Button Bloat

[Jeeqbit]

To the point where I know some players actually have macros just to swap hotbars between AOE and ST skills because it's that ridiculous right now.

I have such macros, but I had them in Heavensward too. I don't see how they would solve it other than to do the 100% to target, 50% to all others thing.

[Asako]

Relating to summoner and scholar, why is summon pet even a thing. Just make it auto summon and remove the button. I don't want to waste a button that is pressed once an instance. Why would you not have it summoned? They even made it so dissapate auto summons it again after use, so there is really no point in it.

[rawker]

Relating to summoner and scholar, why is summon pet even a thing. Just make it auto summon and remove the button. I don't want to waste a button that is pressed once an instance. Why would you not have it summoned? They even made it so dissapate auto summons it again after use, so there is really no point in it.

1 use case: if you want your pet to return to your location asap. This problem arose when they decided to make pets set and leave. Should pet management gets the attention it needs, then we might get people asking for it to be instant cast

[Merrigan]

Oh absolutely. That was just an example. More just trying to say "There are ways to condense multiple buttons down into far fewer without losing the overall gameplay of the combo system"

Like, I don't think it would be a good change to make the AoE and Single Target rotation exactly the same. CERTAINLY not as a universal change. It was more an example of one kind of way the system could be implemented. But an increased focus on things akin to stances that change what action is on each button, would help give us more toys to play with, without also giving us carpal tunnel.

I just jumped to AoEs because the vast majority of endgame content doesn't use them, or uses them sparingly. They are used in the occasional add phase and that's it. The rest of the time they are taking up space. My point is that it would be far better to have some alternative use for those buttons when we don't need AoE's, which is THE VAST MAJORITY OF THE TIME.

Hm... Yeah, okay. I understand better what you mean, and it seems more interesting than stacking a combo on the same key like in pvp. It would just have to be implemented in a more interesting way than the tank stance (clicking a button = an effect, no thought given to inserting the button into a class synergy), whether we're talking about a stance that activates AOEs or something else. In fact, I'd even find it quite interesting to have a form of "unlocking" the aoe, rather than a mono rotation / AOE rotation that are juxtaposed without any other form of interaction.

So we could imagine a kind of mono action combo, which would then transform the bar into an AOE action. It sacrifices a lot of flexibility, but at the same time, anticipating situations has always been part of this game's gameplay, so I don't think it's too crazy.

[Esmoire]

Think BLU having 24 abilities it can pick + role actions, while no doubt part of the design of having to make choices, also speaks to the intended scope of buttons. Would like if jobs are kept to a maximum of 30 buttons; a controller user can map two sets of 16 (32) and a M+kb user three hotbars (12 each for 36). Leaves room for stuff like a stat pot and flexibility for a macro or glam-specific mount or whatever. Seems fair. A few jobs at 35 buttons that definitely don't need that.

Something like SMN could definitely dare to have more.

[Ceetee]

Think BLU having 24 abilities it can pick + role actions, while no doubt part of the design of having to make choices, also speaks to the intended scope of buttons. Would like if jobs are kept to a maximum of 30 buttons; a controller user can map two sets of 16 (32) and a M+kb user three hotbars (12 each for 36). Leaves room for stuff like a stat pot and flexibility for a macro or glam-specific mount or whatever. Seems fair. A few jobs at 35 buttons that definitely don't need that.

Something like SMN could definitely dare to have more.

Oh that is ABSOLUTELY great insight, yeah. I think capping at 25 job specific buttons (again, not the same as actions. RDM has 33 endgame actions, but only spread across 24 buttons) plus the 5 additional role actions, is probably the best design decision overall.

[Moqi]

32 is the sweet spot for me (including role actions) because it's 2 crossbar, but stuff like tank stances, summon pets and dance partner can go in a 3rd crossbar since they're only tipically used at the start of a fight and can go in a non active crossbar.

But I'll never stop wanting new skills lol. There is so much more they can do with 32 buttons. Make me use them all!

[Arkdra]

Legitimately, most classes have bloat but it's pretty minor and only comes in 2 flavors: things that are only usable under certain conditions tied to another button, and aoe/single target iterations of the same skill. For the first, I mean like arcane circle should change to plentiful harvest when you use it because plentiful harvest is only usable after you do arcane circle, it makes no sense to have them be separate buttons. For the second, samurai is laden with gurren/senei, shoha/shoha 2, and shinten/kyuten. It baffles me that these buttons are all separate and abilities and not just aoe abilities that are like 300 potency attack to your first target, 40% potency to the rest.

[Souljacker]

I'm with the folks who think we're getting a bit too bloated. I use a gaming mouse and it's still only comfortable to use 1 hotbar and another with the shift modifier, adding ctrl\alt modifier means I'm losing speed and moving too far from the home row. So, probably 30 skills in a quickly and easily accessible spot, and I think even that is getting a little on the high side.

I feel like they made encounters as braindead as they could possibly be, and everyone's focus is on hitting their buttons in the correct order (and never stopping pressing them). I'd rather see more challenging encounters, with maybe fewer skills that were more impactful if they aren't used correctly\at appropriate times. I know that this design is possible, because many other games have very challenging encounters and nowhere near the number of skills any given job here has. Some of these OCD damage skills, well, what's the actual point of them except to have another button to press. Could be rolled up into the intended rotation.

[TaleraRistain]

I don't think there's a huge amount of bloat right now but probably are some places they could adjust things without affecting rotations too much. I do feel they would need to be careful, though. For instance, Brutal Shell spam has saved my butt more times than I can count. So it would be detrimental in that case to make that combo a single button that cycled through the actions. As someone mentioned, abilities where only one other possible button could be pressed after it? Possibly, but only if it wouldn't mess up weaving or things of that nature.