The One Stop Elemental Shop - Page 73

Kaideq · 05/09/08, 11:32 AM

What is AHK?

Chaostheoryx · 05/09/08, 11:56 AM

Autohotkey, I've fixed the original post as well.

GoG · 05/09/08, 1:10 PM

Originally Posted by Chaostheoryx

The end result of that conversation was something like this: There are ways of screwing up a 4:1 rotation such that you lose most if not all DPS benefits while still incurring the increased mana cost. On the other hand, it is possible to achieve near-perfect results: http://elitistjerks.com/717090-post1654.html

I don't know how many ways there are of screwing it up or of doing it correctly. However, I would suggest that everyone grab LagInfo to see their performance. It will show you your interval as well as that of everyone in your party/raid. I was surprised to find that almost ALL of our casters had intervals of 140-180ms. They are now all using AutoHotkey and running 10-40ms. So that's equivalent to a permanent buff of ~80 haste rating per caster. If I spam LB I'll see 0-10ms. A 4:1 rotation puts me at about 36ms. Hunters may get depressed if they are using a castsequence macro, as ours clock in at 350-450ms depending on spec.

Fixed.

I have some questions.

One, exactly why does the mechanics of AutoHotKey help? If Blizzard has implemented a spell queue, wouldn't one simply need to enter the spell queue anytime prior to the end of their current cast? I'm not contesting your results at all, I've seen this myself, I just don't understand the implementation that would cause this.

Two, would you expect the Logitech G15 keyboard produce similar results to AutoHotKey?

Three, even using a 1ms key spammer, you did notice a latency loss using a chain lightning rotation? Granted its only 26ms difference but it's existance at all (unless your sample size was too small) indicates something about the spell queue mechanics slows down when switching the type of spell you are casting.

If you ever get bored I'd love to see results of your style of testing where you do a 4:1 rotation of rank 12 Lbolt to rank 11 Lbolt just for giggles.

Chaostheoryx · 05/09/08, 2:42 PM

One: A lot of folks in my guild were just too lazy to spam and hit the key well into the quartz red-zone. Some didn't realize that it's the key-up event that initiates the spell cast and so held it too long. It also relieves carpal-tunnel

Two: My guess is that AHK and the Logitech software driver operates similarly. AHK has more flexibility, however, such as enabling only while your WoW window is active or has focus. It's also 80 dollars cheaper.

Three: Rewriting this point whilst I test this at Dr. Boom... OK, I found out why my 4:1 rotation has been giving me 36ms average interval rather than 0-10ms. My Chain Lightning macro (the one bound to key 6) uses /cast Elemental Mastery along with a /use 13 (hex head). I took out the EM cast and I just got 11ms average on Boom. Just did another round and got 5ms. I discovered this when I tested just the interval between LB->CL I found:

LB->CL
67
188
238
169
113
91
-10
-1
221
129
88
231
177
74
53
71
141
88
111

Without '/cast Elemental Mastery' I got a more sensible:
11
-34
22
28
70
57
-34
81
34
30
12
29
25
35

Mox · 05/09/08, 2:56 PM

Can I just ask what macro you use along with AHK, do you simply have a key for LB and a key for CL and hold down your LB key untill CL is ready. Or do you have a cast sequence macro that casts 4 LB then a CL. I've noticed when I've tried it out using 2 seperate keys if I was alittle late "releasing" the key for LB the game would have already queued it up and would cast it so I wouldn't be able to do a CL till after.

Chaostheoryx · 05/09/08, 4:36 PM

Originally Posted by Mox

Can I just ask what macro you use along with AHK, do you simply have a key for LB and a key for CL and hold down your LB key untill CL is ready. Or do you have a cast sequence macro that casts 4 LB then a CL. I've noticed when I've tried it out using 2 seperate keys if I was alittle late "releasing" the key for LB the game would have already queued it up and would cast it so I wouldn't be able to do a CL till after.

I've a bit over 200 haste, so I've always got plenty of time to switch to the 6 key during the 4th LB. I use CoolDownTimers 2 to place a small bar above my cast bar that shows the 6s CL CD. So I hold 2 until the green CL bar goes away, then I hold 6. And BTW I tried having it send '62' to cast CL as soon as it's up, but performance is poor.

#ifWinActive World of Warcraft
{
$2::
   Loop  
   {
    if not GetKeyState("2", "P")
      break
     Send 2 
     sleep 1
    }
return
$6::
   Loop  
   {
    if not GetKeyState("6", "P")
      break
     Send 6 
     sleep 1
    }
return}

GoG · 05/09/08, 4:45 PM

I think he meant do you have a WoW macro bound to 2 and 6.

Interesting Dr Boom test. Perhaps the WoW client performs an expensive query to the system each time to determine if EM and/or the Hex trinket is available.

Maybe the answer is just to bind them both to my drums and forgo working them in on trash.

Chaostheoryx · 05/09/08, 5:00 PM

It seems to be only Elemental Mastery. I'm getting 5ms average with '/use 13'.. just took out EM.

And that's the entirety of my macros really: /use 13, /cast ....

GoG · 05/09/08, 5:36 PM

Do you think there would be a latency issue if you used AutoHotKey to spam the following macro?

/cast [modifier:shift] Chain lightning; [modfier:ctrl] Hex Head; [modifier:alt] EM; Lightning Bolt

In theory, while that macro is being spammed you could then simply hold down shift, cntrl, or alt and change what the next iteration would attempt to be.

Shkarn · 05/09/08, 5:42 PM

Chaos, how big of a performance increase did you see when you switched away from the AHK script that sent 62? What kind of "lag period" do you see when switching from CL back to LB?

Chaostheoryx · 05/09/08, 5:52 PM

Originally Posted by Shkarn

Chaos, how big of a performance increase did you see when you switched away from the AHK script that sent 62? What kind of "lag period" do you see when switching from CL back to LB?

One: When using the '62' method my 4:1 dps was a little less than my LB dps. Pretty sure when I did that test I tried it without macros and got the same results.

Two: CL-LB:
-28
23
59
-19
113
84
-9
-29
108
-48
-38
-17

Kyuki · 05/09/08, 7:23 PM

edit: Nvm

Binkenstein · 05/09/08, 9:58 PM

Originally Posted by Chaostheoryx

It seems to be only Elemental Mastery. I'm getting 5ms average with '/use 13'.. just took out EM.

And that's the entirety of my macros really.. /use 13, /cast blah

Hmm, maybe that's what was playing with my rotations. I was using a EM/CL macro.

Mirranda · 05/09/08, 10:18 PM

Originally Posted by Binkenstein

Hmm, maybe that's what was playing with my rotations. I was using a EM/CL macro.

If this is true, then what's an effective (or least disrupting) way to work it in I wonder. Or does it even really matter.

Chaostheoryx · 05/09/08, 10:24 PM

I like Gog's drums idea of putting it in a drum macro, think I'll give that a try.

Binkenstein · 05/10/08, 12:47 AM

I'm going to have a seperate button for CL/EM/Trinkets, and just use it when things are up. Should be a minimal way of doing it.

Mirranda · 05/10/08, 6:00 AM

Originally Posted by Binkenstein

I'm going to have a seperate button for CL/EM/Trinkets, and just use it when things are up. Should be a minimal way of doing it.

That's what I do already, I didn't realize that people did it differently. Do they have it as part of their main attack key? :o

Croaker · 05/10/08, 2:14 PM

Originally Posted by GoG

Do you think there would be a latency issue if you used AutoHotKey to spam the following macro?

/cast [modifier:shift] Chain lightning; [modfier:ctrl] Hex Head; [modifier:alt] EM; Lightning Bolt

In theory, while that macro is being spammed you could then simply hold down shift, cntrl, or alt and change what the next iteration would attempt to be.

Any macro in game will lag if you spam it because of the time it takes to parse it. I had a macro similar to this before I discovered AHK that I bound the free-spinning mousewheel on my Logitech MX Pro to. Straight up Lightning Bolt cast? No problem. Cooldown macro/cast? I'd drop to 5 FPS.

Shaftoe · 05/10/08, 2:56 PM

Originally Posted by Binkenstein

I'm going to have a seperate button for CL/EM/Trinkets, and just use it when things are up. Should be a minimal way of doing it.

This makes sense to me now.

I give myself Carpal Tunnel and spam my LB/CL hotkeys, use my EM keybinding when up, click my trinkets and I've never experienced a noticeable delay in casting.

When pvp'ing as 40/21 I do get a delay when using the "insta gib" EM/Trinket Slot 14/NS/CL Macro and sometimes it stalls itself completely.

I will vouch for experiencing no delay from NOT using a macro to cast CL/LB/Em/Trinket (always wondered why there was so much disccusion on something I never noticed unless I screwed up my rotation...)

GoG · 05/10/08, 5:48 PM

I've set up my G15 to just spam the 'C' key over and over. That's my lightning bolt. I've bound Shift C to Chain and AltC to EM/hex/drum trinket. I'm going to try starting up the C key spam then I just hold down shift to chain or alt to bust the cooldowns. But maybe i should not even macro the cooldowns together.

Kegsta · 05/11/08, 1:11 AM

I found having elemental mastery in the macro using AHK lagged me up a bit aswell, I sometimes get a bug where EM gets used, but doesn't go on cooldown on my end, the macro keeps trying to cast it resulting in the flaming hands animation being played over and over and dropping my FPS significantly.

Other than that AHK is working well for me, hope to see a little DPS increase on brut this week.

Mox · 05/11/08, 7:15 PM

Originally Posted by Roywyn

* Curses/spell penetration have no impact on level based partial resists. Which is moot due to the first point anyway.

So, spell penetration is totally useless for us in PvE? If so I'm going to change to subetly on cloak.

Binkenstein · 05/11/08, 8:23 PM

Originally Posted by Mox

So, spell penetration is totally useless for us in PvE? If so I'm going to change to subetly on cloak.

Correct.

Mmootimus · 05/11/08, 11:06 PM

Has there ever been a definitive blue answer on the legality of AHK for spell-spamming, or are so many people using it now anyway that the point has become moot?

I dug around a bit, and this blue post makes it reasonably clear Blizz disapprove. However I have never heard of them taking any action, and keyboards can of course do the same thing.

Chaostheoryx · 05/12/08, 12:05 PM

Originally Posted by Kegsta

I found having elemental mastery in the macro using AHK lagged me up a bit aswell, I sometimes get a bug where EM gets used, but doesn't go on cooldown on my end, the macro keeps trying to cast it resulting in the flaming hands animation being played over and over and dropping my FPS significantly.

Other than that AHK is working well for me, hope to see a little DPS increase on brut this week.

I want to point out for everyone here that just one person using the LagInfo addon can increase your raid DPS anywhere between 2 and 5%. I wouldn't think of doing Brutallus without having this addon to monitor caster performance in your raid. All the casters in my guild were at 160 - 240ms intervals before using this mod. Now every one of them is 0 - 50ms. Our mages are finally starting to catch up to me... Also, client-server latency is NOT a significant factor or valid excuse. No one should be in the triple digits.

So give that addon a try. Gain new insight into how yourself and your fellow casters are doing and perhaps find a free 2-5% DPS gain for your raids.