Ninja Macro Idea

[Selvokaz]

This is what I want to do. Ninja has 3 combo enders, I want the ender button to change/rotate after I use one. So basically, what I want to so is, after I hit the first combo ender at the end of a string, say Aeolian Edge, I watch the Button to Change to the next, Shadow Fang,... and after I finish a combo with Shadow Fang, I want it to change to Armor Crush, and when armor crush is hit it changes back to Aeolian Edge.

Is it possible to do this with some combinations of macros?

[ReiMakoto]

You shouldn't use macros for most combat abilities as they dont queue properly and the more lines the macro has the longer it takes to go off

[Shamox]

Becoming good at the game is actually way much easier.

[Maero]

Not certain if plausible with the current macro system. But in general macros should be avoided for any sort of dps. i had a macro even for TA but have since dropped it as it did not seem to work 100% of the time.

[Selvokaz]

what are you people even talking about? I'm not making a one button combo here, im pretty sure i explained it simply enough that a 6 year old could understand it. It's basically no different than use the /hotbar set "X" 1 3 macros many a smart player already uses. Maybe I gave this forum to much credit, clearly you don't get it.

[Canadane]

Don't use ANY macros for combat skills.
It's not that a single button one us bad (it is...), it's that all macro use is worse than manually executing skills.

Even if your end goal isn't an attack per se, you just want to swap hotbars, use the keybinds for it, not a macro.

[Wiccan026]

what are you people even talking about? I'm not making a one button combo here, im pretty sure i explained it simply enough that a 6 year old could understand it. It's basically no different than use the /hotbar set "X" 1 3 macros many a smart player already uses. Maybe I gave this forum to much credit, clearly you don't get it.

You'll always catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, just saying .

That being said macros can't be used for such purposes (and than folks were trying to tell you nicely that even if the system would work to actually do that, it would mess up your dps because of the delay in using the macro system... it screws over any dps who tries to use their dps abilities for such a thing).

They do have something in the game similar to your concept, PvP actually has their combo system set up in a similar way (all the attacks are on one button and you have to cycle that button through all of the combos to get to them) but nothing in PvE is set up in such a manner.

[Megguido]

what are you people even talking about? I'm not making a one button combo here, im pretty sure i explained it simply enough that a 6 year old could understand it. It's basically no different than use the /hotbar set "X" 1 3 macros many a smart player already uses. Maybe I gave this forum to much credit, clearly you don't get it.

You can be a macro smartass and do what you want, (if I understood well), having a bard with Spinning Edge > Gust Slash > Aeolian Edge, and when you press Aeolian Edge it gets replaced with Shadow Fang etc...

The issue here is we're talking about macros. The way the game works with "regular" weaponskills, spells and abilities, is a queue system. If you press Gust Slash 0.5s before the GCD of Spinning Edge finishes, it will use Gust Slash exactly when the GCD is over. Any macro isn't working with this queing system, so there's two issues:

- First, the delay between the end of the previous GCD and the next attack is affected by player reflexes (you can't press the button as fast as the server does it for you with the queing system, so you'll lose time and damage overall, because of the delay between each GCD)

- Second, a macro isn't guaranteed to go off when you press it (because no queing, again). So, let's say you want to use Aeolian Edge, you press the macro, Aeolian Edge can't be used because youre still animation locked from previous attack but the macro will still switch the hotbar and you'll have Shadow Fang instead.

Overall, you'll be having much more trouble doing macros and dealing with them, than just pressing 1-2-3 > 1-2-4 > 1-2-5 in a rotation yourself. Macros are unreliable and should be used in very few occasions (e.g. once a minute for Shadow Flare). Using macros on a GCD is not a good idea in general.


Oh and you don't really want to use your 3 combo finishers in a rotation like SF > AE > AC > SF etc... It's more of something like SF > AE > AE > SF > AE > AC > SF (Shadow Fang every three combos, Armor Crush when you're below 40s timer on Hûton).

[Hasrat]

It'd basically be no different than the old Protect swap macros. Use finisher, swap skill with next finisher. But it'd still be clunky and not recommended.

[Rongway]

If you macro your attacks at all, they will be late and you will lose DPS.

If you want to do this and still be able to use your actions in a timely manner, it'll require a fourth button after each combo finisher. This button can be pressed oGCD without affecting anything. However, you will require three copies of your hotbar, stored on ROG or elsewhere, with just the two slots different (the finisher action, and the hotbar swapping button).

The actual attacks would not be macroed at all.

Bars:
[Spinning Edge] [Gust Slash] [Aeolian Edge] [Macro: /hotbar copy ROG 2 NIN 1] [other things]
[Spinning Edge] [Gust Slash] [Shadow Fang] [Macro: /hotbar copy ROG 3 NIN 1] [other things]
[Spinning Edge] [Gust Slash] [Armor Crush] [Macro: /hotbar copy ROG 1 NIN 1] [other things]

This is the only way to do it without gimping yourself by forcing you to perform every finisher late, and even this, as a demonstration of masterful abuse of the macro system, is not better than just learning to play the job right. Just spend the extra one button slot to have all three finishers on your bars.