Tanking Addon Idea

[Corp Punishment]

I've been searching for an addon that will bring up a side "party window" of marked targets and targets target (preferably with some way of identifying the percentage of threat you have on a target to see when someone else might pull from you.) Haven't been able to find anything like this successfully. So my first request is if anyone knows of such an addon if they'd bring it to my attention. I feel a tool like this would help immensely with tanking in Cataclysm based on the current state of threat from tanks and the lack of aoe tanking abilities. This way I or a raid leader could mark targets kill order and a list of targets that I need to hold will come up as well as show the CC state of the other targets. I'm not even sure if this is possible to do, but if WoW would allow for it I'd be shocked if someone else hasn't had this idea. If no addons are available for this and it is possible...then I guess I need to learn how to use LUA scripting to help out my fellow tanks. Any help would be appreciated.

[River]

I believe the default WoW UI displays the percentage of threat you have on any target you mouseover or click. It's displayed on the unit frame and in my tooltip, at least. Also, if you hit 'v' to bring up enemy nameplates, they glow red when they're targeting you. Furthermore, I think it's the default UI that displays text warnings over mobs that say 'losing threat' or 'changed target' when aggro changes.

I have a lot of addons, but I believe the default UI does the three things I mentioned above. That seems like all you really need in a proper tanking situation. In Cataclysm, mobs will once again have to be CC'd and focused down (yay!). So if you're using your AOE threat abilities appropriately, they should still provide plenty of threat on adds. Unless, of course, your DPS is a little thick and thinks nothing's changed since WotLK's AOE-fest.

[gollie]

oRA (2 or 3) had a function similar to that one. If you had a raid with x people, and the tanks had been promoted to "tank-rank" in the raid then their Health-bars would show up, and if they targeted someone their targets health-bar would show up to, and their target's target aswell.

That's about as close as you can get, I think.

[Corp Punishment]

I appreciate the quick responses. I kind of figured target and targets target would be all I could get...was just hoping for a little bit more detailed way of looking at it. Hopefully dps gets the idea real quick that you can't just spam aoe to win in Cataclysm.

[Deleted]

If you use Tidy Plates and skin it with Threat Plates you'll be able to configure the name plates of mobs to change colors/transparency/size depending on aggro and threat levels.

[Rilgana]

Hopefully dps gets the idea real quick that you can't just spam aoe to win in Cataclysm.

I feared that too in the beginning. But after I leveled my own dps now to 80 after my tanks and healers I realized that
the tanks are the only ones left with "good" aoe ... every other class (except perhaps shadowpriest) is better of to use singletarget for
max dps.

[Alexio]

What you're basically asking for is multiple focus windows, with a threat indicator. Not sure it's possible, but it'd be awesome if it was.

Rather than create a new thread, I've also had an idea for tanking mods, so I'll add it here.

What I'd like to see is my threat on my current target, as a percentage, BUT, if I've got 100% threat, make the percentage equal my threat (100%) divide by the second on the threat list (say 80%). This would show me how much "overthreat" I've got (in my examples, it'd show 125%), which would give me an idea of whether DPS are right on my tail, or whether I can afford to switch targets and build up threat on another add for a few seconds.

Does this exist? Is it possible? I'd have thought it was possible give what Omen does.

[gollie]

try sThreatMeter2. It shows your threat in percentage and it's very lightweight so you should be able to modify it if you really deem it necessary. Although, in my opinion it would suit you well straight out of the box, as you'll be 100% yourself if tanking, and watching DPS on whatever percentage they're on will easily tell you what you need to know.

[ComputerNerd]

There are no specific means of identifying units by their marks, be it targeting or otherwise gaining information about them.
Such an interface would only work well with units which have a UnitID, and raid marks are not that.

[Deleted]

A window like this actually would be possible, but you wouldn't be able to click-target anything using it.
a) Scan all raid member targets and their targets, check their raid marks.
Like this:

local raidstuff={"raid","raidpet"}
local function getraidtargetunitid(raidTargetId)
    local scanned={}
    for i=1,GetNumRaidMembers() do
        for _, uids in ipairs(raidstuff) do
            local uid = uids..i
            while UnitExists(uid) and (not scanned[UnitGUID(uid)])
                if GetRaidTargetIndex(uid) == raidTargetId then return uid end
                scanned[UnitGUID(uid)] = true
                uid = uid.."target"
            end
        end
    end
end

2. If the above function returns a unitID, get threat info for it.

3. Display threat info as needed.

Even though, due to the fact that a raid target's unitID can change mid-fight, click-casting/targetting etc will not be possible.

[lvlark]

Now sorry if I get this wrong, but I assume you're aiming to show the threat levels next to the raid member that's targeting it? Cos if no raid member is DPS'ing it it'd probably be less of a problem anyway. In that case, you can always assist your raid member, manually if need be.

[stuperdude]

There are no specific means of identifying units by their marks, be it targeting or otherwise gaining information about them.
Such an interface would only work well with units which have a UnitID, and raid marks are not that.

If you were the one who had marked the targets couldn't there be a way to recall prior targets such that you could write a script designating each one by the mark you placed on them and allowing you to retarget it based on that mark?

[Corp Punishment]

What stuperdude is saying is exactly what I'd be looking for. As a general rule I will be co-raid leader with our guild master...so I will generally know what needs marked. If I can find a way to set up a mod to look for things I marked, have our other tank mark his own targets (per our input) it would leave everything marked and recall-able by the designated tank. If things hit the fan we'd have to adapt anyway...but this would be a good general help overall. I'm just not a fan of tab targeting and sometimes in a mess of a situation it's hard to click on the target running away from me. Any further input would be great *stares at Treeston* :P

[Deleted]

Again, just displaying aggro levels on a raid target mark would be possible (as long as SOMETHING is targeting it), but click-targetting is not.

[Corp Punishment]

Well I guess I'll leave it to Blizzard to fix the architecture to my liking and until then I'll just compensate the best I can.

[ant1pathy]

Well I guess I'll leave it to Blizzard to fix the architecture to my liking and until then I'll just compensate the best I can.

They have it the way it is specifically to prevent what you're asking, unfortunately.