Take the Micro out of Macros

Ann,

Thanks for the reply, but I think that my reason for posting was misconstrued. I am going to post replies to your responses. Not upset or anything like that, but I want to make sure that my points are understood.

[Ann]
"to start out with, macros are rather old. They been around for years and had no updates so far (to my knowlage at least). Besides this, it was only meant to make it slightly easier so that you won't have to keep all your skills in the skill bars making it impossible to see much."
[OldNewb]
I can tell that they are old and have not been updated, and that they were meant to ease some aspects of gameplay. That is not a good enough reason to not ask for improvements and accept the current poor status. There are tons of features in programs today that we take for granted that do amazing things but started out with a totally different use in mind. The current implementation is missing out greatly on its potential and needs an upgrade.

[Ann]
"1. See my answer above. But I do agree this should be updated with new ones"
[OldNewb]
They don't have to create new ones. Just give me access to the icons that are already a part of the game.

[Ann]
2. Naming macro's is perhaps ok while working on them, but you won't need that during fighting. You don't have the time to read when mobs attack you. So would be rather pointless.
[OldNewb]
With limited icons to choose from (most of which I absolutely hate) there could be some that are reused until they expand the list of choices. If I were to hover over two macros with the same icon and see "Macro(0)" and "Macro(5)" that is not much help to me. Seeing "FireBlast" or "SlowPoison" (although admittedly they would have different icons) is helpful. But the suggestion on naming was more for allowing the inclusion on existing macros in other macros.

Say I am an archer and I want a set of macros for fighting ranged mobs and another for fighting ones that live to be all in my personal space. I create macros called "StartFight", "SlowPoison", "GetoffMe" and "BlastEm" that all call the appropriate skills. Then I create two macros called "RangedMob" and "CloseTalker". RangedMob will call StartFight, SlowPoison and then BlastEm. CloseTalker will call StartFight, SlowPoison, GetoffMe and finally BlastEm.

The power of being able to do that will open up very different gameplay, and I just can't see how this is pointless.

[Ann]
3. I noticed the same thing I fixed it with adding 2x 'Normal Attack' which seems to lessen this problem.
[OldNewb]
So adding the normal attack twice is a cool workaround, and I will try it. However, some of my macros are full and will not allow it.

[Ann]
4. Idea is nice, but i'm affraid you don't have much space left to place such things in.
[OldNewb]
Developers cannot hide forever behind the current implementation not easily handling a good feature. Trust me. I am a software developer and live it every day. Here is how i see it working.

When you create/edit a macro it brings up a new window that has a left and right side. The left will show the list of eligible macros and skills that can be added. On the right is the list of items that are currently added. You can remove, add and change the order of the items on the right. The order in which they appear in the (unlimited) list is how they will be run.

To keep people from creating recursive macros the game will do two things 1. Not include the current macro in the list of items that can be included. Of course this will only be an issue wen you are editing and not creating. 2. keep track off the name of the current macro that is being run and not allow it to be run again. This will come into play if someone includes a macro that includes the "parent" macro.

This is not hard to implement at all. Should be mostly a UI change and maybe one or two data structures behind the scenes.

[Ann]
5. Thats a matter of working out the scripts on the PWI crew side, nothing that you should worry about
[OldNewb]
I don't understand this at all. I believe that when you make a complaint, you should be prepared with a potential solution. Don't just whine about something. Put some effort into thinking about how it can work. The reality is that someone put some hard labor into making this game how it is. I don't want to just come in here and say. "THIS SUCKS!" I want to offer my experience in the form of what I know could be pitfalls and ways to get around them.