What are addons and why do you need them?
Addons are player made extensions that can enhance features of the game or even introduce whole new features that alter the gameplay and improve your performance. In this article we will be looking at the best addons for the healer role and how they can help you with keeping your allies alive even in the direst of situations. Keep in mind that while this is a Top 15 list, the addons here are in no particular order, since they all serve very different functions.
15. Method Raid Tools
Starting our list on a high note is the Method Raid Tools addon, a must have for healers who are serious about raiding. This addon comes with plenty of features that allow you to keep track of difficult encounters and react accordingly.
Why you need Method Raid Tools:
- Set up custom notes and instructions for your raids, never forget a boss mechanic again;
- Keep track of all the relevant information about your raid members during combat, which helps a lot in keeping them alive;
- Record your combat statistics and those of your allies.
14. ElvUI
When we talk about changing the interface of WoW, it is inevitable to talk about ElvUI, a full replacement of the original World of Warcraft user interface that allows you to completely customize every nook and cranny of the HUD, from positioning to sizes, hiding or showing specific elements, and a lot more.
Why you need ElvUI:
- Allows you to completely customize your UI;
- Making the perfect UI for you can be a great help overall, improving the visibility of important elements of the user interface while hiding useless ones;
- A customized UI can make the game a lot more comfortable and intuitive to play, which in turn increases your overall performance.
13. Healer Protection
The Healer Protection addon is a very useful tool for any healer in WoW, automatically sending important messages in chat which your allies can greatly benefit from, such as when monsters turn the aggro on you or when you are almost out of mana.
Why you need Healer Protection:
- Automatically communicate important combat information to your allies;
- Let your tank know when enemies turn their aggro on you;
- Shows your mana percentage to your party or raid members.
12. Deadly Boss Mods - Dungeons
Moving on to an essential mod for PvE players of all roles, we have Deadly Boss Mods, or DBM, split into two categories: Dungeons and Challenges. The Dungeons version can greatly improve your performance in 5-man PvE content, with features such as colored warnings, warning messages, custom bars, and an auto response to whispers.
Why you need Deadly Boss Mods - Dungeons:
- Additional warnings can really help you survive a difficult boss encounter, which is particularly useful for healers, because your team’s survival mostly depends on you;
- Auto responds any whispers sent to you, letting your friends know that you are busy;
- Custom timers and infoframes specific for 5-man PvE content.
Get Deadly Boss Mods - Dungeons here
11. Deadly Boss Mods - Challenges
The second part of the DBM addon is the Challenges mod. It shares most of the pros previously mentioned for Dungeons, but is optimized for challenges instead, such as Proving Grounds and Torghast.
Why you need Deadly Boss Mods - Challenges:
- Additional warnings that can keep you safe during a difficult boss encounter, being particularly helpful for healers, because your team’s survival mostly depends on you;
- Auto responds any whispers sent to you, letting your friends know that you are busy;
- Custom Timers and infoframes specific for challenges.
Get Deadly Boss Mods - Challenges here
10. TopCombat
TopCombat is a targeting assistant addon that is mostly used by DPS players, however it can be very useful for healers in PvP as well. Recognizing the enemy player who deals most damage quickly means that you can get away from them and reposition yourself to a safe spot that allows you to continue healing your allies.
Why you need TopCombat:
- Allows you to easily identify the top DPS enemy players;
- Staying away from a potential death is much easier when the highest threats are marked;
- With this information you are able to better reposition yourself in PvP encounters.
9. Kui Nameplates
If you think that the nameplates in WoW are lackluster, then look no further, Kui Nameplates is a great mod to improve on that aspect of the game, with a plethora of settings, from frame sizes to custom auras, in order to make nameplates in WoW much better.
Why you need Kui Nameplates:
- A wide variety of options for you to improve nameplates in the game while also being easy to set up;
- Improved visibility and more information about your targets;
- Has an aura function, threat and aggro glows, and much more.
8. Gnosis
Gnosis is an addon that allows you to keep a precise track of cast bars and every sort of combat timer in WoW, such as auto attack timers and GCDs. You can set up an unlimited amount of bars using this addon, making it very useful to any magic class in WoW, especially healers.
Why you need Gnosis:
- Keep track of your casting times and auto attack timers;
- Allows for custom bars for tracking your GCD as well as off-GCD abilities;
- Plenty of customization options for an intuitive UI, allowing you to even anchor cast bars to your mouse cursor.
7. Skada Damage Meter
Skada Damage Meter is a fully customizable addon for keeping track of our damage and healing output. It has several options when it comes to viewing modes, additional bars and an import/export function for your settings profiles.
Why you need Skada Damage Meter:
- It is very important to keep track of your overall healing output;
- Fully customizable with different viewing modes and the option to include additional bars;
- Import and export profiles in order to keep your settings across different computers or sharing with friends.
6. Threat Plates
Similarly to the Kui Nameplates addon, Threat Plates is an addon for improving and customizing nameplates in WoW. However, this addon has more features and settings available such as an automatic spec detection function, fully customizable nameplates, support for multiple profiles and lots of different options.
Why you need Threat Plates:
- Fully customize every setting of the nameplates in WoW;
- Automatic spec detection that makes the setup process a lot quicker and easier;
- Save and load as many different profiles as you want.
5. Death Note
Tired of your team wiping in dungeons or raids and not even knowing what went wrong? Then check out Death Note, an addon that gives you detailed information on how you and your allies have died. We learn from mistakes, and this addon is certainly a huge help for improving and eventually overcoming challenges.
Why you need Death Note:
- Provides detailed information about your deaths and those of your allies;
- Analyzing and understanding the death of your teammates is essential for you to improve as a healer;
- This is an amazing tool for figuring out difficult boss mechanics that might wipe your team over and over again.
4. Ability Team Tracker
Ability Team Tracker is an addon that can completely change the way you see PvP in WoW, allowing you to keep track of every cooldown of your party members, which means that you will know the correct time to retreat and be defensive, and the best time to burst the enemy team down.
Why you need Ability Team Tracker:
- Allows you to keep track of the cooldowns of your party members;
- Provides more synergy between you and your party in PvP;
- Fully customizable, which means that you can keep track of any specific ability that might have a heavier influence on your actions.
3. WeakAuras
You can’t talk about addons in WoW without talking about WeakAuras. This amazing and flexible tool allows you to set up and display custom graphics in WoW’s interface, showing important information such as buffs, debuffs, alerts, and all sorts of valuable data during combat with improved visibility.
Why you need WeakAuras:
- Greatly increases the visibility of important combat information;
- Allows you to set up and display all kinds of custom graphics related to combat;
- While this addon might be intimidating due to the large amount of features, the website has many premade WeakAuras for specific classes and specs.
2. Healium
Healium is an awesome UI optimization addon specifically made for healers. It allows you to put specific spells, items and macros right next to the healthbars of your allies, making your life so much easier when healing a group.
Why you need Healium:
- You can add up to 15 fully customizable buttons next to each ally’s health bar;
- Custom buttons have their own cooldown animations and range checks;
- Easy to configure, just drag and drop skills from your spellbook.
1. VuhDo
Raid Monitors are a very popular category of addons in World of Warcraft, and when it comes to healers, no raid monitor addon is better than VuhDo. The features of this addon include the display of relevant information of your raid members such as mana pools, debuffs, shields and aggro, a click to heal feature and a full raid setup function.
Why you need VuhDo:
- Have a full display of all the relevant information of your raid members;
- Assign up to 40 different mouse click combinations which allow you to quickly cast spells on your party members;
- Automatically cast your trinkets and off-GCD abilities.
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