Mouseover Macros

[Katlyna]

I've been using mouse over heal macros since release. But you have to be a bit careful with them. The core problem is NOT loosing your cursor to someone, or reactive healing. The problem is that macros are not operational switches on repetitive casts. And no ability queuing What this means is the following:

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If you have this macro (NOTE THIS I A BAD MACRO):

/macroicon "Cure III"
/macroerror off
/ac "Cure III" <mouse>
/ac "Cure III" <t>
/ac "Cure III" <tt>
/ac "Cure III" <me>

And you cast that macro repetitively healing say a tank. If you tap the macro each time while not casting it will validly run through the list and do the first available action. Which per the above design would be mouse over first, your target second, target of target (usually tank), and then you. Which is the fairly traditional WoW healer macro priority.

THE PROBLEM is if you cast this same macro while casting BEFORE the next ability queue something strange occurs. Specifically the macro keeps running (each line takes X amount of time to run). IF your ability queue activates while your macro is still running the line its at will attempt to execute (and then all lines below). This means that with a traditional long style mouse over heal macro, you run a notable chance of executing the macro incorrectly, and a heal going to the wrong person. I noticed this when I started raiding and had to debug what was going on.

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Consequently I changed to the following (NOTE THIS IS AN OK MACRO):
/macroicon "Cure III"
/macroerror off
/ac "Cure III" <mouse>
/ac "Cure III" <tt>

This adjustment limited my macro to two lines. It meant that if I'm moused over the tank (or have nothing targeted and am right clicking - which gives no mouse over targets) I will always heal the tank. No heals can get sucked up anywhere else due to SE strange design. Now while using this macro to heal prey... if heavily spammed there would still be a small chance for a heal to get sucked off to the tank (if I still have the boss targeted). But generally speaking I've found this completely ok for healing savage raid content. The number of heals sucked off to the tank while healing someone else is virtually non existent.

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The last part of the issue is the ability queuing not working. This part sucks flat out. It does result in some loss in healing or DPS with macros. I'm not aware of any work around here except spamming your heals near the GCD.

[Katlyna]

Note that the IDEAL mouse over macro is:

Consequently I changed to the following (NOTE THIS IS AN OK MACRO):
/macroicon "Cure III"
/macroerror off
/ac "Cure III" <mouse>

With ONLY one action. Making a zero chance of your heals wandering from spamming the ability too fast while waiting for your next GCD.

[Rongway]

(NOTE THIS IS AN OK MACRO)

Better is

/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/ac (Healing Spell) <mo>
/micon (Healing Spell)



This gives a pseudo-queueing window of 1/4 to 1/2 second, does not have to step over the /micon line on every run, and doesn't offer alternate targets.
Contextual targeting is great for buffs and binds/heavies, bad for heals.

[Katlyna]

This gives a pseudo-queueing window of 1/4 to 1/2 second, does not have to step over the /micon line on every run, and doesn't offer alternate targets.
Contextual targeting is great for buffs and binds/heavies, bad for heals.

Nice recommendation Rongway! I'll give this a try with my own spin. I hadn't considered stacking the /ac <mo> To increase the mouse over attempts. Very smart!

[Katlyna]

This gives a pseudo-queueing window of 1/4 to 1/2 second, does not have to step over the /micon line on every run, and doesn't offer alternate targets.
Contextual targeting is great for buffs and binds/heavies, bad for heals.

I tested your approach and like how I was able to adjust my healing macros with "light" context. I adjusted my macros as follows:

/mlock
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Benefic" <tt>
/echo Macro test 1
/macroicon "Benefic"

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This locks the macro till finished (which is much faster than anticipated, tested with an echo). The lock is required if you spam to allow the context clause at the end to be reached (if you spam hard). This makes it such that when you are not mousing over context clauses will be reached after a split second (testing indicates these take between 0.1 and 0.05 seconds to run)

You consequently can build something like this too which runs really well

/mlock
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <mouse>
/ac "Aspected Benefic" <tt>
/ac "Time Dilation" <mouse>
/ac "Time Dilation" <tt>
/macroicon "Aspected Benefic"

[Rongway]

You consequently can build something like this too which runs really well

The Time Dilation lines will run during a GCD, which means that after using this macro to cast Aspected Benefic once, you won't be able to spam it to regen/shield the next target, making it less useful. I'm also confused as to why you want to use both mo and tt on a heal. In what situation would you not use a mouseover when mouseover is an option? Out-of-party tanks in a FATE or alliance raid can be mousedover as the target of target pane, or one of the alliance panes.

Your macro, while certainly innovative, gives too much flexibility for a heal. Healing macros should be focused, to minimize the risk of unintended effects. I could definitely get behind a separate Time Dilation macro with mo-tt-t targeting, as I would with any target party member cooldown, but adding it to the end of any of the healing spells introduces the possibility that clicking to heal people doesn't actually heal them.

[Katlyna]

The Time Dilation lines will run during a GCD, which means that after using this macro to cast Aspected Benefic once, you won't be able to spam it to regen/shield the next target, making it less useful. I'm also confused as to why you want to use both mo and tt on a heal. In what situation would you not use a mouseover when mouseover is an option? Out-of-party tanks in a FATE or alliance raid can be mousedover as the target of target pane, or one of the alliance panes.

Your macro, while certainly innovative, gives too much flexibility for a heal. Healing macros should be focused, to minimize the risk of unintended effects. I could definitely get behind a separate Time Dilation macro with mo-tt-t targeting, as I would with any target party member cooldown, but adding it to the end of any of the healing spells introduces the possibility that clicking to heal people doesn't actually heal them.

Good questions and points Cyrillo! The answer to your questions are both complex, logical, and a taste of personal preference:

First whenever an ability is cast and a macro has zero wait times, no other ability is cast again during the macro. This means that functionally you can control what occurs by changing your behavior. If I tap this ability just outside the GC it will simply cast Aspected Benefic over and over. On the other hand if I quickly cast this twice it will cast Aspected Benefic and then Time Dilate the person, which is my traditional usage of the ability. If one were to compare my usage of Time Dilation with other raiders what you would find is because of my approach my usage and uptime of the ability is VASTLY more than your average raider. Admittedly this means that sometimes I will use the ability at a less opportune moment, but in general I get healthier use out of the ability period.

The above approach of pairing secondary abilities off the GC with primary abilities is personal preference, but it is also an excellent way to get very good use out of them in intense raid settings where you have much higher priorities.

As for your second question related to why mouse over and target of target. The reason is because functionally I like to do as much damage as I can during fights. Likewise I want to preserved the ability to heal and move fluidly with the right mouse button pressed down. Consequently the easiest way to do this is to include a <tt> line for all heals. This makes running dungeons a breeze, and makes complex raid movement easier. Note that target of target in all these cases is simply the tank.

Again though both of these are personal preference, along with some improvement on efficiency due to how I play. Contextual macros are NOT for everyone o/