This is an addon for an addon.
I used to use Drathal's Hud. It did for me what I wanted in a heads up display. Centrally located health and mana and buffs. It went away when i didn't need to see it anymore. Drathal decided to stop supporting it for reasons I'll let you read about on his mod.
Caeryn then took up keeping it updated for a time. Then one patch I fixed it up when it started giving out display anomolies.
Not long ago I ran into DaHud. An Ace mod. It is a kind of generic HUD mod that lets you fix things up the way you like them. I didn't like any of the default styles it came with and the authore of DaHud has stated he isn't adding anymore styles.
DaHud is active and kept updated by the author. It is also highly configurable. So, I endeavored to recreate drathal's hud as closely as possible using DaHud.
For a long time I would have to copy my files back in for them to work. I finally got around to creating a "mod" of this to attach a drathal style to DaHUD. In this form, you don't have to manually find all the graphics and reset them. It shows up as a style in the DaHUD dropdown.
It also doesn't disappear every time wowmatrix updates DaHud. It doesn't require any fiddling with the DaHud code. It is, as I said, an addon for an addon.
As such, you do have to have DaHud (its a dependency) for this to work.
The second picture shows the buffs on my target. They are large because those are self applied buffs. Everyone else's buffs/debuffs are small boxes so don't freak out.
I find it useful to easily see when my debuffs are coming off so I can reapply them.
I hope you enjoy it. I don't forsee it breaking as it is really just some graphics and lua file that extends existing tables.
As this is just a graphic mod, I can't do anything about any functionality of the DaHUD addon itself. That's Benumbed's project. I don't even know him, but I will extend thanks for an versatile HUD addon.
This will work with WOTLK when DaHud works with WoTLK.
Just install this like any normal mod. To use it, select drathal from the drop down style menu in DaHud.
TODO:
* fiddle with the bar graphics a bit more as they don't actually display losses until about 95% health/mana. Its not as bad as it sounds.