Resto Shaman Power Auras

[Stoove 347]

Hi everyone,

I was just reading the Resto Shaman Macros & Addons guide through and noticed that you recommend Power Auras as a useful addon. A lot of the people I've spoken to about PowA have said that they have a huge amount of problems getting a good aura set up and working to show their cooldowns.

I was wondering if it might be useful to link to a thread (like this one) where people can discuss setting up Power Auras for Resto Shaman. I can contribute some auras I've made which work very simply and are easy to understand visually for; Spirit Link, Water Shield, Mana Tide, Unleash Elements, totem re-placement, and a few other things. If you think that's interesting, I'll post the shareable strings that PowA can create for you and some screenshots.

This would also be a good place to start a discussion on PowA uses for Resto Shaman in a raid environment.

Let me know,

Stoove

[Damien 1,514]

It would be a good idea as Power Auras is indeed, difficult to set up. I'll just wait for the thread to get started before linking it in the guide ;)

[Stoove 347]

Awesome, well my links will have to wait a while - I'm unlikely to have the time till this time next week :(

[meukow 15]

No need for it really...

[Damien 1,514]

I'm just bumping this so that my sticky doesn't appear as the "last post" in this section on the board index :P

And I also can't wait to see your Power Auras guide ;)

[Stoove 347]

No need for it really...

Can you explain exactly why? I've done my best to describe in my OP why it would be useful for some people. Neither does your comment address the issue I raised nor do you give any reasons not to. Overall, you look very much like the opposite to the kind of discussion I was trying to foster.

[Damien 1,514]

I also have a different opinion than meukow. Granted, I haven't used Power Auras much as a Restoration Shaman because I never played that spec in a progression environment so it never really mattered if I noticed 20 seconds too late that Mana Tide Totem was ready. That said, I have warnings for when my Water Shield or Earthliving Weapon drops.

However, I did Firelands progression on my Enhancement Shaman and I found Power Auras to be very useful for being warned about all my cooldowns without having to look at my action bar: Lava Lash, Stormstrike, and Earth Shock.

In the end, it all comes down to personal preferences. A good friend of mine is regularly ranked on his Elemental Shaman on worldoflogs.com and I know he's fine with keeping an eye on his action bar to see when Lava Burst comes off cooldown. I know I can't do that and, on top of that, I find Power Auras to be quite annoying to configure, so I'm looking forward to reading what Stoove has to write. Whatever applies to Restoration Shamans can certainly apply to other specs as well (and probably to other classes).

[Stoove 347]

Thanks Damien, I'll be writing this up at some point over the next few days. I think that the key to good Power Auras is to have something which trades off well on a few different levels; you need something that doesn't take up much screen space, which gets your attention when needed but doesn't confuse you normally. You need each of the auras to be immediately differentiable from each other, and you need the auras to be instantly recognizable. This is a tough tradeoff, but it's one I believe I have a reasonable answer to! ^_^

[Finadamo 0]

A good place to start is the power aura's website. They have lots of setups for every build. Just find one that looks good, and edit it as you like.

There are plenty of how-to guides on youtube as well

http://powerauras.wikispaces.com/Class+Exports#Shaman

Hope this helps

[Stoove 347]

For the record, I've already written and posted the guide on these forums and on my blog. The I-V version is 7th on the Google listing for "Spirit Link Totem Power Aura" (yay!) and my blog's version is somewhere on the second page.

Furthermore, I tried some of the PowA setups when I started with it back in Wrath - they were rather naff in my opinion.

[Arknoc 0]

Has PowA been updated to work with MoP yet?

[Stoove 347]

According to their page on Curse, the update is still in development. The comments below appear to be writing the mod off as abandoned, but I'm happy to wait around for a bit and find out if the new version ever comes out (I got the v5 beta while it was still available and it's awesome!).

In the mean time, there is an unofficial patch to make the 4.3 version work with 5.0+ which has some small but liveable issues, but otherwise is apparently fine.

For the methods I show in my original, you will need to pay attention to the following known issue with the unofficial patcher:

"Use Own Texture" is not working properly, use the "Custom Texture" and put the spell/ability name or spell ID # in there as a workaround.

[Mutterkorn 8]

Hi There,

i am not using PowerAuras, but WeakAuras, which is, as far as i know, nearly the same.

I just use three Icons, that i want to see always.

- Earthshield. Below my Character is the ES ICon with the remainig number of stacks in it.

- Tidal Waves. Directly beside ES is the TW Icon with the Number of stacks.

- CD of Healing Stream Totem. If the Totem ist of CD, an Aura around my Char appears.

I son't know if PowerAuras can do it, but WeakAuras allows you to share a single item with everyone just by copying the code.

[Stoove 347]

Hi Mutterkorn,

Yes, Power Auras can do all of that. Most of what you said is fairly simple, and the aura around your toon is slightly more difficult but still practical.

PowA also lets you share your auras using the same kind of 'code' string.

[Mutterkorn 8]

Hi Stoove,

thanks for the Info. I've taken a closer look at PowA. But i will continue using WeakA, cause i've found a great Code String for my Prot Pala which works perfectly.

But PowerA seems interessting to. Maybe i will test this on my Warlock.

[Stoove 347]

Good luck then! I don't know if/when PowA will be updated, so staying with WeakA might be a better idea =\