Spotlight on: UI Mods - Group Icons

[Anglakhel]

In the last couple of months we've been seeing a growing trend of UI Mods and AddOns that alter the HUD within your UI. Specifically, Mods that make additions to the HUD when dealing with friendly and enemy targets. Previously, I discussed the Nemesis Mod which takes some of the elements of a PvP Blackbook and ties it into special icons that appear when important enemies are nearby. You will see a graphical icon over the head of your current Nemeses or anyone you are currently Dominating. Today, we're looking at another AddOn that using Icons over player heads to make better sense of your playing experience: Group Icons.

Group Icons

Group Icons is a very simple AddOn brought to the community by project manager Rhekua. When you activate Group Icons it will place a small icon over the head of everyone in your party or warband. Party members will show up with a small green icon that looks like a head and shoulders above their avatar's head. When a party member dies, they will show up with a bright red version of the head and shoulders icon.

groupicons_1.jpg

For members of your warband, the icon is slightly modified. It appears like a stack of several of the regular icon and it colored blue. When a member of your warband dies, the icon goes dark with a red border.

groupicons_2.jpg

I find Group Icons to be extremely helpful in chaotic oRvR. It can become very difficult to track party and warband members when navigating a battlefield where others are also engaged. Avatars can look very similar and nameplates are not always desirable to have visible or easily readable if they are visible.

groupicons_3.jpg

Group Icons always you to quickly scan the area and visually track where you in relation to the rest of your party and warband. Being able to easily read the locations of your allies makes it easier to move and react to the enemy in a coordinated fashion and helps keep people from running off in the wrong direction.

Interestingly, these Group Icons seem to have a much longer range that the usual visual range for characters. So you can see the icons when the actual avatars are out of sight. You can also see the icons through terrain, such as on the other side of a hill or through a wall.

This aspect raises some potentially troubling issues, however. Similar AddOns allow you to place icons of the heads of enemy players. These modifications can allow you to track a target that you should not be able to see visually due to features of the geography. There was a substantial outcry during beta about the targeting rings around our characters. Initially in beta, the targeting rings would track the motion of your enemy target with a red arrow that would allow you to follow their movements even if you could no longer visibly see them. These target icons raise the possibility again for enemies to track you when they shouldn't be able to see you at all.

I would like to see some extra functionality added to Group Icons. It would be nice to add in a special icon for the Warband Leader, Warband Assistants and the Main Assist. It would add another layer of visual organization to the warband that would be extremely helpful. You can find similar functionality in AddOns like FollowMyLead, LeadAssist Show and Paint the Leader, but I think it's long overdue to have a comprehensive AddOn that allows us to visually organize our parties and warbands.

Are you using Group Icons or a similar AddOn? Let us know what you think about it. Or chime in on the issue of Icons allowing you to track friends and foes when geometry and geography shouldn't allow you to see them. We want to know what you're thinking.

[Talc]

quick question:

Are you able to see the icons if the person is on the other side of a building from you? That would be great for keeping track of everyone.

[Anglakhel]

Originally Posted by Talc

quick question:

Are you able to see the icons if the person is on the other side of a building from you? That would be great for keeping track of everyone.

Yes.

You can see your party and warband members through walls and through obstructions like hills. Not sure of the exact range, but it is further than normal visible distance.

[Ictinike]

Great addon and use it all the time.. A "staple" of my addon experience.

[dunehunter]

Had heard about this one in the past (bit of an add-on addict ) but never got around to trying it out...seems like it might be useful to keep track of the people I am supposed to guard though

[NainaHellebron]

would be 10 billion times better if it worked on enemies

[Jostle]

Originally Posted by NainaHellebron

would be 10 billion times better if it worked on enemies

So you can tell when they are dead? Heh.

[WeRT]

Originally Posted by NainaHellebron

would be 10 billion times better if it worked on enemies

Use TargetRing - ofc - only one person - but hey - better then nothing

[Greenriver]

Wow, this is an awesome add on. Especially for sc's. Thanks for the spotlight of it!

[Softbuns]

Used it for a while now and most benefit I get from it is that it allows me to keep track of the group while Pbaoeing without having to loose track of my tank.

But I find it even more useful when playing a healer since I can combine that with targeting through squared and not have to worry about the surrounding non group members confusing me in where to go.

[ZwerG]

This owns for healing, saves me from trying to figure out where the hell they all ran off to in my group.

[Yakar]

i arranged this with the huduf addon. i already used this mod for my player & target frames.

GroupIcons with Huduf (archtype and classicon)

GroupIcons with Huduf (hp state)

huduf has the tools to display more information than the other groupicon addons. for example you could color the outer ring depending on the debuffs of the target, etc.
it is just a little tricky to configure it that way



so to give you a hint: create a new bar in huduf, make it squared and size it how big you want to have your group icon. now enable the career icon, scale it to ~1.0 and center it in the bar. use the "attach to world object" function and swt the state to "grp1hp". if you want career icons only, set the bars textures to none. i made a little custom texture that is a circle and used this for the bar so you get this effect of an outer ring.

cheers
yak


p.s.: the warhammer api doesn't supply the information if a target is dead, or not. it only tells you the % of his health. so if someone has only a hand full of hitpoints left, he might be displayed as dead, but isn't

[Nymfo]

Originally Posted by Yakar

i arranged this with the huduf addon. i already used this mod for my player & target frames.

GroupIcons with Huduf (archtype and classicon)

GroupIcons with Huduf (hp state)

huduf has the tools to display more information than the other groupicon addons. for example you could color the outer ring depending on the debuffs of the target, etc.
it is just a little tricky to configure it that way



so to give you a hint: create a new bar in huduf, make it squared and size it how big you want to have your group icon. now enable the career icon, scale it to ~1.0 and center it in the bar. use the "attach to world object" function and swt the state to "grp1hp". if you want career icons only, set the bars textures to none. i made a little custom texture that is a circle and used this for the bar so you get this effect of an outer ring.

cheers
yak


p.s.: the warhammer api doesn't supply the information if a target is dead, or not. it only tells you the % of his health. so if someone has only a hand full of hitpoints left, he might be displayed as dead, but isn't

looks great!
i really should try huduf again, but i can't even get the sc/wb templates to disappear permanently. -_-