How can I manage all of my skills on hotbars?

[Khalithar]

I use both hands on the keyboard and use strafe rather than the keyboard and practicing until I could get my hands to move as fast as they needed to be so I could do all of my rotations without fail while still maintaining my situational awareness of the arena as a whole and dodging telegraphs. Not sure if that would work for you OP.

[Jim_Berry]

You can macro some. Such examples are:

/macroicon "Dream Within a Dream"
/ac "Assassinate" <t>
/ac "Dream Within a Dream" <t>

/macroicon "Swiftcast"
/ac "Swiftcast" <me>
/ac "Raise" <t>

/macroicon "Fight or Flight"
/ac "Fight or Flight" <me>
/ac "Bloodbath" <me>

I'm against certain macros, like when tanks have all their defensive CDs under on macro. I use Hotbar 8 for these by Holding L2 then R2, and Holding R2 then L2.

[FinaSel]

Wow, thank you everyone for your advice. There is so much. So many things to try.

I am using the Q E and R keys now, combined with Shift and Control to give me 9 additional hotkeys.
I have used WSAD my whole life, so switching is maybe difficult for me.

I have considered hotbar switching. If the new Q E R keys don't work out, I will try it. I still have two more ninja abilities to aquire, so that might be easier.

I also am quite fond of using the mouse for camera controls and some movement.
The only problem with removing Q and E is my strafe keys are gone, but I can still do it with the mouse.

I sometimes forget they are gone though. So I need to get used to it.

Playing ninja is so different from WHM because with Ninja I need almost all of my skills all the time.
But with WHM, I either only need offensive or defensive at any one time, depending on my stance. And cooldowns on most skills are long enough that I don't need to access them every 30 seconds.

I need more practice with ninja. I need to do more dungeons, especially 50+.

I will use this thread as a reference to try future ideas.

[Neophyte]

You can place strafing on A/D and turn your character with the mouse. That's what I was used from every game with strafing so far ('movement' only on keyboard, direction of looking is done by mouse).

[Krindor]

You can place strafing on A/D and turn your character with the mouse. That's what I was used from every game with strafing so far ('movement' only on keyboard, direction of looking is done by mouse).

I don't recall how it is in other games but here you don't even need to bind A and D to strafe, you just need to hold right mouse button down and you'll strafe with A and D.

[Darkstride]

Since you mentioned potentially getting a controller, I'll quote myself from an older thread...

Use the expanded controls (L2 + R2 and R2 + L2) on the cross-hotbar. I play on PC, but use a controller and am able to fit every ability, including a Potion on my Hotbar without issue. I have Shukuchi macro'd to R3 for quick and easy use. I do have Venoms on a separate bar only because there is little need to stance-dance while in combat.




My main combo abilities are all used with R2. I hold L2 if I want to combo into Shadow Fang or Dancing Edge. I have the 2 vertical hotbars on the left just so that I can see certain cooldowns at all times (and when Assassinate lights up).

Hot bar setups will be different for everyone, since it really needs to fit to your comfort and play style, but I'm simply showing this as an example that you can have every ability available for use. There isn't a need to sacrifice an ability (such as Jugulate, in your previous post).

[Valenth]

I uploaded an image of my keyboard, lighting up bottoms for easier recognition just for this thread xP



Red = movement (W and R strafing, E walking forward)
Green = regular used skills
Dark blue (bottom) = Defensive CD's
Purple = Less used or special CD's (they're slightly harder to reach, reactiontime thingie)
Yellow = modifiers or switches (Stances usually on F1-4, battlemode on/off on Z, and modifiers on Shift and Alt)

The main advantage here is it's a "natural" position of your hand. If you're used to typing blind, moving your hand 1 row to the left to constantly cover WASD is considered unnatural. Now your index finger is on the same row as F, the same row as when typing blind. It also frees up Q and A to be used for skill by your pink, and you pink will naturally rest on A to begin with. the Shift and Alt modifiers are close to your pink and thumb this way.

This setup comes from Taugrim's keybinding guide, have a look at it if you would like an as natural as possible setup that doesn't require advanced mouses and the like. Even though the guy used to be quite active in the competitive scene, he explains in a really rational and calm manner. It makes a lot of sense.

Good luck! ^^

Ps. pic works for me, let me know if it doesn't for any of you ^^;

[MaeIsMean]

Personally, I was never comfortable using WASD AND the mouse for movement. To my brain, using both hands to move seems inefficient. So I have an MMO mouse, and I have movement keys mapped onto the spare keys, rather than combat keys. That way I can do alllll my moving on my mouse, forward, backward, strafe, turn, and sprint. I also include my mount in there for non-combat. That means all my movement is normally controlled with my left hand, leaving my right to operate hotkeys for combat. To my head, that made much more logical sense than trying to teach my brain WASD movement after gaming for more than a decade without using it.

[Sida]

I use both, keyboard and mouse, to both, moving and skills. That is, I have skills I frequently need to use in succes in keyboard. Pretty much everything that needs to be used between (except ninja mudras) I use with mouse. It might seem inefficient at first but that actually let's me use two hands somewhat interchangeably to use in most situations giving room for multitasking regarding the situation. Once learning to use the one thats optimal at the moment it becomes rather efficient.

[Lilyth]

Woah so many different play styles. What a great thread.

Using legacy movement, consider the following keybinds.

Move Forward               :  W  |  UpArrow
Move Back / Walk Backwards :  S  |  DownArrow
Move Left / Turn Left      :  Q  |  LeftArrow
Move Right / Turn Right    :  E  |  RightArrow
Strafe Left                : [NO BINDS]
Strafe Right               : [NO BINDS]
...
Point Camera to the Left   : A
Point Camera to the Right  : D

If you eschew the strafe keys altogether, dodging in eight directions is far easier and doesn't require moving the camera. There will be a slight arc to left and right movement but there will no longer be possibility of back pedalling.

That was so interesting to try out! It was like a mix of both legacy and standard. That said and after having playing with it a bit, I still favor standard for my MNK (more on that below)

I'm curious as to why you prefer standard at all if you use legacy some of the time. Have you tried fulltiming legacy and using the Lock Camera on Target (default Num5) to toggle a standard feel?

I don't really know but it feels I have much more control over my camera and my character while on standard. The fights just feels better overall and my DPS was never an issue nor is dodging AoEs while keeping an eye on whats going on around. Oh and I'm not really a fan of locking on, it tunnels your vision way too much for my taste. ^^