Do you guys mind sharing your Macros / methodology?

[Redbeard]

Howdy,

As you can tell from my other posts Im just getting going on a 2 man setup. Ive just rearranged all the windows how I want them (for now at least), i have 5 little bars in the lower right of my screen just waiting for ability / macro goodness... and im a bit at a loss of how to go from here.

I have innerspace / ISboxer setup and its passing keystrokes just fine, I just need to setup what TO pass now.

I checked out Khatovar's wonderful macro guide, and that was very helpful to learn a bit about how macros in EQ2 work (for example the queueing, etc). What im curious is how you guys are actually setting up your bars.

In WoW I didnt use FTL, but I did use a leaderless setup with the jamba add on. I am not sure if I can setup something similar here, but would be nice (for when one char croaks). I generally used 1 or 2 spam buttons for dps, is that what you guys do for your teams?

Basically Id love to hear all about your setup if you care to share,

Thanks.

[shdwdrgn]

Right now I just control the tank with the mouse or the keyboard, to ensure he keeps agro and I have a N52 (also used the numpad) for the slaves. For DPS I just have a macro in game for all of the single target spells and I just mash the button that broadcasts to that macro constantly. I have a different button for each type of heal...eg single target heal, reactive/ward, group etc.

I am looking to make it better though because I know I don't do as much as I should and a lot of the characters aren't doing as well. For example I use no stealth attacks for my brigand. I have only been doing 6 chars for a month though so I'm still new.

With that in mind, I would also love to see how other people are doing it so i might be able to improve.

[Noxxy]

I have set all my kboards to suit the accounts on that particular pc - so all my CC are on the one accnt and use a certain keyboard setup, dps on another etc etc

Few simple macros i use:
- /assist + /autoattack 1,
- /follow,
- /clearallqueuedabilities + /cancel_spellcast + /cast spell (normally a heal or detaunt or a mezz)
- /autoattack 0 + /clearallqueuedabilities + /cancel_spellcast + /targetnext + single target stun/mezz (rogues) + /assist + /autoattack 1

All other macros are really simple consisting of basically 2 spells put together on the one macro

There are several reasons why I shy away from jamming all the spells into 1 macro:
- when I want to cast a debuff I want to do it NOW but being all jammed together I can't really tell when it is ready or not (without looking at the mob debuffs like a hawk which I do anyway)
- I like to fire spells in a particular sequence to maximise impact (either dps or debuffs or group/self buffs or wards/cures, etc - depending on the situation) - jamming all together doesn't allow me to do this
- I like to see what spells are up, having 2 spells together gives me a better idea especially if they are of the same refresh time (i.e., both 30s refresh) so when the icon highlights I know both are up
- jamming all the spells together promotes spell spamming = BIG NO NO - NAUGHTY - have to train yourself out of this or raids will suck the big one and your dps WILL suffer

As for what areas I use on the keyboard:
- basically, I can easily reach 1-4, alt 5-1, ctrl 1-5 - these I run with my left hand
- 5 is assist, 6 is follow, 7 is major de-curse/sanctuary
- the ENTIRE numpad is run with my right (all keys except enter - yes, I have configg'd numlock etc)
-- numlock / * are all AOES, + . 0 are all various tempory pre-pull and in fight buffs or wards, - group cure, 1 cures, 2 wards/procs/hots, 3 small heal, 4 large heal, 5 group heal, 6 major ward/healgroup, 7 emergency heal or something, 8 major all slave 'oh sh!t' detaunt, 9 other emergency heal /ward/pre-death buffs
- G5 mouse runs the tank with the buttons and toggle flip set to various taunts or AOEs but they are also set to run different spells on different screens like the rogues smuggle etc
- do have the nostronimo (sp??) but I only use it for FPSs

I tend not to physically press 8 to + keys as they are mapped to the numpad - if you looked at my key settings you'd see a big blank spot (bit like a 'v') with all spells sitting one side or the other but not much in the middle

Brig stealth attacks:
- you want to make sure you hit the mob with 'rob' (or whatever it is now) great STR debuff
- easiest way to incorporate this is to use it as a pre-pull
- simply, /cast your self invis on pre-pull, when mob gets close (<5m from memory), give it a rob

[Redbeard]

Thanks for your thoughts Noxxy,

When I 5 boxed WoW I had, basically... a single target button, an aoe button, a debuff button... and separate controls for healing. These were my spam buttons. Then I had 3 keys for each character designated (for example, Char 1 got g h and j, char 2 got q w and a, and so on) that were only mapped to them... that allowed me to have some fine control over who was doing what...

Ill have to work towards something similar here I guess. Does ISboxer allow me to use strict white listing? For example, If I want to map E to move forward... shift + E shouldnt move forward (because shift + e != E)...

[asgradth]

I tried ISXBoxer, tried setting up the keys and the white lists and all the other special stuff. Spent nearly 10 hours during my vacation setting everything up. Spent another 3 hours tweaking it. In the end, I nuked all the special key control from ISBoxer and now only use it to position my windows and launch all 6 instances at the same time.

Right now, I just use the DNP/MUTE functions in Keyclone and it works well enough. Take some time to mess around with it and you'll find Keyclone to be infinately simpler than ISBoxer. I'm not slamming ISBoxer... but Keyclone does have years of dev, whereas ISBoxer is fairly new.

After talking and reading these various threads, I've changed up my setup (again). Out on the net, there is a spreadsheet with every spell, skill, ability, etc as of the GU52 patch for every class and every AA. Going through the spreadsheet, I have now reconfigured most of my combat attacks to start a fight with the skills/spells that take the longest to recast, and work my way down. I still have special keys to launch all Taunts or Stuns or Mezzes, but general fighting has been reduced to cycling 3 keys over and over... almost like playing a bard in EQ1, and this has made life even easier.

My dps has improved slightly, tho not noticable. Hopefully but end-game/tso, I'll see a difference.

As I mentioned to Shdwdrgn, don't try and plan ahead, go with the flow, build up your team and your spell bars and your ideas as you go. Don't static anything, know that it is all changeable, just depending on how much work you want to do... And remember, whatever you come up with as 'perfect' today, will suck tomorrow

g'luck

[shdwdrgn]

Asgradth, What do your 3 keys that you cycle over and over do? I'm curious to know cause it seems almost too simple.

And keeping in mind that the setup is fluid is definitely important. I have changed mine around a few times already and only been doing this a month with 6 characters!

[asgradth]

Asgradth, What do your 3 keys that you cycle over and over do? I'm curious to know cause it seems almost too simple.

And keeping in mind that the setup is fluid is definitely important. I have changed mine around a few times already and only been doing this a month with 6 characters!

You will never stop changing your setup... I know this because three times now I 'thought' I had the perfect setup, only to scrap it and start over again :huh:. I have resigned that my setup will never be perfect, only good enough to get the job done. Not fighting the interface makes the game much more fun.

My Three Keys:
Key 1: Any dmg ability with recast timers >= 35s
Key 2: Any dmg ability with recast timers between 10s & 34s
Key 3: Any dmg ability with recast timers < 10s

The times fluctuate depending on how many spells are in the macro. I try to limit it to 10 spells/abilities, but it changes. I also didn't strictly adhere to the times above, instead allowing the spells to flow and ebb between the buttons until they seemed 'happy'. I'm still tweaking it, but this is my general guideline. If you 'edit' your macro, leave the edit window opened and start a fight and start slamming that macro key, you can watch the order of how the spells are cast and tweak it to your style.

I then configured 10 more keys, each using special abilities, some of which I have setup on round robbin, like Stuns, Mezzes, Deaggro and Special_one_off_abilities. I round robbin'd them because... while the stuns and mezzes stack, their times do not add up, they overlap... So if 3 toons cast a 5s stun at the same time, the mob is stunned for 5s only. Some of these special abilities are part of the 3 main keys above.

Using the above method, I find single-target fights are a breeze. Drop some heavy long-recast or dot spells , in-between firing off a stun or two, then finish off the mob with fast casting single target dps.

AOE Fights are similar. I have two buttons setup on each toon. One for AOE Encounter spells and one for AOE All spells.

Before, I was using around 60 macro keys and playing the keyboard like a piano. Now I have ~ 20 macro keys and can do it all with one hand. The sad thing is, I think i can reduce it down to ~ 14 macro keys, but I'm still fleshing out the idea ^^.

I have a whole new idea i'm working on at work... Voice Activation. If I say "Tank", then all the healers heal the tank. If I say 'Pre", they all the healers pre-ward/rective the tank, if I say 'Go', then they start fighting... etc... This setup works great as long as the game isn't running... For whatever reason, once I fire up EQ2, there's like a 4-7s lag between me talking and the actual action taking place. 4s lag in eq2 in a tso dungeon is death... so, i'm still working on it. My goal is to voice activate all healing and special abilities so I can switch from keyboard/mouse to a logitech gamepad. It's a pipe dream, but I gotta have something to keep busy!

g'luck