Addon idea: Countdown clock?

Just an idea here for an addon, what about a simple countdown clock for your screen? Since you can set up a rotation on your slaves but its hard to track casting times and cooldowns, why not have say 10 programmable countdowns to help time keypresses? For instance if your slave is casting a spell with a 3sec cast time have a countdown on your master for 3sec so you know when to cast the next spell in rotation. Also it seems cleaner on your screen to have a basic 00:00:00 clock than a bunch of cooldown bars. I'd write it myself if I knew how.

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Originally Posted by topgear

Just an idea here for an addon, what about a simple countdown clock for your screen? Since you can set up a rotation on your slaves but its hard to track casting times and cooldowns, why not have say 10 programmable countdowns to help time keypresses? For instance if your slave is casting a spell with a 3sec cast time have a countdown on your master for 3sec so you know when to cast the next spell in rotation. Also it seems cleaner on your screen to have a basic 00:00:00 clock than a bunch of cooldown bars. I'd write it myself if I knew how.

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Why, hello there new person and welcome to the forum.

The first thought that comes to mind is that because of lag and latency that these timers would not be
accurate. Add-ons cannot communicate outside of the game so something like this is most likely bound to an
in-game channel like JAMBA uses. Multiboxers already have enough on their plate to deal with and 10 more
timers on the screen would probably be a giant distraction or they would never ever get looked at. People
would probably die standing in fire while they're busy staring at these timers to get the next keypress perfect.

Perhaps I'm visualizing your idea incorrectly, but it brings me to my next point...

Have you ever seen videos of any player, solo or multiboxing, that have scrolling combat text on their screen at
the default 100mph? People don't read that. That default speed has to be turned way down and even then it's
still ignored. I heavily raided from Ulduar to ICC and I had that scrolling combat text on my screen and I rarely
ever looked at those numbers because they were unimportant and out of sight. I eventually disabled them
because it was much easier to see the big yellow default numbers in my face. I am trying to bring this back
though on my boxing teams because it looks snazzy. :)

I agree that you'd have to compensate for lag and fps, but the basic idea is 1 clock that starts on target unitframe and counts down the presets 1 at a time. I've seen a clock that counts up but I have to memorize casting times. It would have to be simple because I dont look at SCT either.

Also the addon wouldnt need to communicate outside of the game, and wouldnt need data input from slave chars. It would simply be a 00:00:00 in a frame attached to target unitframe that begins a preset countdown with a defined keypress (such as Numpad 2 as I use Numpad 1 to send my /petattack macro to my warlocks). In my case the 2sec needed for my locks to Immolate, and the 3sec needed to shadowbolt. Simply to prevent me from missing my Corruption cast, for instance, because I pressed the key while still casting Immolate since I'm using my Shaman as my main.
1xElemental Draenei Shaman
1xBalance N.Elf Druid
3xDestruction Warlocks

Another idea would be something similar to CooldownCount where the actionbar buttons themselves have a countdown, but with custom user assigned countdowns to help track what the other chars are doing not just the main.

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Originally Posted by topgear

Another idea would be something similar to CooldownCount where the actionbar buttons themselves have a countdown, but with custom user assigned countdowns to help track what the other chars are doing not just the main.

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Using ISBoxer's Video FX you could view specific alts' abilities/spells/bars on either your main window or the
dxNothing window granted your character set is on the same computer.

I use HKN so I'm not familiar with ISB. I keep 1 screen open and minimize the other 4. I see the merit in your advice, but idk how that would work for me. Also seems to me there are alot of addons out there that show countdowns on bars but the screen clutter is too much for me, and I havent found one that shows my alts cooldowns.

I use ElvUI in healer mode as I like where it shows my party. I use Jamba as well. Is there a plugin for either of those?

Really I just want an addon with a timer in a frame 00:00:00 will countdown from whatever value I set and is triggered by a keypress that I assign to it.

I've seen keyboards that have macro keys with programmable pauses but I dont want to go that route.

I haven't had my coffee yet, but that sounds like you're trying to do things the hard way. Most people simply use various castsequence macros to create rotations of various standard spells.

You claim cooldown bars are too messy, but I'm not sure how having a slew of numbers is any easier to work with. Cooldown bars don't need to be paid attention to in the way that a clock would. It's very easy to see from the corner of your eye that a cooldown bar is shrinking and changing color, as opposed to a simple clock, which is not making any noticeable change other than number increments. And that only becomes more obvious as you start adding a dozen "clocks" for various spells across various toons.

Try Deadly Boss Mods with the Spell Timers mod and/or Group Cooldowns.

Better advice would be learn to use castsequences and toggles so you don't have to keep track of every single spell and cast time and cooldown. That attention is better spent watching enemies, procs, CC and healing. Trying to time things yourself will only lead to a loss in DPS running a mixed team as you get more spells or as things get chaotic. Especially, since as Fenril said, you have to account for lag and latency.

Let me explain my problem this way:
My Shaman(my main) casts Flame Shock(instant cast) and my Warlocks cast Immolate(3sec cast) all on the same keypress (Numpad 2)
So I press key Numpad 2 then try to approximate 3sec before I move to my next spell.
What I'd like is to stop approximating those 3sec and see it countdown that time above the target frame (which I do watch)
I wouldnt need a slew of numbers just 1 simple rectangle with a timer in it so I know my alts are done casting.
I'm not sure how castsequencing would fix my timing issue but I'm open to ideas.

correction: Immolate is a 2sec cast not 3 as I said

Because with a castsequence you can create a macro that says {for example, because I don't play these classes}

/castsequence Flame Shock, Lava Burst, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt

and stick it on key 2 for your shaman. Then

/castsequence Immolate, Conflagrate, Shadowflame, Chaos Bolt

and stick it on key 2 for your warlocks.

Now you only have one key to press and as long as you're pressing it, the macro will progress as soon as it's able. No need to worry about how long until you're done casting a spell, no need to worry about getting spells off in the right order, no worries about missing spells because of lag or being out of sync or because of varying cast times.

I see your point here.
I can add up the casting times + GCD's and get a rough figure of my reset values (then change these values every patch or talent that alters cast time, etc).
My player unitframe has a cast bar, but I cant see the cast bar from my alts.

Though by no means necessary a timer would be a useful tool.
(unless I can get an addon that shows me all 5 castbars)

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Originally Posted by topgear

I see your point here.
I can add up the casting times + GCD's and get a rough figure of my reset values (then change these values every patch or talent that alters cast time, etc).
My player unitframe has a cast bar, but I cant see the cast bar from my alts.

Though by no means necessary a timer would be a useful tool.
(unless I can get an addon that shows me all 5 castbars)

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as has been mentioned earlier, by Fenril.. if you are using ISBoxer then you can setup video feeds of the alts castbars and display them on your mains screen

I thought of a few problems I might have with castsequence:
1. my opening rotation would be fine, but my DoTs have varying lengths so I have to change what I cast as the fight goes on.
2. I couldnt use reset=target because I have to reapply my DoTs on bosses
3. I would have to estimate the reset time which is essentially the same problem I have now, I have to estimate the cast times

I am going to think more about this and thanks for the input

Ty but I use HotKeyNet I'm not familiar with ISBoxer.
But I must say that sounds very useful.

1. Reset=Xs is an idle timer, not a force reset condition. Reset=10 means the macro will not reset until it has reached the end of the sequence OR until you have not pressed the button for 10 seconds. Reset conditions are not used as active timers, therefor adding and estimating GCDs and cast times is irrelevant. Once you reach the end of the cast sequence, the macro will start from the beginning, there is no timing required. If your Shaman is through with his cast sequence and your Warlocks are only halfway through, the shaman will just start over while the warlocks keep working through their sequence until they reach the end and start over.

2. You can break up castsequences to do different things. For example, put all your DoTs in a cast sequence and put it on 1, then put your spammable damage spells in a sequence on 2. Spam through 1 to put up your DoTs then move to two and spam that until your DoTs are about to fall off. Or use a toggle or modifier key to swap between the two.

Or you can approximate the duration of the DoTs and just make a longer cast sequence to incorporate them into the main spam sequence, like Mercurio shows

Quote:

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/stopmacro [channeling]
/castsequence [@targettarget] reset=5
Soul Fire,Immolate,Corruption,Incinerate,Incinerate,Inc inerate,Life Tap,Soul Fire,Immolate,Incinerate,Corruption,Incinerate,Inc inerate,Incinerate
/cast [@targettarget] Firebolt
/cast [@targettarget] Chaos Bolt
/cast [@targettarget] Shadowburn
/use 13
/use 14

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There's dozens of different macros listed in the stickies showing how to use castsequence to deal with spam damage, DoTs and even procs.

http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=33870
http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=33080
http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=32633
http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=32456

And as a HKN user, you can duplicate ISBoxer's 2step macros with Toggles or using ingame Action Bar Swapping.

Also, many unit frame addons have the ability to show party cast bars. But, with proper macros, they become useful only to see that your slaves are casting, as with proper macros, you don't need to keep track of cast times and such once you have figured it out for the initial macro creation.

Thats very elaborate and ty for taking the time to post it.
I will try it.

I use X-pearl frames on my main, dont think its exactly what you want, but it gets you close

In case it hasn't been mentioned yet, the Hermes addon takes care of team/slave cooldowns most excellently. I even use it when single boxing to track other players in my raid's healing cooldowns.

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Originally Posted by Khatovar

I haven't had my coffee yet....

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/aside
You did well, posting before coffee. I tend to have post failures if I have not had coffee first!

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Originally Posted by Jafula

/aside
You did well, posting before coffee. I tend to have post failures if I have not had coffee first!

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/raises a mug ;)

Just want to add that I found an addon called Gnosis which shows the castbars of my alts without excessive lag (I tried Pitbull frames but fps dropped to 15). Hermes is good for cooldowns and ty for the suggestion.X-perl just doesnt have the look I want but ty for that suggestion too.