MNK hotbar setup for PS4

Hey everyone!

I'm a healer, but my friend mains monk right now. He's still new and leveling and he's approaching level 50.

The main thing I hear him complain about recently is his controller setup. It seems he's reaching a point where he doesn't have easy reach of his whole toolkit on his hotbar. I'm sure there's an optimal way to set it up that makes it easier, but not playing a DPS I thought I would throw it at you guys and see if anyone has any experience they'd like to share.

Also, if there are some macros you use to cut key-bloat (I know that MNK is very situational, so if there's not any I understand)?

Cross hotbars and quick key switching from one hotbar to another. The cross hotbar gets him easy access to the second hotbar. If he learns to swap between one, two, and three with the shortcut he'll do himself a favor because by Heavensward he'll be up to 3 hotbars including cross class skills and limit break.

It is flat out impossible to stick to one hotbar and be a competent player.

First, I would generally stay away from macros on monk. There are plenty enough spots for monk using cross hotbar (+expanded hotbar)

There is one thing I wish I could change about my setup, I have tried but 2 years muscle memory not easy to overwrite

For the most part, try to keep all attacks (Dragon Kick, twin snakes, bootshine, demolish, etc) on the face buttons (square, x, triangle, circle), as this allows you to move around for positionals/dodge aoe with your left thumbstick, while having your right thumb free to keep attacking. This is pretty important/convenient.

I put off-GCDs on the direction pad buttons to weave in between attacks (steel peak, elixer field, howling fist)

Other buffs like internal release and blood for blood, well I generally keep these on the dpad as well to weave in between attacks, but my set up is similar to other classes (like internal release and blood for blood are on the same button for monk, dragoon, bard, nin) so that keeps it kinda consistent between classes

For monk I put the fists buffs on the expanded hotbar, don't use them that often. I have mantra, bloodbath, second wind, featherfoot, potions, limit break, haymaker, meditation, form shift all on the expanded hotbar.

Unfortunately I don't have any monk hotbar screenshots saved, if no one has posted one by the time I get home tonight I'll upload one to give you an idea. Otherwise, following the above considerations should output something similar :)

On all jobs but SCH, I have managed to get the important battle skills one two crossbars - one main, one expanded. Things like teleport and chocobo go on a dedicated non-combat bar, and I have the limit break bound to kb numpad (as I always have it nearby to chat - I could possibly fit it on the crossbar). Things like stances, which are not used often, go to a third bar. I've built the muscle memory to switch bars as needed.

Ok. So i use two macros.
Ocd attacks - in this priority. Elixir field steel peack howling mercy stroke
Ocd attack buffs - in this order. B4b internal release

Point being i refuse to use more than one hotbar.

Now that thats out of the way.

R2
O- bootshine
X - true strike
[] - twin snakes
^ - snap punch

Right - ocd attack buff macro
Down -fracture
Left - hq pot
Up - nq pot

L2
O - demolish
X - rockbreaker
[] - ocd attcks
^ - dragon kick

Right - limit break
Down - arm of the destroyer
Left - mantra
Up - shoulder tackle


EXPANDED BARS

R2 + L2
O - touch of death
X - tornado kick
[] - form shift
^ - perfect balance

Nothing on this dpad section.


L2 + R2
O - purify
X - second wind
[] - chakra
^ - invigorate

Left - bloodbath
Up - featherfoot


As you can tell i hate dpad. Dont use dpad for abiluties you need while moving. My only ify thing is shoulder tackle.

I like to put my buffs on the expanded hotbars and on like hotbar 10 ill have the icon nice and small to see when its rddy to use again.

Main hotbar

http://i1072.photobucket.com/albums/...pschzd1hbe.jpg

I tried to move bootshine and demolish around but couldn't get used to anything else :/

Expanded hotbar

http://i1072.photobucket.com/albums/...psolzeprw0.jpg

Maybe overkill on the surrounding hotbars, I started putting all my cds like this on tank and then the other jobs looked so blank and bland xD

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Morzy

Ok. So i use two macros.

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first, its very bad to use macros like that. second, the fact that you are using the expanded hot bar means you already use more then one hot bar for controller. only thing i can agree with what you said is not to use dpad for moves that you need on the move(unless you are able to use both thumbs on the whole controller. i know i can.)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Kaze3434

first, its very bad to use macros like that. second, the fact that you are using the expanded hot bar means you already use more then one hot bar for controller. only thing i can agree with what you said is not to use dpad for moves that you need on the move(unless you are able to use both thumbs on the whole controller. i know i can.)

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It's too convenient. How else can you use every ocd attack while moving with one main bar and i dont count expanded like that cus i dont switch hotbars to reach that. Its easy. Maybe one day ill drop macros, but not now. And how can you say my buff macro is so bad, its literally two skills. This works fine for me.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Morzy

It's too convenient. How else can you use every ocd attack while moving with one main bar

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I just showed you basically :P Granted, I would like to be able to get used to bootshine/demolish being behind the other 4, like where I have haymaker/meditation/form shift/tod. Then they'd all be on the R2 or R2 expanded and be a bit smoother for moving around. Maybe I'll try it again sometime but I just couldn't get used to the change.

If you are going to use any macros, use them for defensive buffs, not offensive moves (mainly because you use them less frequently). I don't have a space for potion since I'm still gearing monk and not raiding or anything on it (still have lv55 weapon lol), but I'd stack bloodbath/foresight in a macro and put the potion where bloodbath is.

This is my setup:

Dungeon Set:

1: https://i.gyazo.com/5de6b98b43dd24f8...2594ae9dad.png
2: https://i.gyazo.com/e846cf135ecb27aa...818512cfbe.png

Boss Set:

1: https://i.gyazo.com/872eec0cd2fdf45a...cb87efe035.png
2: https://i.gyazo.com/f8aeb75201e2bc98...107a0d1b99.png

On #3, I have the stances and my 2 main macro that switches my skills from a dungeon set to a boss set (it's the red and blue buttons on the far left) :
https://i.gyazo.com/229f89f9a4b41093...c71d72fc84.png


The difference between both sets is that the Dungeon set has the AoE skills on the main bar, while the Boss set puts the chakra, form shift and Elixir Field to the front.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Morzy

It's too convenient. How else can you use every ocd attack while moving with one main bar and i dont count expanded like that cus i dont switch hotbars to reach that. Its easy. Maybe one day ill drop macros, but not now. And how can you say my buff macro is so bad, its literally two skills. This works fine for me.

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like i said, learn to use both thumbs at all times. as for the reason macros like yours are bad, its because should any kind of hiccup happen between you and the server, it could skip the first skill you have in the list, or flat out not use any of the skills. i wasnt talking about just the buff macro.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

I just showed you basically :P Granted, I would like to be able to get used to bootshine/demolish being behind the other 4, like where I have haymaker/meditation/form shift/tod. Then they'd all be on the R2 or R2 expanded and be a bit smoother for moving around. Maybe I'll try it again sometime but I just couldn't get used to the change.

If you are going to use any macros, use them for defensive buffs, not offensive moves (mainly because you use them less frequently). I don't have a space for potion since I'm still gearing monk and not raiding or anything on it (still have lv55 weapon lol), but I'd stack bloodbath/foresight in a macro and put the potion where bloodbath is.

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Maybe one day ill try that. But my hate of dpad is big. I wanna do stuff while moving. I can deal with buffs on dpad cus using thosr while moving means i miss on auto attcks that would be buffed. Iunno.