting a 2s cast with 300ms of latency and spam your next cast/ability right as your cast bar finishes, you're actually casting a 2.3s spell. Quartz will make this back into a 2s cast. Gaining a third of a second in this cage is massive. You've effectively added 200 haste rating to your character (15%) just from using an addon. The more normal haste rating or faster spells you use, the bigger the gain.
mibluvr13 Aug 1st 2009 8:06PM
I knew a guy like your friend and it was infuriating to say the least. I think he eventually caved to the AV Premade addon back in those days.
HOW CAN YOU PLAY WITHOUT COORDS!?
-A warlock (Shhh, don't tell anyone I read this column)
peon47 Aug 1st 2009 10:29PM
You dont need co-ords to play. A simple macro will give you in-game co-ords directly to your chatlog.
And for about a year before I discovered the macro, I did it all in my head. If someone told me the mob was at 50,50 I looked in the middle of the map. 25,75 is the south-west quadrant, and so on.
mibluvr13 Aug 1st 2009 10:32PM
But why bother doing more work? If I'm playing temporarily on a computer without coords, yes, I can handle it with some guesswork, but why would I want to otherwise?
Ametrine Aug 2nd 2009 12:14AM
SPY!
bittina Aug 2nd 2009 12:36AM
I'm a warlock and I read this column...the better to out DPS the mages :-)