Beyond directly making your character stronger through talents, equipment, enchants, etc, there are 2 more things you can use to improve your performance as a player: addons & macros. It cannot be understated how much of an impact they can have on your gameplay — increasing your DPS or healing by a large percentage, preventing you from dying, etc. You will need the best addons & macros to be the best Arms Warrior you can be!
Addons
General
Addons are direct quality-of-life improvements to the existing game features. They can range from User Interface modifications to simple tools such as a Damage Meter or Threat Meter. Addons can also be used to generate text notifications or even in-game vocal notifications to keep better track of your buffs and procs. They can also be used to display boss tactics and notify you of impending threats.
The only addon that may enhance an Arm’s Warrior’s performance is WeaponSwingTimer as it allows you to keep track of your Melee Weapon Swings for better Slam casts. The rest of the addons are pretty standard, with DeadlyBossMods being a staple for all PvE encounters and Details being the most up-to-date in-game performance tracker for either Damage, Healing, or Threat.
- WeaponSwingTimer – Allows you to track your Melee Weapon Swings. A very useful addon, especially for Arms Warriors that prefer Slam.
- DeadlyBossMods – Allows you to track boss abilities. A must-have for raiding.
- Details – Shows you how much damage, healing, etc everyone in your raid is doing. Flex on your friends!
- Auctionator – A great tool for any interaction with the Auction House!
- LFGBulletinBoard – A great tool for quickly finding PUG Raid groups and filtering Premade Groups.
WeakAuras
WeakAuras is a versatile addon with almost limitless possibilities. It allows you to install mini-addons created by other players, which are confusingly also called “WeakAuras”, to perform specific tasks, such as tracking the cooldown of a spell, having a visual or audio notification when something procs, giving you a warning when a boss uses an ability, etc. You can find WeakAuras that suit your needs on wago.io. It’s strongly recommended that you use WeakAuras; they’re a huge quality-of-life boost.
Macros
Essential
Startattack Macro
It is optimal to have the /startattack command on all of your abilities as a melee DPS character. Doing so allows your character to begin auto-attacking your target right away, even if you aren’t currently in range to attack them, that ability is on cooldown, etc.
#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast Heroic Strike#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast Mortal Strike#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast OverpowerCooldown Macro
This macro uses all of your cooldowns at once, so you don’t have to use them individually. Includes trinkets, potions, and engineering enchants. Will skip any cooldowns that are currently not available, so you don’t have to worry — just press this macro twice when you want to “pop off” and activate all effects at once! It is optimal to use this macro when one of your proc items, like trinkets or weapon enchants, proc. Furthermore, by adding the “/use 10” command to this macro, you automatically use your Synapse Springs together with your other cooldowns.
#showtooltip
/cast Recklessness
/cast Deadly Calm
/use 10
/use Golemblood PotionStance Dance Macro
While “Stance Dancing” was considered essential in Vanilla and TBC Classic, its importance significantly dropped as we reached Cataclysm Classic. Nonetheless, “Stance Dancing” is still considered one of the best methods to maximize your damage output as far as min-maxing is concerned.
“Stance Dancing” became more important for min-maxing damage as most of the requirements for Warrior abilities have been removed, effectively allowing you to cast most of your abilities in either Battle Stance or Berserker Stance. Of course, some abilities still kept their restrictions such as Overpower and Whirlwind.
At the same time, the removal of most requirements for Warrior abilities also allowed casual players to play the class in a simplified manner, as long as they don’t seek to top the DPS Meter.
However, to properly execute “Stance Dancing”, you will either need a complex macro that utilizes two different sets of Keybinds on the same slot or two separate macros bound to two different Keybind slots. The main reason for this is that you will want an efficient way to return to the initial stance that you swapped from without wasting any GCD.
Note: You will need to press each macro twice for it to take effect, so just mash it!
Examples:
- 2 x Shift + F
- 2 x Ctrl + F
- 2 x F
Macro with both keybinds to one slot
#showtooltip
/startattack
/cast [mod:shift] Battle Stance
/cast [mod:shift] Overpower
/cast [mod:ctrl] Berserker Stance
/cast [mod:ctrl] Heroic StrikeSeparate macros for two different slots
#showtooltip
/cast Battle Stance
/cast Overpower#showtooltip
/cast Berserker Stance
/cast Heroic StrikeCancelaura Macro
There are multiple situations in which you may find yourself wanting to end one of your effects earlier, and this macro allows you to do so. For Arms Warriors, this macro is generally used to cancel Bladestorm swiftly in case a serious threatening raid mechanic is imminent. You may also want a macro like this for scenarios where you quickly have to move from one side of the encounter to the other and you need to stop Bladestorm to cast Intervene or Heroic Leap.
#showtooltip
/cancelaura BladestormAdditionally, you can add one more line to the macro to turn it into the same Keybind for casting Bladestorm in itself! However, you must be careful if you choose to do so since it can result in a fatal mistake by mashing the button twice, as it will directly stop your Bladestorm instantly after you cast it.
#showtooltip
/cancelaura Bladestorm
/cast BladestormSurvive! Macro (Must be pressed twice)
This macro instantly switches you to Defensive Stance, equips your shield, and activates your defensive cooldowns. Perfect for moments when things are getting ugly and you just need to survive for a little bit longer. Note: You will need to key bind this macro on any of the optional “Action Bars” while you will also need to press this macro twice for it to take effect, so just mash it!
#showtooltip Shield Wall
/equipslot [noequipped: shields] 16 (NAME OF YOUR 1-HANDED WEAPON)
/equipslot [noequipped: shields] 17 (NAME OF YOUR SHIELD)
/cast Defensive Stance
/cast Shield Wall
/cast Shield BlockSpell Reflection Macro (Must be pressed twice)
Allows you to instantly use your Spell Reflection to reflect a spell, without having to fumble with stances or equipping your shields. Note: You will need to key bind this macro on any of the optional “Action Bars” while you will also need to press this macro twice for it to take effect, so just mash it! Also, by default this macro changes you to Battle Stance if you are in Berserker Stance — you could change line 4 to “/cast [stance:3] Defensive Stance” instead, for a more defensive option.
#showtooltip Spell Reflection
/equipslot [noequipped: shields] 16 (NAME OF YOUR 1-HANDED WEAPON)
/equipslot [noequipped: shields] 17 (NAME OF YOUR SHIELD)
/cast [stance:3] Battle Stance
/cast Spell Reflection
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