wiseman

Back before 2.0 I had a mod that essentially let you write code that would dictate the action your character would do when you hit the key bound to it. I can't quite recall the name.

But I pretty much had every major skill to the point where it was completely automated.

Since the new macro system came out I've been working on and improving a one button tanking macro. I know there are various third party programs and even a few add ons that make the macro system a little more robust and while a lot of that information isn't entirely mainstream I felt that if anywhere had some information on the subject, it would be these forums.

The macro I currently use is this.
Now obviously changes can be made to this macro depending on the situation. Like for example if you have devastate and are about to fight a hard hitting boss... assuming you want to use the one button macro for the boss, you could modify it like this:

I know blizzard has done their best to limit the functionality of this and I know alot of people consider automating the game to remove the fun of it. But the job where I work is to essentially find ways to automate things so I think that is just carrying over here. The funny thing is.. coming up with clever ways to automate tanking makes tanking MORE fun for me. Go figure.

Note: I know the macro isn't the most efficient threat cycle but for all intents and purposes it does its job very well. The only time the logic is wrong is when Shield Slam/Revenge are available and it randomly chooses to Sunder. From my experience this macro tends to keep Shield Slam and Revenge on cooldown pretty nicely. So I'm not losing much TPS.

Thoughts?

 

Brissa

Yea, why?
As you yourself say its clearly inferior for threat generation and you only end up lowering your bar by using a macro like this instead of raising the bar.

If you want to minimize the ammounts of buttons you have to press I would instead merge revenge with shield block (since pretty much most of the time you want to use both whenever they are up).
/cast [equipped:shields] Shield Block
/stopcasting
/cast Revenge

 

Twid

Be careful having a /stopcasting in any macro that you would be looking to press repeatedly while tanking. It will dequeue a heroic strike, something I did not realize for far too long.

 

wiseman

I'm mainly looking for the thoughts of people who have ventured down this path. I realize it's not the optimum way to go.

Also:

Last night on Magtheridon I noticed I had better results when I spam-clicked shield block rather than relied on waiting for my macro to use it. Does anyone have any explanation for that?

 

Melnor

if the call to do shield block in your macro is in a /castrandom statement with a few other abilities, then the chance of the macro to perform shield block when you want it to goes down exponentially. It's the nature of the castrandom function.

You give it a list of commands that you would like to call randomly. The bigger the list, the less chance you'll have of actually getting the ability you want to activate on time heh.

CastRandom is basically good for randomizing which Netherdrake you want to fly on or if you limit it to 2 or 3 abilities. I used to have one for activating on-click trinkets and for backstab. But I'm such a spaz that I'd be spamming the macro while the mob was dying and waste a trinket at the very end of a fight.

 

wiseman

If you look closely at the macro's I posted Shield Block would never be included in a cast random function as it does not operate on or trigger the GCD.

Shield Block and Heroic Strike can be added to any macro and should always be active. The problem is I am noticing that even if I spam the button as fast as possible I notice I can get a few ms faster by spam clicking the icon.

It's almost as if there is a bit of interface lag between Shield Blocks cooldown expiring and the macro allowing itself to use the skill.

 

Phoenix

Brissa - I think...

/castsequence reset=5 Shield Block, Revenge

...would work out better.

 

wiseman

A sequence for those 2 skills is completely unnecessary as is /stopcasting.

/cast Shield Block
/cast Revenge

 

Phoenix

Doh, forgot Shield Block doesn't trigger GCB. Me thick

Edit - Especially since you even mentioned it in your post

 

stampy

Just the idea of this shames any half decent warrior. If you want a class that can be automated with a silly macro, my best suggestion is that tanking is probably not for you.

Anything you can even approach a half-assed tanking job on with a macro is pretty damn boring to tank in the first place... its just the nature of the beast. Anything that isnt supremely boring to tank is going to be eating your friends while you stand around wailing on 1 with a mob behind you.

The time it would take to write and choose macros for all the different incoming damage, mob health, and mob count situations will take longer than learning to tank effectively anyways. You are making some presumptions in these macros that are flat out false as well... for example, you do NOT want to always activate heroic strike.

Heroic strike is a low aggro ragesuck, and you shouldnt go anywhere near it* unless you are using your max threat instant on every cooldown and your rage is still rising... even then I only hit it once rage starts staying above 40. Including rage lost from the swing, you are paying as much as 20 rage for 176 pre-modifier threat, and even that is mitigated by the mob's armor. Its a rage dump, plain and simple, and if you are fighting anything that can crank up your rage you had best be paying attention.

(*or if you need the biggest immediate threat pop possible on a transition, but thats a rare case and a different discussion.)


But... I digress. The main point is that these macros always have and always will suck. The best advice possible for one-button tanking is "dont." I dont know who you are grouping with, but unless they eat babies, set puppies on fire, and throw chainsaws at kittens, they probably deserve better.

There are some roles for some classes that can be fairly acceptably automated, for when you are feeling lazy in easy content. Tanking as a warrior isnt one of them.

 

wiseman

I love how no matter what you say in your first post, people always feel the need to tell you how they feel. Reminds me of forums.worldofwarcraft.com

If I wanted to hear people bash the idea I'd go post it there.

I know a 1 button macro will make me generate less threat. I know it makes it more boring to most people. I know I suck and you rule. I'm glad you shared.

I am not an idiot. I actually am a pretty good tank in an accomplished guild. In fights where I need to really push the threat ceiling up, I don't use the macro.

Did I come to the wrong forum for an on-topic macro-improving discussion?

 

Phoenix

Wiseman - the miniscule lag you detect is probably the game running the macro.

And FWIW I agree with Stampy - some, small macros can be useful but an all in one tanking solution is always going to be sup-optimal and unless your in a raid of monkeys hammering keyboards is 'a bad idea'.

 

wiseman

And for those that feel the need to argue the logic behind a macro.

Just how much can you automate safely?

Just because I chose to go so far with my macro doesn't mean macro's are completely useless and you can't simply take a step back and be fine.

Example:

/cast Shield Block
/castrandom Revenge, Shield Slam

Nothing wrong with this macro. You do the sunders and devastates yourself while spamming this. Provided rage is plentiful, this macro will keep all 3 of those skills on cooldown.

/castsequence reset=60 Bloodrage, Commanding Shout

This line doesn't really impact anything threatwise. Sure it uses a GCD every 60 seconds on Commanding Shout to keep it up. Sure I could refresh it every 119 seconds and be fine. But is that really worth arguing over?

/cast Heroic Strike

Yes. This is a rage dump. I love these forums because without them I never would have guessed. But on a boss fight where you're sitting at 100 rage... yes, you want to keep this toggled the entire fight. What better way than have a macro do it?

Does anyone have anything to add besides what I've specifically asked not to see?

 

Pyre

Pretty much, yeah. The point is to maximize performance, not maximize laziness. What benefit would you ever have from gimping your tanking just so you only have to hit one button?

 

wiseman

Macro's are the computer doing the thinking and the reacting. They are faster. The threat I lose by using a sunder instead of a revenge, but then revenge right after... is there... I realize it. But when comparing that loss in efficiency to the loss in efficiency to being a human. The computer wins.

Being more aware of your surroundings? Losing absolutely no TPS while moving a boss or performing extra functions the tank is expected to do in the increasingly complex fights blizzard is adding?

I first started automating alot of the skills back in blackwing lair on fights where I was required to move and turn bosses during certain abilities.

And all things being equal.. if the logic of the macro is correct, it will beat the human every time.

A great skill to develop is being able to see the value in something... even something trivial or seemingly stupid.

Ignorance and close mindedness is not what I was looking for... I will seek my answers elsewhere.

 

Pyre

You've already admitted that you lose threat when you use a macro.

As others have pointed out, the macro would have to be excessively complex to perform as well as a relatively skilled, thinking player. To presume otherwise is fairly insulting to relatively skilled, thinking players. Would you want to play a game where pushing the same button repeatedly gave you the best performance you could get?

A great skill to develop is not to walk into a theorycrafting forum with ideas that inherently reduce performance.

Ok.

 

Senerius

Seeing this made me wonder if something might be possible, and unfortunately I'm at work where I cannot test it... could you do something like...

The reset numbers may not make any sense, so let me explain - the point of them is to put the reset number as the cooldown values and let the order of the lines in the macro set a sort of priority. You could put the reset numbers above the actual skill cooldown in order to lower the priority, even.

For this to work, /castsequence would have to work by using the next skill in the sequence and then stopping the macro, or continuing the macro if there is nothing in the sequence ready to be used. I have no idea how /castsequence works or if that sort of functionality could be achieved by some other combination of commands and I apologize that I cannot test it out in-game, but maybe it'll give someone some ideas.

An example that might make more sense is a Druid self-buff macro:

For those going why?, feel fry to ignore me. This is an exercise is curiosity and what-if's for me, although I think that if this works, it may be possible to create an optimal Balance Druid nuking macro...

 

• Chicken

Is the exact same as:

The reset for castsequence only matters if there's multiple casts in it, you could try putting in a 'dummy' spell at the end of the castsequence (Basically, a spell that doesn't exist), though last I tried that caused more problems than it could potentially solve.

reset=[number] in a /castsequence basically works like this: If no succesful spells in that /castsequence have been cast for [number] second, head back to the first step of the sequence. I use it myself for Mana Tap > Arcane Torrent, though that's an imperfect way of using it, it's simply a lazy automation over having to think about it myself.

buff /bʌf/ Pronunciation[buhf]
–verb (used with object)
- to reduce or deaden the force of

 

Kruthal

No, that won't work, only the first line will ever be executed.


I find an addon like SmartBuff easier for that myself, but YMMV

 

wiseman

1st: When I said "losing no TPS while moving a boss or performing other duties" I'm talking about, in comparison to your TPS when you were standing still mindlessly tanking. You notice no drop in TPS when you have to do something extra, like move the boss.

2nd: I lose threat when sunder/devastate is in the castrandom. But not if sunder/devastate isn't part of the macro. You're very selective about what parts of my posts you even bother to read. You've missed a lot of it..

Again... no. In fact, the more simple a macro is, the higher the probability that it will perform the actions involved faster than a human. For example: the shield block/revenge macro you use.

See point number one. Not all macro's reduce performance. Why would they even exist?

Advanced Macros are easy to consider theoretical. I want to make some.

Theorycrafting sounded right.

I'm sorry if my lack of intelligence insults you.. but I promise if you never post in this thread again.. you'll end up being happier as a result; as will I.

 

wiseman

I've thought of the dummy spell before.. it is a very interesting beast. If such a thing exists. I guess it comes down to what you can use in a castsequence. Can you slap a use trinket command in there? Not all trinkets have uses, I wonder if that would stop the sequence until reset.

However this would be more useful for casters than for warriors and it would only really work well to apply a buff/use a cooldown as a lost resort at the bottom of a macro.

The reason

/castsequence reset=60 Bloodrage, Commanding Shout

works so well is that the commanding shout succeeds.. thus allowing you access to further down the macro.

 

Pyre

All that's utterly irrelevant when the point is TPS using the macro vs TPS when, you know, you actually use your brain.

No, no. I'm quite sure I've not.

That's never been the issue. The issue is whether those are the proper actions to perform. I agree that a one-press macro will allow you to do the wrong things much more efficiently.

Sounds like you're fairly unclear about the purpose of the forum, then. Perhaps a little more reading and a little less posting would fix that.

Then again, maybe not.

That's so unfair! You already promised to look for your answers elsewhere.

 

wiseman

Your profile says you have a lot of alts. Pyre is listed as your main character. You have no warrior alt listed.

I checked your armory profile:

Level: 70
Epics: 0
Blues: 11
Greens: 5
Exhaulted Factions: 0
Revered Factions: 0

You have no heroic keys. You're neutral with Hydraxian, Zandalar, Cenarian Circle.. there is no evidence to support you've ever joined a party bigger than 5 people.

How can you honestly have any perspective on anything being discussed here?

Why are you here? And why do you talk to people that way?

 

Pyre

All of that is true.

Your appeal to authority is touching, but irrelevant. Your concept is absurd, and my posts here are intended to point that out to you. Do I really have to link you my warrior's profile for you to believe that a "One Button Tanking Macro" is stupid?

 

Edghar

That's fine if you don't like it, but some people enjoy working with macros for proof of concept purposes or to improve performance. Try not to get so angry when people like doing things differently than you.