WoW Addons
Addons are always a big thing for raiding. They can help (and sometimes hinder) the raiding process immensely. I personally run with 148 addons currently. Now, i don't actually raid with that many addons but that's how many I have in my addon folder. Most people run with like 40 max. As the guild leader(and raid leader) I need to run with a little more than most just so i can see more of what's going on in the raid.
IMO these are the addons that a general raider needs to have running at all times during raiding:
Class specific mod to help you out(IE - Pally Power)
Our guild also requires Ora2 which is an addon that provides the leaders with some useful information as well as provides the raiders with a tank window when the leaders post it. This addon is one of the best addons for leaders. It lets you mass invite, set a keyword so it auto-invites someone when they whisper you(so you can go afk and eat dinner and the latecomers can get into the raid), do polls when needed, assign the tank list, mass disband the raid if needed, auto-promote assistant raid leaders, auto set the loot rules, etc... It is probably the addon that I use the most that is an active addon(as opposed to Omen which is a passive addon).
We also require Group Calendar so that people can sign up for raids without having to go to our website to do so. Since it is in-game it is much easier to enforce people to sign up as a requirement.
And of course it's not an addon but Ventrillo or an alternative voice chat program is also a requirement for raiding.
Raid leaders on the other hand need to have more information than what those addons provide. For raid leaders I suggest at least the following:
X-perl or equivilant - so you can see the raid as a whole and see what is going on with it(who has aggro, who is being healed, who is cursed, etc)
A DKP program - assuming your guild runs with DKP
Big Brother or equivilant - Tells you who is breaking sheeps, who's misdirecting to whom and etc.
Examiner - lets you inspect people and instead of just seeing thei gear it gives you an overview of what their gear is giving them stat wise. Can quickly check if people have the right resists for the fight or etc. Very useful for recruiting too.
Grim Reaper - Now part of X-perl , it tells you what happened to each person if you hover over them. Better than scrolling back through the damage log to see why Jimbob died 5 minutes ago.
Incubator - Gives you the respawn timers of the instance you are in so you can tell whether its safe to have people run back or not.
Loothog - Helps track the /ran 100 rolls. Ignores when people roll twice and gives you an option to post all the rolls into chat. helps when lots of stuff is going on and you might miss a roll or two.
LootWhore - tells you when people are looting in combat(as opposed to doing their jobs)
PallyPower - Pallys have a knack for not being good at buffing for whatever reason. Helping them setup buffs and seeing what buffs they have assigned to themselves can speed things up.
A damage meter - I personally think that only the raid leaders should be running damage meters actively. Too many people concentrate on how well they are doing on the charts and not how well they are doing avoiding things they need to avoid. I only use damage meters to see who is underperforming, I could care less who is at the top. I use Sw-stats because it gives me Effective DPS which takes into account how important someones dps was to the fight based on the fight and not how well someone did personally. I you died 3/4 through the fight then your personal dps is going to show what you did up to that point, mine shows what you did through to the end of the fight. Again, it's more important to stay alive than it is to top the meters.
Telltrack - It may sound stupid but as a leader I get whispers from a million people all the time and when the fights are going on it makes it really hard to pay attention to that. This program shows me who sent whispers. If they show up as read it means I haven't responded and I can pull their message back up, even if it was an hour earlier. Still doesn't mean you wont lose tells if you are getting a lot but it helps not lose all of them.
On top of all that I also use atlas-loot. It helps with planning to look at boss loot and can even help you with a new instance as far as to which way you should go towards a boss.
I think my next post I will delve into some addons that are more class specific.
Vote for this article on Massive Blips!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
New here? Subscribe to Kree's Blog by RSS or by Email.
