Arena Interfaces

[ellbot]

I've been playing WoW since release but have always been much more PvE-focused then PvP. Just now (more in anticipation for 5.2) i'm getting into Arenas. I'll primarily be playing my Mage, Shaman and maybe Hunter but am looking for some examples of people Arena interfaces. The primary thing i know i need to focus on more is enemy team awareness and what they are currently casting/buffs they have. I know nothing is a substitute for experience but I feel a solid interface layout will at lease provide me with better information to make better decisions in games. Also, any information about what you are really focusing on while you arena (places you are looking, etc) would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

[Saantri]

Standard ui with gladius, plate buffs and perhaps some class flavor addons (for example rune addons for dk's, totem timers for shamans etc). Thats what im rolling with, cant really complain or wish for more.

[rzy]

Base ui entirely except Tidy plates, only use that because i'm an unholy dk...on my hpal i use nothing.

[Flaim]

i went back from all those fancy (!) addons and just installed a few to slightly modify the standard ui to fit my need.

arena specific only addons that i use are
sArena for tracking of enemy trinkets/resize/move of the arena frames provided by blizz. don't like the clutter with gladius.
LoseControl for tracking cc on practically everyone. platebuffs would be slightly better as you don't need to have everyones frames, but i don't like having my screen flooded with thousands of icons.


any other addon i use is not specifically for pvp, rather preference of how basic information is provided.

edit:
depending on your class you might need a dr-tracker aswell.

[Snuggli]

Best thing to do when coming from PvE to PvP is to completely uninstall your interface folder and start fresh with the bare necessities. I use default, a self-made addon and Juked. That's it.

Gladius and GladiuslosSA are both good. You can get click functions for Gladius if you are running out of keybinds (so when you shift click a target on the Gladius frame you cast polymorph on them etc - it's still better to get poly123 though). GladiuslosSA is more for people who need help understanding what is going on in Arena, because at first you don't really understand how important it is what the other team are doing.

Get Juked to track enemy CDs and interrupts. Amazing if you're a healer and helps with faking so much.

SafeQueue is a nice simple addon which removes the 'Leave Queue' button on the arena pop. Means you'll never have any hugely embarrassing "shit i just pressed leave by accident" moments.

Flaim above me recommended sArena, which allows you to move the enemy arena frames and track trinkets. This is what most people use now instead of Gladius who aren't short on keybinds and don't need click-functions. It's a lot neater and doesn't take up 1/4 of the screen. It's up to you which one you use though.

Tidyplates is also another good recommendation. It's mainly good if you're a DoT class so you can keep track of DoTs on the nameplates.