The recent news about Blizzard’s new security philosophy, specifically the changes that will lock down what combat-related add-ons can compute, is poised to have a huge negative impact on how healers interact with the game.
The community has been holding its breath since the major players started reacting. ElvUI officially pulled the plug on their combat modules weeks ago. VuhDo, HealBot, and Cell have been silent, but the worst-case scenario is quickly materializing: the author of the popular add-on Healer’s Serenity has officially shut it down (source: author comment on curseforge).
If this trend continues, healers are facing the very real possibility of entering the Midnight expansion without any of their essential, specialized healing add-ons.
My Two Cents on What the Native UI Needs
I’m a casual WoW player, on and off since the start, but actively pushing end content (mainly M+) in a semi-casual way since Shadowlands, with the seasonal goal of hitting the 3k achievement. My current UI is built around HealBot and Bartender4.
If Blizzard is going to remove the functionality of our current tools, they must step up and integrate that essential functionality into the native UI. They’ve done it before by taking inspiration from add-ons like WeakAuras (leading to the new Cooldown Manager) and Hekili (leading to Assisted Highlight). The core healing UI needs the same treatment.
Must-have features the native UI is currently lacking
1. Unified and Customizable Unit Frames
The current native UI options are far too restrictive. The existing ability to use raid-style party frames needs to be expanded so we can use the same sleek, compact visual style for:
- The Player frame (Self)
- The Target frame
- The Focus frame
Furthermore, we need a flexible option for grouping and sorting unit frames:
| Frame |
Merge |
Split |
| Self (aka Player) |
|
|
| Healer(s) |
merge with Self if the player is a healer |
|
| (other) Healer(s) |
(only show this if the player is a healer) |
|
| Tank(s) |
merge with Self if the player is a tank |
|
| (other) Tank(s) |
(only show this if the player is a tank) |
|
| DPS (aka Party w/o Tank/Healer) |
|
preferably into Ranged and Melee |
The key reason for this customization is muscle memory. As a healer, you need critical targets (like the yourself, tanks and other healers) to be in a consistent, static position on your screen, regardless of whether you’re in a 5-person dungeon or a 30-person raid. For me, this is also true when switching between solo, raid and group content as well as when switching between playing healer, tank or dps.
We also need the optional ability to use duplicates - for example, when I go into raid I want the Self/Player to remain in size and position, the Healer(s), Tank(s) and DPS/Group frames to be in the same dedicated spots as in a 5-man, but all those players/units should also appear in the correct group spot within the main raid frame. Of course, all of this should be optional, allowing players to choose separate, grouped, or duplicated frames.
The same goes for the target and focus. In HealBot there is an Enemy Frame, where you can show bosses and choose to include target and/or focus. The native Boss frame should be transformed into something similar, also with the possibility to use the same raid-style frame as the other elements of the UI. Also in this case, merging or duplicating the target and/or focus should be optional.
2. Advanced Buff/Debuff Filtering and Highlighting
This is perhaps the most critical part of healing. You do not have time to look for one small icon in an array of 20. We need a native system that acts like a customizable Icon Manager for buffs and debuffs.
I suggest five distinct Icon Sets for each unit frame
| Set |
Description |
Purpose/Example |
| 1a & 2a |
Normal Buffs (1) and Debuffs (2). Customizable size/position. Showing ALL buffs/debuffs on the player by default. |
The baseline, non-critical. |
| 1b & 2b |
Highlight Buffs (1) and Debuffs (2). One or two large icons, offset from the bar, with border flashing and sound alerts (optional). Customizable size/position. |
Filtered critical tracking. Examples: For buffs things like Prayer of Mending, Atonemen, Rejuvenation. For debuffs things like dispel-at-certain-stack-count, or dispel-when-player-is-in-correct-position, or must-heal-to-full-to-dispel. |
| 3 |
Tank Mitigation |
Automated Tracking. Examples: To show that when the tank has an active mitigation buff like Ignore Pain, Barkskin, or Bone Shield up. |
How to Implement the Filtering
The simplest bare minimum is to allow us to position and size native “Blizzard-controlled” highlights and add a flash/audio alert.
A much better approach would be to give us a filtering system similar to the Cooldown Manager where we can select exactly what shows up in the Highlight Sets (1b and 2b). If Blizzard is worried about third-party lists, they could implement a “Learning Listener system”: during a dungeon or raid, any buff/debuff displayed in the normal icon set (1a/2a) can be selectively filtered into the highlight set (1b/2b) by the player during that run.
3. Comprehensive Health Bar Customization
Healers rely on visual cues and muscle memory for health status. We need full control over:
Heal Absorb: I need to be able to customize an overlay for this critical state.
Incoming Heals and Overhealing: The visual representation (color/texture) for this needs to be customizable.
Health Threshold: I need to be able to set custom health percentage breakpoints and corresponding colors. For example:
- Green above 95%
- Yellow at 75%
- Red at 35%
- Some healers prefer to be able to have all bars colored by class
Conclusion
If Blizzard wants to move away from combat add-ons by locking essential combat information - and still have people wanting to play healers, they need to provide the tools to make the native UI viable for high-level healing. The features listed above are not luxuries; they are fundamental requirements for the speed and reaction time demanded by, especially in m+ and raid encounters.