DPS class with the fewest buttons?

[Humorless]

Bard and Black Mage are the only candidates. Bard rotation is even easier than Black Mage.


Edit: as for the other classes:

SMN - brings pet skills with it and a bunch of odd oGCDs that come in "sets" (aetherflow consumers, pet buffs and general buffs)
MCH - my hotbars are all full and I have my turret placements on my mouse and AOEs on somewhere I need to click. By far the most ridiculous of all dps.
MNK/DRG - the rotations are simple enough but the need to move constantly narrows down what you have access to on keyboard
NIN - slightly easier than the other two melee but the mudras waste space on the hotbars


As for the geniuses saying MNK has no oGCDs:
IR, B4B, Invig, Mercy, Mantra, Shoulder Tackle, Elixer Field, Steel Peak, Howling Fist, Perfect Balance, Purification, Tornado Kick, Meditation/Forbidden Chakra (13)
DRG:
IR, B4B, Invig, Mercy, Mantra, Jump, Spineshatter, Dragonfire, PSurge, LSurge, Battle Litany, BotD, Leg Sweep, Elusive Jump (14)

They're pretty much the same. If you want to argue that Tornado Kick (for example) isn't used much we can do the same for Elusive Jump and DRG Mantra. Neither of them are easy on buttons considering you're still WASDing the hell out of your keyboard at the same time.

[SuzakuCMX]

Still easy mode just put up 3 dots then Aetherflow > Fester (Swiftcast - Shadowflare) > Fester again > Energy Drain

And then you get into Bahamut Trance, Summon switching and micromanaging your pet....

Also Fester has a cooldown so you can't Fester twice in a row.

[Drakeos]

Um you can ruin II until its up lol

[UBERHAXED]

Um you can ruin II until its up lol

Let's not suggest that people be bad players. That's like telling him to play bard and only use heavy shot.

[Allyrion]

NIN - slightly easier than the other two melee but the mudras waste save space on the hotbars

Fixed that for you.
Mudras are an anti-button bloat mechanic (it's flaws are with lag not bloat).
Imagine if the ninjutsu skills were each given individually. That would waste space.

As for the geniuses saying MNK has no oGCDs:
IR, B4B, Invig, Mercy, Mantra, Shoulder Tackle, Elixer Field, Steel Peak, Howling Fist, Perfect Balance, Purification, Tornado Kick, Meditation/Forbidden Chakra (13)
DRG:
IR, B4B, Invig, Mercy, Mantra, Jump, Spineshatter, Dragonfire, PSurge, LSurge, Battle Litany, BotD, Leg Sweep, Elusive Jump (14)

They're pretty much the same. If you want to argue that Tornado Kick (for example) isn't used much we can do the same for Elusive Jump and DRG Mantra. Neither of them are easy on buttons considering you're still WASDing the hell out of your keyboard at the same time.

Not just Tornado Kick, but Purification and Forbidden Chakra too.
They're not guaranteed oGCD skills except for the first Forbidden Chakra.

You might as well not separate Purification and Forbidden Chakra separately because Meditation stacking is the main lock.
It's disingenuous to separate them. If you used a Purification then you didn't use a Forbidden Chakra.

Perfect Balance is also not exactly like the rotational buffs either.
You usually use it to get back GL3.
Doesn't really matter if it's on or off the GCD at that point (except for timing), because you don't weave it between your regular GCD rotation.

MNK uses Shoulder Tackle, Elixer Field, Steel Peak and Howling Fist (4) regularly.
DRG uses Jump, Spineshatter, Dragonfire, PSurge, LSurge, Leg Sweep and BOTD (7) regularly.
Not even counting Battle Litany.

NIN uses Jugulate, Mug, Ninjutsu (shared cd so I'll count as one), Dream within a Dream, Kassatsu, Duality and Trick Attack (7).
That's not even counting Goad or Assassinate (since they're niche).

I'm obviously leaving out the shared damage cooldowns that are equal anyway.

But just counting abilities is a flawed comparison.
NIN is obviously the most oGCD active because of ninjutsu every 20s in addition to the rest.
A proper comparison would require you to take all the recasts into account.

DRG is the second most oGCD active.

While MNK has less to deal with, it's still a lot more now that Shoulder Tack doesn't have a ranged req and Elixir Drive is only 30s recast.
But Forbidden Chakra (and Purification) and Tornado Kick are really fight dependent.
I like how MNK plays, but those skills just don't fit with the regular oGCD wielding of the other melee.

Which is fine, because MNK isn't designed around oGCDs as much as the other classes are.
It's designed around GL stacks, positionals and (now) filling downtime with meditation.

[Humorless]

Fixed that for you.
Mudras are an anti-button bloat mechanic (it's flaws are with lag not bloat).
Imagine if the ninjutsu skills were each given individually. That would waste space.

You mean Ninjutsu? Mudras are a waste of space because it's 3 buttons you need to press regularly for mostly the same 2 skills.


And I listed the different buttons that you're going to need. You claim Dragonfire is regular... when it's used as frequent as Tornado Kick and Mantra in A1S while Meditation/Purification are spammed in A2S. BLitany equals PB pretty much.


NIN is always going to be easier because you don't have to move much unlike the other two.

[Allyrion]

You mean Ninjutsu? Mudras are a waste of space because it's 3 buttons you need to press regularly for mostly the same 2 skills.

The 3 mudra give you access to 7 abilities.
It's button efficient, no matter how you spin it.

If you didn't have Mudra, you'd to have at least 6 key binds for the ninjutsu instead of 4 (counting the activation skill).

And I listed the different buttons that you're going to need. You claim Dragonfire is regular... when it's used as frequent as Tornado Kick and Mantra in A1S while Meditation/Purification are spammed in A2S. BLitany equals PB pretty much.

That's why I said fight dependent.
So in X fight, you might use Tornado Kick as much as Dragonfire Dive, but it doesn't apply universally.
You might use it more or once for the whole fight.
There's no fight where spam is really the right word for Forbidden Chakra/Purification. You spam Meditation is which is on the GCD.

Mantra, BLitany and even PB, I didn't include at all because the former are raid CDs and the latter has nothing to do with oGCD weaving anyway.

NIN is always going to be easier because you don't have to move much unlike the other two.

What does difficulty have to do with this?
It's not like the amount of oGCD weaving in isolation is any really difficulty measure.

NIN has the most oGCD activity by far but it's also the most forgiving melee mechanically.
You don't have to get defensive admitting that MNK isn't very oGCD active.

It just isn't. It's main kit mechanics are on the GCD.
DRG's and NIN's kits place a lot more importance on skills between the GCDS.
That's just difference in design.

[broren]

had you asked before heavensward, i would've recommended dragoon. but blood of the dragon added more bloat. :/ but even before and in heavensward, black mage has the fewest buttons to push to work well.

[Kabooa]

I want to see those MMOs that didn't have button bloat.

Guild Wars? You're limited to 8 (I think 10 in GW2) so that'd be one.

Aion, Warhammer, WoW, FF14, just about every MMO I've ever played ran into the "too many buttons" trap.

[Nadirah]

Instead of gimping yourself by not having all of your abilitys available, why not learn to use modifiers/F keys etc. Practice makes perfect.

Because I shouldn't have to have that many abilities in the first place? I mean, it couldn't be that hard to code the DRG proc to use one ability, but the thing only works if you use it on the correct position instead of it having two separate abilities clogging the bars.

Having abilities just for the sake of having them is bad design. I only have so many fingers.