Thoughts on bringing modern addons to classic?

[Aleks0410]

Nobody is making you use an addon that ruins your personal experience. Back in the day we would be alt tabbing Thotbot to find a quest item that was vaguely referenced in the quest text so an addon that saves you leaving the game is welcome. I seem to remember one that automatically brought thotbot comments into your wow ui.

1) Well, it’s an MMO. What others do will affect you too. If you don’t like transmog, you can’t just Not use it. Transmog will still affect you cus everyone around you uses it.

2) It’s not so much for my own purpose. It takes away a big part of the leveling experince for others. And I think that’s a shame.

[Echocho]

Were addons less powerful in vanilla because of the api was limited or because people didn't know just how much they could exploit it?

The latter. The modern API is a shell of what it used to be, they've been patching holes for almost 15 years after all.

My only guess as to why private server addons haven't evolved much is either because they don't want them to or they don't know how. WeakAuras is perfectly doable with the 2006 API, it just require a lot of development.

[Whistl3r]

1) Well, it’s an MMO. What others do will affect you too. If you don’t like transmog, you can’t just Not use it. Transmog will still affect you cus everyone around you uses it.

2) It’s not so much for my own purpose. It takes away a big part of the leveling experince for others. And I think that’s a shame.

People will still use other resources to help with the poor quest text whether they are in game so not so having an add on for convenience will not effect you if you dont want to use it.Who are you to say what levelling experience others should have? My experience of vanilla was you could waste hours looking for something in the wrong place through no fault of your own and an app that helps is a godsend.

[bloomy]

im part of the "no changes" group but i don't see this as a change so im fine with it. as long as what they create is as close as they can get to what they created over a decade ago im fine with whatever happens after. i fully expect new addons and better addons than were ever in vanilla wow, the only thing i think blizzard should step in to stop would be lfg style addons that encourage people to circumvent their default server chat channels to form groups.

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also, it sure would be nice if there was some sort of beta sometime soon so people can start getting addons setup and creators of addons can have some time to get them working before launch...

[Akka]

I'll actually enjoy being able to use WeakAura, Recount and some sort of threatmeter.
For the rest, meh. I hope we won't have the usual retards trying to enforce the equivalent of a Gearscore police, but I think that the different context will make such add-ons much less useful, so I'm not too much worried.

[Piesor]

The modern API is the perfect opportunity for every player to set up his way to play via addons.
Some will just use a copy of their retail UI, some will stick to classic-style addons.

I will definitely not have the same UI as in retail and stick to the basics (threatmeter, dmgmeter, bossmods + unitframes) to have an authentic experience.

[willemh]

I hope someone will remake the greatest addon ever: the boss mod that made projected textures and was developed during ICC. Should be possible with vanilla API.

[Tehterokkar]

I hope someone will remake the greatest addon ever: the boss mod that made projected textures and was developed during ICC. Should be possible with vanilla API.

But the game will not have the vanilla API.

It will have 7.3.5/8.0 Addon API. They have removed/restricted far more stuff from the API over the years than enabled functionality.

They have done this because it either created security loopholes(weakauras mailing all of your gold to someone else, macros that delete all of your gear) or because they have undermined Blizzard's attempts at creating difficult content or outright removed the decision making from the player to the addon(HFC Archimonde Radar, AVR from ICC times, Decurse from Vanilla).

Regardless of what people think of "no changes", Blizzard's stance on certain things has not changed. They will continue to protect the game from abuse due to AddOn/Macro API loopholes that were not initially intended(especially when it comes to automating gameplay).

[owbu]

mods in general seem fine to me, since they are user made and the whole idea of classic is "what if vanilla, but with modern people".

And then the mods should be treated like all other player activity. If it's exploitative (breaking intended gameplay), it gets banned.

[nodlimax]

Well, I will certainly use various addons. This goes especially for stuff like threat meters (was essential for raids back in the day) and dps stats. I will probably also use something like bagnon. One bag addons where a thing back then. There were also map addons to track resource nodes (mining, herbalism).

Even though there were a lot less boss mechanics back then I will have boss mods just to have timers.

Due to Blizzard making changes in the whole UI mechanic to block various actions I think it will be easier to modify existing addons for use in Classic. So depending on what is available I will use the stuff that is sensible to me. Even during Vanilla I had various addons installed.

One more thing I want to mention. I would prefer to avoid group searching addons. However I will probably have to use them because due to how the reporting system will work I can't really go into the trade or city chats to look for people. You will be reported quickly for spam and once you are silenced you will be screwed...

[avitush]

Fine with me.

I mean...add-ons existed in Classic. As long as the they're functional and don't break the game or violate the ToS or such, I see no problems and am not sure how even the most hardcore/unreasonable of the nochangers could argue with that. Mods that would've been allowed in 2004-2006 shouldn't be banned now.

Personally, I don't use a ton myself. I use DBM and Recount when I'm raiding (which I probably won't be doing in Classic anyway). Coordinates has always been handy, just because people always post coordinates on those WoW sites that tell where a quest objective or something is located when I finally get tired of chasing my tail looking for it. I've always been pretty happy with the default UI and never felt the need to change it. There are also a few minor QoL things that exist in the current game but not in Classic, and I may look for mods to fill those gaps. I think dungeon maps may be my big one there.

But either way, I think add-ons should be 100% allowed in Classic as long as they don't violate any rules or break anything.

[justandulas]

I’d rather have no addons at all in both current and classic wow. It’s a crutch for the weak gamers

[Essem]

Most people are going to be following Joanas or any other leveling guide to the teeth, so questing addons wont make all that much difference. Things like ELVui and a modern damage mater is the best QoL though.

[Puri]

They use the api of the current client, so it will be ways easier to convert modern addons to work in the classic client than vanilla addons.

And just to add, the current api is much more restrictive than the classic one, so things like AVR will not work.

[Noxina]

NO MODS! YOU WANTED VANILLA, YOU GET VANILLA!

/s

I'm fine with mods, though I don't think we'll see old school mods, unless people manage to make more modernized versions of them.

We had mods in vanilla aswell, not as good as those produced today, but we had them.

[Jibjub]

Hmmm.

I think UI stuff is all I would allow. Bags, bars, plates, easier hotbinding, etc. Not a huge fan of anything else.

[RobertMugabe]

I really really don't understand the purpose of these addons threads.

1. The game is specifically designed with addons in mind and people were using them in vanilla.
2. The vanilla API is actually more powerful than the modern one. You could do a lot of shit that almost like botting or projecting textures

[wysimdnwyg]

As a Vanilla raid healer, the one mod I'll miss the most is the OG Decursive. Fights like Luci (the fear) and Chromag (multiple debuff types) were FAR easier for a Priest with Decursive's one-button functionality. If I get to the point of raiding in Classic, I suppose I'll get a mouse-over mod to use for clearing debuffs, plus a player frames mod that will show me who is debuffed (and what type). It won't quite be the same, but it's likely the easiest alternative. (For the record, I suppose that combination exists today, but I haven't raid healed since Vanilla, so I don't know.)

The one mod I WON'T miss is anything that paints a picture on the floor. I used that in Wrath, and while it was fantastic for melee, it did feel like cheating a bit. I never had to worry about where to stand, even in the plague wing of ICC, where there was always something to avoid on the ground. I'm glad that kind of thing will not be available for Classic.

Everything else I've used (bags, buttons, UI, AH mods, etc) were all available in Vanilla, so I don't see a problem with using them now. The only ones I use in BfA that I won't in Classic are mount and pet mods, but with the lack of collections, those won't be necessary. I'll have one mount, and maybe one or two pets. Don't need a mod for that.

[avitush]

100% everyone will be using addons for quests

I can guarantee that I won't be using any addons specifically geared towards questing, unless you count Coordinates. My general go-to when I can't find something in WoW has always been to look it up on a fan site (which was Thottbot back in the day, of course), and people usually just post stuff like "the guy you need to kill spawns at [insert coordinates]"

I used some kind of quest helper mod back in Classic (briefly) and never liked it. Maybe it improved over the years (and maybe a better/more modern one will come out for Classic's re-release), but the one I remember using caused me all sorts of game stability issues and left a bad taste in my mouth. I screwed around with it for like...a day before I decided it wasn't worth the problems it caused and got rid of it.

Also I think for the most part my memory will function well enough for a lot of quests. It's been a few years, but short of raid stuff, I did most of the 1-60 quests in Classic multiple times, at least as Alliance. Although yeah, I could see a player who is completely new to Classic getting frustrated and resorting to some quest helper mod or other. I imagine busting out the world map and seeing nothing except your character's position in the world might be a shock for some who are used to seeing quest objectives plastered all over it.

[Yamuri]

Make Thottbot great again.