Broker: EpicAvg is the new name of the old FuBar_GearRating.
What is Broker: EpicAvg?
Broker: EpicAvg is a small addon that calculates the ''EpicAvg'' of you, your target, the party or the raid.
What is EpicAvg?
The simple explaination
Simply stated, your EpicAvg is the (epic) average of the ''item levels'' of each item you're wearing.
The ''item level'' of an item is a number that indicates the quality of an item. This number is not shown by the default Blizzard user interface, but can be queried by addons. For example, Naxxrames 10-man loot usually has item level 200.
EpicAvg is best interpreted compared to common item-levels, like 200 (Naxx10-epics), 213 (Tier 7), 226 (Malygos), etc.
Though EpicAvg works for every player-level, it is used mostly to distinguish between level 80 players.
Why would I want to know a EpicAvg?
The EpicAvg of a person is a '''quick indication''' of the quality of his/her gear-set.
While using the addon, you will get a feeling what a certain EpicAvg would mean.
Beware!
EpicAvg is '''''only''''' a '''quick indication'''. Keep the following in mind:
- The EpicAvg of a person changes if he switches gear. For example:
- A player in a capital city could be wearing his ''Around Town'' gear-set.
- A person could be wearing gear that is not meant for his Talent Spec. For example:
- A holy priest wearing his DPS-gear might have a high EpicAvg, but would still be a bad healer.
- A protection warrior wearing his DPS-gear might have a high EpicAvg, but would still be a bad tank.
- The item level of an item is ''constant'' and therefore:
- all item enchants are ''ignored'' by EpicAvg.
- EpicAvg is not influenced by the quality of possibly socketed gems. Therefore, the EpicAvg of a completely unsocketed gear-set and the EpicAvg of a full epic socketed gear-set would be the same.
The complex explaination
Your EpicAvg is not simply the average of the items levels of each item. The notes below explain what factors complicate the calculation.
- Item level 200 on a rare quality item (blue) is different from item level 200 on a epic quality item. Conclusion: It would be unfair to rate items by just their item level alone. Item levels have to be compensated by looking at the quality of the item.
- An item level 200 chest-item has more 'room for stats' than a item level 200 bracer-item. Conclusion: It would be unfair to compare items in different slots. Item levels have to be compensated by looking at the ''location'' of the item (which slot it is in).
So, EpicAvg is the 'average' of the '''compensated''' item levels of each item.
If you want to know ''how'' the item levels are compensated, read the section ''Calculation'' at the bottom.
How do I use Broker: EpicAvg?
Installation
As any addon, place the ''Broker_EpicAvg''-folder into your ''World of Warcraft/Interface/Addons''-folder.
Reading EpicAvg
EpicAvg will be available to you as a LibDataBroker object. The icon looks like a purple chestpiece. Next to the icon is a number. That number is the EpicAvg of the gear-set you are currently wearing.
As you move your mouse over the icon/text a popup appears. The contents of this popup depend on some things:
- If you have a player targgeted, there will be the option "<Get EpicAvg of Target>"
- If you are in a party, there will be the option "<Get EpicAvg of Party>"
- If you are in a raid, there will be the option "<Get EpicAvg of Raid>"
You can click these options to get the EpicAvg of other people. Note that since WoW 2.4, it has to open the Inspect-window to be able to get the EpicAvg of other people. So, in fact, if you request the EpicAvg in a 25-man raid, it will open 25 Inspect-windows really fast (and the last one will stay opened).
Broadcasting EpicAvg
On the tooltip, there are some ''captions'', like 'Player', 'Target', 'Party' and/or 'Raid'. By clicking a ''caption'' the popup will change to "Choose a destination to broadcast to"-mode. (You can only click a caption if the EpicAvg belonging to that caption is known.) By clicking:
- 'say', 'party', 'raid', 'guild', 'officer': broadcast to that channel.
- 'target': whisper your target
- 'whisper': your chat-editbox will open with "/gearrating broadcast2player ", type the name of the player you want to whisper and press enter.
- 'channel': your chat-editbox will open with "/gearrating broadcast2channel ", type the name or number of the channel you want to broadcast to and press enter.
- '<<< Back': If you changed your mind and want to return to the normal contents of the popup.
Calculation of EpicAvg
Step 1 and 2 will explain how the item level of ''one'' item is compensated.
Step 3 will explain how to sum these up and divide to get your EpicAvg.
Step 1: Compensation for Item Quality
As explained above, uncompensated item levels are different accross the quality spectrum (uncommon, rare, epic, legendary).
To get the quality-compensated item level of an item, do the following:
:quality-compensated item level = (uncompensated item level - X) * Y
X and Y being:
- 4.00 and 0.5000 for Uncommon (green)
- 1.84 and 0.6250 for Rare (blue):
- 1.30 and 0.7692 for Epic (purple):
- 0.00 and 1.0000 for Legendary (orange):
These numbers have been deduced from http://www.wowwiki.com/Level_(Item)#Calculating_Item_Level
Step 2: Compensation for Item Location
As explained above, items for different item-slots can have the same uncompensated item level, but 'totally' different 'room for stats'.
Step 2.a: Armor
To get the location-compensated item level of an item:
:location&quality-compensated item level = (quality-compensated item level) * Z
Z being:
- 0.550 for Neck, Wrist, Finger, Back
- 0.700 for Trinket
- 0.777 for Shoulder, Feet, Hands, Waist
- 1.000 for Head, Chest, Legs
These numbers have been taken from http://www.wowwiki.com/Level_(Item)#Slot_Modifiers
Step 2.b: Weapons
To get the location-compensated item level of an item:
:location&quality-compensated item level = (quality-compensated item level) * Z
Z being:
- 1.000 for Main Hand Weapon
- 0.777 for Off-hand Weapon
- 1.777 for Two Handed Weapon
- 0.777 for Shield
- 0.550 for Bow, Crossbow, Gun
- 0.550 for Thrown
- 0.550 for Wand
- 0.777 for Held in off-hand
- 0.550 for Relic
Note that these numbers have been partly taken from the previously mentioned site, but some of them have been 'guessed'. Check the comments in the code of RatingConstants.lua for the justification of these numbers.
Step 2.c: Hunters
The above numbers cause ranged weapons to carry less weight in the EpicAvg. As this is undesired for Hunters, the following is done:
- Ranged weapon:
: hunter location*quality-compensated item level = location&quality-compensated item level * 3
- Melee weapons:
: hunter location*quality-compensated item level = location&quality-compensated item level / 3
Note that 0.55 * 3 = 1.65 making the ranged weapon of the hunter almost as important as a 2-handed weapon.
These formulas cancel eachother out when it comes to EpicAvg, which is convenient if you still want to be able to compare Hunters to other classes.
Step 3: EpicAvg
So, now we have the ''compensated'' item-level for each item.
Simply sum these values to get the: total compensated item-level, abbreviated to ''tcil''.
So, the question that we ask ourselves is: "What epic-item-level would 17 items have be, to get to the same ''tcil'' that my gear has?"
To answer this question we have to solve the following formula:
:(X - 1.3) * 0.7692 * 1 + (X - 1.3) * 0.7692 * 0.55 + (X - 1.3) * 0.7692 * 0.777 + ... + (X - 1.3) * 0.7692 * 0.777 + (X - 1.3) * 0.7692 * 0.55 = ''tcil''
We can substitute U = (X - 1.3) * 0.7692 to get:
:U * 1 + U * 0.55 + U * 0.777 + ... + U * 0.777 + U * 0.55 = ''tcil''
This can be shortened to:
:4 * (U * 1) + 5 * (U * 0.777) + 6 * (U * 0.55) + 2 * (U * 0.700) = ''tcil''
Which simplifies to:
:(4 * U) + (3.885 * U) + (3.3 * U) + (1.4 * U) = ''tcil''
Which simplifies to:
:12.585 * U = ''tcil''
Now, U is the answer to the question: "What LEGENDARY-item-level would 17 items have to be, to sum up to ''tcil''?"
Remember U = (X - 1.3) * 0.7692
Now, X is the answer to the question: "What EPIC-item-level would 17 items have to be, to sum up to ''tcil''?"
So, to conclude, to calculate the 'average' epic-item-level the formula is:
:((''tcil'' / 12.585) * 1.3) + 1.3
This formula is used to calculate the EpicAvg.
Installation Guide
- Exit "World of Warcraft" completely
- Download the mod you want to install
- Make a folder on your desktop called "My Mods"
- Save the .zip/.rar files to this folder.
- If, when you try to download the file, it automatically "opens" it... you need to RIGHT click on the link and "save as..." or "Save Target As".
- Extract the file - commonly known as 'unzipping'
Do this ONE FILE AT A TIME!
- Windows
- Windows XP has a built in ZIP extractor. Double click on the file to open it, inside should be the file or folders needed. Copy these outside to the "My Mods" folder.
- WinRAR: Right click the file, select "Extract Here"
- WinZip: You MUST make sure the option to "Use Folder Names" is CHECKED or it will just extract the files and not make the proper folders how the Authors designed
- Mac Users
- StuffitExpander: Double click the archive to extract it to a folder in the current directory.
- Verify your WoW Installation Path
That is where you are running WoW from and THAT is where you need to install your mods.
- Move to the Addon folder
- Open your World of Warcraft folder. (default is C:\Program Files\World of Warcraft\)
- Go into the "Interface" folder.
- Go into the "AddOns" folder.
- In a new window, open the "My Mods" folder.
- The "My Mods" folder should have the "Addonname" folder in it.
- Move the "Addonname" folder into the "AddOns" folder
- Start World of Warcraft
- Make sure AddOns are installed
- Log in
- At the Character Select screen, look in lower left corner for the "addons" button.
- If button is there: make sure all the mods you installed are listed and make sure "load out of date addons" is checked.
- If the button is NOT there: means you did not install the addons properly. Look at the above screenshots. Try repeating the steps or getting someone who knows more about computers than you do to help.
Translations
When you download a mod, please be sure that the mod is compatible with your translation of wow. Some mods only work on the US versions, while some only work on some of the various European versions. These variations are called "Localizations".
TOC Numbers (Out of Date Mods)
When Blizzard patches WoW, they change the Interface number. This means that all mods will be "out of date" unless or until the author releases a new version for that interface. Some people go into the .toc files and update the numbers themselves, but this is STRONGLY advised against as it will cause problems locating possible incompatibilities addons. When you log into WoW after a patch, you DO NOT have to delete your interface directory. All you have to do is simply tell WoW to ignore the interface numbers and load all the mods anyway. All you have to do is, while at the "character select" screen, look in the lower left corner and click on the "addons" button. A window will pop up listing all your installed mods.
If you look in the upper left corner of that window there should be a box that says "Load Out of Date AddOns". You want to CHECK this box. Now simply go into WoW normally and all your mods should load. As of the 1.9 patch, you will have to do this after EVERY patch/update that Blizzard posts! If you encounter any problems with a mod after a patch, please be sure to let the author of the mod know so they can fix it.
See also: About "Out Of Date AddOns"
Mac Support
WoW addons are not platformed based. As such, they can be used on either Mac or PC. You can extract both .zip and .rar files on a Mac using StuffitExpander.
Directory Structure
World of Warcraft
|_ Interface
|_AddOns
|_*AddonName*
|_ *AddonName*.toc
|_ *AddonName*.xml
|_ *AddonName*.lua
|_ (possibly others as well)...