AddOn Spotlight: Nudge
by Eliah Hecht 
Mar 1st 2007 at 11:31AM
As I've discussed before, my main is a priest. So when the 2.0.10 patch notes came out...nah, just kidding, I've whined enough about this patch. I'm not going to talk about that now. Anyway, my priest is currently specced 14/40/7, in a strange holy DPS/healing hybrid, which works fine for farming as well as for healing Black Morass and Shadow Labyrinth and such. However, I'm anxious to start raiding, and to do that I really want a straight healing build (probably 21/40/0). Healing builds are great for healing, but I do still need some way to farm primals for my cloth transmutes -- what's the answer to this conundrum?Roll a Hunter. And thus my BM Hunter was born; he's currently level 50. This character has been a blast to level, as I've always heard Hunters are (previously, I hadn't gotten one past 30ish). One thing that took some getting used to, though, is the range limitations, and one thing that helped a lot with getting used to that is the mod Nudge (see? I was getting there). It's pretty simple; it provides a frame that changes colors based on whether your targeted mob is in melee range, your dead zone, ranged range, or out of range (i.e. 0-5 yd, 5-8 yd, 8-40 yd, >40 yd). It didn't take long before I was able to just watch Nudge out of the corner of my eye to figure out whether I was close enough to shoot or not. And yes, I could just look at my action bars, but Nudge is a lot more obvious and a lot easier to read at a glance. Green for melee, yellow for dead zone, blue for ranged, red for out of range. Of course, now when I see a red stoplight, I have a strange urge to edge closer to it until it turns blue...but I'm sure that's unrelated.
The frame only appears when you've got a hostile mob targeted, you can move and resize it however you want, the text and colors are customizable, it takes into account Hawk Eye if you have it (at least I think it does), and altogether it feels like a well-made little bit of frill that's handy for any hunter. By the way, if you're not a hunter and are looking for something that'll simply tell you when you're in range of some given spell (40 yards for heals, perhaps?), Fudge is what you want.
Download Nudge at WoWInterface
Previously on the Spotlight
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Filed under: Druid, AddOns, Features, AddOn Spotlight
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Gitr Mar 1st 2007 11:58AM
Great addon. Thanks for hooking me up. That's always bugged me in close quarters, I experienced range issues like crazy in the ziggurats in Ghostlands and in Deatholme with my new Hunter.
Marlus Mar 1st 2007 11:59AM
One use I could found for this addon was to know when you are at the hunters dead zone, so I used in my hunter but I keep using on my other chars for if I stuck in battle with a hunter I could know where I should be to avoid his annoyn shots.
Tigraine Mar 1st 2007 12:16PM
I start asking myself:
Why can't they integrate this into the action bar?
I mean, if we can change the color of a button if we are out of range, why can't we chance it to blue if we are in range and green when in melee range?
greetings Tigraine
Mekias Mar 1st 2007 12:16PM
Nudge is my favorite range indicator addon for my hunter. It's very noticable when the colors change but it's not intrusive at all. It might be the single best hunter addon there is.
sautz Mar 1st 2007 1:35PM
CTMod actually incorporates this into the action bars. If the target is out of range the button turns red.
Deathlike Mar 1st 2007 1:36PM
Don't use it!
I used to play hunter, and had a tendency to change often from Melee to ranged attacks to maximize DPS. Originally I know I looked at the action bar to tell, but after a while, I've found I learned how to tell the range I was at without having to look at anything.
I still carry on this ability with the other classes I play now. I know you'd get it with other classes and that everyone else develops the same thing, but when it comes down to it.. Would you rather be more skilled at something or more dependent on an addon, however simple it is?
Just something to consider.
Deathlike Mar 1st 2007 1:38PM
And my apologies on the double post, but, Sautz, that happens with the normal game too. That or it's a default option in the interface menu or something.
Lex Mar 1st 2007 2:17PM
Nudge is actually a simplified version of a much better but now defunct addon called rangehelp, which lost its greater capabilities in the 2.0 mod nerfs. Rangehelp, in addition to the range indicator, also had the option to automatically change action bars when you moved from range to melee. Thus you could bind a shot and a melee attack to the same key (concussive shot and wing clip were a natural pair), and the correct one would be used based on your range.
As I understand it, the same changes that made Decursive obsolete broke Rangehelp as well. Now I'm all for the logic that no addon should decide what buttons to press for you, but to me Rangehelp was for hunters the same as the built-in automatic bar changes that rogues, warriors, and druids have . We have a completely different set of attacks for melee and range; can't we have a completely different bar?
Ngnsewa Mar 1st 2007 5:59PM
@8. I had a similar thing setup in Discord Action Bars (which is also missing from TBC)
Hot damn I still miss it!
It kicked so much ass for everything, expecially PvP.
Sure the auto-shot to melee thingo helps a little, but its a paint having so many buttons on screen now.
Ive resorted to using mainly 1-6 and shift(stings) or alt(melee) combos to get everything compact.
It still sucks tho.