Hello Community Council!
Recently, World of Warcraft’s director, Ion Hazzikostas, revealed in an interview that the team intends to limit the functionality of addons and WeakAuras in raids, aiming to reduce their dependency in encounter design. The goal is to create less complex and more intuitive mechanics, prioritizing the core game experience. This change aims to break the “arms race” cycle between addon developers and the challenges proposed by raid designers.
Source of Information
Firstly, I would like to congratulate the decision, which I believe is something that should have been implemented many years ago. Moreover, I believe this initiative should not be limited only to raids and dungeons but should also be expanded to other aspects of the game, such as the user interface. Many players still rely on addons to address long-standing interface issues, which often provide incomplete information and lack more robust options and functionalities.
It is also important to highlight the existence of certain addons whose use remains questionable, even today, as they are still allowed by the game team. These addons, in many cases, offer unfair advantages or compromise the integrity of the gaming experience by automating processes that should require direct player interaction. While some addons are indispensable for improving the quality of life of players, such as interface adjustments or accessibility, others cross the line between facilitating and unbalancing the game. The maintenance of these addons raises questions about the extent to which the development team is willing to regulate and control these tools to preserve a competitive and fair environment in World of Warcraft.
===========================================================================
Spy Addons and Other Scanners
I don’t understand how allowing addons that assist in detecting and locating stealth players—whether in the open world or in instanced environments—or those that display coordinates (including location and map) of other players, even without the user having visually spotted them, can be considered beneficial. These addons remove the need for perception and strategy, breaking immersion and giving an unfair advantage to those who use them.
Player Fishing While an Addon Displays Class, Level, Stealth Player’s Name, and Health
The image shows a scenario where a player is fishing while an addon displays detailed information about a stealth player, such as their class, level, name, and even health amount, without the player ever having spotted them.
Addon Displaying a Player’s Exact Location
The image shows an addon that reveals the exact location of a player, even without them being seen or interacted with in any way. This type of tool makes it easier to identify other players in real-time, disrupting gameplay dynamics, especially in situations that rely on stealth or strategic exploration of the environment.
Honestly, allowing this type of addon goes against the very design of the game. It’s like offering an excessively enhanced version of the hunter’s tracking ability, but available to all players, regardless of class or specialization. This creates an imbalance, turning mechanics that should be strategic and skill-based into something automatic and universal.
Now, imagine playing a Counter-Strike match where your opponent is using an addon with the same purpose as the Spy or other “scanners” in WoW. What would happen? It would be completely unfair, right? The player could easily locate and neutralize any of their opponents with ease, completely breaking the integrity of the game. In the end, it’s not about skills or strategies anymore—it’s about who has the tool that reveals everything. This is exactly what’s happening in WoW with these addons, and it’s something that needs to be addressed.
The use of addons like this completely undermines the spirit of a fair and balanced game. In a game like World of Warcraft, where part of the strategy relies on mechanics like stealth and surprise, allowing addons that nullify these dynamics goes against the core design. It’s equivalent to using a “wallhack” (or something similar) in an FPS, which destroys both the competition and the fun. In WoW, the impact is the same: these tools break immersion, reduce the challenge, and make the experience less engaging and strategic.
Now, imagine a jungler in League of Legends going for a gank and being alerted by an addon that “reveals” someone hiding in the bush, ready to ambush. This would completely destroy the strategic depth and mind games that are essential to the game. The fun lies in predicting and reading the opponent’s plays, not in being notified by an external tool. The same applies to WoW: these tools weaken not only the challenge but also the very essence of how the game is meant to be played.
Yes, using a third-party addon that provides a competitive advantage by offering information not equally accessible to all players through the game’s basic tools would also result in a ban. This undermines the original experience the game was designed for.
Gladius
The Gladius addon is a great example of functionality that, in my opinion, should be integrated directly into the game’s standard interface for 2v2 and 3v3 arena players. Players could then optionally choose which abilities to share cooldown visibility with their team, helping optimize communication in a competitive environment and reducing the need for unnecessary verbal calls.
Addon Gladius
I believe that having access to cooldown information for your own team is perfectly valid. However, when another feature of the same addon begins to provide detailed cooldown information for the enemy team, it undermines the strategic elements that should be exclusive to them. This is exactly the kind of impact the GladiusEx addon introduces to the game, making a key strategic mechanic too accessible and disrupting the balance of the competition.
Addon GladiusEx monitoring enemy team’s cooldowns
There are addons that introduce an “artificial” difficulty into the game, which, in my opinion, should neither exist nor be allowed. Addons with scanning functions, which connect to the World of Warcraft API, are among the biggest aberrations still permitted to this day.
The purpose of addons in World of Warcraft (and in games in general) should be to enhance the player’s experience without compromising the integrity of the game’s design. In other words, addons can be useful, but they must do so without interfering with the core mechanics of the game or creating unfair advantages, as many do today.
In any other game with a zero-tolerance policy regarding the use of addons for this purpose, the player would immediately be classified as a “cheater” under Blizzard’s code of conduct, resulting in severe punishments, such as temporary or permanent bans.
In Diablo 3, some players resorted to using a third-party addon known as TurboHUD, which provided detailed information on the minimap, including the location of elite monsters near the player. This functionality gave a significant competitive advantage, allowing players to easily locate powerful enemies—something not possible with the native tools in the game.
Blizzard, the developer of the title, considered the use of such software a violation of the terms of service, as it compromised the game experience and undermined fairness among players. As a result, the use of addons like TurboHUD was banned, and players who chose to use them faced penalties, including permanent bans.
While World of Warcraft does not have the same randomness in monster respawn rates in dungeons as Diablo 3, not providing certain information natively in the game can create an unequal playing field. In other games, like Civilization 6 and Baldur’s Gate 3, when players join a match using mods, everyone must have the same addons installed to ensure a fair and equal experience for all.
The issue here is not just about installing an addon, but rather the impact it has on the integrity of the game as a whole. Allowing certain addons alters the game experience in ways that go beyond simple aesthetic or functional changes. These addons not only affect how players interact with the world, but also influence the game’s dynamics, creating unfair advantages or even removing mechanics that were carefully designed to provide a balanced challenge. The problem is not with the addon itself, but with how it distorts the original design, harms balance, disrupts healthy competition, and undermines the immersive experience the game was intended to offer.
Official statement from the Diablo 3 team in 2019 regarding this “addon”
Source of Information
For those who have never seen TurboHUD, it’s quite similar to many of the informational tools we already use in World of Warcraft. In Diablo 3, the addon displayed elements like the hitbox of monsters, the range of spell effects, monster identification on the minimap (though not for all monsters), and the duration of monster abilities. These features are somewhat comparable to what we use in WoW through addons like DBM, WeakAura, and others.
“Addon” TurboHUD being used in Diablo 3 before it was banned.
There are other addons with scanner-like features, such as RareScanner, NPCScan, and Silver Dragon, which, although less “intrusive,” still diminish the element of discovery and exploration—an aspect that should happen organically, through the player’s own effort. Often, a player’s first encounter with an elite monster isn’t a natural experience in the game world but is instead prompted by the information provided by these third-party addons.
RareScanner informing that a specific monster is alive, even though the player hasn’t spotted it yet.
In games like Ragnarok: Eternal Love (mobile MMORPG), players are encouraged to explore the world, much like in World of Warcraft. One of the rewards for this exploration is the creation of an internal database, or a kind of “wikipedia,” which players can consult as they progress.
In the image below, we can see how each NPC the player interacts with generates an entry in the Adventure Journal (similar to the system in WoW for dungeon and raid bosses). These entries include a colored portrait, while NPCs the player has yet to encounter are displayed in grayscale. The journal not only provides a brief biography of the NPC but also reveals their location, role, and the items they sell within the game, which can be particularly helpful when you’re uncertain about where to go or what to purchase.
In World of Warcraft, players have access to more detailed information about dungeon and raid bosses. However, in Ragnarok Eternal Love, there is a complete internal database, something similar to Wowhead, offering comprehensive information about everything in the game — from common monsters and NPCs to books the player has read and other details, all accessible directly within the game.
A similar implementation in WoW could include an internal registry system accessible through the in-game interface, allowing players to easily consult information about all NPCs, monsters, and items. This would reduce reliance on addons or external websites, integrating more data directly into the game and enhancing the exploration experience.
This proposal for an interactive and progressive database/wiki is inspired by the Pokédex from the Pokémon franchise, a concept rooted in field guides and scientific encyclopedias. Satoshi Tajiri, the creator of Pokémon, based the Pokédex on his childhood passion for collecting insects, turning the idea of ‘collecting and cataloging’ into an interactive digital experience.
In this adapted concept, instead of capturing and cataloging creatures, players would interact with various aspects of the world, generating records that contribute to the game’s database.
In World of Warcraft, this would be similar to defeating a boar in the starting zone of the orcs. After the boar’s defeat or interaction with its loot, a record would be created containing a brief biography of the creature, much like what is found on WoWpedia or in the physical manual of World of Warcraft Classic (shown in the image below):
But it’s not just the information about the creature or NPC’s description, but also complementary information such as what they drop, sell, and where they are located in the game, similar to some of the information available on Wowhead:
I find this experience much more interesting because it invites and encourages the player to interact with and explore the game world, offering a reward that goes beyond mere achievement points. The reward translates into information that can be consulted at any time within the game, based on the discoveries made by the player themselves.
Perhaps the functionality of detecting elite monsters on the map could be implemented as an additional reward for completing all quests in a particular region or as an achievement for defeating all elites on a specific map at least once. I believe something like this could be worked into WoW, rather than ‘outsourcing’ this function to an addon that acts as a constant scanner.
===========================================================================
Addon Tomtom
Adding a native function equivalent to TomTom in World of Warcraft would make it easier to identify the character’s coordinates in real-time. Currently, we only have the option to mark the map and share it with other players, but not the option to view it as shown in the image below.
On the left, the coordinates identifier below the minimap in Final Fantasy 14, and on the right, the absence of a coordinates identifier on the minimap in World of Warcraft.
This small improvement would already be one less addon to install and keep updating.
===========================================================================
Addon Better Wardrobe
Why do players use this addon? Have you ever questioned that?
Because the database of transmog sets that was developed in the past was never completed. You can see in the image below that the first equipment record the player has access to is from the Firelands raid from the Cataclysm expansion, and I ask you, what about the previous expansions? What about the other raids from Cataclysm? And the PvP seasons? And the other tier sets from campaign zones?
There simply isn’t an official record within the game, where the data is already available.
If I’m not mistaken, starting from the content of Battle for Azeroth, the records become more consistent and properly organized. The records before this expansion are inconsistent or sometimes nonexistent.
===========================================================================
Addon Capping
In battlegrounds like Alterac Valley, players don’t have access to information about the time remaining for a cemetery or tower to be captured by their faction without using specific addons. Currently, players use the addon Capping to monitor this, but we could have a HUD displaying this information without the need for an addon.
Addon Capping recording the progress of capture points in the Isle of Conquest battleground
HUD from the MMORPG Rift designed to provide important information quickly and accessibly, without interrupting the gameplay action
Video showing the HUD of flag capture progress in a battleground in the MMORPG Rift
https://www.curseforge.com/wow/addons/capping-bg-timers/screenshots
===========================================================================
Addon Total RP
Relying on an addon is not ideal, as in the future, the creator may decide not to update it anymore, leaving the entire community without an essential tool for developing their own experience and immersion in the game.
There are more than 57 RP servers worldwide, and leaving such a large community “dependent” on an addon for so many years doesn’t seem like a good idea to me.
Initial interface of the Total RP addon used in WoW
Character background selection in Baldur’s Gate 3
Customization of background during character creation in Guild Wars 2
Edit Profile, which would be equivalent to a character background editor in Final Fantasy 14
I believe it is high time for the team to consider creating or integrating a native, alternative solution to this addon, to prevent the RP community from becoming dependent on it.
===========================================================================
Mission Table Manager Addons
This is a type of addon that could be avoided if there were a more intuitive way to change the button located on the mini-map radar for mission table progressions from other expansions.
Addon adding a button to the side of the Dragon Isle Summary banner
Addon adding buttons to the top of the player’s screen to access the mission table from previous expansions
Other players use scripts to view the progressions of mission tables from past expansions like the ones below:
WoD
/run ShowGarrisonLandingPage(Enum.GarrisonType.Type_6_0)
Legion
/run ShowGarrisonLandingPage(Enum.GarrisonType.Type_7_0)
BfA
/run ShowGarrisonLandingPage(Enum.GarrisonType.Type_8_0)
Shadowlands
/run ShowGarrisonLandingPage(Enum.GarrisonType.Type_9_0)
Is it really necessary for the community to develop addons to fill gaps in the game? Shouldn’t the experience be more refined and complete, without relying on external modifications?
===========================================================================
Impact on Game Performance
Certain addons, even when using powerful hardware, can cause a loss of more than 30 FPS during a raid encounter or large battles in PvP battlegrounds.
In the video below, a setup with quite robust specifications demonstrates significant performance drops.
PC configuration:
CPU - Amd Ryzen 9 7950x3D
GPU - Sapphire Radeon 6950XT Nitro+
RAM - Corsair Dominator 6000MHz
SSD - Samsung 990 PRO 500GB
Observe the frames per second (FPS) rate between the two comparisons in the video
The use of various addons to supplement information in different game content, combined with raid addons, can lead to substantial performance drops in these environments. Often, players complain about performance issues without realizing that, in some cases, these problems are caused by the addons they are using.
===========================================================================
Addon Noob Blocker
In Battle for Azeroth, this addon would instantly remove players from different regions and specific server types, regardless of their performance in the game. As long as this addon was active, players from blocked regions began migrating to more populated servers to avoid the restrictions these addons were causing in the game.
Although this addon was eventually removed, other methods were created and continued to be applied in the game in different forms, similar to the integration of WeakAura, Dungeon RIO, and class-specific addons.
Dungeon RIO and Classes
The Brazilian streamer Jhoolna revealed during the Shadowlands expansion that the “Dungeon RIO and Classes” extension of the “Weak Aura” addon hides the Raider IO scores of LATAM players, negatively affecting their selection for Mythic+ dungeons and raids. This tool not only conceals important information but also places these players at the end of the queue, intensifying implicit bias. The situation was demonstrated in a test where Brazilian players who were watching the stream had their data hidden.
The video is in Portuguese, but it’s clear that after the streamer asked players from a specific Brazilian server to join the open group he created, no player from that server was displayed.
Clip Title: “Xenophobe weak aura | doesn’t show IO from latam/br servers”.
https://www.twitch.tv/jhoolna/clip/AbstemiousHardHedgehogHumbleLife?lang=da
This is not something limited to players from a specific NA region, but also affects other servers around the world where the progression history isn’t high.
This is an example of an addon/aura that is visible and shared by other players, but what about the addons that aren’t public and are made for a small, select group of people who continue to do this, and players don’t even know?
===========================================================================
Petopia (Bonus)
Although it’s not an addon, the role played by websites like Petopia, widely known among WoW hunters for providing information about tameable beasts and their locations, is often integrated directly into the game environment in other games. This allows players to perform queries within the game, eliminating the need to rely on external websites.
** Internal Database Interface with Information on Tameable Monsters in Ragnarok Eternal Love
(Skills, Locations, 3D Animations, Advanced Filters, and Other Features)
I think we could introduce something similar to this in WoW.
===========================================================================
Improvements in Progress
It would be possible to mention various other addons that automate quests, facilitate purchases in the auction house, or even add-ons that infringe copyrights and, in theory, should be prohibited. However, many of these addons are widely used as if nothing would happen, or their use has been downplayed to the point of being considered acceptable in the game. Still, I will limit myself to the examples already mentioned.
Despite some criticisms of addons that positively and negatively impact the game, it is important to highlight the recent improvements in the UI and HUD, which have been enhanced by the game’s team. These improvements include the identification of icons on the map, player interface customization, the “white” background indicating main campaign quests, and the separation of campaign quests from other side quests, among other aspects of the game.
Icon Identification in TWW on the Map
Icon Identification in Legion on the Map
I don’t advocate for the end of addons, but I believe their functions should be more restricted and regulated by the game’s team. Addons that truly enhance the player experience could be integrated into the base game and improved by the development team. On the other hand, those that compromise balance or violate guidelines should be banned. In WoW’s current state, excessive reliance on addons can make some content frustrating and less enjoyable to play, especially for those who choose not to use certain addons.
Moreover, this dependence on addons and third-party websites hinders the player onboarding process, as it often requires explaining not just the basics of the game, but also how addons A, B, C, and D work, in addition to pointing players to information that must be sourced outside the game.
I believe there is a lot of room for improvement in this aspect of the game.
===========================================================================
Supplementary Topics
Other topics that have been recently discussed related to addons in the game.
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/if-they-are-going-to-remove-addons/2032750
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/bandisable-gse-aka-lazy-macro-addon-please/1950582/21
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/we-need-an-ah-filter-without-addons/2029704
https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/remove-all-add-ons-from-the-arena/2029469