EQ2 Macro Guide

[Noxxy]

I believe you can only follow a group/raid member.

Yes and no - Yes, can only follow a group member, no, cannot follow a raid member if they are not part of your group within the raid

The last part is a bit of a sticking point with me as I have tried /follow with 7 accnts in a raid setup and the 7th char (who I had sitting off in their own group within the raid) was unable to /follow requiring me to manually move it all the time

When it comes to assist I simply use:
/autoattack 1
/assist {insert tank name here]

But I do admit - sometimes I have to spam it a bit before everyone is attacking so I tend to dbl tap it

[Herc130]

I believe you can only follow a group/raid member.

Yes and no - Yes, can only follow a group member, no, cannot follow a raid member if they are not part of your group within the raid

The last part is a bit of a sticking point with me as I have tried /follow with 7 accnts in a raid setup and the 7th char (who I had sitting off in their own group within the raid) was unable to /follow requiring me to manually move it all the time

When it comes to assist I simply use:
/autoattack 1
/assist {insert tank name here]

But I do admit - sometimes I have to spam it a bit before everyone is attacking so I tend to dbl tap it

I'll try the /autoattack 1 as first command. Makes sense, gettting em attacking first and then /assisting, but if they don't have a target, then still won't work. Might just have to break down and make one key dedicated to being assist and nothing else as moosejaw said .
EQ1, I'd do: /assist whatever, /pause 2, /attack/cast/whatever inserting pauses of various lengths when casting spells. Worked great. We're playing over the internet, always going to be some latencies, some people have worse then others, so I cannot understand why they don't have a delay as a / command, especially since they had it in EQ1. But they also didn't have the "implied target" as EQ2 does, which is throwing me for a loop. I keep trying to make hotkeys like I did in EQ1 and it is kinda the same /commands.

So, with implied target, if my warden has my tank targetted and the warden cast a direct damage spell or any kinda hostile spell, that spell will land on the mob that my tank has targetted? Or if the warden has a mob targetted and the warden cast a heal spell, that heal spell will land on whomever the mob has targetted? I might have a couple accounts with 5 year vet rewards, but EQ2 is a whole new game for me lol. So, as long as all my boxes have my tank targetted, they will assist him without me even needing a /assist command? So really, I don't need a /assist button, I need a /target tank button which can be hit well before going into combat and then all boxes will attack the mob via the implied target my tank has...? And while in combat mode, the only time I break off from having my tank or main assist as target for any boxes is if I need to cast a beneficial spell on a different box, but then I can just include a /target tank at the end of the heal spell.

EQ1 you can't /follow outside of groups either, but you can group up, /follow a toon in the group, then disband and you'd still be following that toon. I use to run an alpha team and a bravo team with my rogue taking point Alpha team had my tank and usually shaman +whatever. My shaman was usually /follow on my tank and all others in that team would /follow the shaman. Bravo team had my druid and my druid would join alpha team in order to set-up /follow, then disband. All bravo team was /follow on my druid. I'd run ahead and check things out with my rogue then run my warrior through which would drag the whole box army with him. If I was going to attack a target, I'd break off follow with my shaman at a safe location thats close enought o land spells, then run in with my tank. Fights over, shaman goes back to following the tank and all others never stopped following the shaman. Or if I was just transiting, my warrior would just /follows my rogue...yep...9 accounts following 1. Unfortunately, just checked in game and once you disband for EQ2, /follow ends.
For

[Noxxy]

I honestly and humbly apologise - you are totally correct - my macro is assist first then autoattack not AAtck then assist

Yep - re implied target - I use all my heals this way - to reiterate what you have said but in a different way:
- healer /assists the tank
- therefore, the healer will have the tanks mob targetted (and not the tank)
- if the tank takes a few hits, the healer casts a heal which will land on the mob's target - that target being the tank or whoever else is targetted at the time the spell was cast

All my heals are set this way as are my cures (except one) - it basically means that each cure/heal is targetless if you like - and also means I only have 1 of each heal/cure

There are cases when this approach may put you in strife though:
- tank gets stifled (so can't taunt), mob starts chewing on say the DPS, in this case I do have my 1 and only targetted macro being simply '/target tank /useability cure' to remove the stifle/stun so it can begin taunting again
- another example, tank pulls mob, mob takes a swipe at say the healer in passing knocking it down 50%, then retargets the tank - to heal the damaged char I just throw a group heal (as I can't target the specific char who is damaged without a lot of fiddling)
- above I made a point of including the statement 'at the time the spell was cast' - so an example, mob is targetting tank, I cast a heal intended for the tank as a top up, mid cast the mob chews on the DPS knocking down 50%, the heal I am casting will land on the tank not the DPS which is the new prioirty - to heal the DPS mid-cast I retap the heal spell and as I have /cancel_spellcast included in the macro it simply restarts casting but with the DPS as the recipient of the heal

Personally, I would not recommend using /target - this basically means that your slaves will have say the tank, and only the tank, targetted - yes, all dmg spells will land on the tanks target but all heals / cures anything and everything will land on the tank alone even when the mob is targetting another group member - you 'could' get around it by always casting group heals but they aren't the most efficient or fastest heals (both in cast and refresh) to be using all the time

[Herc130]

I think having everything work off my tank on target may be best for me. Seems pretty simple that way. Also, I have an X-keys pro for each account ( look at the pic to the left), it is no problem to have keys dedicated to healing all my boxes for both my healers. In EQ1 I had 10 keys on the X-keys pro to assist my tank: fast heal him, heal over time him, delayed big heal ( love this spell, basically lands a heal that counts down from 20 seconds and is very low agro) big slow heal, snare his target, DoT his target, nuke his target, root his target, various debuffs and then a mirror of that for my other melee. And then I also had a fast heal and a heal over time for each box. I have more X-Keys buttons then I know what to do with really lol. And with only having to have a /target tank and a /target scout key and then working all other spells off that, I have even more X-keys to play around with then before. Both of my healers are already set-up to fast heal and big heal/heal over time all of my boxes by name. SO really as far as healing goes, they won't be healing via implied target. And I just noticed that a macro made by dragging the heal spell into the macro box and then typing in the name of the toon you want healed, does not change any targetting when used, so all my toons can keep my tank (or my scout if I am offtanking with him...or the tank died) as primary target at all times and heal all the toons I have by name using every kinda heal line EQ2 has ( fast, big & slow, HoTs, timed?) and I'd still have more Xkeys to play with then I can probably use. Hell, I use to have X-keys to just do emotes lol.

Really, /target on my tank clears it all up for me. I just gotta figure out how to layout the macros ingame. Before I was simulating all 58 keys ingame.....which was 7 hotbars onscreen. But I think I will just go down to three actually on screen and the rest just set-up with macros offscreen. I even have x-keys for moving each characterm which helps with placement if a box didn't set-up right to melee (although things die so fast at low level that its not even wortht he effort for now to move em) I can nudge em forward, left, right or back to place em better. Also have x-keys just to /follow different toons.

[Frosty]

Now that they are allowing more hotbars with keybinds, I'll probably set up designated keys to heal each member as I did in WoW. :thumbup:

[Herc130]

Let me make sure I am not missing some obvious setting that allows me to do it.

This is a screen of me setting up the hotkeys to work with the x-keys



This is with all the hotbars linked to X-keys off screen except for 1 bar that represents the 3x4 section in the middle of the xkeys that I will use for heroric opertunities.



Unfortunately, taking those hotbars off screen appearntly shuts em down completely and I can no longer hit my xkeys button to exicute the spell/ability/macro. Works fine if the hotbars are on screen. Was there a setting to allow me to use hotbars that are not on screen? Are am I going to have to re-think this and go through setting things up using the first hotbar and (shift+1-12)downarrow and basically re-doing it yet again from the ground up?

[Noxxy]

Actually - that's a very good question Herc - I've never tried firing off a key on a hotbar which isn't visible - I'll have a play tonight and see what I can come up with for you

As a note too - see all those macro icons which are blue and just say EQ2? - when you create the macro, the icon is the top right - beside it has little spinny arrows - hit the arrows and there's a whole bunch of other icons you can use - it may make it easier to associate a picture with your spells instead of trying to remem all the key positions on your x-keys

Few others bits which may help:
- you only need 1 group member to yell to break the encounter so that would free up a spot for you
- your going to have a fair few different types of rez spells in later levels
- unlike eq1 - we don't need to sit to regen mana / hp - /shudders at remembering sitting for hours with a troll SK trying to regen mana in eq1
- all chars 'run' by default (as opposed to walk) - the only time I actually use walk now is in dungeons with fearing mobs where I set the slaves to both walk and crouch
- honestly, don't ever remem needing to 'sprint' as you'll pwn most things - plus - at later levels your warden (by the look) will have evac
- at the start, we all get free food and water, personally, once this runs out I never restock food (perma-hungry) till 80. I always buy drink which is simply, your level rounding up to the next 10, as the mana regen is so good (i.e., so at 20, buy level 30 drink, etc). But that's somethig you won't need to worry about till your in your 20s- and dungeon crawling

Edit:
Forgot to mention - if hiding the bars and using the spells doesn't work - you can always shrink the hotbars
- right click a hbar, click hbar options?? (going from memory), and on the left? I think there is a either a slider or a number, have a fiddle with that and you can shrink the bars down a fair way
- hbars can also be displayed vertically as well as horizontal - basically, go back into hbars options again and unlock bar, hover your mouse over a corner, drag'n'drag till you get an outcome you like the look of
- also, see all those empty hbars borders? you can hide the grid lines if you wanted to by right clicking and selecting hide borders?? I think it is

[Herc130]

All the blue EQ2 boxes just represent an unused box since ingame hotbars are 12 buttons a row, while X-keys have 8 buttons per row (2+4+2.....+ being a blank space) Also, the near solid row of EQ2 boxes on the bottem is just because I set the xkeys to do up/down, left/right....and a jump outside of EQ2s hotkeys, so yah, the blue boxes are just to remind me not to put a spell, ability or macro there.

I am not sure what you mean by yelling to break an encounter? Totally in the dark there lol

I printed out icons from the wiki, but all of them are too small, but I think my hotkey/x-keys set-up will be going through many revamps along the way and I am not really sure what spells are must haves and what can be left in the book. So not gonna go through the effort of playing around with the icons in paint to get them the right size yet. Right now just trying to set-up all my toons in a playable manner. I was hoping to start playing again by today, but I think I will be using up most of the time just setting up the hotkeys and x-keys. Oh well, once they are set-up, it makes everything else much easier.

My wardens x-keys. Icons too small and not nearly done yet, but the plan for my healers is all heals and cures are on the top section, devided into 6 sections (3 top, 3 bottem) to correspond with how my screens are set up. Left section....so far I only have 3 keys (not counting food suommoning) just has a target tank and a target scout key. Then below that will be any hotile macro keys I make (only have one that does fire nuke and ice nuke so far) . Big middle section , top three rows will have probably all the hostile spells and heroic opertunity icons. Two bottem rows are movement keys and /follow keys. Right section will be whatever buffs the character has.


Sorry for the flash, it really puts a bad glare on things, but I don't know hwo to turn it off and blocking it just makes the picture red. Once I have the icons printed out to the right size and all buttons filled, it actually looks pretty cool. But I am gonna do that over time as it becomes more clear to me how best to do this. Right now, I am just trying to get it in a workable manner and all I need from each account is a /target tank and then melee attacks and spells...and heals. Back to re-programing the x-keys again. Only problem I have now is I can have the x-keys button shift into the hotbar I want, hit the key from that hotbar I want, but don't see how to swtich it back to the default #1 hotbar.

Thanks for the info on shrinking and adjusting the hotbar, that opens up some more options for me, Will be pretty useful.

[Frosty]

As a note too - see all those macro icons which are blue and just say EQ2? - when you create the macro, the icon is the top right - beside it has little spinny arrows - hit the arrows and there's a whole bunch of other icons you can use - it may make it easier to associate a picture with your spells instead of trying to remem all the key positions on your x-keys

You can also drag spells from your spell book onto that icon.

[Noxxy]

I am not sure what you mean by yelling to break an encounter? Totally in the dark there lol

The first picture posted - 3rd row, 2nd and 3rd icons = yell (as in yell for help) - basically, when you fight mobs, the encounter is locked to your team - so any passersby can't kill-steal or help if you get into trouble (i.e., mobs unattackable to them). When you /yell, the encounter is unlocked and passerbys can help get some mobs off you. Even when there is no-one around to help you, it is sometimes good to yell for help to avoid training a huge chunk of mobs all over the place (i.e., sometimes they reset back to their original positions faster - not all the time though). Once you yell though, the mob/s gives no exp or loot.

As for shifting between hotbars:
- first hbar - default = shift+1, shift+any other number = non-default
- second hbar - shift+alt+2 would be the default, any other number for non-default
- third - shift+ctrl+3 = default, any other number = non-default

So you got your xkeys to shift into the hbar - I assume it's just a matter of putting in the relevant 'default' command to revert back (i.e., shift+1 or shift+alt+2 or shift+ctrl+3)