Button Bloat But Nah?

[RitsukoSonoda]

I have 3 hotbars set for job specific layouts on each job then a 4th bar I set as a vertical bar on the right edge of the screen that is used for common commands like teleport, return, sprint, item usage etc.

For jobs bar 1 and 2 will have active skills/spells on them that go with rotations. Bar 3 is where I place CD skills.

[Nethereal]

Can you post a pic of these 3 hotbars please?

WHM


SCH


AST

[ItMe]

WHM


SCH


AST

Thank you. I appreciate the context.
Also, dang, those are some nice looking hotbars~

[Alestorm]

I'm fine with many keybinds, I've been using an mmo mouse since forever, that solves everything for me. I highly recommend those to everyone playing FFXIV on the PC.
Currently I use the Corsair Scimitar Elite RGB, 12 buttons right under your thumb, works like a charm.

^ this mouse right here! I use it and it's been the best money I've spent on a mouse. I also use Shift and Control modifiers and Q, E and R and never run out of buttons for skills. Only downside is sometimes my left pinkie finger gets a bit sore.

[MilkieTea]

^ this mouse right here! I use it and it's been the best money I've spent on a mouse. I also use Shift and Control modifiers and Q, E and R and never run out of buttons for skills. Only downside is sometimes my left pinkie finger gets a bit sore.

i just use 1-= keybinds, ctrl, and shift. if i really needed another modifier i'd use alt.

[RitsukoSonoda]

^ this mouse right here! I use it and it's been the best money I've spent on a mouse. I also use Shift and Control modifiers and Q, E and R and never run out of buttons for skills. Only downside is sometimes my left pinkie finger gets a bit sore.

I use the Logitech MMO mouse. Has the same number of thumb buttons. However I paired it with a Logitech gaming pad for my left hand that later was replaced by a Razer Orbweaver when the thumb stick broke from years of usage. I use the thumb stick to move my character and the keys on the pad for hotbar 1 and hotbar 3. Bar 2 is mapped to the thumb buttons on my mouse.

[Rongway]

All my jobs fit on this with at least eight slots open. That is to say, any job should be able to fit on three hotbars.

Most actions are on 1-6 with four possible modifiers. I avoid binding anything to Sh+6 or ASh+6 because they're just too easy to get wrong when everything is happening quickly.

On healers I don't use the the top Sh1-Sh6 and ASh1-Ash6 rows (UI Hotbar 2) except to show cooldowns. Most heals are bound to the mouse cluster (UI Hotbar 3), which uses middle click, navForward, and navBack.

The navigation cluster (UI Hotbar 4) has Sprint on Del and knockback blocker on End for all jobs. Jobs that have gap closers use Ins and jobs with backsteps use Home. Sprint and knockback blocker are also bound to thumb buttons on mouse in case I'm healing.

I don't play with a mouse unless I'm healing. My resting hand position is left hand thumb on alt, ring finger on 1/A, index on 3/D. Right hand thumb on ctrl, fingers on arrows/nav. Target Nearest Enemy is G/backslash and duty action is X/rightbracket so either hand can press either button quickly. I access the ASh row with left thumb alt and right index shift, except when healing since I mouseover heal; in that case I access my ASh heals with left thumb alt, left pinky shift.

Not pictured are the limit break button, which is bound to CASh+L so if I press it it's very deliberate. Also not pictured is a hotbar to the left of the party list with buttons lined up with party slots for direct macroed things like Aetherial Manipulation or Rescue on each party member; these of course are not a contributor to "button bloat" because the dedication of this hotbar to that purpose is of my own choice.






In the specific case of AST, I have all my card-related actions on the ASh row so I can see their cooldowns but I don't press those buttons. The cards are all macroed to two buttons on the neutral row, but with the changes to Minor Arcana and Divination I'll be able to eliminate one of those macros unless Play Minor Arcana is going to be a button separate from Draw Minor Arcana; I haven't looked closely enough at AST footage and Action Helps yet because I plan to heal Sage first.



Also also not pictured is by the limit break button I have a macro bound to Backspace which can swap between two bar sets, with the intent that this be used to switch between AoE mode and single target mode. In practice I haven't been using this on jobs I actually play often, but with the changes coming in EW, some jobs will be even better suited to splitting AoE and ST bars, so I'll probably use this more in EW, further reducing the hotbar demands of those jobs. If I ever wanted to switch to keyboard-only healing, I could also use this to swap between offensive and defensive bars.

[Nethereal]

I plan to heal Sage first.

Eyyyyyy

Also also not pictured is by the limit break button I have a macro bound to Backspace which can swap between two bar sets, with the intent that this be used to switch between AoE mode and single target mode.
In practice I haven't been using this on jobs I actually play often, but with the changes coming in EW, some jobs will be even better suited to splitting AoE and ST bars, so I'll probably use this more in EW, further reducing the hotbar demands of those jobs. If I ever wanted to switch to keyboard-only healing, I could also use this to swap between offensive and defensive bars.

I actually briefly fiddled with the concept of having essentially 2 hotbars with the space of 1 by virtue of macro but never got comfortable using it nor did I try it out for long but it did work like a charm.
That's actually a fairly good idea to revisit because like someone else said I'm not running out of space per say but comfortable keybinds to put things on that require urgency.
Luckily I don't have to worry about that at all on sage but things to think about for AST and SCH.

[RobynDaBank]

Saved me a lot of sanity because the default cramped style all at the bottom annoyed my vision when I began getting to 50+ levels. Misshapen Chair, a YouTuber, gave me this idea for a layout. It's made my field of vision greater and "trained" me to look someplace besides mid-bottom to my hotbars.

This is definitely going to take some adjustments with the new SCH ability - and for sure AST with its Minor Arcana split and Astrodyne. But we'll see when it happens.

[lisaa]

You just can't. People keep asking for more and more complexity. WHM can fit but already AST and SCH have too many so you just have to add them somewhere else on screen and click them and it will just get worse in EW.

I don't think having to buy an MMO mouse which is a lot of money is a reasonable expectation

We are at the limit of keyboard hotkeys