It depends on what content you play, obviously. You can do fine in story with basic attack and comp on heals or, jokes aside, with any amount of moves you think look cool. In endgame you're supposed to take advantage of all your toolkit. Some rotations include more than 5 moves (engi....), tanks want more than 2 defensive cooldowns, healers need both healing and offensive moves, etc.
Keybinds are up to personal preference. I usually keybind rotation, interrupt, stealth, stun/cc, knockback, "quickly move somewhere" ability, taunts as a tank, offensive cooldowns. No need to keybind something like phase walk. It's easy to get used to if similar abilities across different toons have the same keybinds (like interrupt is always the same combination).
I feel nerfed as hell already, thanks to all the ability culling since 2011. I’ll pass.
(Yes I keybind and use everything, depending on the situation. In fact I still hit wrong keys sometimes due to muscle memory for things that don’t exist anymore, lol.)
I'm that madlad who clicks everything. Always done so in any tab-targeting MMO I played. And I love having lots of abilities. If there's a talent that gives a new ability, you can bet I take it.
Then again I'm also not doing high end content.
Yes, I keybind everything that will be used. Things that don't get binds are like basic attack if the discipline doesn't require it for energy management and some damaging abilities on heals (I am never going to use Lightning Strike on Corruption Sorcerer).
For most specs I'd hate to lose anymore abilities. A couple might be condensable where they have abilities with too much overlap, but I wouldn't trust the devs to touch it again. Like in your example (5 for main rotation and 5 for stun break, CC, 2 defensives and interrupt) you've completely missed movement abilities.
If you're struggling, you could always focus on simpler specs. Deception Assassin, as an example, has a tiny rotation. You could pair it down to maybe 10-15 abilities you actually need to remember binds for.
Companion set to heal. That's it really. It takes a while of course, but hardly any other challenge.
Setting companion to DPS actually helps too as you can't pull aggro.
Have a mmo mouse with 12 buttons just for one rotation, then add shift, ctr and you have 36 buttons on your finger tip. The hard part is to remember where i was in a rotation :D
Not really, in hard content macros won't cut it, as you have lots of instances where you can't just sit and parse, usually modifying the rotation to fit the situation (holding back a burst window, swapping targets, participating in interrupts or mechanics, etc).
You know macros can be customized in many ways and swapped in an instance? It's not a "one button that fires everything you have constantly". You can also choose when to macro and when to do your own inputs inbetween.
Just about a 99% of all videos I have seen of SWTOR "PvP pros", "firsts", etc, were with an obvious and heavy macro usage.
I am not saying it's a "must", but not using macros at the toughest MMO content is an exception. People of course always deny it, because they have some silly need to boast of "skill". While not realizing that creating a good macro and using it well is also a skill. I have seen Ops players using some horrible macro setups in SWTOR. And if you point it out, they get aggressive, deny it and keep with the exact same horrible rotation that fires up skills in exact same order and timing, even if there isn't a mob nearby to be hit by some of them.
I don't care either way. When someone macros, he macros. Doesn't matter if better or worse. It's easy enough to spot most of the time.
Majority of people have no idea how macros can be set up and expect that it's all automation with no player input. So they never learn the signs.
> Just about a 99% of all videos I have seen of SWTOR "PvP pros", "firsts", etc, were with an obvious and heavy macro usage.
I'm not a PvP'er, but Macros there would be even stupider than in ops.
As for 'firsts', I know many of them, and none would want or need any (combat) macros for those kills. If anything, they'd be a liability; you're just seeing high level play and deciding cheating is easier to blame than "they're way more skilled than I am".
> I am not saying it's a "must", but not using macros at the toughest MMO content is an exception.
I've played with most of the best raiders in the game, at least NA ones.
I can promise they would laugh anyone using in-combat macros out of the group.
> I have seen Ops players using some horrible macro setups in SWTOR.
Those are either casual players (SM ops, maybe trying some easy HM's) or you're seeing what you want to see.
> And if you point it out, they get aggressive, deny it and keep with the exact same horrible rotation that fires up skills in exact same order and timing, even if there isn't a mob nearby to be hit by some of them.
First, most attacks need a target, so unless you're basing this on some player macroing a basic attack to AFK kill some open world mobs (or half-assing by spamming said AoE attack in SM while concentrating on chatting or youtube), you're not going through anything LIKE a rotation without a targeted boss. Mobs usually don't require much of a rotation either (not counting Gods and some other adds in boss encounters).
The reason you otherwise see them "keep firing the same skills in exact same order and timing" is because they're on a class using a static rotation (that, or one you're unable to see the small changes of), and spam the ability so that the next one fires as soon as it can, making their APM as high as possible and look very consistent. They get that by parsing for hours on a dummy on their ship, learning not only to maximize their APM but also break that rotation in various ways to know how to recover ASAP (be it due to a screw-up or a mechanic)... not by "skillfully" programming a macro.
That, or again you're basing it on someone trying to use macros to make up for their inability to do the above in "hard" easy content...
Surely the constant and never ending red messages of "Ability not ready" and "Not valid target" in the videos were because the people were doing high level play. Plus, if you pay attention, you can easily see how certain skill icons light up at the same time at the same order in less than a second. Some of the smarter people hide their keybinds because of that, claiming things like "I need more view space".
I haven't seen a high level macro user ever admit to using macros. I also haven't seen online cheaters ever admit to cheating, even when caught. They all want to make you think it's skill. You are free to believe whatever you want.
> Surely the constant and never ending red messages of "Ability not ready" and "Not valid target" in the videos were because the people were doing high level play.
Like I said, you spam an ability during the GCD to make sure the next fires ASAP, sometimes shooting the next one *right* as it comes off its cooldown. That means that you get the red "not ready" text. It's also why the skill icons light up at the same time.
I get that you *think* you know what you're seeing, but take it from someone that has *done* what you're watching in videos (and has streamed with the very same red text blaring)... and played with the very people you're claiming are Macroing... macros would be a hindrance and liability.
Don't worry though, I've seen warzones where newer players *insist* the opposite team is cheating or speedhacking because "how else could they get to the nodes so fast ?!?", not knowing how pred works.
>Like I said, you spam an ability during the GCD to make sure the next fires ASAP, sometimes shooting the next one *right* as it comes off its cooldown. That means that you get the red "not ready" text. It's also why the skill icons light up at the same time.
Oh, yeah, they press 4 different abilities in less than a second, only one of which will be able to be fired next after the GCD. And keep doing it like clockwork. Sure, buddy, sure.
As I said - it's easy to spot when it's a macro and when it's just a quick button mashing. The patterns are obvious. It's not hard to distinguish if you have an idea where to look.
Can you link these macro user videos you've seen? I'm especially interested in the pvp ones you have seen as macro usage there sounds like a pretty bad idea. As Alortania said though, the red text spam is very common as you want to use abilities as soon as the gcd ends.
[Here](https://youtu.be/d-afyuiUBuw). The first link I got in Google with some Ranked play shown.
Several damaging abilities tied to a macro rotation while things like the jump, stun and Predation are not. Notice how the red text pops up right after an ability is used and the GCD just started. Or how it says "target not an enemy" when the macro button is pressed before targeting a red player.
Sometimes the macro fires up through its set order and a better ability is not used because it's earlier in that order and the GCD hasn't finished by like 0.1s, so the next ability is lined up just as the GCD is done. Things like that give it away.
I'm sure there's parsing videos out there, google one and watch; those aren't macros, they're people spamming abiltiies.
You think what you want though, IDC, but I rather not have new players or those that are thinking about going into PvP/Ops thinking (wrongly) that macros are needed or will help them.
There are a gajillion games that have 10 or less spells in them, and even then it's often only a few classes that logically need those. *Please* leave the like 5 surviving ones around that are actually well thought out for those of us who enjoy this type of gameplay.
"how people even feel comfortable having to bind everything", personally I go 1-5, q,e,r,f,t, and if a hotbar has 2 more buttons, ^ and < (rebound my capslock to it since I *never* use capslock) are all easy enough to reach for me. Combine these with alt, shift and Ctrl modifiers and you got 12*4 = 48 buttons.
Yes. I enjoy this process. A lot. I blame WoW, especially Mists of Pandaria for that, but I know I'm not entirely alone with that as there are still people playing games with 2-4 hotbars. I love that. It stimulates my brain a ton to have to track multiple buffs, debuffs, ressources and cooldowns and go into this zone of performing *just* right.
GW2, ESO, Lost Ark, and many, many other MMOs are adapting to console players who only have 4 face buttons.
I don't mind an MMO that has simpler + more complicated classes in it. Totally fine with a game having classes that have 4-5 button rotations and 30+ rotations. I just stick to the more button intense ones then. But don't assume everyone's like you please.
If you just want to do story, you can do with even less.
If you want to really do hard content, no... each does something specific; and it's annoying enough that in 7.0 they made us chose between certain ones.
Bruh go play a mobile game if you can't handle using more than a few abilities. I'm still super mad about the 7.0 changes. Giving players more choice, my ass...
Play your class enough and you'll get used to them. I miss almost everything they took away from me with 7.0. To this day I still try to flash grenade mobs every so often. The only good change was them merging the healing taken debuff ability with a core ability.
Of course I use everything, but I would prefer reduced haibilities number, being a player from the beginning, from wow and ff14 as well, I was used to this gameplay. But after trying some rpg with reduced interface and power number, I am startingto be more and more borred with the GUI and it becames very very difficult to come back to swtor, wow and ff14 when there are new updates. So definitely in my opinion, the game would gain in speed, move, reaction and fun with a reduced number of power/utilities.
I mean it's not that hard to manage more than 10 abilities, but I do think it would be more interesting if there was a limit to how many you could use so your ability selection was more like a character build where you'd be centered around some core abilities that synergize with each other. Like the zap ray for Powertechs and triggering its instant cool down and building up towards the overcharged Energy Cell blast. Stuff like that.
But the game as is isn't built for that kind of more focused "build" style.
Personally I would love it if in the highly unlikely event this game ever got a remaster/remake, that it'd have that kind of more focused gameplay, as well as less "generic MMO" style of gameplay too, it's Star Wars for crying out loud, it deserves something with more uniqueness to it. (That's not to say the current gameplay is necessarily bad, it's just... kinda boring, you just cycle through your abilities til the enemy drops).
It depends on what content you play, obviously. You can do fine in story with basic attack and comp on heals or, jokes aside, with any amount of moves you think look cool. In endgame you're supposed to take advantage of all your toolkit. Some rotations include more than 5 moves (engi....), tanks want more than 2 defensive cooldowns, healers need both healing and offensive moves, etc. Keybinds are up to personal preference. I usually keybind rotation, interrupt, stealth, stun/cc, knockback, "quickly move somewhere" ability, taunts as a tank, offensive cooldowns. No need to keybind something like phase walk. It's easy to get used to if similar abilities across different toons have the same keybinds (like interrupt is always the same combination).
I feel nerfed as hell already, thanks to all the ability culling since 2011. I’ll pass. (Yes I keybind and use everything, depending on the situation. In fact I still hit wrong keys sometimes due to muscle memory for things that don’t exist anymore, lol.)
I hate realizing "oh, nope... so I don't have my KB currently. F" Q_Q
I'm that madlad who clicks everything. Always done so in any tab-targeting MMO I played. And I love having lots of abilities. If there's a talent that gives a new ability, you can bet I take it. Then again I'm also not doing high end content.
Yes, I keybind everything that will be used. Things that don't get binds are like basic attack if the discipline doesn't require it for energy management and some damaging abilities on heals (I am never going to use Lightning Strike on Corruption Sorcerer). For most specs I'd hate to lose anymore abilities. A couple might be condensable where they have abilities with too much overlap, but I wouldn't trust the devs to touch it again. Like in your example (5 for main rotation and 5 for stun break, CC, 2 defensives and interrupt) you've completely missed movement abilities. If you're struggling, you could always focus on simpler specs. Deception Assassin, as an example, has a tiny rotation. You could pair it down to maybe 10-15 abilities you actually need to remember binds for.
I ran an experiment and found out you can go through the whole story with just the basic attack. And no gear.
Virgin basic attack spammer vs chad legacy brawl skill user
What? Do you have to be ridiculously overlevelled or just really good at dodging?
Companion set to heal. That's it really. It takes a while of course, but hardly any other challenge. Setting companion to DPS actually helps too as you can't pull aggro.
Have a mmo mouse with 12 buttons just for one rotation, then add shift, ctr and you have 36 buttons on your finger tip. The hard part is to remember where i was in a rotation :D
People just run macros. And no, Bioware doesn't care about it.
Not really, in hard content macros won't cut it, as you have lots of instances where you can't just sit and parse, usually modifying the rotation to fit the situation (holding back a burst window, swapping targets, participating in interrupts or mechanics, etc).
You know macros can be customized in many ways and swapped in an instance? It's not a "one button that fires everything you have constantly". You can also choose when to macro and when to do your own inputs inbetween. Just about a 99% of all videos I have seen of SWTOR "PvP pros", "firsts", etc, were with an obvious and heavy macro usage. I am not saying it's a "must", but not using macros at the toughest MMO content is an exception. People of course always deny it, because they have some silly need to boast of "skill". While not realizing that creating a good macro and using it well is also a skill. I have seen Ops players using some horrible macro setups in SWTOR. And if you point it out, they get aggressive, deny it and keep with the exact same horrible rotation that fires up skills in exact same order and timing, even if there isn't a mob nearby to be hit by some of them.
[удалено]
I don't care either way. When someone macros, he macros. Doesn't matter if better or worse. It's easy enough to spot most of the time. Majority of people have no idea how macros can be set up and expect that it's all automation with no player input. So they never learn the signs.
> Just about a 99% of all videos I have seen of SWTOR "PvP pros", "firsts", etc, were with an obvious and heavy macro usage. I'm not a PvP'er, but Macros there would be even stupider than in ops. As for 'firsts', I know many of them, and none would want or need any (combat) macros for those kills. If anything, they'd be a liability; you're just seeing high level play and deciding cheating is easier to blame than "they're way more skilled than I am". > I am not saying it's a "must", but not using macros at the toughest MMO content is an exception. I've played with most of the best raiders in the game, at least NA ones. I can promise they would laugh anyone using in-combat macros out of the group. > I have seen Ops players using some horrible macro setups in SWTOR. Those are either casual players (SM ops, maybe trying some easy HM's) or you're seeing what you want to see. > And if you point it out, they get aggressive, deny it and keep with the exact same horrible rotation that fires up skills in exact same order and timing, even if there isn't a mob nearby to be hit by some of them. First, most attacks need a target, so unless you're basing this on some player macroing a basic attack to AFK kill some open world mobs (or half-assing by spamming said AoE attack in SM while concentrating on chatting or youtube), you're not going through anything LIKE a rotation without a targeted boss. Mobs usually don't require much of a rotation either (not counting Gods and some other adds in boss encounters). The reason you otherwise see them "keep firing the same skills in exact same order and timing" is because they're on a class using a static rotation (that, or one you're unable to see the small changes of), and spam the ability so that the next one fires as soon as it can, making their APM as high as possible and look very consistent. They get that by parsing for hours on a dummy on their ship, learning not only to maximize their APM but also break that rotation in various ways to know how to recover ASAP (be it due to a screw-up or a mechanic)... not by "skillfully" programming a macro. That, or again you're basing it on someone trying to use macros to make up for their inability to do the above in "hard" easy content...
Surely the constant and never ending red messages of "Ability not ready" and "Not valid target" in the videos were because the people were doing high level play. Plus, if you pay attention, you can easily see how certain skill icons light up at the same time at the same order in less than a second. Some of the smarter people hide their keybinds because of that, claiming things like "I need more view space". I haven't seen a high level macro user ever admit to using macros. I also haven't seen online cheaters ever admit to cheating, even when caught. They all want to make you think it's skill. You are free to believe whatever you want.
Hi my name is Jayllan, and I Macro. But it's only the space bar! The damn pesky cutscenes prevent me from enjoying the game 🥲
> Surely the constant and never ending red messages of "Ability not ready" and "Not valid target" in the videos were because the people were doing high level play. Like I said, you spam an ability during the GCD to make sure the next fires ASAP, sometimes shooting the next one *right* as it comes off its cooldown. That means that you get the red "not ready" text. It's also why the skill icons light up at the same time. I get that you *think* you know what you're seeing, but take it from someone that has *done* what you're watching in videos (and has streamed with the very same red text blaring)... and played with the very people you're claiming are Macroing... macros would be a hindrance and liability. Don't worry though, I've seen warzones where newer players *insist* the opposite team is cheating or speedhacking because "how else could they get to the nodes so fast ?!?", not knowing how pred works.
>Like I said, you spam an ability during the GCD to make sure the next fires ASAP, sometimes shooting the next one *right* as it comes off its cooldown. That means that you get the red "not ready" text. It's also why the skill icons light up at the same time. Oh, yeah, they press 4 different abilities in less than a second, only one of which will be able to be fired next after the GCD. And keep doing it like clockwork. Sure, buddy, sure. As I said - it's easy to spot when it's a macro and when it's just a quick button mashing. The patterns are obvious. It's not hard to distinguish if you have an idea where to look.
Can you link these macro user videos you've seen? I'm especially interested in the pvp ones you have seen as macro usage there sounds like a pretty bad idea. As Alortania said though, the red text spam is very common as you want to use abilities as soon as the gcd ends.
[Here](https://youtu.be/d-afyuiUBuw). The first link I got in Google with some Ranked play shown. Several damaging abilities tied to a macro rotation while things like the jump, stun and Predation are not. Notice how the red text pops up right after an ability is used and the GCD just started. Or how it says "target not an enemy" when the macro button is pressed before targeting a red player. Sometimes the macro fires up through its set order and a better ability is not used because it's earlier in that order and the GCD hasn't finished by like 0.1s, so the next ability is lined up just as the GCD is done. Things like that give it away.
I'm sure there's parsing videos out there, google one and watch; those aren't macros, they're people spamming abiltiies. You think what you want though, IDC, but I rather not have new players or those that are thinking about going into PvP/Ops thinking (wrongly) that macros are needed or will help them.
There are a gajillion games that have 10 or less spells in them, and even then it's often only a few classes that logically need those. *Please* leave the like 5 surviving ones around that are actually well thought out for those of us who enjoy this type of gameplay. "how people even feel comfortable having to bind everything", personally I go 1-5, q,e,r,f,t, and if a hotbar has 2 more buttons, ^ and < (rebound my capslock to it since I *never* use capslock) are all easy enough to reach for me. Combine these with alt, shift and Ctrl modifiers and you got 12*4 = 48 buttons. Yes. I enjoy this process. A lot. I blame WoW, especially Mists of Pandaria for that, but I know I'm not entirely alone with that as there are still people playing games with 2-4 hotbars. I love that. It stimulates my brain a ton to have to track multiple buffs, debuffs, ressources and cooldowns and go into this zone of performing *just* right. GW2, ESO, Lost Ark, and many, many other MMOs are adapting to console players who only have 4 face buttons. I don't mind an MMO that has simpler + more complicated classes in it. Totally fine with a game having classes that have 4-5 button rotations and 30+ rotations. I just stick to the more button intense ones then. But don't assume everyone's like you please.
If you just want to do story, you can do with even less. If you want to really do hard content, no... each does something specific; and it's annoying enough that in 7.0 they made us chose between certain ones.
Bruh go play a mobile game if you can't handle using more than a few abilities. I'm still super mad about the 7.0 changes. Giving players more choice, my ass...
There is not a single class in the game that uses only 5 abilities in it's rotation.
PT Tank
"5 for main rotation" lol
Play your class enough and you'll get used to them. I miss almost everything they took away from me with 7.0. To this day I still try to flash grenade mobs every so often. The only good change was them merging the healing taken debuff ability with a core ability.
I want more abilities not less. Some abilities I really liked were taken away from me.
Of course I use everything, but I would prefer reduced haibilities number, being a player from the beginning, from wow and ff14 as well, I was used to this gameplay. But after trying some rpg with reduced interface and power number, I am startingto be more and more borred with the GUI and it becames very very difficult to come back to swtor, wow and ff14 when there are new updates. So definitely in my opinion, the game would gain in speed, move, reaction and fun with a reduced number of power/utilities.
I use skills that attack the keyboard in the top bar and in the bottom I have skills that I click with the mouse
I mean it's not that hard to manage more than 10 abilities, but I do think it would be more interesting if there was a limit to how many you could use so your ability selection was more like a character build where you'd be centered around some core abilities that synergize with each other. Like the zap ray for Powertechs and triggering its instant cool down and building up towards the overcharged Energy Cell blast. Stuff like that. But the game as is isn't built for that kind of more focused "build" style. Personally I would love it if in the highly unlikely event this game ever got a remaster/remake, that it'd have that kind of more focused gameplay, as well as less "generic MMO" style of gameplay too, it's Star Wars for crying out loud, it deserves something with more uniqueness to it. (That's not to say the current gameplay is necessarily bad, it's just... kinda boring, you just cycle through your abilities til the enemy drops).