Beginner's Mod List

[Maticus]

If someone was just starting WoW, or at least getting their first few mods after playing for a while, what should they be? What are the absolute essentials?

[Khab]

I guess it would depend on what type of things they wanted to get from the mods. When I first started playing, I didn't use anything. I didn't even know what mods were.

I think a simple map mod for revealing the entire map is nice (MozzFullWorldMap)
A bag mod to make all your bags one big bag (bagnon, Tbag)
TomTom for coordinates
Maybe something like MobInfo or MobMap would also be good.
If they want quest help, then quest helper, lightheaded or carbonite would be good.

[Marlous]

Hm, I think it also depends on taste and the general idea of what someone finds vitally important. But what I would suggest to a starting player are the ones below.

Advanced Tradeskill Window - this addon doubles the window of your crafting profession, showing the items you can make on the left side and their materials on the right side. It also allows you to place items in queue, and shows you a shopping list for the queue and whether you have those in your inventory, bank, or on alts. You can sort the items list on category, dificulty, or alphabetical order, which can be really nice: difficulty during skilling up so that the ones you can skill up from are at the top, alphabetical for cooking when I'm not skilling up so that I can easily find a certain recipe, or category for my jewelcrafting so that my gems are sorted by colour.

Auctionator - before 3.0 I would recommend Auctioneer, but that one has turned into a difficult to understand mod with a 12-volume manual, and configuring it might be a bit too steep for beginning peeps (I'm relatively seasoned but still struggling with it). Auctionator compares an item you put up to the ones that are already on the AH, or even similar ones when it's an "of the xx" item. Basically, it saves you the trouble of having to look up the going price of stuff but doesn't do anything else.

AutoProfitX - this one adds a button to a vendor's window which you can click to sell al grey items at once, and after enabling it'll also sell all unusable soulbound items. Before I started using this I spent quite some time hovering over all the items in my bags, this one just cleans up half of the contents with one action.

DiMapCoords - this addon both provides you with coordinates on your minimap/worldmap and cleans up the default minimap buttons for you. I don't need a button for zooming in/out or a cross to cilck to hide my minimap, but for the rest I like the classic view. The coords are placed at the bottom of the minimap (overwritten by the ingame clock if you display it) and at the bottom of the world map, showing the coods of your location as well as the cursor. I prefer this one because it only cleans up and doesn't do anything to the layout or look of the minimap.

Druidbar (Druid only) - if you're a Druid that occasionally shifts into bear/cat form, then this addon provides you with an option to view your mana bar. I have it setup so that it's stuck to the bottom of my energy/rage bar, only shows up when I haven't got full mana, and really helps me check if I've got enough mana left for a heal or powershift.

Gatherer - if you have a gathering profession, then this really is a must-have. It shows icons on your world maps where nodes have been found in the past, making it easier for you to find places where a certain node is likely to be found again. Make sure to also download its database, otherwise you'll only get to see the nodes that you've farmed in the past yourself (and whatever you might get from guild or party members who also have this addon).

UberQuest Reborn Again - to me this is a musthave, but it's not absolutely vital. What it does is double your questlog, showing all the quests on one side and the quest text on the other side. If enabled, it also shows a little list on your screen where you can keep track of quests, much like the in-game version only more customisable as you can manually check/uncheck quests to show them in the list, and they don't disappear after 5 minutes.

Of course I use a lot more addons myself, but some are meant for raiding (so not interesting to a starting player) or are merely offering additional info so not really vital (such as AtlasLoot Enhanced).

[Siodar]

these are the some of the best suggestions i seen.

i like to throw in my tiny little one

questhelper - if your new and you don't know your way around, this mod will tell you where to go for pretty much every quest you get. you just have to open your main map (M key) to see where to go.

or

Carbonite - same as questhelper, but tells you how far the quest objective is and you can have a little map on your screen showing you where quests are (color coded areas)

[rgirty]

Bagnon, One of the few areas of the game that has not been improved is the bag system.

Bagnon is the answer, it allows you to view all of your bags on one screen as well as what is in your bank for any char on your account.

You can also simply type in a search for the item in question and it will be highlighted in your bags.

A very nice addon:

http://wowui.worldofwar.net/uploads/full4107_20070217.jpg

[clevins]

I prefer Arkinventory, but fully agree with the bag addon as a musthave. What I like about Ark is that you can setup virtual bags and assign those bags to predefined classes of t hings (Potions, tradeskill items, etc) OR you can set up your own category and then as you assign items to that, items go in the matching virtual bag. Virtual bags are just sections of one window, so you get one window goodness too.

A coordinates mod. So many times I've looked up a quest that's confusing me and someone will say that what I need is at X,Y. Makes it MUCH easier to find. A mapnotes mod can be handy too.

I didn't have ag_unitframes or Dominoes, but I'd recommend them to a new player. Partly a matter of taste, but I like being able to make my action buttons take less space by rearranging them and I like aguf's clean version of units.

NOT Questhelper/Carbonite etc. Great addons, but I think the first time through it's worth paying attention to the quests, the land around you and not rushing from point A to point B. On alts? Yeah, sure. But I LOVED exploring the world and seeing things for the first time and new players should give it a chance. There's way too much emphasis on 'the game starts at 80' IMO. Take your time on your first toon.

[Wiglet]

Cartographer

[Marlous]

I prefer Arkinventory, but fully agree with the bag addon as a musthave. What I like about Ark is that you can setup virtual bags and assign those bags to predefined classes of t hings (Potions, tradeskill items, etc) OR you can set up your own category and then as you assign items to that, items go in the matching virtual bag. Virtual bags are just sections of one window, so you get one window goodness too.

A friend of mine used to have Ark as well, but when he found that it disallows you from opening your bags while in combat he switched to Bagnon.

And I agree on not recommending any quest helping addon - it takes the fun out of the game if every quest is just turned into a "go to x, kill y, fetch z" chore without having to bother with reading the quest text or just paying attention. Indeed, on an alt or so it's a different matter, but not for starting players.

[clevins]

A friend of mine used to have Ark as well, but when he found that it disallows you from opening your bags while in combat he switched to Bagnon.

And I agree on not recommending any quest helping addon - it takes the fun out of the game if every quest is just turned into a "go to x, kill y, fetch z" chore without having to bother with reading the quest text or just paying attention. Indeed, on an alt or so it's a different matter, but not for starting players.

Hmm... I've opened Ark in combat to hit a potion when I've forgotten to hotkey it. Might be a setting.

Oh and one more: RatingBuster. When I was leveling, I figured out what stats were good for my toon, but it was sometimes hard to see if a drop or a quest reward was an upgrade or not. RB lets you mouseover an item and shows the net gain/loss in each base stat. It converts stam to health so you can see if you gain 50 hp or 500. And it shows how base stats like agi affect secondary stats like crit. Makes it MUCh easier to decide on gear.

[rgirty]

every quest is just turned into a "go to x, kill y, fetch z" chore

The quests are designed this way. All the text really tells you is some background or general hints on where to go.

The addon won't change the fact that a quest is either:

1. Kill these guys
2. Kill these guys and loot x from them
3. Use this object on these mobs
4. Go talk to this guy
5. Escort xx mob or npc

I heard a lot of talk on how the quests are better now, but thus far I haven't seen anything other than these type of quests.

[clevins]

rgirty... there are more of the new kind of quests in HF and beyond than in Borean. Most of the quests are still the type you list but they've got twists. For example in Storm Peaks there's a quest to free a drake, use it to rescue 3 NPCs (while you're mounted on it) and then fly back to where it started... while people are shooting at you. There's an escort in Grizzly Hills but the twist is that you and the NPC hop on a horse and it rides off. You don't control the horse, but it has weapons that you use to kill the mobs who chase and attack you along the way. And one of my faves, in Sholozar with the Frenzyheart are a series of quests where an NPC takes you to do various things and comments on stuff along the way. So, yeah, you're right in that the basic type of the quests is the same, but several have much more style and some use mounts or have you controlling a cannon etc to accomplish the tasks.

I'm actually having quite a bit of fun leveling the first toon. Yeah, I'll hit 80 and yeah I'll raid... but there's not going to be enough raiding to keep me occupied for 24 months (figuring 2 years to the next expansion), so I'm taking my time.

More to Marlous' point, the quest text can add flavor and background to the world, especially for a new player who may not know anything about Warcraft. Addons generally encourage you to just go accomplish the task. It's the same task... but without the flavor.

[rgirty]

I like my food bland, just like my questing.

I'll skip the flavor and take the effective route :D

Thanks for the heads up on some quest variance i'll definitely check those out!

[clevins]

Sure... but you're experienced. New people should try Tabasco®, er quest text.

Oh and a fave early one is in Howling Fjord... it's a short chain to get stuff that lets you operate a harpoon launcher. After taking one over as a cannon and destroying the village below you use a key to unlock another launcher... and ride a flaming harpoon down the cliff and across the bay.

I quite like what they did to add bits of fun to some of the quests. Sure, you could have just taken the key back to the NPC... but they took the time to put the 'ride a harpoon' bit in to add a bit of a kick.

[Maticus]

I'm surprised there's no Titan Panel or something like that on the list, I think it was the first mod I ever installed because it did so much in one.

[Aerath]

Want an honest answer?

I think beginners should most definitely avoid using addons.
Auctioneer is more of a hazard than a convenience (especially when real beginners wouldn't even be able to find, let alone use, the auction house).

The quests in the starter areas are all relatively straight forward and leveling is fast enough that a Quest Helper might even detract from the gaming experience.

Let a beginner decide what they're lacking before you shove a list of mods in their direction. I personally would prefer a list along the lines of:

If you want to move your minimap, use SimpleMiniMap
There's several mods to change action bars, such as Bartender4
There's a Bagmod, which'll sort your bags and show 'em cleaner, which is...

etc etc.

This is ignoring the fact that, for a true beginner, installing mods is anything but straight forward and self explanatory.

In short, there is not *one* mod I'd consider absolutely essential, and I do run a heavily modded UI.
If anything, I could see a mod which puts coordinates on your map as 'essential', due to the majority of people answering a question like "Where can I find Mankrik's wife" along the lines of "25.16".

[Gorny]

Some people ... especially Diablo players will tend to think that mods are hacks.

For the beginner, a few suggested are:

Gatherer
Auctioneer or something like it.
Titan
Maybe Cryo3 and Bartender

PvP Related:
Paranoia EPA

[ShadowForces]

I'm surprised there's no Titan Panel or something like that on the list, I think it was the first mod I ever installed because it did so much in one.
Bar mod - Yeah you're right, I think there are no "must have" mods for a beginner, but if I recall correctly Titan was one of my first mods, and all the info it provided me in one little bar (local time and coordinates for instance) were very useful! Due to some rather strange bugs I then had to switch to Fubar and only regretted not having done so earlier.

Autioneer - Wen I got to lvl15 and started using the AH I had to go get Auctioneer (I realy don't see why ppl say its confusing nowadays, it took me 5min to understand how it works, and the authors added a "like the old days" frame now. The only thing that made me stay a bit longer on the previous version was the collected data, so I used both for a wile just to feed the data to AucAdvanced and then made the switch. And lets not forget that this comes with Enchantrix, and also an "auto sell Grey items" functionality)

Map mod - there's nothing wrong with the default map... ...except it lack instance maps and boss drops. So wen you get to lvl20 and start venturing into dungeons its a good time to get a map mod for dungeons. Atlas is still the best out there imo.

Healbot - If you're a healer, you gotta have it at some point, even if its just to see how it works.

Cast bar mod - Blizzard now has one but I still don't like it, ECB works just fine.

I think the best thing to say to a newcomer about Mods is that they exist and that there are mods for virtually everything! Then ask him what they would like the game to have and point a mod name for those things. Till this day I use mods (had something like 200 at some point) and I only go search for any of them wen I have a problem in game that needs to be solved... I had a piece of paper with all the names of those who ganked me for a wile then went to search for PVPlog wen the number got over 20 :P

[Twoflower]

http://wowui.worldofwar.net/uploads/full4107_20070217.jpg

omg you have way too much crap... I can give you a course in housekeeping ( or bankkeeping in that case ) if you want :P

[Dejoule]

My first two mods were Smartbuff and Autobar. I rarely use Smartbuff anymore what with the change to Raid buffing.

Autobar is a mod I cannot function with anymore. It does so much that when I don't have it, my gameplay literally slows down.

I do agree with Aerath though. As a beginner, I would recommend running unmodded until you find something that annoys you or that you want to change, then find something that does the task that you want. I didn't have any mods on my game until after about 2-3 months of playing.

[Marlous]

Dejoule, I did the same thing but then when I finally did discover the addons I felt like I missed quite a bit.. I really wish I'd known about at least some of the addons when I started playing.

omg you have way too much crap... I can give you a course in housekeeping ( or bankkeeping in that case ) if you want :P

You think -that- bank is bad? Oh, you are SO not going to have access to my own bank.. o.O

[Dejoule]

Dejoule, I did the same thing but then when I finally did discover the addons I felt like I missed quite a bit.. I really wish I'd known about at least some of the addons when I started playing.



You think -that- bank is bad? Oh, you are SO not going to have access to my own bank.. o.O


I don't really feel I missed anything, however, I do agree that I'm going to be crippled if Autobar ever stops working.

And don't worry... my bank is far far worse... I have a private guild bank that has every item I pick up on any alt in it. It's really nice too for professions... (This requires 5 Elemental Earth) Oh - that's in my bank, huzzah