Expansion has been fun until ability overload has made me lose almost all interest

[Geryth]

I dinged 56 and realized I forgot about the class quests and new abilities. As a dragoon I run down to Central Coerthas and grab the quests from Alberic and run through them until I picked up my 3 new abilities.

I get Battle Litany, Blood of the Dragon, and Fang and Claw.

It doesn't take me long to figure out the Blood of the Dragon and Fang and Claw are going to be heavy additions to my rotation. My keybinds were already full, but I had to add these new abilities to somewhere easily accessible. I go to the DPS forums to see what my other new abilities are going to be and see where they are going to fit as well since I have to rehaul everything. Even without all the rest of my abilities (and I still have more cross class buffs to get from pugilist that I've been too lazy to level) I'm completely overwhelmed by the sheer amount of crap there is manage. If I'm starting a boss fight and I want to use my wombo combo for maximum DPS, here is what I lay down in keybinds (shift + key is (S:<Letter>) and control + key is (C:<Letter>))


(this is just for level 56 without my 58 or 60 moves and is missing internal release from pugilist!)
R-(S:4)-E-(C:G)-(S:E)-3-(S:Q)-(C:E)-C-(S:G)-(C:R)-2-F-(S:2)-(S:F)-G-(C:F)-(C:2)-C

Add in positionals and encounter mechanics to that complexity. For any interested, that's:

Heavy thrust, battle litany, impulse drive, blood for blood, disembowl, blood of the dragon, leg sweep, chaos thrust, fang and claw, power surge, phlebotomize, Jump, True Thrust, Spineshatter dive, Vorpal Thrust, Life Surge, Full Thrust, Dragonfire Dive, Fang and Claw

From there I restart with Heavy Thrust and probably either back in the full thrust combo or reset my DoTs with a chaos thrust combo, and then it's just watching my buffs to use whenever they come off cooldown and using more of a priority system than a rotation.

And that's just a single wombo combo I would use for something like at the start of a boss fight. That doesn't take into account: When I need to lose enmity or position with Elusive Jump, use a limit break, still clicking on invigorate/blood bath, slowing mobs with feint etc. etc.

Oh, and on top of that for trash pulls you fit in AoE's into that equation.

Oh, and don't forget that when things calm down and I can hit some PvP again I have to fit in a slew of PvP abilities...

What. A terrible. Mess. That's way too much to keep track of. I truly felt like at 50 that my rotations and complexity were maxed, and I was absolutely right. Add in a couple of abilities and it just feels downright overwhelming. I don't even have all the abilities I need to use yet and I have 28 key binds and 4 moves to click on.

I've been sitting at a target dummy for the last 2 hours of game time practicing my new rotations and getting used to my new keybinds and it's enough to make me log off and play other games with how many sheer abilities I have to use. And I still have wheeling thrust (which, from reading, is going to be a 50% chance to proc to be used instead of Fang and Claw I think?) and a new off GCD ability to fit in when I eventually hit 60.

Square...I can't even...can you tone this down please?

[Gilthas]

This just proves that you can't make everyone happy.

Does anyone still remember people complaining about how FFXI was better because its spell list was a lot larger?

[Mhikail]

I don't even pay attention at all to trash and do whatever.
I use positional's on bosses.

That said, don't ever play MNK LOL.

[Shadow_Sama]

gotta git gud m8

[Rjain]

Are you complaining that SE gave your job more things to do to keep things fresh? Yes some things will be an overhaul and there's a lot more to learn but it takes practice like anything else.

Also I'm sure many keyboard enthusiasts will want to maim me but from the beginning of this game I've been going on about how much more superior controller play feels. Although it takes practice and may take a few weeks to get used to, if you pick up a gamepad and learn it you will never have a problem with hotkey space again. With a gamepad it feels like you have much more control over movement/camera than kb/mouse on top of the fact that you have access to more than enough room for all of your abilities, PVP ability sets, items, pet stuff, chocobo stuff, macros, emotes, whatever and you hardly even need to move your fingers. You won't ever run out of room with a gamepad and it just makes combos even more fun to execute with how smooth the crossbar system works (once you get used to it).

[Monty]

They added a skill to MNK that you perform while doing nothing for god sakes. We all wanted something to help keep GL up during battles, which they kind of fixed. Then they go ahead and add another ability you have to spam...5 times...in between mobs OR while doing nothing (which will most likely be advance your form).

[Catwho]

I'm a keyboard user and I got around this issue by adding a Hotbar 3 as Alt key binds. I'm on bard. I stuck all my chocobo commands and all my party buff songs up there, freeing Hotbar 2 up for my new abilities. As it is, I've got my personal buffs stacked 2 at a time in macros.

I use the FFXI keyboard layout and never touch the mouse except for out of menu battles and ground targeting. Move WASD over to the NUMPAD 2 4 8 6, which frees the left hand entirely for battle controls and macros (like in FFXI.) 10 years of muscle memory was hard to erase, and I can do 90% of my battle movements without even looking at the keyboard this way.

[Felis]

snip

We need a "Controller players master race" picture ^^

[Monty]

Controller's are really not bad (at least on PC). I have all my abilities laid out across 2 hotbars, some buffs macroed and the rest of the stuff (like mounts, etc) on a keyboard hotbar below and just click with my mouse. You could go to 3 hotbars I suppose, but that would start getting complicated in battles. Now, if we get another level cap increase with new abilities, then we're done...

[Callinon]

@OP: I recommend for the future that you don't forget about your class quests. If you'd been able to fold those abilities in to your existing rotation as you got them instead of all at once, it probably wouldn't have seemed so overwhelming.

For reference, using your notation, my opening as a NIN is:

pre-pull (A:6)-(A:5)-(A:4)-(A-=), 1-(S:9)-2-(S:0)-(S:3)-(A:4)-(A:5)-(A:6)-(A:=)-1-(S:5)-(S:2)-7-(S:1)-0-1-(A:4)-(A:5)-(A:=)-2-9-4-(C:-)

That's a pre-pull Huton, Spinning Slash, Internal Release, Gust Slash, Blood for Blood, Dancing Edge, Suiton, Spinning Slash, Trick Attack, Shadow Fang, Jugulate, Mutilate, Kassatsu, Spinning Slash, Raiton, Gust Slash, Dream within a Dream, Armor Crush, Mug.

After that I go into maintenance mode keeping up my dots and debuff and juggling my huton timer so it doesn't fall off, weaving in ninjutsu and trying to look 10-20 seconds ahead to feel out whether or not I'm going to need an Armor Crush next combo or if I'm going to fall into boss downtime and have to recast huton. At the same time I'm watching my party members for people who need Goad or Smoke Screen. I Shadewalker on adds to help the tank pick them up and weave Duality in between Internal Release and Blood for Blood timers on Aeolian Edge combos.

And I can do all of that because I picked up my class abilities one by one and had time to figure out what they did and where they fit.