If two nameplates are overlapping when you click, what mob gets targeted? The closest? I'm sure a lot of people would rather have an option to toggle the nameplate collision

Range: Excellent. Always wanted that. In fact, can we have a slider that lets us set this? =)

Name plates through pillars: Why... ???
I mean alright, there probably is a good reason in gameplay. I just can't tell what it is.

Overlap: Horrible. Horrible, horrible, horrible!
I use nameplates because they allow me to see the enemie's health without looking at any frames - I get to keep an overview. I can easily see which totems a shaman has out as well (although I think a lot would prefer to be able to disable them) and I can easily tell them apart.

By stacking all of them on top of each other, you're making them, quite frankly, a complete and utter mess, and it will be horrible using them for targeting. Please reconsider.

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Q u o t e:

You can no longer see the nameplates through objects which block line of sight.

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This quite frankly sucks.

The rest seems good though.

Just make all of these changes optional. I welcome the range change, In the other hand, the other two would annoy me preventing targetting some mobs due to camera limitations (particularly on building entrances and some corridors) If PVP is what worries developers, exclude pvp targets nameplates when not in LoS

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Q u o t e:
We have made some changes to the way creature and character nameplates display in the game and would like to get feedback from those of you on the public test realms. There are three significant changes you should notice:

• The range at which you can see the nameplates is now much longer.


• You can no longer see the nameplates through objects which block line of sight.


• Instead of the nameplates trying to sort themselves, they just overlap. We think this makes them more useful for very large groups (example: Onyxia whelps).

Please let us know how this change affects your play experience, whether through PvE or PvP.

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That last option will be a godsend for me as a tankadin.

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Q u o t e:

You can no longer see the nameplates through objects which block line of sight.

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This is currently the only chance we have of reporting hackers mining nodes from underground, a well-known issue today. For this reason ALONE, it's a bad idea. It will make those hackers even more undetectable.

Also, it is a convenience during normal pve play, since you can prepare for a mob around the corner. Disabling nameplates behind LOS in arena and bg however, I have no problem with.

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Q u o t e:

You can no longer see the nameplates through objects which block line of sight.

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^ Who even came up with this?
Seeing the amount of posts about this i doubt it will go Live, But still this is just silly.

Also, an option to turn off pets/totem nameplates would be a lovely

I'll miss being able to see how many players are charging up the tower im guarding in AV (hold my ground or evacuate? :D) or to see them behind wall, but i guess it's fair.

But PLEASE add an option to toggle off nameplates of non-players! Nameplates for totems, blood worms or (ARGH!) snakes from a hunters trap drive me mad!

maybe don't stack marked nameplates ( raid marks ) and stack then only after a certain amount , when ther are a lot of nameplates on the screen. I find it extremely helpful that i can click nameplates when tanking , or need to single target something out of a bunch of mobs , especially when it is marked and i don't have to tab - tab tru a bunch of mobs.

I did notice the change yesterday while trying the new instances.
From a PvE point of view, nameplates not visible when out of LoS is not an issue really, think it's a good idea as a mechanic. At least I can see its logic.

Nameplates overlapping instead of stacking: it can get messy in large packs (not happy if I don't chainpull two groups :P), when you try to specifically select that caster to interrupt.
I think the idea itself is good, but situational. Perhaps an optional switch to toggle it on/off is best here, so it can fits every player's style.

About pet names and totems: very much appreciated if there'll be an option to toggle those specific names on/off. It can be just annoying sometimes, other times instead (Faction Champions when I want to quickly see totems) it's useful.

Any odds critters could have their nameplates removed? Or swapped over to show friendlies instead of on enemies?

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Q u o t e:
The original post has been updated to clarify a few points based on some of the feedback and concerns we have received.

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Thanks for the clarification, will give it a shot tonight.

Apologies for the whininess of this, but please don't go through with the los change. Really really need to be able to tell where sneaky drinkers are

Excellent changes!

Thanks for addressing this. I have a report to give but since I don't participate in Arenas/PvP that much, it's entirely related to PvE.

Premise:

My primary (and only) role in my guild's activities is Main Tank. I've been doing this for 3 years now, and optimized my skills around the available tools in-game. Let me say, nameplates are the critical component for tanking.

Facts:

The knowledge around the tank community is that (for a protection warrior) our standard AoE abilities (Thunderclap, shockwave) must be properly integrated with Cleave and a single target rotation spread across multiple targets. This is clever and has its inner logic consistency but... reality in the tank world is made of snap decisions based on relevant data that is reported by the client and quickly assimilated by the player.

To this purpose, the Threat status auras around nameplates where a complete success implementation by the devs, but they often happen to be triggered when it's too late to do something about it (think top tier dps in a critting spree). A totally random or sequential rotation (through tab cycling) could let the tank arrive at deploying threat on the mob that requires it too late.

My solution (since I completely and effectively handle all skills and movement using my left hand on keyboard alone), has been so far, to preemptively identify which mob is taking the most damage from the raid/party through his helth bar (nameplate), and with a single click select it as the recipient of my primary single target rotation.

Some of my skills are obviously macroed to be directly deployed on the mouseover target, which effectively renders the targeting of a mob only a full redirection of my threat onto it, while I still can apply devastates by simply hovering the mouse on top of the nameplate I want. That allows me to cope with collateral damage from melee dps, healers threat etc..

This allows me to promptly apply threat before a damage dealer pushes me in a critical situation, and this is all thanks to nameplates giving me a perfect overview of what's going on. It doesn't replace the effectiveness of a coordinated effort through marks and sequencing of dps focus, that is still the best approach, but as a tank I have the power to correct the mistakes of my friends and so I do. Things hardly ever happen as we plan, and being rude to a non experienced player incapable of following a focused dps strategy isn't the best morale boost for a guild.

The new tech for nameplates (Where it improves my experience):

In a situation where I have 10+ mobs, I can safely assume (if I didn't totally mess up the pull) that the devs are throwing swarmers at me, which means they have low health, and thunderclaps + shockwaves will just do. Keeping the mobs stunned while dps quickly takes them down is the way to go.

In this case, the new tech is brilliant, is faster, creates less confusion on screen! I don't need the overview, all I need nameplates for is identifying the mobs escaping the AoE area (leaving the bunch), taunt them back in after selecting the escapee's nameplate with my mouse (tab's useless here). This works because the nameplate will exit the cloud of other nameplates, standing on its own.

The new tech for nameplates (Where it handicaps me):

In the situation in which I am tanking 3/4/5 mobs (usually heroics), when I have a non coordinated dps effort or "bad" players, or players who don't /assist the tank. In this case my method of adjusting my tanking to the DPS instead of having a bunch of people adjusting all to me is impaired because of nameplates overlapping. In an ideal world spamming the tab key until I get the right target would be enough, but it doesn't beat the speed of selecting the nameplate with a mouse click.

I tried the new instances on the PTR when I still had no clue about these changes from the patch notes, and I immediately realized that it disrupted one of the elements that made me most confident about my tanking abilities. Trash was running everywhere it wanted, I couldn't keep the situation in check because I had the wrong target clicked 7 out of 10 times. It effectively forced me to go back to tabbing every rotation to hit a different mob. This left a big part of my role to chance, and made me feel a lot less effective at it.

My suggestion:
Please understand that this issue is irrelevant when the effort is fully coordinated, marks are adopted and dps follow the planned killing sequence. Though I pride myself of the acquired experience and skill, and would still like to be a better tank to be with, to speed things up avoiding the time invested in marking everything, and to be able to cover up for other's mistakes.

I don't know how many tanks do what I do, if they have another way to do this that doesn't feel too slow or random like the tabbing around, but I do know what could help me shall this be a concern shared by others (it it's just me I'll simply adapt, like always before).

instead of rendering the nameplates in a cloud overlapping, stack them in piles (4/5/6) per pile, and have the pile be relatively static above the group of mobs. This would allow for a clean and precise selection and avoid the problem with the previous nameplates that had me frantically chasing a nameplate around if the mobs' path finding had them relocate slightly and continuously.

I understand that nameplates are (or were) part of the 3D models, anchored to them, and that probably the previous build of the code was just juggling around with offsets when a collision was detected, which effectively renders a solution like the one I describe a little too tedious to work out. But hey, the most important part of my message is how it affects my gameplay, to the good devs the task to coming up with a decision and solutions (if required at all).

Thanks for letting us share feedback on new things!

Live long and Prosper

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Q u o t e:
Update 09/10:

...

Nameplates for totems can be toggled under “PRODUCTION” settings in “Interface Options” on the test realms. We will look into adding this functionality for pets as well.

The way nameplates are sorted when large numbers of creatures and players are grouped together is not fully functional and we will continue to address the way these are sorted and displayed throughout the testing process. In the mean time, you can choose to toggle this feature back to its original functionality, also under "PRODUCTION" settings.

[/ul]

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The word "PRODUCTION" is displayed as "PRODCTION", a typo.

nameplate spam is fine, i dont want it to stack, instead i dont want nameplates re-shuffling themselfs every second, defeats the purpose for tanking when you struggle to click your next marked add in a swarm or something with an agro warning, and not be able to cuz the bars is bouncing all over the center of the screen

keep them dam nameplates still!

since gm's only read the blizzard posts, i will say it on here

why cant i log in with my battle.net account? i can log in with my original details but none of the premades are there. is it because i have to wait 2 days since i only did it yesterday? please get back to me on this one because its really annoying me.

thanks

Very nice indeed