Class choice and UI choice.
 

This is just something random that's been on my mind for a while. People who play certain classes, seem to often have a certain style in addons. While this of course isn't always the case, I've noticed a few similarities. Maybe it lies in the personality of who plays these classes?

Shamans: Spend a lot of time on customizing their UI. Very advanced, graphically interesting, and minimalistic.
Warlocks: Seem to be unable to use simple addons. Often have a heavy compilation such as LUI, or have many elaborate warlock-specific addons. Don't seem to be very active in the UI customizing community.
Hunters: Usually have a minimalistic style. Try all sorts of things to make the pet interface "blend in" with the rest of their UI.

Etc.

Of course, these are generalizations and probably often false. But has anyone noticed anything similar?

I tend to go with the same route on every character I play. Only adding in debuff timer/pet frame/totem bars/etc when needed.

I guess I'm just versatile like that. =)

Same with me. I don't like to change my UI and have different UIs for all my chars because it just seems too confusing to me. I like to have a universal setup for all my chars, and if I'm healing, I just set up VuhDo for that :)

edit - I know some people can say it looks bloated, say my svelte ui, on my Rogue, but I play alot of characters and having a unique rogue for my UI would bug me :O If I have a new idea, i just make a new reflux profile and mess with it. If I get bored, I'll switch between all the UIs I've made (which right now is like 2 because my last reso is now gone, but my previous resolution, I had like 5 different reflux profiles)

I have one of everything. MY idea is to use a ui that is good for all classes.
That way no matter who I am playing on I know what and where everything is.

I tried the different ones per toon, but if you dont play on something for a while , you might forget something.

I think a simple ui with everything needed to survive a fight, and yet look good is all one needs.

There are a TON of cool addons that do all kinds of good stuff, however, the game is designed pretty well, and I am at the point now where I would like to have screen left over to see it, not clutter it with a bunch of addons that are not really critical.

Priests: Usually clutter their Interface with every unitframe addon they can possibly find like having pitbull, smartdebuff, raidwatch2 bite addon unitframes. Unable to get a feeling of aesthetics due to the cluster**** of addons on their screen.. Oh and they can't even see an inch of ingame graphic infight.

Something like this: Screenshot :rolleyes:

I only have the one character right now, but I'm using TukUI because it fits every character, so I won't have to worry about a new UI when I make a second character. Each class has different things it needs from a UI, so I think the default UI or something simple like TukUI - which, let's be honest, doesn't exactly change how the UI functions, just makes it look a lot slicker and makes a couple of things more conveient - is a lot better. I'm actually switching between TukUI and the default UI a lot at the moment.

Also, whenever I look at TukUI, I think of Shadow Priests. That must just be because I watch a lot of SiianaWoW though. >.<

Well, you can see what classes I play the most in my sig. :)

Apart from that, I've got:
70 Hunter
39 Druid
49 Warrior
12 Warlock
2 Mage

There's a post of my UI up 2-3 pages back in the "Post Your UI" thread. I've been trying to do cool interfaces for about 3 years, started on the hunter, then the priest. Now I do most of my UI work on the Druid, and just play on the others. :)

I was thinking about the same, while working on an article about this subject for my blog sometime ago.

There are several things to consider when it comes to choosing an UI or a personal UI style.

First of all, people who play only one class (not counting occasional low lvl twinks) can concentrate more on ONE specific style, for obvious reasons.

It also comes down how you play your class, even though I don't like that kind of playstyle myself, some people only do ONE thing with their class (like tanking). Even though the class might be capable of dealing damage and maybe even healing, too. Which will also result in a different choice of addons/layout.

Than there is a difference in roles for different classes, even if they have the same role. Like a resto druid needs at least some sort of HoT tracking while a paladin could easily live without any kind of buff tracking (Sacred Shield and Beacon of Light aren't hard to keep track of without an addon).

After all the role of your class defines the most of your interface decisions. For example, a DD could get away without any raidframes, at all.

I personally try to always create an interface that - AT LEAST - is capable of fitting all roles my character can choose from. Since I play a paladin since vanilla, I can use my UI for pretty much any other class/role, too. Which I consider a very good reason to handle it that way.

If you care to get rid of unneeded information and if you choose a good layout during the creation of an interface, you won't end up with a complete mess, even if you change your role or class, later on.


And finally, a good interface is NOT dependent on class/role/whatever. It's only dependent on how capable someone is to get things done right (functional, clean, at least somehow pleasing to the eye). And that is achievable for everyone, by following simple design basics. :rolleyes:

I agree with your last point, and to spin it around, a good player should not have to rely on a good UI - at the end of the day, every class needs to know how much health they have, how much health their targets have, and the various buffs and debuffs which are important to them. Those things are the foundations of every class and therefore every UI. Just a small point, I don't think I'm going anywhere with that.

Going to agree with what Dawn said. As you can tell from my sig, all of my 80s are dual-specced, and I cover the whole range of possible WoW roles (Tank, Healer, Melee DPS, Ranged DPS) with those 3 toons.

I design, generally, with my healers in mind (both Shammy and Holy Priest), on the idea that both DPS and Tanks can use the same UI as a Healer, as the only real change from a DPS/Tank UI to a Healing UI is the raid frames.

I think most players just base their interface on the needs of their main character and re-use it on their alts with slight adjustments.

Personally I have an UI style I've simply adjusted to over the last few years, there are slight differences for every class and role I'm playing (and I am playing every class) but they're mostly on a per-role basis.
E.g. my grid is in the top left corner when doing damage and below my character with recount being in the top left when healing. If I'm playing a DD, Recount is in the bottom right corner and I use the space below my character to show class-specific rotational stuff using addons like ShockAndAwe (bars for Enhancement rotation), DebuffFilter (as the name says, important DoTs and debuffs) or smaller self-written addons.

In general, however, I have to agree with the thread starter; but I think that's at least partly fault of the class designs. Shamans e.g. always had to use lots of addons to properly manage totems so most shamans are still more into addons than other classes.

Well i play a warlock , mage , rogue and hunter, all 4 use the same interface,

i personaly prefer a really minimal ui, with maybe 6 buttons my unit frame and a target unit frame a dot timer (for the lock usualy somethin minimal) and thats it. anything else is a waste of screen 1980x1020 max ui scalling gives beautiful visibility :)

Personally I agree with the "one size fits all" UI. I play a prot warrior, disc priest, arcane mage, and a holy pally (with a few other characters in there that I play on and off) and I as alot of others try to make my ui functional for all classes and specs. I don't have separate profiles set up in any addons except for clique. I try to avoid all "class specific" addons because for the most part there is usually another addon out there that has the same functionality and can be used for multiple classes and specs, I just find it a complete waste to had an addon that is only going to be usable on one of my characters. And that's my two cents. :banana: