Controllers, hotbars, cycling... Worried for the future

[Bracken]

a 3rd cross hotbar isn't too complicated when you get used to it, quick double tab or single to cycle, you get used to it. I was worried when HW came out, but now its just as easy as double

[Toguro]

One trick I use is to make both left and right side oh Crossbar 8 have the same buttons in the same place.

I'm losing 8 buttons yes but I have never been bloated like THAT.

Making both sides the same allows you to to press the extra buttons as fast as possible without accidentally pressing say.. R>L instead of L<R for example. They will be the same

[LDR]

The furture is definately the most concerning due to what choice they make

-if- they choose to add new skills i hope its only 2 and the rest are traits to old ones


whilst i personally have no issue with multi tabs, finding positions for everything i need that is comfortable for me to use gets rough when stuff is added.

i have certain things on certain buttons across different classes based upon what it does [eg, i have cure/psysick/benefic on the same button]
but to make that work and be comfortable along side having what i need im often operating on 3 hotbars. [i even have 5 on sch, its a bit hectic]
im good with it but man for others and going further this could be a mess

[LineageRazor]

Weel, you can "cheat" a bit to have this. By using macros. For Example:

/micon "Sonte III"
/ac "Stone III"
/ac "Stone II"
/ac "Stone"

This way, if you have Stone III, use stone III, if you haven't III, then will use the next one, Stone II. Of course, this is annoying because you will read the error message “Stone III” is not a valid action name" all the time on screen...

One problem with this solution is that Stone actually has some extra utility than damage. It's one of WHM/CNJ's crowd-control abilities, with its added weight effect. I used this sort of macro for a while, and was occasionally frustrated when weight could have come in handy but was not easily accessed.

That said, there ARE a lot of abilities that can be combined nicely into one macro. For example, this one I use on PLD:

/micon "Cover"
/action "Shield Bash" <t>
/action "Shield Lob" <t>
/action "Cover" <t>

In this case, the macro works reliably because each action in it is viable under different circumstances.
- Is the target an ally? Then Shield Bash and Shield Lob do not apply. Cover is used.
- Is the target an enemy? If the enemy is close enough, then Shield Bash is used. If not, Shield Lob is used.

There are lots of abilities that can be combined into one button, since they have different valid targets. Unfortunately, Cure spells do NOT work reliably in this way, as they have a default target of yourself. Here's what I mean. Take, for example, this macro I used for a while:

/micon "Cure"
/action "Stone" <t>
/action "Cure" <t>

In theory, if you're targeting an enemy, it should use Stone, and if you're targeting a player it should use Cure right? Normally, that's true - but if you're button-mashing, or even trying to just cast as soon as you can after a previous action, there's a chance you'll clip off the first command and move on to the second. Suddenly, you're casting a totally useless Cure on yourself when you meant to cast Stone. This might not seem like it would come up much, but it happens surprisingly often.

It makes me SERIOUSLY wish you could disable "Target self by default" for Cures and buffs. "Default: Self" is really only useful when soloing content - and even there, it's kind of a crutch that's simply not needed by practiced players. In harder stuff, even if you're NOT using macros, it's all-too easy to accidentally cast a cure spell while you have the enemy targeted, wind up curing yourself, and wondering why the tank is still dying...

[nexas506]

My setup has 2 hotbars showing when my weapon is out. When it's away, all my bars will cycle through. I use the extended feature for my heals "oh s**t" buttons and do buffs for my DPS.
I also use a hotbar toggle macro to easily switch back and forth instead of mashing L1

[Leigaon]

a 3rd cross hotbar isn't too complicated when you get used to it, quick double tab or single to cycle, you get used to it. I was worried when HW came out, but now its just as easy as double

It took some getting use to but now I'm doing it without thinking about it. It's not so bad, since you don't need all the actions all the time. Between rotating between 1 & 2 with my weapon out, and the 8th one so quickly accessible. When I set 3 - 7 with pre-made set ups and use the copy chotbar, I can switch between all 3 as I need and eliminate things I don't need until I need them. Even now though, I think i'm getting to my max..lol

[Seraphyna]

Well, they are testing a new add to the extended Cross Hotbar. The double click.

Now we have L and R for 1st hotbar, then L-> R and R -> L for 2nd hotbar. They will add the new one, double click R and double click L for a 3rd hotbar. I think will help a lot, that's another + 16 buttons.

Here, the 1:28:09 https://youtu.be/V1pe9AnqRS8?t=5289

God that looks absolutely horrible.

I can see using macros ( since I don't yet) and start removing skills if they go with that. *shudders*

[Mycow8me]

I edited and hopefully clarified the main post. Community thoughts and ideas are being added as I come across them too.

I'm kinda curious how people who play summoner and scholar and maintain full control over there pets actions with a controller. I could not do it on scholar and ended up leaving the pet on full auto when I tried playing it.

Edit: Now that I think about it, one of the main reasons I haven't done PVP content is because it adds even more skills to figure into our hotbar settings.

[LineageRazor]

I'm not sure I can speak well to SCH, as I don't really play it, but I have several macros on SMN that work well for me.

One interesting thing to note about pet actions is that they do not require <wait> command to separate them from player actions. For example:

/micon "Ruin"
/action "Ruin" <t>
/petaction "Mountain Buster" <t>
/petaction "Burning Strike" <t>

With one press of the button, this macro will cast Ruin, and also command your pet to use Mountain Buster or Burning Strike (depending on the pet). I could see this as possibly being useful for SCH, if you want to "direct" your pet's auto-cures to specific targets:

/micon "Physick"
/action "Physick" <t>
/petaction "Embrace" <t>

For other actions, like Garuda's aoe Aerial Slash, putting them on my Ruin macro wouldn't be desirable since use of Aerial Slash is a loss of DPS against a single target (Garuda's auto-attack spell, Wind Blade, does 110 potency, while Aerial Slash only does 90). So, I put this attack on my Bane macro instead. Anytime I'm using Bane, there are at least two targets, so Aerial Slash becomes worthwhile! It could also be put on your Miasma II macro, another attack you generally use against multiple enemies. Personally, I put Contagion on my Miasma II macro, though; after applying my other DoTs, I apply Miasma II last. Since it's instant and Contagion has a casting time, it gains the benefit of Contagion.

Looking at SCH's pet actions, though, it looks like it's a much more complicated case. While I can see some possible synergistic macro possibilities, pretty much all of them have drawbacks. For example, you could put Whispering Dawn on your Succor macro. In a situation where everyone's taken a lot of damage, this works great - you cure everyone and put shields on them while your fairy simultaneously casts a mass regen. Awesome! But it makes applying Succor just before a pull a lot more awkward. Suddenly your tank has to deal with your fairy drawing regen hate while he's rounding up the mobs. A good tank can deal with it, sure, but it's still an irritation.

You could stack Fey Illumination with Emergency Tactics, potentially. There's no point in using Emergency Tactics, after all, unless you're about to cure someone, and Fey Illumination boosts your cures by 20% - but this would be awkward for those cases where you're using Fey Illumination specifically because you want a stronger Galvanize (such as fishing for a crit Adlo just before a big pull or boss to use Deployment Tactics with).

You could also stack Fey Caress with Leeches: you remove someone's status, and your fairy automatically steps up to remove everyone else's. Unfortunately, this combo means that either you're wasting an action, or your fairy is: If the debuff is single-target, your fairy has just wasted a GCD using Caress, and if aoe there was no point in you using Leeches since Caress would've taken care of it as well.

Yeah, compared to a lot of jobs, SCH definitely has a lot less places where multiple skills can sensibly be piled onto one macro. It may be a challenge to keep track of them all!

Edit: After posting, I remembered another trick that might come in handy.

If you have Selene up, you don't care about any of Eos's moves, and vice versa. So here's an idea: Make two identical crosshotbars, different only in that hotbar 1 has Eos's skills and hotbar 2 has Selene's. Now, make these two Summon macros:

/micon "Summon"
/action "Summon" <me>
/chotbar change 1

/micon "Summon II"
/action "Summon II" <me>
/chotbar change 2

When you summon Eos, your hotbar will change to crosshotbar 1, where Eos's skills are. When you summon Selene, your hotbar will change to crosshotbar 2, where Selene's skills are. This way, even if you wind up not stacking these abilities with your job actions, at least you don't have to crowd one hotbar with both Selene's AND Eos's actions!

If you're the type that tends to forget to set your pet to Obey, you can add those to the Summon macros as well. Don't forget to account for the possibility of hard-cast vs Swiftcast!

/micon "Summon"
/action "Summon" <me>
/chotbar change 1 <wait.2>
/petaction "Obey" <me> <wait.5>
/petaction "Obey" <me>

[Derio]

I dont see the problem. I use a controller had have 4 hotbars, 5 if you include the default one I have shared across multiple jobs/classes. And 1 is just a whole bunch of macros. For my SMN and SCH it can be a pain when trying to control the pet but eventually I just set up macros for them too.

Then it came down to just knowing the hotbar and muscle memory.

Now I can see a problem if come 4.0 the pets get new skills and I get new skills and have to redo some or all of 1 or 2 hotbars and redo some macros. But I did that with 3.0 and it only took me less than an hour to fully change them, and after that a couple of dungeons to get used to the hotbar.

However if you have quick reflexes you can manuever through your hotbars and macros with ease. I prefer the controller setup because it gets annoying having all of my skills just sitting there on my HUD taking up 1/3 of the screen.