Is playing without addons viable?

[Mad_Murdock]

While I understand what you are saying, this here is just the raid leader telling him what to do (who is using DBM) over DBM actually telling him.

Therefore, there is still a reliance of an addon, without actually having it installed.

Hope that makes sense. A buddy of mine used to do the same thing, run no addons, but when it came time to raid, things had to be called out because he had no timers.

It makes sense and there is a truth to it no doubt. But have you ever been at that place were the timers were off and then the raid went to shit because people couldn't watch for the cast bars themselves? As others have said, many things have alerts and animations and the Boss does an Emote that lets you know something is starting. I believe the really skilled players pick up on all that and have the reaction speed to act on it.

I suffer from tunnel vision and baddieness. I use powerAuras to set up alerts to tell me things I shouldn't need to be told, like when my Health is below 35% because I zone out and forget to look at myself. I found the more mods I can use to play for me, the more lazy I get.

[Tuesdays]

Other than QoL add-ons, you're cheating.

[Izalla]

It makes sense and there is a truth to it no doubt. But have you ever been at that place were the timers were off and then the raid went to shit because people couldn't watch for the cast bars themselves? As others have said, many things have alerts and animations and the Boss does an Emote that lets you know something is starting. I believe the really skilled players pick up on all that and have the reaction speed to act on it.

I suffer from tunnel vision and baddieness. I use powerAuras to set up alerts to tell me things I shouldn't need to be told, like when my Health is below 35% because I zone out and forget to look at myself. I found the more mods I can use to play for me, the more lazy I get.

Jesus christ, that stupid Dragon in DS that would cast the oneshot thing and you had to hit your button, forget his name right now, but EVERY DAMN TIME someone died to that I'd hear "Oops my DBM messed up" or "Oops didn't hear my alert" and I'm raging because watching the friggin cast bar was all you had to do and there was NO EXCUSE for "my addon didn't tell me to hit the button"...

[DrPeanut]

I raid mythic, and while I don't have a mythic archi kill (and won't because of guildies quitting the game), I will say that the only raid addon I use is skada to see damage numbers. I don't think addons are required at all. However, I've been playing this game for a decade now, and I think the average player looking to improve can use an addon or two to help them out. Don't think they should become a crutch, though. If you like UI changes aesthetically, then that's your preference. But if you have an addon that tells you which skill to use next, or when to move out of fire that you're standing in? Those are things you want to ween yourself off of as soon as possible in order to become a better player.

[Lesane]

A shit player is still shit with all the most helpful "play the game for you" addons, and a great player is still a great player without them.

A lot of what makes great players great is how they use all the information add-ons give them to minmax performance.

Personally I use a minimal amount of add-ons and only the ones I really "need". Playing a rogue, I really need something that puts CP/Energy in the middle of my screen near my character along with buff/debuff rotations. Otherwise it's just unplayable. Some info also cannot be seen without add-ons. I have a weakaura for example that tracks how much more SS I need to use until the next insight level. That's something you'd never have access to without add-ons aside from counting in your head, along with all the other shit you need to pay attention to.

[Qlix]

Mythic Archimonde without the mark of the legion addon would be a total nightmare, you'd have to get 4 groups into the right position within a few seconds without knowing who will be chosen to be at each mark. It's probably doable but the % of players completing the content would be even lower.

Outside of serious PvE/PvP I would imagine that it's viable, it just requires more effort for the same results

This is actually one of the few instances I can think of that would be near impossible without marks being handled by an addon

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A lot of what makes great players great is how they use all the information add-ons give them to minmax performance.

this. this a lot.

[rasako]

Physically playing; Yes.

Playing at the top end of the game, in the most hardcore and most strict environments that demand so much of you; No.

Anything between those two extremes; Depends.

You can do mythic raiding without addons, as I was a hardcore raider from vanilla to cata and never used an addon in my life, including running my own pugs every single week for 2 years in wrath. I agree that every single group will demand/require you use them though, thus making your statement "technically" correct.

Raiding has gotten to the point where addons are a necessity due to encounters being designed specifically for said addons as well, which I think proves how ridiculous our reliance on addons has become.

[Qlix]

Raiding has gotten to the point where addons are a necessity due to encounters being designed specifically for said addons as well, which I think proves how ridiculous our reliance on addons has become.

Mythic Archi comes to mind here.

[Pull My Finger]

Intrinsically, yes. The game is playable, and I believe that much of the content is theoretically beatable without addons.

But in practice, it's hardly possible to play without them if you're interested in difficult content, because the way the community operates is built around addon usage.

[RedGamer030]

Imma have to disagree here a bit. One of the best Rogue players we had said he didn't use any add-ons, particularly DBM has he felt that was having the game play for him. He was a solid player, a solid DPS and someone you could depend on to do the call when you made the calls.

I am talking about a new to average player. There are exceptions, obviously.

[Rezhial]

That's not really fair, just because your buddy needed such things. Personally I learned the fights and knew something was coming up before anyone called anything out, and was prepared already, because I got a sense of how long there was between each important ability. And the screen alerts you when the boss is casting something big or whatever anyway. So to each his own.

My point was simply I don't think it's possible for an entire raid to get away with the default UI and still be successful in the higher difficulties. That's all.

Mythic Archi comes to mind here.

This being a great example.

[Qlix]

My point was simply I don't think it's possible for an entire raid to get away with the default UI and still be successful in the higher difficulties. That's all.



This being a great example.

Yeah the thing with Archi is literally the whole raid could be on default ui with 1 person running one of BW/DBM/ERT and still function. But there... someone has to make that mark.

[kurama]

I think is possible, but not at the same level.

[Jademist]

I don't think they're necessary at all. Granted the highest raising I have done is heroic HFC but to be honest I don't use DBM or HealBot or any other raid assistance mods. I only have AtlasLoot and other QoL and making my UI cleaner types of mods and I have played optimally when healing or DPSing.

I think DBM and similar addons makes the raiding experience less fun. For me at least. It removes the challenge when I have to be told to do things rather than learn how to avoid them and adapt to then. Again I haven't done mythic raiding. The only boss I think that would need a mod is Iskar and even then it's doable without it.

I don't use addons to tell me how to play in other games why should I do it in WoW? I don't even think games like FFXIV have addons like DBM and their raids can be really challenging and yet people can play and perform optimally in the hardest content without addons. Why should WoW be different?

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Intrinsically, yes. The game is playable, and I believe that much of the content is theoretically beatable without addons.

But in practice, it's hardly possible to play without them if you're interested in difficult content, because the way the community operates is built around addon usage.

That's the problem here. The community has evolved to have to rely on addons to play the most difficult content in the game. It's like playing Dark Souls with an addon that tells you exactly when to dodge and when to attack instead of actually relying on reflexes and learning the boss battles so that it becomes second nature. That makes for fun and engaging gameplay in my opinion.

[SoulSoBreezy]

Yes.
All content is designed assuming the client has no addons installed.
What you miss out on are the QoL enhancements. It also presumes that you are not a competitive player in the world/server first sense, as with competitive raiding, everything short of exploits is fair game.

[Deleted]

It's not viable for some boss mechanics. The best current example is mark of the legion ability of mythic archimonde. The ability is probably one of the most hard core abilities ever created in this game, but, because of the way an addon can cheese it, it can become one of the simpler ones with addon support.

Now, I do think Blizzard could fix that a bit, because they could make a better default UI for those things. For example the marks could have nice graphics on top of people's heads denoting which debuff will explode first so that addon use might be less needed.

[ComputerNerd]

Playing - Yes.
Playing optimally ? No.

The default UI is horribly lacking in a lot of areas, I would argue particularly in terms of information display.
As shown by blizzard's implementation of addon features, they understand that their UI is not ideal for everyone.
The nameplate enhancements shows that.

There is some information you can read off the default UI, such as cooldowns on buttons and durations or stacks on buffs.
But it simply does not present it in a way that is easy to read much of the time.
I think there should be a serious rethink of many of the default UI informational elements.
Unitframes, buffs, action bars etc.

[Felfaadaern Darkterror]

Other than QoL add-ons, you're cheating.

No - Blizz has been designing the game with addons in mind for years. They officially allow them, so that's not cheating.

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Well of course you can log in and "play". So I'll take the question the way I think it was intended: Can you play well and have a positive experience.

That, imho, depends on what aspects of the game you are playing. No one needs DBM to do pet battles or quest dailies.

I personally find DBM and GTFO to come in very handy in challenging instances.

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It's not viable for some boss mechanics. The best current example is mark of the legion ability of mythic archimonde. The ability is probably one of the most hard core abilities ever created in this game, but, because of the way an addon can cheese it, it can become one of the simpler ones with addon support.

Now, I do think Blizzard could fix that a bit, because they could make a better default UI for those things. For example the marks could have nice graphics on top of people's heads denoting which debuff will explode first so that addon use might be less needed.

Blizz assumes most raiders will be using DBM.

[Baconeggcheese]

Yes, though increasingly difficult depending on what content you're playing.

Though legion is bringing some changes that should make it significantly easier with default ui.

[l33t]

What do you think?

If by playing you mean world content, yes, definitely.

If by playing you mean mythic raiding, high-end pvp, or anything liek that, no, absolutely impossible.