Couple of Healer questions!

[Crabsy]

Hey all so I've been playing since early release but just now decided I want to try out WHM! As a side note my forum character is my main WHM character.

Right now I am a level 22 Conjurer and have had a blast healing Ifrit and Copperbell Mines, but I have a few questions I'd like if anyone could help me out with.

- is there some sort of easy way to switch hotbars? I use 1-5 a lot and when I go from healing to soloing I need to click and drag my abilities around.

- does anyone have any basic UI tips? I feel like I have tunnel vision looking in the top left and not so much the fight.

- are there any handy macros that every healer should be using? Right now I'm not using any.

Any general tips would be much appreciated too! This is my first time healing in an mmo ever and it's very fun for me!

[Dastarly_Fox]

I have a tip for the tunnel vision. Try moving around Party Character Box to maybe the right of the enemy health bar so you can focus on the monster, field and team without having to draw to much attention away from the battlefield. Try to also just train yourself with mainly focusing on the battlefield and checking the party box every few seconds, soon enough you will come to look at the entire field without feeling lost in one thing. Or just position yourself further back than everyone else, sounds simple but pulling the emity gets in the way sometimes if you have a problem with that.

[pbplaya7]

The way I have my hotbars setup is:
1 - dungeon skills i don't really use elsewhere
2 - solo skills (attacks)
3 - main heal skills
4 - other skills not keybound

I have them on my UI as:
4------------
1/2---------- (switch for dungeon/solo)
3------------

The keybinds for the 1st bar don't change even if you switch it to the 2nd so you don't have to worry about more keybinds.

O and you can also set a keybind to switch to a specific hotbar or cycle up/down, if you need to.

[Crabsy]

Thanks for the tips! I completely forgot about switching the main hotbar, every mmo I've played has had that option I just need had a reason to use it, now I do.

[Maiandra]

I set up basic party macros so I don't have to worry about changing target filters just to heal somebody once.
For CNJ, that would be
/action "Cure" <2>
/action "Cure" <3>
/action "Cure" <4>

Those will take up space on the action bar, which could be a problem at later levels.
You can also use the mouse-over <mo> and target's target <tt> placeholders.
Another option is to set a target filter to show only party members or only player characters. So you would have to switch target filters, select the character, cast cure, switch target filters, resume/repeat. Or you could just have player/party filter on all the time and use <tt> macros for all attacks.

I use a controller, so switching hotbars (R1) and target filters (L1) are built in, but you should be able to keybind them.

[KeyboardCowboy]

Get rid of hotkeys 6 to 0 and replace them with x q e r z f t and use g as well. The best place for your group health bars is always just to the left of your screen next to your character. A good healer will use mouseover macros
/ac "Cure" <mo>

Create a seperate hotbar and place it next to your group frames, use this hotbar to monitor your cooldowns rather than looking down at the bottom of your screen

[Crabsy]

Get rid of hotkeys 6 to 0 and replace them with x q e r z f t and use g as well. The best place for your group health bars is always just to the left of your screen next to your character. A good healer will use mouseover macros
/ac "Cure" <mo>

Create a seperate hotbar and place it next to your group frames, use this hotbar to monitor your cooldowns rather than looking down at the bottom of your screen

Could you maybe post a picture of your UI in a group, I am a bit confused what you mean with where to place the party/raid frames.

[KeyboardCowboy]

Could you maybe post a picture of your UI in a group, I am a bit confused what you mean with where to place the party/raid frames.

http://oi44.tinypic.com/iv8s3q.jpg

Hope that gives you an idea

[Eccho]

A great macro to have is one that alerts other healers in party when you are resing someone.
/ac "raise" <target>
/p casting raise on <target> <se.02>
This way your other healers don't also attempt to raise and are alerted that you are unable to heal for the next 7.5ish seconds.
A big tip for the harder end game stuff. when you raise someone as soon as you finish the skill run from that spot. Most bosses like to throw aoes at targets, if you stay standing there your fellow team mate will be insta killed the moment they res up.

[Kafziel]

A macro I find useful is:
/focustarget <tt>
This sets my focus target to my current targets target. I generally use this while targeting the tank to set his target as my focus. Bosses are always set my focus target so I can see what they are casting.
I also macro abilities I would cast on the boss to cast on my focus so I don't actually have to stop targeting my party members (I'm a scholar so life drain and virus).