IntroductionGreetings, and welcome to the first installment of Peanutbutter's mini-series,
How2Play! This series is designed to play World of Warcraft better by applying proven theory and strategy and old-fashioned common sense.
CredentialsI have mediocre arena ratings and lead a guild that that is ranked
1418th in the US realms. How could I possibly know how to play? Well, the answer lies in a lot more than just metrics. Would you say Mother Theresa didn't know How2Help even though she lived among the most destitute people in the slums of India? Would you say Charles Manson didn't know How2Teach even though he managed to brainwash girls into doing his dirty work? Would you say George W Bush doesn't how How2Lead based upon... er don't answer that.
The truth is, not all credentialed individuals spend their time among the elite. That said, I'll try to keep my influence to areas of the game where I am most knowledgeable.
Episode One: Last Actionbar HeroAnd now, a funny baby.
This episode concerns something I've stressed for while now.
Designate one slot on your action bars, preferably something very easily accessible in the 1-6 range, as your gimmick button. This button will change constantly, depending on what encounter you are doing, and has even wider-reaching goals. I recommend you keybind as much as you possibly can, including less-used combinations such as stance-dancing, focus-cast macros, and other tools, but lots of fights have a gimmick for several/all people that a free button will always allow you to control. If you think you just don't have the space, I suggest you look at your buttons again and start deleting the useless ones, or moving them to more out-of-the-way spots (or ideally, keybinding them to more obscure binds).
I use #6 as my gimmick button, but you should use something comfortable for you to push. Here are some of my examples.
When fighting Archimonde, you need to have the Tears of the Goddess easily accessible.
Mother Shahraz is somewhat easier with a shadow resist potion (or cauldron).
Daily quests with items you need to click in a hurry are another good time to use this.
Another Daily quest where I'd rather just not keep my bags open, cluttering my screen.
When I spec to PVP, I need to put Silence on my bar and have the perfect spot for it.
Why not just click it? The answer is that clicking, no matter how good you are at is, is always slower than keybinding. You can hollar and argue about that all you want, but if you are trained at the highest level to do both, you will always do it faster when you keybind. You should keybind everything from trinkets to spells you cast in PVE and PVP. You can get away with not keybinding (and clicking instead) stuff like tradeskills.
Too used to clicking? I recommend you break the habit. Reorganize your action bars to use your most common abilities with the 1-5 keys, and then add keys like q, e, z, x, v, f, and g.
Don't even think about re-binding the 's' key, though, son. I want to see some motha' fuckin' 's' key action. The best way to get better is to improve small parts of you at a time, so take some time and practice this for a week, and you will find yourself instantly with faster reactions.
That's all for this week. Tune in next time when Peanutbutter continues teaching you How2Play. Next week we'll cover a topic dear to Peanutbutter's heart:
Macros.