Clicking vs Keybinding discussion

While keybinding helps somewhat don't make it into the divine thing it is not.

Wow is a very predictable game and like a chess player a good wow player thinks ahead and knows the abilities he wants to use next.
Situational awareness isn't something that comes with converting clicking to binding, it comes with people playing their game more seriously. Setting up addons and moving your bars to where you can see them AND your surroundings helps a lot more on that.
Also you have the GCD which gives clickers a 1 to 1,5 second window to move their mouse to their musclememorized location. Yes, muscle memory works for clickers also.

Also, for classes like rogues, they're for the most part not capped by GCD but by energy, is you don't let your energy get full AND do the right rotation there is quite some leeway on when you use your abilities so clickers are not at less of a disadvantage.

All in all, yes keybinding is preferred over clicking but it won't make the difference people make it believe. Playing your game more seriously is what makes that difference.

On another note, who has taken the next (obviously superiour ;-)) step which goes from mouselooking to mousemoving. Unbind your WASD and do all the moving of your character with the mouse, man I love the freedom my left hand now has.

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Also you have the GCD which gives clickers a 1 to 1,5 second window to move their mouse to their musclememorized location. Yes, muscle memory works for clickers also.

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Originally Posted by Myself, aka something I already posted but was ignored

Now. I have set myself up for the argument that "You are limited by the GCD in wow, you can only use an ability every 1 to 1.5 seconds (depending on character haste level)." This is correct. But, there are a lot of abilites off the GCD, also the ability to start pressing a key before the GCD has ended is important.

Why is it important? Assuming you haven't watched this video by Kripparrian. If you start spamming after the GCD has ended, you will not execute your ability until after the GCD has ended BUT after the server receives the information that your GCD has ended. This means you can lose 100 to 300 ms of up time every time you use an ability.

Over a 4 minutes 30 second fight you can see some where in the 200 GCD range. Losing say 200ms between abilities is 40 seconds of up time. That means the boss gets pulled, and you stand still for 40 seconds doing nothing. I can literally get disconnected, end wow, and log back into the game in less time then you waste doing that.

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I swear I could make a post that would solve the conflict in the middle east, break rsa, and solve world hunger and nobody would read it. So lets keep it short and sweet

***TLDR***
All top players use keybinds, pve and pvp. You can argue till your blue in the face. I have never met somebody, who killed heroic ragnaros, or got a gladiator title and clicked (or keyboard turned). All you are doing is handicapping yourself.

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Also, for classes like rogues, they're for the most part not capped by GCD but by energy, is you don't let your energy get full AND do the right rotation there is quite some leeway on when you use your abilities so clickers are not at less of a disadvantage.

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Rogues have to consider their positioning as part of the rotation. Also, sub-35% you ARE gcd capped as assassination. You have twice the energy that you need, and the rogue GCD is 1 second. On Occuthar sub-35% I am constantly on the move as the tanks never seem to get that you don't need to stand 180° to each other. Constantly on the move = my mouse is nowhere near the action bars and if I don't use my abilities I don't do any damage. Same goes for pretty much all melee. If you want a Firelands alternative, Shannox, Beth'tilac, Alysrazor, Rhyolith, Baleroc (to a lesser extent), Majordomo and Rag (OK so all of them) all require high dps while moving, and they require an accuracy of character steering not possible with WASD(QE) alone.

Keybinding IS better than clicking everything. You want sources? How about the dozens of threads made specifically about this topic since 2007. There is no rational argument that would substantiate the claim that clicking is better than keybinding. Or at least, I haven't seen one in 5.5 years of WoW playing. I'm fairly sure that I would have seen at least one in that time.

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On another note, who has taken the next (obviously superiour ;-)) step which goes from mouselooking to mousemoving. Unbind your WASD and do all the moving of your character with the mouse, man I love the freedom my left hand now has.

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Using WERSDF for movement is better than QWEASD, you gain 3 base keybinds left and right of the movement keys (QAY(Z) and Z(Y)HB) which can also be mapped with +alt, +crtl, +shift for 18 additional binds without stretching your hand unnecessarily (even more if you use combinations of modifiers) and you can also reach N and M with your thumb.

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Originally Posted by Fetzie

Using WERSDF for movement is better than QWEASD, you gain 3 base keybinds left and right of the movement keys (QAY(Z) and Z(Y)HB) which can also be mapped with +alt, +crtl, +shift for 18 additional binds without stretching your hand unnecessarily (even more if you use combinations of modifiers) and you can also reach N and M with your thumb.

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Hmm i move around with W + mouse and use S maybe once a day to backpedal (ie proper boss positioning, moving vehicles on Flame Leviathan etc), i don't see the benefits of strafing in WoW compared to a first person shooter. Keyboard turning is cruel, so it comes down to four binds maximum for movement (forward, backward if needed/wanted, strafe left/right). I could swap to E(S)D(F) to free up even more possible keys but i've ~ 40 abilities bound i use on a regular base and it feels sufficient for me.

Clicking is no option for me, not because it's for lesser skilled people etc but simply because i'm not good at reacting and aiming/hitting the right ability in time if necessary.

Forward is both mouse buttons, backpeddlr is the other left mouse button, and strafe is mouse wheel tilt

I wish my mouse button tilted...

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Originally Posted by Tengenstein

Forward is both mouse buttons, backpeddlr is the other left mouse button, and strafe is mouse wheel tilt

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Forward I the same, I have backpedal on the middle mouse button, an strafe left and right on the two side buttons on the left of my mouse. I tried to have it on tilt but was afried I would and up with a scrollwheel in my hands.
It took some practice getting used to though I started a new character and unbound wasd and by the time I got to level 50 it was "in my system". It's worth it though but definately not something you want to try on a main. Learn it on an alt then when you can also switch on your main.

I'm on to my second MX620 the backpeddle button failed on the last one. The switch spring broke in the on position, so I couldn't move forward and just passively backpeddled. THAT made ICC interesting.

I use QWE for movement in any MMO I play. Right now I use my naga buttons for binding with a mix of shift and alt. I used to use my keyboard for binds and I had some crazy ones :p

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Originally Posted by Aggathon

Disclaimer: I didn't really read the other posts here, so I might be repeating things. I went straight from "contemplative interesting discussion" to nerd rage.

There is a right answer... CLICKING IS BAD. DO NOT CLICK... EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Healers can get away with a "kind of clicking" by using keybinds, mouseover macros, and clique, but that's as close as you get, and clicking on a spell takes way more time and effort than just pressing keys.


This is just a grossly inaccurate statement. I never look at my keyboard, ever, and I have everything bound. I mean... maybe if you still have to look at your hands when you type, but the muscle memory for 12345 qefzvgt `, etc. etc. etc. etc. is there. There is no looking, you instantly queue up your next spell, no down time, no moving your mouse, no taking your eyes off what you need to to be raid aware. AND mouse moving is faster, if you keybind, you just click and move, no keyboard turning, no repositioning your mouse, you're just there. And in raid environments where you can get clipped by things (leaping flames on domo, engulfing flames on rag) by just being a half second off, keybinding is way preferred.


This is accurate



This made me giggle a little, opinions are not facts. BUT the FACT of the matter is, keybinding is better. You might be able to do "acceptable" damage or healing, or "acceptable" raid awareness etc. if you're just a REALLY GOOD CLICKER, but you're not going be at the best possible performance levels. Period. Keybinds, moving with your mouse, NOT CLICKING AND NOT KEYBOARD TURNING, flat out will make you a better raider. Period. Fact.

Now you might see a temporary drop in performance when switching from clicking to keybinds, you might even suck for a couple weeks, but stay with it because you will get better.

Signed,
Irylath, former clicker that L'd2 keybind and got WAY WAY WAY better.

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I know when i posted it, It didn't make sense. I was trying to get peoples personal opinions, and then back it up with why you do it. and there are some facts to back things up. I apologize because I was half-awake when posting it(sorta the same right now), and may have not wrote it in the right manner.

There is no debate here, keybinds > clicking. How much better is open for debate but uninteresting ... its like mouse turn vs keyboard turn. If you want to be the best you can be at wow you will need to mouse turn and keybind, end of story. I like the sub-debate about mouse-movement. I've been doing this since release with thumb 1 forward, thumb 2 back, and mousewheel tilt strafe. I still have strafe on my left hand too, however, as I've found the overlap important depending on what I'm doing (when healing it really helps to have some left hand movement available while cliquing my heals :)

Clicking works just fine for leveling. In PvE it can still put out competitive damage, keep people alive, or glue enemies to the tank (especially now). When playing against the machine, it isn't mandatory to perform at the absolute best that a human can achieve.

I know the original poster said this topic should cover PvE only, but I'm going to ignore that. Why artificially exclude an entire area of gameplay from having any weight on this matter? Because clickers don't survive long in PvP. I've seen clickers try to fight. They can either move, or cast. It is easy to remain behind them, where they are incapable of dealing any real damage.

Why are keybinders so insistent on their "superiority" over clickers? My guess is that all keybinders were clickers at some point in their gaming life. We used to click on everything, but moved onto a better system. Join us.

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My guess is that all keybinders were clickers at some point in their gaming life. We used to click on everything, but moved onto a better system.

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I think this too. We converted and have seen our own gameplay improve significantly, and thus hope to improve those that linger under the curse of the mouse but still can be saved :)

interesting read. ty for the content

Ever since Vanilla, and in every similar MMO, there has never been a good argument for why clicking abilities is a better alternative to primarily binds. This thread and the dozens before it in the past 6 or 7 years are proof of that.

I'm a keybinder that does not use a mouse (hate the stupid things), and I play on a laptop. Almost everything thing I do is key bound. Everything I do would be key bound if tab-target worked at all like it use to (seems to target furthest target rather than nearest target). I make extensive use of macros to make life easier for me by combining activations that I commonly use together, such as popping Avenger's Wraith and a specific trinket at the same time. The only down side is that I'm a keyboard turner, so PvP is challenging for me most of the time (playing a non-holy paladin makes PvP challenging pretty much all the time).

I don't look at my keyboard while playing, because this is how I've played for 2 years now. Did try to learn how to mouse turn, but found that it reduced the number of actions I could take simply because I had to remove one hand from the keyboard to maneuver (exchanging 48 board keys for 17 mouse keys was too much loss of control). Ironically enough, trying to mouse turn led to my desire to click over keying, so I dropped it until some later date when I'm not doing endgame content.

SJ

I'm not the most accomplished keybinder in the world, but most of what I do is keybound and has been that way for a looong time. Since DAoC in fact, where I played a Paladin and anyone here who played that class will know how much keybinding was a necessity for that. Twisting chants 24/7 while moving and doing your combat styles, simply wasn't going to happen with mouseclicks.

It makes a big difference, not just in terms of playing ability, but comfort as well. Trying to do everything through the fingers of your mouse hand places a lot of strain on that hand, keybinding spreads the workload across your hands.

Even if you're touch typing ability isn't great, you should be able to managed one or two bound keys and depending on what you choose to bind, you'll still see an improvement in performance. Especially if you combine that with mouseturning. You can always start with a few keys and building up over time. Practice is the key though, build up the muscle memory and you'll wonder how you ever managed to play without keybinds.

I know this post is fairly old, however I thought I would add a few things now that I have started posting on Tankspot.

It will always be better to use keybindings than 'clicking' for several reasons.

1.) Game Awareness. You will be focusing more of your attention to your Action Bars than someone who doesn't click. This gives you much less awareness of what is going on around you. Yes you can still see most of the stuff that goes on around you but you will always be slower at spotting and reacting than those who are decent keybinders and hardly ever need to look at there action bars.

2.) Abilities off of the GCD. Sure a great deal of this can be fixed with some macros, however how are you supposed to interupt an ability whilst continuing to maximise your DPS?

3.) Targetting. Tab Targetting is bad, it is as simple as that. I get so frustrated with those who tab target because it just isn't optimal at all. Playing with keybinds means you have the mouse free to actually physically click on the enemy you have to nuke instantly.

4.) Click on the lightwell! You have no idea how annoyed our Holy Priest gets by clickers :p. You just can't click on the lightwell whilst maximising your numbers.

5.) Keyboard turning. So you either have to keyboard turn or stop clicking on abilities for a second to be able to rotate. Both are very bad.

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Originally Posted by Zaronis

Why are keybinders so insistent on their "superiority" over clickers?

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This isn't so much about trying to claim superiority from where I am sitting. This is about trying to help said players do better. We all play this game for fun, and we do get our fun from different things sure, but what is wrong with trying to help everyone be the best they can be.

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Originally Posted by Fetzie

Using WERSDF for movement is better than QWEASD, you gain 3 base keybinds left and right of the movement keys (QAY(Z) and Z(Y)HB) which can also be mapped with +alt, +crtl, +shift for 18 additional binds without stretching your hand unnecessarily (even more if you use combinations of modifiers) and you can also reach N and M with your thumb.

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Just because you prefer a style does not make it 'better'. Unlike keybinding vs clicking, which there is a clear winner for, using WASD and ESDF has very little difference either side. You should not confuse personal style with optimal.
There are players, like me for example, who just don't need that many more keybinds. I have 48 on my mouse and 34 on my keyboard which is more than enough. Moving to use ESDF will achieve nothing, and for me is actually less optimal as I'd have to stretch futher to reach the modifiers.

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Originally Posted by Ishau

3.) Targetting. Tab Targetting is bad, it is as simple as that. I get so frustrated with those who tab target because it just isn't optimal at all. Playing with keybinds means you have the mouse free to actually physically click on the enemy you have to nuke instantly.

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There is worse things in the world then tab targeting. In a prefect world we would all use target macro's but we always can't. Tab targetting works on most fights when and add dies and you need to switch right back to the boss. But it has felt very broken after 4.3

Tab targetting is generally fine for a melee tank, but for dps it's a death wish, and for healers it's retarded. We used to call the dead rogues in my guild in BC the "tabfuckers". Hilarious. Drunk Southern drawl yelling out "tabfawkerzz" on vent after a few deaths usually made my night.