For many games, third-party addons are against terms of service, highly discouraged, and can even get players permanently banned from playing the game. However, with the current state of World of Warcraft, addons are an inseparable part of the game – like peanut butter and jelly – without one the other is not nearly as good. While addons are not a mandatory part of playing WOW, they can improve the game in so many ways that many veteran players would not still be playing without addons.
Playing in the higher skill echelons of the player base, addons are most definitely required as some players will refuse to play with people without the necessary addons for the hardest content in the game. This post will go over the types of things addons do in WOW, how to easily get addons, and some of the most useful addons currently used by millions of players.
Third party addons used in WOW are essentially massive quality of life features for the game, so much so that the WOW developers support the usage of addons and even have in-game tabs and commands for players to easily access and manage their addons. Addons have a nearly infinite amount of capabilities, but some of the more useful ones track player or enemy abilities and procs; tell players how they are performing with damage, healing, and other stats; change the way the base UI looks with many customizable features; and even can direct players to treasures and collectables around Azeroth.
While it is debatable whether the usage of third-party addons is actually healthy for the game, it is certain that the game would be much more difficult, frustrating, and grindy and thus would be far less popular without them.
With all of that in mind, there are several ways to actually download addons onto WOW files, but only one really easy way – using a program called CurseForge. This program syncs with WOW and all players have to do search the addon they are looking for under the WOW tab of CurseForge, click download once they have found it, and it will automatically add that addon to their WOW files. If the addon gets updated, all the player has to do is open CurseForge and click update for any given addon to update.
CurseForge has been around for a very long time and is very trustworthy; in fact, it is the same application used for installing Minecraft mods, so there is nothing to worry about when using it.
Moving onto some of the most used addons, there are a few the nearly every player has because they are useful for every part of the game. Then, there are some that are specifically used for specific parts of the game, like PVP, mythic plus dungeons, or world exploration. Here are the most useful ones for all content:
DBM or BigWigs – These are two addons that basically do the same thing. They tell players what a boss is doing and when. Simple but helpful since some bosses have very difficulty mechanics that are often done in quick succession. This addon works in all PVE content like raids, dungeons, delves, world bosses, and more.
Details – Tracks damage, healing, deaths, and much more depending on what a player wants to track, all in real time. It even shows breakdowns by abilities so players can understand exactly how much each of the abilities are doing. Most players use this to evaluate their performance and the performance of others in their group.
Plater Nameplates – Changes the default WOW nameplates for every targetable entity in WOW to cause less screen clutter. It also makes debuffs, DoTs, and buffs on enemy targets much easier to see and track. Plater can be customized in many ways to any players’ liking.
WeakAuras – Can track many different things but requires players to set up exactly what they want to track. Most players track procs of gear and abilities, enemy ability casts, and many more things that are somewhat tough to track without this addon. For easy setup, download the WeakAuras, type /wa in WOW, and import specific things needing tracking from the website “wago.io.” Most high-skill players and guilds require players to use specific WeakAuras.
Those are the most used Addons. Here are some of the more niche addons that are popular:
HandyNotes – Shows the location of all treasures, collectables, and rare mobs on the world map.
Simulationcraft – Helps players find their best stats, gear, and simulates their damage based on their current stats and gear using the website raidbots.com.
Raider.IO – Tracks all players mythic plus and raid progress score.
OmniCD – Tracks group members offensive and defensive cooldowns.
GTFO – Alerts players if they are standing in something they should not be.
GladiusEx – Tracks allied and enemy abilities, trinkets, health, and other resources in PVP, excluding Battlegrounds.
Bagnon – Helps players sort their in-game items within their bags and banks. Auctionator – Allows players to have a faster and easier experience using the in-game auction house.
