Boss encounter questions

Can AVRE show where Malleable Goo is going to land on heroic Festergut?

Nope.

Can AVRE show where the ghosts are on heroic Lady Deathwhisper?

Nope.

Can AVRE show the range of Blistering Cold on Sindragosa?

Nope.

Can AVRE show who Defile is on during The Lich King?

Not at the moment due to a Blizzard bug.

Can AVRE do _?

AVRE cannot put circles around NPCs, totems, or pets. AVRE does not know which way an NPC is facing. AVRE cannot do anything if the NPC is untargetable. AVRE does not know where that circle on the ground actually is unless it's cast on a specific player by a targetable boss.

Examples:

• Lady Deathwhisper ghosts: AVRE cannot know where they are or who they're targeting
• Festergut Malleable Goo: AVRE cannot know where this is going to land
• Sindragosa: AVRE cannot know where the boss is, which way she's facing, or where Blistering Cold will hit

Requests to put circles under tanks or off-tanks will be denied unless there is a very good reason (for example, the Rotface Big Ooze kiter).

General questions

What's the difference between AVR and AVRE (AVR Encounters)?

AVR handles 3D rendering, manual scene creation, and scene sharing. Other addons can utilize the 3D drawing functionality in AVR.

AVR Encounters utilizes AVR's rendering engine to automatically display various graphical effects during many raid boss encounters. AVR Encounters requires AVR to work, but AVR can be used on it's own without AVR Encounters. Note that AVR and AVR Encounters have different authors. Try to direct your question to the right place to get the best possible answer.

Is using AVR cheating?

That's up to everyone to decide for themselves. All addons ease some aspect of the game in some way. If you think AVR somehow crosses the line between acceptable and cheating, don't use it.

Is this against Blizzard's Terms of Service?

No. A common misconception is that AVR somehow edits WoW models or textures. AVR does nothing of the sort. AVR also does not inject into the process or do anything else that's forbidden by the Terms of Service. AVR is completely written in Lua and operates only in the WoW addon environment. Blizzard has the right to ban any addon they want, but until they do, AVR doesn't violate the Terms of Service or the Addon Development Policy in any way.

Will this be banned or disabled in some way?

In patch 3.3 (Fall of the Lich King), Blizzard enabled the GetPlayerMapPosition() function call within modern instances. Prior to 3.3, this function didn't work in instances, so you couldn't tell where players were. This function also enables similar functionality in other boss mods including DXE, DBM, and VampArrow.

Blizzard has stated that they don't mind AVR/AVRE at this time. They do reserve the right to ban these addons or (more likely) disable them by breaking the functionality in some way. Be aware that if Blizzard does choose to disable GetPlayerMapPosition(), DXE and DBM arrows will also cease to function. DXE's range check would also stop working.

How much memory/CPU time does AVR/AVRE use?

AVR uses quite a bit of both memory and CPU. CPU time is the important part, as memory usage by itself doesn't usually contribute to performance problems. AVR renders graphics over every single frame. This means that the higher your frame rate is, the more work AVR must do to keep up. If you normally have a frame rate of 120, for example, AVR might drop your frame rate by as much as 10 to 20 FPS. If you have a lower frame rate, such as 20, AVR won't cause a noticeable loss of frame rate.

AVR Encounters by itself uses very little memory or CPU time. It has been engineered with load-on-demand modules and a very lightweight encounter system that should result in no performance impact.

Usage questions

Does everyone in the raid need to have this, or just the raid leader?

Everyone in the raid who wishes to use AVR and AVRE must have them installed.

Can't you have AVRE just share AVR scenes with my raid so they don't have to install AVRE?

Nope. There's just not enough network bandwidth available to transmit all that scene data to the entire raid constantly in response to dynamic events during the fight.

Does AVRE have a version check?

To see who else in your raid is running AVRE, and what version they're running, type:
/avre ver

Can I turn on a range check for fights not covered by AVRE?

You can turn on a range warning scene at any time using AVR. Check out the how-to page for more details.

How do I configure AVRE?

Type /avre. You can also bring up your Interface options, click the AddOns tab, and find AVR Encounters in the list.

Does AVRE use, conflict with, or require any other boss add-ons?

No. AVRE is a standalone boss mod. It works alongside any other add-on.

Troubleshooting

I installed AVRE, but it doesn't work. What's going on?

Check all of the following:

• You installed both AVR and AVRE
• You didn't accidentally install the "no-lib" version
• Both AVR and AVRE are enabled on your add-on screen (as well as whichever individual raid modules you need)
• Once logged into the game, verify that AVR and AVRE are both installed:
  • Type /avr. If you get a response in your chat window, AVR is installed
  • Type /avre. If the AVRE options screen opens (and you've enabled the AVRE_Options module), AVRE is installed
• Within AVRE, verify that the expansion, raid instance, and individual fight(s) are enabled
• Verify that you don't see any Lua errors coming from AVR or AVRE
• Verify you're running the latest version of both AVR and AVRE by updating them from curse.com or wowace.com (any other sites or updaters other than the Curse Client are not official and will not be the latest release)
• If all else fails, try resetting your AVRE profile. Open the options window and click the + sign next to AVR Encounters. Click Profiles. Click Reset Profile.
  
  

Extending the functionality with additional addons

More control when configuring colors and transparency

Try EnhancedColourPicker

Visualize the location and range of totems

Try TotemRadius

Ping a location in 3D space

Try VirtualPing