First off, this post is not directed to only damage only. it has to do with all roles in the PVE area of wow. I just made it damage because I'm forced to pick one.
me and a buddy are trying to finish this debate on which is better. were trying to see with the raiders of FL which is better sense it just keeps on repeating. would like your guys opinions and personal experiences. PVE Only
He says:
key binding is no faster then clicking. Even key binders have to look down at there keyboard during a boss fight.
Me:
I say that your more environmentally aware of your surroundings allowing you to see more of whats going on in the fight instead of looking at where my mouse is at that moment in time.
What are your personal opinions on this, and make sure your facts are correct.
There is no right answer, but I can say for a fact my muscle memory allows me to ignore looking at the keyboard. If thats not possible for you, mouse would work just fine. Personally for me, keybindings outperform mouse every time simply due to how familiar I am with my keyboard and layout, and having the same bindings for so long, but I think a combination is still appropriate, using mouse for longer CD's (Shield Wall, Tranquility, etc.)
What are your personal opinions on this, and make sure your facts are correct.
Wat?
A person that clicks his or her abilities will move out of fire slower due to either moving completely with WASD or needing to move the mouse away from the action bar to the general world area of the UI. If they use the mouse to turn as well as click, they cannot perform spells while moving (which can be the cause of wipes in heroic modes, especially rag where you need every point of damage you can produce).
Didn't want anyone saying oh clickers suck.. When you have nothing to back it up..Don't see how it could be explained any other way. "No say dumb things" i guess..Originally Posted by Bovinity
that's a terrible keybinder if they have to do that....
-Jimmy
|Ex Tank|
TWITCH.TV STREAM
Yeah, the point of keybinding is that you can play like you touch-type. Without looking at the keyboard.
Using keybinds is a lot like 'touch typing' namely the practice of typing with out looking at the keyboard.
If you had say a visual keyboard which you can make in windows. And spent days and hours practicing with it. You would not (this is a fact) be as fast at typing as somebody who can touch type. Simply because they are limited with the number of objects touching the keyboard.
A clicker only has his mouse. His mouse must move to the key in question then click it, then move to the next key in question. No matter how good he gets, he will have to do that. While a touch typist can press a key and as his finger removes it self from the key his next finger can already be half way to the next key.
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.
This is incorrect. It is a fact. Watch blood legion's stream the PTR you will notice the streamer has his eyes fixed on the screen of his computer not looking down at his keyboard. Nor will s/he look at this actionbars.He says:
key binding is no faster then clicking. Even key binders have to look down at there keyboard during a boss fight.
A clicker needs to look at his action bars. I would like to see a clicker correctly execute his/her 'rotation' blinded folded. They simply cannot. A clicker needs to look where his cursor is going so that he can click his next ability.
Looking at your action bars prevents him/her from looking around, being visually aware of his surroundings. If you have to look at your bars every 1.5 seconds then you are not looking at your character, your health bars, your debuffs, the boss, the tank, etc.
A keybind'er never takes his eyes off of his surroundings. He doesn't need to look at his bars because he knows where his abilities are, by touch and touch alone. For cool down management he looks at his bars once every 5 to 10 seconds.
Any questions?
[Today 06:48 PM] Ion:swimming in a natural body of water ISN'T acceptable...it's momentarily tolerable
I can press 5 keybinds on my left hand, 3 keybinds on right, and click 1 more keybind; Clicking 9 buttons at once is kinda hard unless you're real fast and precise with the mouse. because there comes a time in a warriors llife that you need to taunt, intervene the co-tank, pop recklessness, shieldblock, inner rage, shield slam, heroic strike, interupt and rallying cry to save the the raid. For the most part whatever you can click i can click too, and while we're clicking i can use my keybinds aswell
I don't look down at my key board (even thought i can't touch type) I can touch tank, and yes you may have to look down when you first start but you get out the habit of it soon enough, like you had to look at your feet the first time you learnd to waltz
You're mates wrong.
Last edited by Tengenstein; 10-20-2011 at 08:26 PM.
Practice makes prefect
[Today 06:48 PM] Ion:swimming in a natural body of water ISN'T acceptable...it's momentarily tolerable
I use my left hand on the keyboard and the right one on the mouse, but its a razarnaga with thumbpad. Mostly using keybinds as its just better and sometimes clicking a thing here or there.
As someone who can touch type and is a prot warrior tank id like to see how any clicker could keep up with mouse turns / selecting targets. then chaining multiple abilities with F keys while doing my standard rotation
and any good keyboard user does not need to look at the keyboard.
the only thing i click is ground mount, tranquility, and mark of the wild. i don't have to look down for any of my keybinds (naga + nostromo n52).
-Jimmy
|Ex Tank|
TWITCH.TV STREAM
Two key differences that have already been pointed out:
1. Abilities off the gcd. Most clockers tend to macro heroic strike or trinkets etc to other abilities where many keybinders do not. Mouse travel time and accuracy make it inefficient to have to click both where I can use two fingers at the same time to pop taunt + shield block, etc. Most clickers also keyboard turn which is an issue for directional abilities (usually not heals). Every person I knew who struggled with sindragosa's aoe were clickers (NOT the same as saying most clickers had issues).
2. Eye movement. Clicking means your eyes have to go to your bars minimum of every 1.5 seconds. Keybinds memorize by touch. Yes, when you first keybind you will lose performance. Only until you develop muscle memory.
"he doens't need healing, he doesn't need healing, he doesn't nee-WHAOSHIT!wtf was that man!". Please stop leaning on TDR. -Teng
Just to be clear, I realized I left several unfinished thoughts there.
Healing - click casting your heals is better IMO. That means a healer is frequently moving via keyboard. Since very few heals are directional (here's looking at you light of dawn) this is ok 98% of the time. Even here, I keybind non-heals. Tree of life, trinket etc. Pressing a keybind for natures swiftness with my mouse ALREADY over the target of that heal so it truly is almost instant has been the difference before.
The point in not macro'ing abilities off the gcd is better control. You can macro your dps trink for max uptime...or manually control it for use during heroism. And if you click it instead of keybind it, you lose dps time with those buffs during mouse movement frequently.
"he doens't need healing, he doesn't need healing, he doesn't nee-WHAOSHIT!wtf was that man!". Please stop leaning on TDR. -Teng
Click player
Move mouse all the way across the your screen
Click heal
Start casting heal
Player dies
Cast Interrupted because player is dead.
Healers aim for uptime also. The ability to mouse over a unit a frame and start casting AS SOON AS POSSIBLE can save lives.
Thank you for giving me an example of why you want to keybind your heals.
[Today 06:48 PM] Ion:swimming in a natural body of water ISN'T acceptable...it's momentarily tolerable
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 accurateMe:
I say that your more environmentally aware of your surroundings allowing you to see more of whats going on in the fight instead of looking at where my mouse is at that moment in time.
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.What are your personal opinions on this, and make sure your facts are correct.
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.
[Today 09:38 AM] Reev: The older I get, the more I think those Greek philosophers were just annoying hipsters.
On my healer toons, I use an addon called "Healium." I keep it small, out of the way, and with the tooltips turned off. I can see what's going on, but when I see a health bar dropping, I click the appropriate spell. Otherwise, I use the typical 1 to = layout Blizz provides and move with my mouse. Would it work better to keybind everything to my left hand? Perhaps! But as is, I do just fine. I don't lose DPS by moving my left arm (I did by changing chairs, but my back hurts way less!), I don't die to fires (unless wifey's yelling at me during the fight at the end of VP >.<), and I don't let others die if it can be avoided. However, relying on JUST clicking CAN promote tunnel vision which usually means you die.
I'm way better at holding my liquor than a panda.
Irylath, former clicker that L'd2 keybind and got WAY WAY WAY better
This, basically.
I used to click, too. I like to think I have higher-than-average dexterity and reactions, so for a long time it worked "ok". Honestly, I was pretty good, PvE'ed and PvP'ed pretty well, folks said I was a good player, blah blah.
One day I saw a PvP video. The guy was very impressive and talked about keybinds. I gave it a try. Holy crap. If I thought I had good dexterity and reactions before, switching to keybinds only amplified that. It's pretty ridiculous the difference it makes. I think back to how I used to be and just chuckle at that poor, silly newbie named Bovinity who thought he was good enough to get away with clicking. =D
When I said "click casting heals" I mean, grid + clique, vuhdoo, healium, etc. These are addons that essentially make mouseover macros for you and bind them to mouse clicks instead of keyboard buttons.
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