Hey guys,
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| Blizzard UI |
It's not a difficult process, that is, installing addons, so we shall get on with it.
I'll begin with explaining the original UI, since most aren't familiar with it for some reason. I won't include everything, but the basics will be provided. So Blizzard's UI is pretty simple, it's quite cluttered, but normally you don't have Bags and Character page open, so it's quite big. However the bars are kind of big, and they limit the number of bars quite substantially. To open up more bars, Press Escape -> Interface -> Action Bars, and tick the ones you want.
Okay, so I don't actually play with this UI per se, as it is quite aesthetically pleasing; but it is very cluttered for my playstyle, so I have addons to change this cluttered-ness.
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| Character Screen |
Installing Addons isn't difficult. It's NOT rocket science. Just download the addon, and place it in the WoW folder/Interface/Addon Folder. Voila. Now to turn these on, they're located on your character selection page;
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| My Old UI |
Please note that whilst I do like a clearer/cleaner UI, I used to have a much more compact and sleek UI. The two UI's are similar because my current UI was pretty much based off on the old UI. The main difference is the Diablo Orbs. Whilst they were extremely awesome; they lacked any PvP advantage, and was extremely cluttering, as it took a large portion on the bottom of the interface.
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| [EDIT] Updated UI |
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| Current UI |
Bartender
An excellent simple addon for configuring and simplifying your bars. You can alter sizes, positions, etc. Up to 10 bars, and you can put them however you like on your user interface. I recommend this Addon for PvP players who want a cleaner and more sleek UI, as it will decrease the space in which your user interface takes up.
Recommended (8.5/10)
Baud Bag
This addon does one simple thing; it combines all your bags into one big bag, and the same goes with your bank "bags". The reason I've chosen this specific addon is because it doesn't give that clear shit looking bag that all other addons give. The specific skin of the addon is the original Blizzard one, so it looks neat and "real". You don't HAVE to use this. But I'd recommend it for convenience. Also note that when you combine the bags, it becomes a bit difficult to know what item is in what bag, which may confuse you, so just uncombine all of em either by turning the addon off, counting the amount of slots, or just uncombine through the addon itself. It's clear, it's clean, and it's extremely useful.
Optional (6/10)
Button Facade
Clearly, an optional addon, and a nifty one that works well with Bartender. This addon simply acts as a nifty "skin" for all your bartender bar boxes. I've also compiled a few skins that I like, and some that I didn't expect to get but still shoved in because, more is always better? Anyways, in the updated picture of my UI, you'll notice my Bartender has a new skin. This is due to Button Facade.
Compilation Pack [Includes Apathy, Caith, Lily, Onyx, PixelSkin, Svelte, Nefs, and Xyrr]
Optional (4/10)
With Bartender, Recommended (8/10)
Doom CooldownPulse
This is a newer addon that I got. Ever watch WoW PvP videos? Ever see how in the centre of the screen, giant skills tick and slowly disappear off the centre? It's showing when a cooldown has finished, and you can reuse the skill. It's EXTREMELY useful, as the player's eyes are usually around the area of your character, thus it acts as a reminder that the skill is ready to use. Highly useful in PvP situations, and useful in PvE for specific rotations for DPS. Whilst this is not a necessity, if you're not extremely good at keeping track through multitasking like me, because let's be honest, there's alot of **** going on when you're PvP'ing, and this makes life easy.
Recommended (9/10)
GearScore
Specifically for 3.3.5a, found on the forums, this will allow you to see other people's Gearscore, and your own. GearScore is a tally of the "worth" of your gear in a quantitative state. It's not actually useful pre-80, but post-80, people will annoyingly only invite you to certain raids/instances depending on your gear score or gs, for short. So this is a necessity at endgame levels.
Necessity (10/10) (Lvl 80)
Useless (0/10) (< Lvl 80)
MapCoords
A sought after addon for the guild; a co-ordinate addon. I have yet to experiment with the addon, but at the current point in time, it seems to do it's job well. I am not sure as of yet if it provides co-ordinates to 1 decimal place, which I would have preferred, but it still does it's job fine.
Recommended (8/10)
Mappy
Works cleanly as a map replacement, can be moved around, is square. Displays your own co-ordinates, zone name, nodes, etc. Cleaner and simpler alternative to Sexymap, high recommendations for it.
Optional (6/10)
MikScrollingBattleText
Basically, it's a damage scrolling addon. Name says it all. It's actually quite a popular one, as it is quite sleek and quite lightweight (space). Fonts can be changed (custom ones as well), sizes of font, colour, etc. all can be changed to your preferences. However, whilst it is quite a good addon, it's not actually needed. Depends on preferences, but it's a good tally of your damage.
Optional (6/10)
EDIT: Updated to 5.4.78 [Credits to Anthony for report]
MozzFullWorldMap
For both veterans and beginners, MozzFullWorldMap is a good and possibly very necessary addon. It provides you with the ability to see everywhere without having discovered the area. It's a key necessity at this point in time as WoWHead and WoWwiki have updated their maps to the Cataclysm revamped mapping, and therefore searching through WoWHead is now useless (for Azeroth, excluding Northrend).
Highly Recommended (9/10)
Pitbull Unit Frames
A completely optional addon that features numerous customizations for the display portraits, bars, buffs, party, raids, etc. It allows you to get a much cleaner UI, and also allows you to see the target's target's target. How awesome eh? My mind will never adapt to this targetception, but hey, we'll never know. At this point, I've used Pitbull to it's minimal capabilities, since playing with the positioning of the UI is a massive *****. Anyways, clearly optional, but if you like playing with the aesthetics, it's highly recommended you play with this UI.
Optional (6/10)
Prat
Simple addon that I can't use to its full degree. It's an addon that provides you with the ability to alter your chats and etc. The best thing it's actually given me is the ability to see what job the people who are talking on Chat are. To be honest, it's quite useless and is a waste of CPU, but hey, it's preferences talking. It will record chat histories however if you are able to customise it to do so.
Optional (3/10)
Recount
Much wanted addon for raids/instances due to it's ability to track overhealing/DPS, etc. It will give a fair idea of how your party is doing in terms of these attributes, and is quite important in some instances. I would highly suggest at least one person in the raid/instance have this addon to recount the statistics.
Optional (4/10)
SexyMap
The name kind of explains most of it. It's an addon that simply changes your map to a custom one. It's displayed above. There are no real advantages, however I prefer it. I plan on changing to another map addon that displays in boxes so that I can clearly see where I am instead of it being on the top right hand corner. It provides no real PvP or PvE advantages, and are simply for aesthetics. If you have a look at my current updated UI, you'll notice that the map is now square. I've simply changed a skin for this addon to get this effect. This allows my eyes to not have to wander around on the top right hand side of the screen for information (during PvP and PvE situations).
Optional (3/10)
Quartz
Again, a simple and elegant clean addon, providing with clean clear castbars with red lag-latency processing. It shows the time required to cast, minus the time that lag is affecting your cast. As the best ping (ms) I can achieve is around 200ms on EternalWoW, 200ms is fairly significant (if you want clean smooth PvP, <100ms is preferred). But this is due to the fact that the servers are in US and aren't fantastic. I highly recommend all to get this addon. There are alternatives, but Quartz does wonders, and so, why not?
Recommended (8.5/10)
QuestHelper
Prior to WoTLK, QuestHelper was a necessity for all players alike. However the introduction of Blizzard's Questing system has loosened it's grip on the populus. The main advantages QuestHelper gives me to be honest is the customizable size of the Quest Lists, and the ability for the addon to generate the shortest paths to each Quest in the minimal amount of time (saving time, is saving money). I suggest you take up this addon, but it's definitely no longer a necessity.
Optional (7/10)
So that's basically all the addons I have at the moment. I plan on getting Recount in the near future, but other things are more important. Thanks for reading guys. This post WILL be edited in the future for more addons that I think will be of use to you, and will have been for me.
EDIT: Added Pitbull and Button Facade.
EDIT 2: Added Mappy, and updated MikScrollingBattleText
EDIT 3: Added MapCoords and Recount
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