For altoholics like me, having an interface that fits questing is very useful. But with Cataclysm approaching, we’ll all have to level and quest in a few weeks. Is your UI ready for this ? If not, here are a few addons and UI tricks I like to use while leveling, you may want to try these :

4 Addons you might need :

Mapster

This addon allow you to scale and move your world map. You can also make the border transparent and see the map for the zone you don’t have discovered yet (only if you want to). I find it very useful while leveling. With Mapster, as your world map doesn’t take a lot of space on your screen, you can have it always out and make the most of the quests objectives feature.

Ding Recorder

Automatically takes a screenshot when you level up. Nice lightweight addon to keep mementos of your leveling experience, especially if you’re like me and have a bunch of alts.

Quest mover

Allow you to move your quest watch frame. Lightweight and pretty useful if you don’t use the standard UI. I personnally prefer the 1.0 version of this addon. You need to define the position of the frame in the .lua file, but in the newer versions the frame can’t be locked.

To configure the 1.0 version, open QuestMover.lua in you World of Warcraft/Interface/AddOns/QuestMover directory.

You can define the position by changing the numbers on line 2 :

WatchFrame:SetPoint("TOPLEFT", "UIParent", "TOPLEFT", 30, -100)

The first number (30) is for the horizontal position, and the second number is for the vertical position.

You can also define the height of the frame by changing the number on line 3.

XP Bar None

If you use some action bar addon, you might need an addon that provide an experience bar. I suggest you to pick XP Bar None. This addon is lightweight and fully customisable, it can really fit any UI.

WoW Carto : another useful tool you should learn to love

This one is not an addon, but an external program that can show you about every thing you ever want to know about wow. It contains the maps of all continents with notes for any NPCs or point of interest. The french version is especially full and up to date. Last time I checked, the English version had less information, but the upcoming expansion is a good time to get the program and report anything you find out other players might want to know. While leveling, I often used Carto to find some hidden NPC or quest objective, or to clear my way through complicated dungeons (especially useful in Wailing Cavern).

3 UI tweaks you could use

If you’re a raider and didn’t level an alt for 2 years (I know it’s hard to imagine but some people – often warlocks, I don’t know why – just hate alts and are happy with their only character), you might want to change some things in your UI :

• Disable any sort of “pass on green” you might have. Some addons can do that, and there is a option allowing you to automatically pass on loot if you right-click on your character frame. There could be some greens you need in the upcoming instances !
• Make sure you have a good unit frame addon. If you’re a healer, you could have been using mainly your raid frames to check your own health, and your unit frames for player and target might be relegated in the corner of your screen. You don’t want to level that way, it’d result in painful deaths.
• You might want to disable the testing feature for the talent tree. I often forget to click “learn” while leveling, resulting in playing for some time with unused talent point. Not good !