Vulcan SimBench

An add-on for World of Warcraft: Forever that copies your gear, talents and stats as one line of text, for the Vulcan Sim at vulcanaddons.com/sim.

The sim ranks every class and talent tree by damage against players or a raid boss, and plays out 1v1 duels. Paste your string into its Your character box and it uses your real gear for your class.

Display only, no automation. The add-on reads your character out of combat and shows a box of text. It never casts, targets, moves or clicks anything for you, and it sends nothing to anyone. WoW add-ons can't reach the internet: the string only goes where you paste it.

Part of the Vulcan Suite: Vulcan GrindWatch · Vulcan RunBook · Vulcan DuoQuest.

Install

• CurseForge app or WowUp: search for Vulcan SimBench and install it for World of Warcraft: Forever.
• By hand: unzip the download and copy the VulcanSimBench folder into the Interface\AddOns\ folder of your Forever game folder (Battle.net > the Forever game > gear icon > Show in Explorer, or Show in Finder on a Mac).

At the character screen, click AddOns and make sure Vulcan SimBench is ticked. If it's greyed out as "out of date", tick Load out of date AddOns.

Use

1. Open the sim at vulcanaddons.com/sim in any web browser. WoW can't open a web page itself; /simbench sim (or Where's the sim? in the export window) shows the address in a box you can copy.
2. Export your character. Out of combat, type /simbench (or click the Sim button on the Character panel, SimBench in the add-on menu by the minimap, or a key you bind under Options > Key Bindings > AddOns > Vulcan SimBench). A box opens with the string selected. Press Ctrl+C (Cmd+C on a Mac).
3. Paste it into the sim, in its Your character box.

Any notes (for example "Found your quiver but couldn't read its haste") appear under the string in game. The string has a checksum, so a copy that got cut off is rejected instead of misread. Sharing a string on Discord? Put it in a code block (wrap it in backticks), so Discord doesn't turn parts of it into emoji.

/simbench, /simx and /simexport all work.

Format versions. The add-on and the sim match on the string's format (FSX1 today), not on version numbers. If you paste a string from an older SimBench, the sim tells you to update the add-on and export again, instead of showing wrong numbers.

What's in the string

Class, race, level, client build, date, talent points and ranks per tree, equipped item IDs and enchant IDs, weapon damage and speed, ammo damage, quiver haste, summed item stats (including plain stats that only appear as "Equip:" text), active set bonuses, your character-sheet numbers, and your active buff IDs. Not included: your name, realm, guild, or anything about other players.

Why combat is blocked

Forever uses the same add-on rules as Midnight: during combat, stats come back as "secret values" add-ons can't read. Export between pulls.

Known Forever client issue: saved data

The Forever beta client has been reported to write add-on data to disk but sometimes fail to load it back, and then overwrite the good file the next time you log out or /reload. SimBench keeps only your last export and the button setting per character. It also keeps a small account-wide file that only lists which characters have saved data.

• It notices a failed load. If a character on that list comes back with no saved data, SimBench warns you in chat instead of quietly starting empty. Exporting again is usually all you need. If both files fail at once, that looks like a fresh install and can't be detected.
• Backing up by hand: with the game closed, copy the WTF folder in your Forever game folder. SimBench's file is WTF\Account\<account>\<realm>\<character>\SavedVariables\VulcanSimBench.lua.

Community workaround tools exist. SimBench doesn't need or rely on any of them, and some work by editing add-on files that your add-on updater replaces.

Limits

• Enchants are listed by ID; the sim leaves them out.
• Set bonuses are read from your set pieces' tooltips. Plain-stat bonuses (+40 Attack Power, +1% hit, +8 all resistances) are counted. Procs, ability changes and conditional bonuses ("when fighting Undead") are listed by number for the sim; they're never guessed into the stat totals. Stat wording is matched in English plus the client's own strings for the main stats, so other bonuses on non-English clients are listed by number.
• Talents are read from your active spec. If the game only gives points per tree, those are exported and you pick the talents in the sim. Export again after switching specs.
• Right after logging in, some items may not have loaded yet. The export says which, and asks the game to load them, so exporting again a few seconds later works.
• The sim models level 60, and the export notes say so for a lower-level character.

Part of the Vulcan Suite by Tavlius: vulcanaddons.com. Source and issues: github.com/Tavlius/VulcanSimBench. MIT licensed.