For well over the past 10 years, World of Warcraft players have used player-created WeakAuras to track cooldowns and navigate mechanics in raid and Mythic+.
In the latest Patch 11.1 PTR build, files were datamined suggesting that Blizzard is adding their own WeakAuras-like tracking to the base UI of World of Warcraft.
Whether it's through WeakAuras, Curse Forge, or WoWUp, players have been using addons to assist with raid and dungeon mechanics for years and years.
With the upcoming release of World of Warcraft: Midnight and Season 2 of The War Within, it looks like Blizzard is responding to some long-time complaints from the community:
From player housing to a 3000 io achievement to updated mechanic visuals, Blizzard is making a ton of changes to World of Warcraft over the next year, largely for the better. One of these is adding WeakAura-style tracking to the base UI of the game.
Wowhead correctly describes the conflict between Blizzard and addons as "an ongoing arms race." With the creation of cutting-edge addons, teams are clearing Mythic raid faster than ever before. This causes Blizzard to create increasingly difficult fights (Gallywix has nearly 50 different mechanics and abilities in the upcoming raid.)
The divide between world-first professional players and the average World of Warcraft player that's happy to get AOTC has become increasingly stark. The use of addons has caused Mythic raid to become so difficult that it feels like Blizzard is creating their content with only the Race to World First in mind.
In response to this, Blizzard has mentioned that they plan on scaling back the functionality of WeakAuras in World of Warcraft, aiming to put more players on an even playing field. Ion Hazzikostas said in an interview with PCGamer:
"I think [addons are] an area where we likely will want to start clawing back some functionality, as long as we can make sure that our baseline game experience is offering players the information they need to have an engaging, elegant time."
Back when the UI was revamped in Dragonflight, Ion also foreshadowed that Blizzard would work to include many of the features that players add with WeakAuras to the base game:
"Crash Reed who is one of the UI designers speaking in that deep dive, one of the things that he's worked on is kind of trying to replicate what a lot of people do with weak auras, which is centralizing information about buff uptime, debuff uptime, cooldown tracking - kind of pulling that information towards the center of your screen."
What WeakAuras are being added to the base game?
On the most recent PTR build, it looks like 2 new lua files were datamined:
A built-in cooldown tracker in the base UI
A built-in party buff tracker under party frames
Although these are only a couple of the features that players use WeakAuras for, it could indicate a bigger UI overhaul coming soon, maybe in World of Warcraft: Midnight! When the 11.1 patch releases on February 25th, players should notice a cooldown tracker built-in to their abilities, and a buff tracker under party frames.
What about mechanic tracking?
As a DPS, I personally use my addons to prevent myself from getting steamrolled by mechanics in keys, rather than worrying about tracking buffs on other party members. Thankfully, it looks like Blizzard is also updating mechanic graphics on the 11.1 PTR.
Back in January, Dorki and other PTR testers were the first to see the updated swirlie graphics coming in the next patch. The new mechanic graphics are a full circle with a definite outline, as opposed to the current swirlie graphic that's the same color as the floor half of the time.
Here are the complete files that were datamined on the Patch 11.1 PTR.
Cooldown Viewer:
local CooldownViewerConstants ={Tables ={{Name = "CooldownViewerCategory",Type = "Enumeration",NumValues = 4,MinValue = 0,MaxValue = 3,Fields ={{ Name = "Essential", Type = "CooldownViewerCategory", EnumValue = 0 },{ Name = "Utility", Type = "CooldownViewerCategory", EnumValue = 1 },{ Name = "TrackedBuff", Type = "CooldownViewerCategory", EnumValue = 2 },{ Name = "TrackedBar", Type = "CooldownViewerCategory", EnumValue = 3 },},},{Name = "CooldownViewerUIConstants",Type = "Constants",Values ={{ Name = "COOLDOWN_VIEWER_LINKED_SPELLS_SIZE", Type = "number", Value = 4 },{ Name = "COOLDOWN_VIEWER_CATEGORY_SET_SIZE", Type = "number", Value = 16 },},},},};APIDocumentation:AddDocumentationTable(CooldownViewerConstants);
Cooldown Viewer Documentation:
local CooldownViewer ={Name = "CooldownViewer",Type = "System",Namespace = "C_CooldownViewer",Functions ={{Name = "GetCooldownViewerCategorySet",Type = "Function",Arguments ={{ Name = "category", Type = "CooldownViewerCategory", Nilable = false },},Returns ={{ Name = "cooldownIDs", Type = "table", InnerType = "number", Nilable = false },},},{Name = "GetCooldownViewerCooldownInfo",Type = "Function",MayReturnNothing = true,Arguments ={{ Name = "cooldownID", Type = "number", Nilable = false },},Returns ={{ Name = "cooldownInfo", Type = "CooldownViewerCooldown", Nilable = false },},},},Events ={{Name = "CooldownViewerTableHotfixed",Type = "Event",LiteralName = "COOLDOWN_VIEWER_TABLE_HOTFIXED",},},Tables ={{Name = "CooldownViewerCooldown",Type = "Structure",Fields ={{ Name = "spellID", Type = "number", Nilable = false },{ Name = "linkedSpellIDs", Type = "table", InnerType = "number", Nilable = false },{ Name = "selfAura", Type = "bool", Nilable = false },{ Name = "hasAura", Type = "bool", Nilable = false },{ Name = "charges", Type = "bool", Nilable = false },},},},};APIDocumentation:AddDocumentationTable(CooldownViewer);
Patch 11.1 of World of Warcraft: The War Within is being released on February 25th, and Season 2 begins on March 4th. Prepare for the next raid by reading our complete Liberation of Undermine Raid Guide and get a first look at the new dungeon bosses in our Operation: Floodgate Dungeon Guide.
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