How are you keyboard key binds laid out?

[Yhoiryo]

I'm curious as a long time controller player even though I'm on PC I switch between my controller and mouse at times though rarely, but as of late I've considered switching it up to keyboard and mouse. I've already got a nice gaming keyboard but I feel like it's been ages since I've ever used a mouse and keyboard for an mmo, mostly used to fps games.

I've fiddled around on test dummies with keyboard and mouse but it's far from the real thing, I guess I'm just more so wondering what people do to make playing with a keyboard easier. Sadly I can't use macro's like I did way back in FFXI for everything.

[Kalsam]

It honestly is a personal preference for each person. I began playing MMO's with K&M, so I got used to various combinations a long time ago. =\
But, to answer your question...

I have 1 through 6 for my main rotational buttons.
Ctrl + 1-4 for AoEs, Shift + 1-4 for any Long CD dps skills (ie; Guass Shot on MCH)

I also make use of Tilde (the ~ key next to 1 on most keyboards) for 'snap reaction' spells (Lustrate, Provoke, Benediction, etc...) using it in combination with Ctrl or Shift based on the importance.
My number pad is all my defensive/offensive CD's or Pet Skills... which is probably the one thing many people find odd. :P

Q and A are both Strafe Left, as various MMO's keep switching it up on me, some of which don't allow one to change the hotkeys. And I hate having 'turn' on my keyboard... I'll turn with the mouse and that's it.
E and D are both Strafe Right. W is forward, S is back. F is my run/walk toggle. Most other keybinds were left alone.

I'm a bit odd for mine, but as I mentioned... it's what I started with, and just continued on like that. lol

I'd suggest just trying out various combinations using 1-# that you can reach comfortably while your pinky rests on the side of tilde or the keyboard itself. (This gives you the flex room for Ctrl, Alt and Shift combos)

[xXRaineXx]

I do a lot of experimenting with my keybinds for every game I play. Usually doing something very unusual and different stuff from what regular people.

This setup sort of comes from my days playing LoL. I had a lot of trouble trying to play the game whilst having to try move the camera with the mouse and manage playing at the same time, so I setup the camera to WASD and changed my skill order to QERF. My point of this setup is to consider what skills you use the most and keep them closest in your reach, skills which aren't used often can be assigned a irregular key.
Though there is a downside to this, a lot of other shortcuts are overwritten. What I do is, assign a side for combat and a side for non-combat. For example, the left side of the keyboard is for combat, I remove all keybinds that opens windows (in the case I get sticky fingers and open up my character window during a raid...). Then assign the rest back to the right side.

[CGMidlander]

(M5 and M4 are my mouse's forward/backward side buttons)

[Reinha]

I have a gaming mouse with 12 buttons on the side, so I'm using 3 action bars with all the number keys above letters bound to them. The second bar has Shift bound to everything and the third bar has Control. (Alt is for pet skills.) My skills are set up almost the same way on all jobs:

123 - dots, debuffs
456 - basic skills like Ruins, Cures and 123-combos
789 - dispell, taunt, aoe
0+´ - utility like Stoneskin, E4E, stun and silence

second bar - damage, healing and mitigation buffs depending on the job, more utility, some off-GCD skills and pet buffs

third bar - situational or out-of-combat things like healer dps, bard songs and monk/ninja stances

On top of the main action bars I have a couple on the side with E and Q bound with and without modifiers. I would have room on the other bars but I got used to these keys when I was a clicker. E has defensive skills on the jobs that have them. Q has swiftcast+resurrection and depending on the job also movement skills like sprint, repelling shot and swiftsong.

[lordstarfox]

1-7, mostly basic rotation
shift + 1-7,mixed,mostly enmity skills
ctrl + 1-7,mixed,mostly buffs and CD's
ctrl + shift + 1-7,alternative rotation(s) and skills
and then i have one of my extra mouse buttons bound to ctrl, another one to shift and third one to ctrl+shift.
Gives me pretty decent amount of hotkeys without having to move my fingers around too much.

[SockPoo]

I've binded ctrl and shift to my mouse so I don't have to reach with my pinkie. I also go with the philosophy that you're more likely to hit a wrong hotkey the farther away it is so I rebind most of my hotkeys to stay on the left side; trying not to go past 5. If you looked at something like the razer orbweaver then that's kind of what I'm going for, except in the orbweaver you can move and push hotkeys at the same time.

[dejavutwo]

The main point of my setup was to make it so that I wouldn't have to go higher than 4 in my main rotation, and to keep simmilar skills clustered together. Overall, I find the flow for my abilities is quite easy, with the exception of the Off-GCD aoe abilities where I have to reach quite far between GCDs.

you may notice I only have Fists of Wind on my hotbar. I have Fists of Fire and Fists of Earth bound to my mouse through a 4th hidden actionbar to free up space.

1-3, Shift+1-4 are my main rotation abilities
F3 for Chakra Spamming
5+, Shift 5+ are all my cooldowns
F1-F4 for commonly used abilities
F5-F8 AoE Abilities
F9 is for potions
F10+ general purpose

[Yhoiryo]

Looks like I have a lot of fiddling around to do, I might roll an alt and just play keyboard and mouse with them to see if I can get the hang of it, I was hoping it would be somewhat simple, maybe I'm just over thinking but sometimes I wonder how anyone plays with keyboards on here.

[RaspberryRipple]

None of these people are serious. Most keyboard and mouse players just click their skills. Maybe some use 1/2/3 (possibly 4/5 if you are pro), but then click all of the other skills. The combat is so slow you can eat a sandwich during GCDs.