Cooldown Planning

The Cooldown Planner is where you plan healing, mobility, defensives, text remidners and more for each boss encounter. It has two views — Grid and Timeline - and supports real-time collaborative editing. There's two types of reminders.

Spell Reminders - Any spell you can assign. They show in the icon or row view in NSRT in game. Text Reminders - These are 'notes' reminders that you can assign. These show in the text display of NSRT in game, and can have Text to Speech.

Creating & Managing

Collaborative Editing

Multiple editors can work on the same CD page at the same time. Changes sync in real-time, saves automatically. Undo and redo with Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Shift+Z.

Grid & Timeline Views

Switch between the two views at the top of the page. Both share the same underlying data, so assignments made in one view appear in the other.

• Grid — simpler spreadsheet-like view. Good for quick overviews and fast assignments
• Timeline — visual timeline, adjust phases, place precise spell positioning. More detail, more control

Spell Filters

The two views have different ways of filtering spells:

• Grid — Click a player or spell category to see the list of spells availalbe for assingment. Click or Drag a spell to begin assigning it.
• Timeline — Click the Spell Filters button in the top left to toggle the visible spell types for each player. You can also adjust the spels for single players by clicking their class colored bar in the left of the timleine.

Boss Spells

The boss track at the top shows the boss's spell casts throughout the fight.

• Timers — hover a boss cast to see the timestamp and spell name
• Types and Colors — boss spells are color-coded by type (damage, debuff, movement, etc.). Hover over a spell to see the spell type.
• Automatic Updates — boss spell data updates automatically when we make changes. No manual maintenance needed

Grid Controls

The Grid view lays out players as rows and boss events as columns. Each cell represents a moment where you can assign spells.

Assigning Spells (Grid)

• Select a player or spell category to see the list of spells availalbe for assingment.
• Drag a spell from the spell list into a cell
• Left-click a spell in the list to enter stamp mode, then left-click cells to stamp the spell repeatedly. Press ESC or right-click to exit stamp mode
• Drag an assigned spell to move it to a different cell
• Right-click an assigned spell to remove it
• Alt+Right-click an assigned spell to open Spell Settings

Organise

Click the Organise button to automatically sort and clean up the grid layout.

Timeline Controls

The Timeline view shows a horizontal timeline per player, with boss casts and phases overlaid. This is where you get the most precise control over spell timing.

Filters

The Spell Filter bar below the boss track controls what's visible:

• Player Spell Filters — click a player name to filter spells for that player only, overriding global filters
• Keep Assigned — always show rows that have assignments, regardless of filters
• Default / Condensed / Assigned — view mode toggles for how much detail to show. I recommend using the Assigned one when you are
• Show all / Hide all — quick-toggle all spell rows

Note that the filters dont filter the CD Notes output.

Assigning Spells (Timeline)

• Left-click an empty spot on a player's spell row to assign a spell at that time
• Left-click and drag an assigned spell to move it
• Right-click an assigned spell to remove it
• Alt+Right-click an assigned spell to open Spell Settings

Zoom

Left-click and drag on the timeline to zoom into a section. Use the phase zoom buttons in the top-right for quick phase-level zooming.

• Shift+Z — reset zoom to the full timeline

Adjust Phases

Red phase bars on the timeline are draggable. Adjust them if your raid's phase timings differ from the default. Spells assigned relative to a phase will shift with it, so check your assignments after adjusting.

You do not need to adjust phases for timers to work in-game. A spell assigned X seconds into a phase will always trigger X seconds into the phase regardless of the phase bar position. They are there to help you plan for timers that fit what you get in game.

Heatmap

Press Q to toggle the heatmap overlay. This shows aggregated spell usage from WCL Top Rankings behind your assignments, so you can see where top players are casting while you plan.

General Assignments

In the bottom of the Setup tab of the Sidebar you can enable general assignments to everyone, tanks, healers, melee, ranged, or specific classes and specs. This is useful for things like text or defensive reminders for Everyone, or "all Evokers cast Zephyr here" without assigning each player individually.

Spell Settings

Alt+Right-click any assigned spell to open the Spell Settings dialog. This gives you per-cast control over:

• Custom Cooldown — override the spell's default cooldown for planning purposes (only affects the planner, not the in-game timer)
• Raidframe Glow — assign one or more targets to glow on raidframes when the spell reminder triggers. Great for externals and Power Infusion
• Timer Options — choose between Dynamic Timer from Phase (default), Dynamic Timer from Previous Phase, or Static Timer from Pull
• Custom Text — add a text label that shows alongside the spell reminder
• Text-to-Speech (TTS) — the custom text is spoken aloud in-game via NSRT
• Text Color — color the text reminder for emphasis
• Audio Countdown — play an audio countdown before the reminder triggers
• Duration — adjust how long the reminder stays on screen
• Soundpacks — choose from different sound packs for the audio alert

Export & Import

Import from WCL Top

Use WCL Top Rankings to browse what top-ranked players are casting. Copy their spell patterns and import them in the CD page's Setup sidebar as a starting point for your own plan.

Import / Export Assignments

The Import/Export buttons (top-right, below the boss track) let you share your entire cooldown layout. Other players can import it and adapt it to their roster.

This feature is also used for the supporters Cooldown Examples.

Copy CDs

The CD page has a Copy button to copy the note for this boss. However, it's recommended to copy from the Setup page instead — using Copy All Notes copies CDs, Assignments, invite lists, and raidframe arrangements for every boss in one go.

Player-Sheet

Raiders see their assigned cooldowns on their Player-Sheet. Everything from every boss in the Setup, in one personalised view.

See Also

• Player-Sheet — view your assigned cooldowns and assignments for each boss

• Resets & Setups — where you create the Setup that feeds the CD page

• Assignments — plan non-cooldown tasks alongside your CDs

• WCL Top Rankings — browse top-ranked cooldown patterns to inform your plan

• WCL Compare — analyze your logs against your plan after raiding

• Northern Sky Raid Tools — getting your plan into the in-game addon

Northern Sky Raid Tools on CurseForge

Required addon for importing raid notes. The addon reads your exported plans and shows each raider their personal cooldown and assignment reminders.