Are macros necessary?

I've heard people swear that they can't go without them but others say "Who even uses macros anymore?". I'm not sure if I need them or not, so hopefully this post shall help me decide

Short answer: No

Long answer: For some classes/jobs they can be handy, like proc based oGCDs or crafting macros, some healers like mouseover macros, but they are not necessary, some are seen as mandatory, but not necessary.

Yes they are helpful. Maybe not much as battle-commands, but I find them useful in DoH for example. Not to mention as chat commands. If you find yourself typing the same things often in chat macros are great.

Using battle-actions with macros isn't optimal 'cause you can't queue your skills and abilities with macros. Also if you experience lag, they may not even trigger. The only way to make sure how you feel about them is to actually try though. Make some simple macros and see if your battles flow better. Or feels less chaotic, etc.

I use some macros simply because I feel my hotbars gets too populated otherwise.

Macro are really helpful in DoH to mass produce things when your gear is high enough.

I also found support skill easier to use with macro
Like virus to be applied on focus target without switch target
Or EfaE to be applied on the target of my target (aka the tank) when i'm dpsing

You can also make annoying macros with sound effects and a countdown using target numbers on your head when you're tank !
This way you can mess up all number-marking previously done just to showoff ! :D

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Originally Posted by Sento-Frost

You can also make annoying macros with sound effects and a countdown using target numbers on your head when you're tank !
This way you can mess up all number-marking previously done just to showoff ! :D

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The annoying countdown macros annoyed me so much I vowed to never count down ever again.
This has annoyed a few groups I've been invited to but hey, the ready check said you were ready! In I go~

Personally, macros aren't necessary. I just use them for reviving someone so the other healer won't revive the guy I'm trying to revive. Also if you're a mage, don't try to macro a rotation. I met a summoner who did this, they had the bio, miasma and Bio 2 in a macro and would recast the macro again if he messes up, just don't be that guy.

They aren't necessary in the slightest.

Text macros tend to make me do the exact opposite of what the macro says.
I'll go out of my way to not despell any WAR who spams the chat and my ears with his annoying sound-based macro about his buff ending and needing despell soon.

Also, if it's purely the healer's fault I died AND they have an insulting raise macro (about how the dead player is lazy and such a fail for dying) I might not get up at all.

But yeah, in general, macros are great to let your group know you are doing something that affects them (raising people, pulling the boss, sleeping certain adds, explaining the strategy, etc.) just don't overdo it.
For skills, usually macros make you a worse player except for very few exceptions the posters before me already pointed out :)
No idea about crafting, but if they say it's great I guess it is :D

Necessary? No. Helpful? Yes, depending on the situation.

What I suggest is looking up some macros for your job, trying them out, and seeing if they work for you or make a positive difference for you. We can all share our opinions on it, but in the end, if it helps you do better, then it's worth it.

Macros are actually inefficient and it's better to not use them in every aspect of the game. Really just a tool for you to be lazy, but they cause lag and make things take longer, and if you use them on battle jobs they will cause you to miss several GCDs in the long run. You can get away with it on crafting jobs if you're geared enough, but it's always more efficient to do it by hand.

So no, not necessary, and actually better if you don't use them at all.

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Originally Posted by Atoli

Text macros tend to make me do the exact opposite of what the macro says.
I'll go out of my way to not despell any WAR who spams the chat and my ears with his annoying sound-based macro about his buff ending and needing despell soon.

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I 100% agree with this. I just take the macro as the WAR reminding themselves of how long they have until they can sit on their thumbs for 5 seconds.

Text macros are just as bad as regular macros. Even if all you're doing is using a single oGCD ability, it still won't queue, it suffers from the possibility of being ignored due to lag.

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Originally Posted by BorisDaBlade

I 100% agree with this. I just take the macro as the WAR reminding themselves of how long they have until they can sit on their thumbs for 5 seconds.

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I don't understand this. First, let me say I'm not a warrior and it's the only job I haven't leveled. Only at 15 so I'm not defending anything, but how is that acceptable? If you are purposely going out of your way to not do your job, that makes you the worst type of player because you're being bad by choice. It's a game and ppl have different play styles. You don't have to like them all. Some tanks mark mobs, and some don't. Well I don't need marks as a dps because I know which target the tank is attacking, so I guess its ok to then just purposely attack the mob marked 3 instead of 1 just because he annoyed annoyed me because I don't like to be told which mob to attack. That's just plain ignorant.

A basic macro that you may want to consider is a simple one for placing any ground AoE's - assuming that your class has any. Instead of having to aim their positioning manually each time, you can set it to drop directly beneath your current target.

Honestly, the animation locks tend to make macros less useful than they could otherwise be. I have Bloodbath and Fight or Flight on the same button, but I need to either spam it in between GCD actions or watch for the animation. Those two are always used together, and it bothers me tremendously whenever the second action fails to fire (which is just enough to annoy me).

They'd also be handier if you could use items in macros, reference other macros, halt execution on error, and/or use conditional logic, but I digress.

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Originally Posted by Garotte14

If you are purposely going out of your way to not do your job, that makes you the worst type of player because you're being bad by choice.

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90% of the time, I have better things to do than despell the 1 1/2 seconds debuff he has left.
The remaining 10%, I totally do it for tanks who are not being annoying about it. The problem is that many macros are ALSO actively bad by choice.
So you have newbies in the moogle fight and mark the moogles in the first phase in order for the newbies to know what to attack. Oh hey, second phase begins and the tank spams his stupid pull macro that displays all the numbers as a countdown on him, actively destroying any markings we set before ;)
Oh, you are trying to explain something essential in chat or even just have a nice conversation with someone? Here, have my 15 lines macro about my debuff ending, complete with any sound effect the game has offered me to use so any immersion the BGM might have built up is gone! ;)

If people actively destroy my enjoyment of the game, I don't feel to bad about annoying them back, as childish as that might sound.

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Originally Posted by FoxyAreku

Macros are actually inefficient and it's better to not use them in every aspect of the game. Really just a tool for you to be lazy, but they cause lag and make things take longer, and if you use them on battle jobs they will cause you to miss several GCDs in the long run. You can get away with it on crafting jobs if you're geared enough, but it's always more efficient to do it by hand.

So no, not necessary, and actually better if you don't use them at all.

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I think you're underestimating macros. Not saying they're essential or anything but there are a ton of useful macros you can create. Text macros to announce mechanics without voice chat, macros to disable b4b or regen, hunt macros, gearset/sorting macros, the list goes on and on.

To the OP, macros are not essential to enjoying the game but you should experiment with them to see if anything you can do would be enriched with them.

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Originally Posted by FoxyAreku

Macros are actually inefficient and it's better to not use them in every aspect of the game. Really just a tool for you to be lazy, but they cause lag and make things take longer, and if you use them on battle jobs they will cause you to miss several GCDs in the long run. You can get away with it on crafting jobs if you're geared enough, but it's always more efficient to do it by hand.

So no, not necessary, and actually better if you don't use them at all.

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Good luck HQ-ing 8000 materials (at minimal) in one shot without going crazy.

Jab aside.

I use macros while I craft so I can multitask.
Set up a multi-part craft macro, add some sound effect to alert me when each part is done, so that I can multitask, like browsing the internet or watching videos or doing my work at the office while pressing the button to HQ certain common materials, and basically most of the food items.
Basically I just go:-
Press Part 1 Button > wait for sound, or just wait until I'm free again > Press Part 2 button > wait for sound > etc > rinse and repeat, while at the same time multitasking with other stuff.


Obviously, for serious hi-quali crafts, better do it manually.


Point Being: Macros can be very useful depending on situation, just probably a lot less for combat classes.

I have never used macros ingame and so far I am doing Oke, but I did hear from my friends that macros are very handy when crafting.

Personally I like when a war gives me 5 and 1 second notice for berserk. It helps me time fey caress.

Macros can be wonderful if you use them right.
Repeating lines help a macro queue, since every .05-.1ish seconds, it will try to activate it on each line.
I personally love what I call gateway or proxy macros.
As an SCH I juggle 4 main hotbars and a back hotbar. A healing hotbar and a dps one for each fairy.

When I am on my healing hotbar and I hit Cleric Stance, it moves me to the fairy appropriate dps hotbar. It does not actually activate cleric stance, but the catch is, cleric stance is in the same slot, so pressing the button twice, as normal players often will, I have changed to my dps hotbar and I queued cleric stance. The same is healing. My dps hotbar has adlo, physick and lustrate setup to attempt to use the skill in the macro, but also to change to the fairy appropriate healing hotbar. To some this looks like horrendous madness, but to me it's a beautiful machine that keeps me pressing the core buttons.

Made this and thought I'd share here too:

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Originally Posted by Rawrz

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Originally Posted by JackFross

There actually IS a way to macro this. It's /additionalaction or something along those lines. Look it up in text commands when making a Macro. You can remove one skill and add another. I have that set for my DRG when I swap between PvP and PvE - I keep Mantra on for PvE, and I use Foresight instead in PvP. I can get you the actual macro lines I use for it tomorrow! C:

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I made one myself actually! Thanks again so much xD.

I chose the lightbulb for my macroicon but none really matters.

/Macrolock
/echo You are switching your cross class skills. The following skill will be disabled:
/recast "Stoneskin"
/recast "Blizzard II"
/aaction "Blizzard II"
/aaction "Stoneskin"
/aaction "Blizzard II" on
/chotbar action "Stoneskin" 8 13
/chotbar action "Blizzard II" 8 13
/echo Your current Crossclass has been changed to the following:
/recast "Stoneskin"
/recast "Blizzard II"


xD Its Macrolocked, because its kind of slow and I wouldn't want it to mess up. The game just cant do this action as quickly as hotbar/text commands. Bar 8, slot 13 is just where mine is on my cross hotbar (ps4) and youll have to enter your own if anyone wants to use this. If on PC, use /hotbar instead of /chotbar command.

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For the person who said they go out of their way to do the opposite of what an annoying macro might call for, sure, no one likes dealing with those. But I'm pretty sure no one likes uncooperative party members either.

Yes, Berserk macros with sounds and countdowns can be annoying. And snarky, sarcasm filled Raise macros or overdone pull macros can be irritating at times, but it's no excuse to completely do the opposite. In a case like that, who's really the bad guy?

Asking if they're necessary is missing the point. There should be 2 categories for people to think about here, macros that are useful and those that aren't.

For battle, most macros are actually counterproductive. The best macros for battle are the new ones for ground target aoes, other beneficial ones like embrace spamming, and /statusoff "Blood for Blood" for times you need it to be gone before a big hit. Anything related to anything on gcd other than those situations will slow you down.

Outside of battle classes go for it, though lag can mess em up.

One useful macro that is widely used is the deliverance macro that changes the skills on your hotbar from inner beast to fell cleave and steel cyclone to decimate.

I also have a macro for every single one of my DPS skills on my healers, which means that if the target is invalid, it will cast it on the targets target (so I can stay on the Mt and DPS), as a healer I'm not really worrying about optimal DPS so having these as macros seemed ok to me, though if that's wrong I'd love to know.

If I have to hear a Warrior macro his fellcleave to a sound effect so we notice it or their pacification macro again...I will be mildly disgruntled for a few seconds
I don't mind provoke and raise macro's though as long as its not a wall of text trying to be funny, not that I care, too busy concentrating on the battle.

Personally, I only use macros for provoke, Raise, Eye for am Eye, Virus, and Collective Unconscious. Plez don't cleanse my pacification! My arms are tired after triple fell cleaving, I need a quick breather to relax.

Definitely helpful, like having one for provoke and reviving to better communicate what you're doing to your co healer /tank.
But my favorite has to be the one where you can make a ground targeted AOE can't directly on your target.
I also haven for my bard that lets me hear a sound effect when its time to reapply my DOTS.

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Originally Posted by Garotte14

I don't understand this. First, let me say I'm not a warrior and it's the only job I haven't leveled. Only at 15 so I'm not defending anything, but how is that acceptable? If you are purposely going out of your way to not do your job, that makes you the worst type of player because you're being bad by choice. It's a game and ppl have different play styles. You don't have to like them all. Some tanks mark mobs, and some don't. Well I don't need marks as a dps because I know which target the tank is attacking, so I guess its ok to then just purposely attack the mob marked 3 instead of 1 just because he annoyed annoyed me because I don't like to be told which mob to attack. That's just plain ignorant.

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This.

Please use more berserk macros, warriors. That's the only kind I would really like to see more of, hopefully with a sound effect. My bard loves having a reason to use Wanderer's Paean.

As a bard, I like certain Berserk macros...the simple ones letting me know you've used it.

That's all I need.

I do not need fifty countdowns. You don't need to time it. The Warden's Paean buff lasts for 45 seconds and Berserk is active for like...what...20? I sing that shit as soon as Berserk is up. No need for a countdown for when it disappears; it's too late then, I won't care.

For tanks and DPS, they're hardly ever worth the effort. Healers should have macros for focus target and mouseover healing.

Outside of skill based macros, macros that have chat alerts built into them are very useful; such as a WAR with a macro on berserk to let the WHM know they'll need an esuna soon.

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Originally Posted by BorisDaBlade

I 100% agree with this. I just take the macro as the WAR reminding themselves of how long they have until they can sit on their thumbs for 5 seconds.

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This is horrendous. Literally one of worst things I've ever read on this forum.

When I heal, I expect WARs to have a macro for Berserk that gives me a heads up for the esuna. My favorite Berserk macro I've seen is one with a 19s delay, and it's simple the word "esuna" with a sound effect in chat. I hear the noise, and I cast esuna; now the WAR doesn't have to sit with pacify for any amount of time.

Furthermore, when I tank as WAR, I don't expect every call for a pacify cleanse to be answered. I understand that there might very well be something more important than casting esuna on my healer's to do list. I put it out there anyway, because if they have the time to cleanse, they should want to cleanse it.

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Originally Posted by Destous

Furthermore, when I tank as WAR, I don't expect every call for a pacify cleanse to be answered. I understand that there might very well be something more important than casting esuna on my healer's to do list. I put it out there anyway, because if they have the time to cleanse, they should want to cleanse it.

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This has been a touchy subject for such a long time. When I play WAR, I want my Pacification to get cleansed as much as anyone, but I feel a little obnoxious if I use a macro directly asking for it with a sound effect. On the other hand, when I play SCH (which I do quite a bit), I always look for Pacification and remove it as soon as possible.

More on topic regarding the necessity of macros - no, I don't think they're required as such, not for any job. But they certainly make my life a lot easier. As SCH, I have macros that summons Eos/Selene, sets the relevant fairy's skills to my crossbar (so I need three less slots) and sets the fairy to Obey. As WAR, I have stance macros that activate Defiance/Deliverence and swap out the relevant skills on my crossbar (again, to reduce button bloat).

I also use callout macros a fair bit for trials and raids, like Bismarck's dragonkillers and debuff color change, or to balance DPS on T11's cube/orb adds, etc.

Not necessary, but certainly helps a lot.

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Originally Posted by seekified

This has been a touchy subject for such a long time.

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I don't see why anyone would be touchy about it. How narcissistic would a WHM have to be to take offense at a sound alert macro that gives them a heads up on berserk pacify? WARs getting butthurt over not getting a cleanse is a different story, but a simple alert macro is helpful.

I use a couple of macros as a bard
They are life! :O

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Originally Posted by Destous

I don't see why anyone would be touchy about it. How narcissistic would a WHM have to be to take offense at a sound alert macro that gives them a heads up on berserk pacify? WARs getting butthurt over not getting a cleanse is a different story, but a simple alert macro is helpful.

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You shouldn't be stopping what you're doing to esuna a pacification. That's the main reason.

Certain abilities I have as mouse over macros, Apocatastasis, Aetherial Manipulation, Goad and Warden's Peaean are a few examples where I prefer to just use macros rather than have to manually select the targets to use them on.

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Originally Posted by Alistaire

You shouldn't be stopping what you're doing to esuna a pacification. That's the main reason.

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Destous didn't ask for that, they are saying that the berserk macro is communication, it's as simple as that. Berserk is the only skill in the game that gives a debuff, which means that it is the only debuff in the game that can be controlled.

As a healer, that is valuable information, and knowing exactly when a debuff goes up is valuable for both healers and bards, meaning that they can plan ahead, and prepare for the debuff, and heal the party optimally. Also, you should be stopping what you are doing to cleanse a pacifism if it is currently the highest priority action of the time, and knowing when it is coming in advance helps in making sure that the higher priority tasks are dealt with before it goes off.

Similar macros I have seen to the berserk macro: provoke, hallowed ground, virus, eye for an eye, living dead. All of these skills having shout outs makes others very aware of what actions you have taken, and allows them to be worked around

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Originally Posted by Lambdafish

As a healer, that is valuable information, and knowing exactly when a debuff goes up is valuable for both healers and bards, meaning that they can plan ahead, and prepare for the debuff, and heal the party optimally. Also, you should be stopping what you are doing to cleanse a pacifism if it is currently the highest priority action of the time, and knowing when it is coming in advance helps in making sure that the higher priority tasks are dealt with before it goes off.

Similar macros I have seen to the berserk macro: provoke, hallowed ground, virus, eye for an eye, living dead....

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That's the thing though, it's not valuable information. If you react to that you're being a bad healer, both for your sake and the warrior's. That whole topic has been beaten to death. You're either a healer sitting there doing nothing (bad), or you stop dps'ing to cleanse it (bad), or you stop healing to cleanse it (also bad).

Virus and eye for an eye as macros have their place because you don't want 2 people overlapping it. Same goes for a raise macro. Provoke is iffy, I find it's something used infrequently enough to not be a bother but when it comes down to it, a macro for that is unnecessary and nobody's going to change what they were doing because of it. Same for tank's ultimate defense moves. As a healer I'm going to see when a tank uses those.

I will say though, that I considered going that route on WAR and went through the abilities it'd be "useful for others to know to work around." But then it turned out the list included convalescence, vengeance, inner beast, provoke, holmgang, berserk, and it's just too much spam, combined with the fact that the people who would react to those have full capability to see when you've used them without the spam.

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Originally Posted by Alkimi

Certain abilities I have as mouse over macros, Apocatastasis, Aetherial Manipulation, Goad and Warden's Peaean are a few examples where I prefer to just use macros rather than have to manually select the targets to use them on.

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That's fine for anything off gcd really. Also ground target actions. Though when you start adding /p lines to those it can be annoying, and is almost never needed.

Some can be incredibly useful. Not really necessary though.

For example my ninja has a macro
/ac shade walker <2> which will always put it on the tank so they get the enmity boost.

Bard you can macro flaming arrow to <t> so it will always centre it around your current target. Without having to manually place it.

My scholar has summon macros that swap pet commands. So when I summon eos L2 square is whispering dawn. When I summon serene l2 square is changed to fey wind for example.

Then simple macros like /target <f> or <attack1> can be really helpful.

Or can't remember who told me this. But macroing /levelsync on to your mount. Is really nice for fates.

Yeah, it's the /party line announcing you're doing these things that isn't so useful. Ground targets are great, it actually made freeze useful in big pulls that you wouldn't want to get in range to bliz 2, as well as faster casting of all the others.

And yeah for controller some are necessary for the limited space issues. That's more of a sign of how bad controllers are for this game rather than macros being good though.