Many World of Warcraft players complain about LUA errors appearing when starting the game. These errors usually indicate that some of the add-ons are not working correctly. Errors do not interfere with the gameplay, however, their constant appearance in the chat box can be pretty annoying. Windows 7, 8 and 10 – these errors affect users of all modern versions of Microsoft OS.
What is LUA?
Before we move on, it’s important to understand what LUA is and what it is eaten with.
LUA is a scripting programming language that brings modularity to a wide variety of applications through embedding. LUA is a favorite language of the WoW modding community because it is relatively easy to learn and can be used to create truly impressive mods.
Having studied the problem more closely, we came to the conclusion that LUA errors in World of Warcraft can occur for the following reasons:
- Glitch / bug in the add-on / interface file. LUA errors often occur as a result of incorrectly working add-ons or files related to the WoW game interface. This is due to a “crooked” or outdated modification code. Starting from rebooting the interface and ending with updating the version of the mod, the solutions are very different.
- Broken addon manager files. If an elementary reload of files did not help, then you can try to perform a complete reset of the WoW interface.
- Residual variables of the custom console. A LUA error can be expected if a player starts WoW with custom console variables related to an addon that was removed long ago. To resolve the situation, it is enough to get rid of these variables.
- WoW has outdated or no longer supported addons installed. Everything is quite simple here: in the current version of WoW, modifications are installed that have not been updated by their developers for a long time or that are no longer supported by the current version of the game. Either we update the add-ons, or we completely remove them.
How to fix the LUA error in World of Warcraft
Method # 1 Restarting the WoW game interface
If the error occurred as a result of a bug or a situation where not all add-ons were loaded with WoW, you should easily get rid of it by restarting the interface using the console command. However, you should immediately warn that the error is almost certainly a symptom of some other problem, for example, an outdated add-on that refuses to work normally with the current WoW build.
So, to reload the WoW interface, you just need to open the game chat (chat box) and execute the following command in it:
/ reload
The note: this method does not work on the most recent versions of WoW, however it should work on the vanilla version.
Method # 2 Complete reset of the WoW interface and removal of the addon manager
If a simple reboot of the interface did not fix the LUA error, then we recommend doing a complete reset of the WoW interface in order to get rid of all unnecessary code that could have remained in your game from a previously removed addon or addon manager.
It is also very important to get rid of the addon manager you are currently using (!) And addon files located in the three main WoW folders.
- Close WoW and its launcher completely (be sure to check if there are any game processes left in the task manager);
- press Win + R and execute appwiz.cpl;
- find the WoW addon manager in the list of installed programs;
- right-click on the manager and select “Delete”;
- follow all the instructions in front of you to get rid of the addon manager;
- restart your computer;
- go to the root folder of World of Warcraft;
- rename the following three folders:
- Cache → Cache.Damaged
- Interface → Interface.Damaged
- WTF → WTF.Damaged
- close all open windows and start WoW.
Check if the LUA error has stopped appearing or not.
Method # 3 Resetting custom console variables
Rebooting / resetting the main interface didn’t have the desired effect? Then you should try resetting all the WoW custom console variables. This procedure will only work if you have previously installed and played with addons that had parameters that could potentially conflict with each other.
Here’s how to reset WoW Console Variables:
- start WoW and open the chat box whenever possible;
- execute the following commands in the chat box:
- / console Cvar_reset
- / console cvar_defaut
The note: ignore any errors about rights after entering these commands – everything is fine.
- restart WoW and check if the LUA error is gone.
Method # 4 Removing the Cartographer addon (or any other obsolete addon)
It turns out that LUA errors can be obtained if you run WoW with outdated addons that can no longer work with the current version of the game. You need to get rid of all outdated add-ons, then go back to the game and check if the problem has been resolved. I would like to note right away that each add-on is removed in a different way, and therefore we will not be able to help you with the uninstallation process. Interesting fact: LUA errors are often caused by the Cartographer addon.
Method # 5 Disable LUA error messages
If you are unable to get rid of annoying LUA errors (or you cannot determine the reason for their appearance), then we recommend not to bother and simply turn off the messages about them. This is done as follows:
- start WoW and open the chat box when the opportunity arises;
- write the command / console scriptErrors 0 in the chat box and press Enter;
- restart WoW.
After that, you are guaranteed to stop seeing LUA errors. Run the / console scriptErrors 1 command to reactivate the error message display feature.