[open] Return UnitId from EVENT_RETICLE_TARGET_CHANGED

[Anthonysc]

Currently most events such as EVENT_EFFECT_CHANGED and EVENT_COMBAT_EVENT use the unitId to identify where various effects are originating, however when you're actually standing there looking at a specific unit, there is no way to determine which UnitId you're actually interacting with. This leads to addon devs needing to implement a number of super hacky and not particularly performant workarounds (lookup tables) to synthesize information between the events and the player's target. (We have to do this in Fancy Action Bar+ to determine who the heck you still have your debuffs on when you try to update the timers based on your targets, it's.... gross).

I think adding the UnitId as a return from EVENT_RETICLE_TARGET_CHANGED, which doesn't currently have any returns (at least not in the documentation), would be an amazing way to allow us to get this information which there currently isn't an easy way to get, without us needing to resort to these awful workarounds.

Alternatively (or additionally), a simple API function like GetUnitNameHighlightedByReticle() but for UnitId would be a welcome addition.

This would also address the scenario described in: https://www.esoui.com/forums/showthread.php?t=11031

[sirinsidiator]

Keep in mind that precise ways to get information about damage sources were intentionally removed by ZOS in the past, over privacy concerns by players, as well as some addons going above and beyond to track things in combat that gave players an unfair advantage in pvp.

[Anthonysc]

Originally Posted by sirinsidiator Keep in mind that precise ways to get information about damage sources were intentionally removed by ZOS in the past, over privacy concerns by players, as well as some addons going above and beyond to track things in combat that gave players an unfair advantage in pvp.

I really feel that doesn't apply here. You can already easily associate the unitIds provided by combat events with the detailed unit information provided by event effect changed. All that's being asked for here is the ability to get the unit id for the unit you're looking directly at while you're looking directly at them. It wouldn't compromise the anonymity of players who hadn't otherwise triggered circumstances/events that would already allow the association of their unit ID and character information, it would just allow us to do so without a bunch of ugly and ill-performant lookup tables.

Considering that it's actually really easy to do this already with very simple lookups if you're only concerned about players (since players have unique names anyway) this is only really even an improvement for dealing with NPCs.