Blizzard, the company behind World of Warcraft, has been very open and friendly towards the modding community that surrounds their game. There are many mods that change various aspects of the user interface, and at this point in the games evolution, it almost takes a lot to be successful. While there is no substitute for care, raw talent, leadership and dedication; These mods will go a long way towards increasing the effectiveness of your guild’s raids.

1. EPGP – This is the system my guild uses to distribute gear and reward raid attendance. Unlike other point systems, such as DKP, which can accumulate and are inherently unfair to new members, EPGP creates a ratio system that, in many cases, allows new members to prepare while also rewarding the longtime dedicated raiders. It’s the best system we’ve found and has reduced the time it takes to distribute loot to 1-2 minutes per boss. The mod also allows everyone in the guild to easily see their priority at any given time and allows the raid leader to distribute points at any time.

2. Deadly Boss Mods – This mod is so critical that Blizzard has practically integrated it into the game, as evidenced by their recent Void Reaver fix to allow mods to work on it again. This mod gives you a series of visual, text, and audio cues in various boss fights in World of Warcraft, allowing for easy integration of strategies throughout the raid. It also provides outrage times, scene changes, and announces when bosses use important abilities that affect raids. It is a very very nice mod.

3. Omen 2: This is a threat meter. It gives you a visual representation in the form of bars that show you how close you are to taking out the tank on any given mob. The latest version will even give you an audible warning when you reach 90 percent tank threat, as well as how much you can go over the top of the tank without attracting the mob.

4. Atlas Loot: This gives you the possible drops from every boss and trash mob in any instance of the game. This way, your raiders can already know what they want from any boss and the time it takes to distribute the loot will be minimal.

5. Queshelper – Even when you are level 80, this is a great mod to use. It pretty much holds your hand though, so those who like a challenge may be turned off. However, especially for the daily and other quests that I do all the time and the “adventure” is gone, this is a great mod. No matter what you think, this is good for making those journals to save for repair bills.

6. Headscore – This shows you how you’re doing relative to everyone else in your raid. It shows your healing, your dps, your damage done, all that good stuff. It can definitely help you improve your character as it keeps you on your toes by showing you how her performance stacks up against the rest of the raid.

7. Carbonite: This is free now. It’s like Questhelper and a little more. All kinds of map mods, quest mods, pvp mods, and all together in one package that, if I remember correctly, doesn’t require a lot of resources. If you like it, go to their website and pay-pal give them a few bucks so they can keep the mod going.

8. Outfitter – There’s now a built-in version of this in WoW, but I’m told Outfitter is even better. Especially now that the raiders are working with two separate specs and two separate gear sets, this mod helps keep everything organized.

9. WIM: Windows Instant Messenger: This was invaluable when running raids. There’s so much going on in raids that it’s easy to lose track of people’s whispers. This solves it by opening a new window for each person who whispers to you IM-style. It also records all your conversations for you, so if you need to go back and show someone who told you not to stand in green smoke, you can. It takes a bit of getting used to, but I really like this mod a lot.

10. Bartender – This allows you to set up all of your bars just the way you want them on the screen. This really helps when you need to be able to quickly access spells, abilities, potions, weapons, and other items during a boss encounter.

All of these mods, with the exception of Carbonite, can be found at www.curse.com. Carbonite can be found by googling carbonite plugin.