Macro of the day!

Today's macro of the day is an Innervate macro for teh dr00dz.

This macro uses my typical Mouseover => Target => Self priority.  That means the first target it will attempt to innervate is whatever target your mouse is over... Then, if you don't have your mouse over a friendly target, it will check to see if your current target is friendly.  If not, then it will just target yourself and cast innervate on yourself.  Also, it will show the tooltip for Innervate so you can mouseover it to check the cooldown.

#showtooltip

/cast [target=mouseover,help][help][target=player] Innervate

There you go.  Simple, but unbelievably critical for it to be simple when you're in the heat of healing a full group, have lifebloom stacks on several group members, and you're running low on mana.  I typically have my main tank set to focus, and have the mob they're killing set as my target, so for me, pressing this macro will always innervate myself unless I'm pointing at a party member (since my mouse pointer is always hidden using MouseLook)

Macro changes for 2.3.3 - and a macro of the day for Warriors

Well, we have a new patch today, and I thought I'd post a little something about the macro changes in it.

Actually, there is only one change that in the patch notes.

Using a castsequence macro on a target moving out of range will no longer cause it to stop working.

I've never experienced this problem myself, but apparently it was a problem, and they've fixed it.

Next, I'd like to post this macro of the day.  This one is for warriors trying to use Shield Bash.

#showtooltip

/equip [noequipped:Shields] {name of your shield here}

/equip [noequipped:Swords] {name of your sword here}

/cast [stance:1/2,equipped:Shields] Shield Bash

This one needs some customization.  First, you need to add the name of your shield to the macro.  It's easiest if you position your cursor in the macro edit window after the [noequipped:Shields] part, then shift-left-click your shield to get the game to type the name of your shield for you.

Next, you need to add the name of your One-Hander weapon.  In my example above, it uses a One-Handed Sword.  You might have a one-handed mace, one-handed axe, or a dagger instead, so if you do, you'll have to change the [noequipped:Swords] part to use one of these code-words instead:

"One-Handed Axes"
"One-Handed Maces"
"One-Handed Swords"
"Fist Weapons"
"Daggers"

Actually, as I review these codes, I find that this is supposed to work: "One-Hand" - if that does what I think it does, then it should cover any kind of weapon that fits in your main hand while holding a shield, so unless you want to make sure a CERTAIN kind of one-hander is equipped, you could just used [noequipped:One-Hand]

Now, here is what this macro does, step by step.

4) First, it checks to see if you have a shield equipped.  If not, it equips your shield.

5) Next, it checks to see if you have your one-hand weapon equipped.  If not, it equips it to go along with your shield (so that you don't have to stop doing damage)

1) Next, it checks to see if you are in either Defensive stance or Battle Stance...

2) if so, it then checks to see if you have a shield equipped...

3) if so, it casts Shield Bash on your current target.

If you try this macro and you end up wondering why it doesn't equip your shield and then Shield Bash all in one button press, you need to understand that if you change your weapon or offhand during combat, it triggers a one-second global cooldown on all your spells, making it impossible to cast Shield Bash immediately after equipping your shield.  You will have to press the button twice if you don't already have your shield equipped. 

This global cooldown doesn't trigger if you are NOT in combat...  So, if you happen to be standing next to an enemy that is casting a spell, and you are not already in combat, you can get away with a one-button Shield Bash, but it will drag you into combat.

There you have it, Enjoy folks!

Mage Mana Gem Macro

Here is a macro that has been serving me well lately. 

/castsequence [button:2] reset=120 Conjure Mana Ruby, Conjure Mana Citrine, Conjure Mana Jade, Conjure Mana Agate;
/stopmacro [button:2]
/use Mana Ruby
/use Mana Citrine
/use Mana Jade
/use Mana Agate

This macro lets me CREATE my mana gems if I RIGHT-CLICK on the button on the action bar four times.  It has a 120 second reset so that I have time to sit and drink if I don't get them all created in one pass.  To USE a mana gem, I can either left-click the button, or I can press the hot-key(I usually press the hot--key from my Nostromo).  It pops up error messages, but at least it gets a mana gem used.

Wand Macro not working

I've been having a problem with my Wand shooting, and I finally figured out what the problem is.

Here is a line from the 2.3.2 patch notes that I missed:

/cast will toggle spells again unless the name is prefixed with an exclamation mark, e.g. /castsequence Steady Shot, !Auto Shot

So, this apparently affects abilities that switch on and off like Shoot: Wand, Auto Shot, and Attack.  They changed these abilities a while back so that if you macro'd them, they would automatically start up, but not cancel - thus you could spam a macro that had /cast Shoot and it wouldn't cancel on you.

In 2.3.2 they changed that back, but added a feature where you can put an exclamation point in front of the spell name to make it a "switch it on only" kind of thing instead of a toggle.

Very nice touch!

You're Doing It Wrong.

Last night, while using the /LFG mechanism on my 29 priest, I happened to join a RFK group.

This group was composed of myself, and two hunters - one was level 23, and the other was level 34.  I told them I'd stick around if they could fill the group quickly, but they suggested we could 3-man it.

Recently, I completed a 3-man run of BFD when I was of appropriate level for BFD.  That group consisted of myself and two warriors - both of which I could tell were played by kids under 14 (gee, thanks Blizzard internal Voice Chat).  To my surprise, both of these guys had at least some clue what they were doing, and were both able to follow my suggestions on how to survive all the encounters with just the 3 of us.  It was an enjoyable experience, and I got to make myself feel good as a healer keeping these two guys alive the whole time.

So, I figure this group with 2 hunters wouldn't be so bad - I actually saw it as an opportunity to challenge myself.  As I always say, the best way to learn your class is to run PUG's.  You never know how good you can be until you have to deal with a real 'oh-shit' moment... and PUG's give the best opportunity for that.

Now, I know there is a nasty stereotype out there with regard to Hunters, and boy did these two guys reinforce that stereotype :(  We had hunter pets pulling extra mobs all the time.  There were only two pets, but they both seemed to pull extra mob packs.

To make matters worse, these two guys were pulling like they do out in the outdoor world - they would target a mob, and send in their pet.  I had to explain that they should NOT do that; they should fire a shot to get the mobs to come to us, THEN activate their pets once the mobs are far away from any un-pulled other mob packs.  I've never understood what is so hard to understand about this concept - if you've already cleared a nice safe spot, pull mobs to it.

Somehow, amazingly, I was able to keep these two guys alive through almost every bad pull.  At one boss, the low level hunter went down, but I was able to tank the boss while the other hunter shot at him... at least, I think the other hunter was shooting him...  I dotted it and just shield/renew/flash healed myself until I was out of mana, then I pulled some more mana out of my ass and kept going.  (Blood elf priests have lots of places to look for extra mana hehehe)

I ended up having to abandon the group because I was getting to close to 30, and I haven't finished my run in BG's with this priest.  It was an interesting experience though.

Insane amounts of +Healing at a LOW level

Ok, I've been working on leveling another priest lately.  This time, I'm going holy.

I guess you can say I've been conducting an experiment with this guy, in that I've been hoarding all the +healing gear I can get to the exclusion of all other stats including intellect and stamina.  I have also been leveling exclusively in PUGs in instances. 

I'm level 29, and I have +165 healing.  Getting this hasn't been easy... basically, I check the AH between every run and buy any greens 'of healing' that are upgrades in +heal.  I'm on a small server now, so they don't show up often.  It's not something you can do if you just walk up to the AH once - you have to keep going back and checking for upgrades as often as possible.

The result, so far, has been interesting.  I keep my groups healed primarily with Renew.  Primarily as in I never have to cast anything else.  I think on average in my runs of BFD and RFK, I've had to cast real heals (Lesser Heal or just Heal) about 5 times.  Healing has been so easy, I often throw out SW:P and whip out my wand and come in second or third on the DPS meter when there are two or more mobs to fight.

In one SM graveyard group at 28, my group chastised me for having only 700 hp.  I died a few times - partly because I was being sloppy - but mostly because we were doing it wrong.  Specifically, we had 3 priests, a warlock, and a shaman who couldn't tank.  Casting renew on anyone usually meant I was going to pull aggro because NOONE was bothering to control adds at all.  It was craziness.  Once they complained about my HP, and since I felt I was being watched, I adjusted my tactics, eliminated my sloppy, and didn't die again.  I basically let the level 33 priest do the healing and I just /assist'd the shaman.  I did pretty well on the DPS meter, considering I was using SW:P, Mind Blast, and Smite (holy spec), but the important part is that I didn't pull aggro any more.

What does this have to do with macros...

Well, I have this priest setup like my other healers.  I'm using Clique to control which spells I cast, so basically my usual method of healing is just right-clicking on my party's health bars to cast renew.  Alt-Left-Click is lesser heal, and Alt-Right-Click is Heal.

In PvP, I feel that sRaidFrames is essential, because it can fade out the healbars of anyone who is not in range of my heals.  This gives me an instant and continuous feel for who I can heal.  If they are in range of me, I heal them.

I'll update about this priest again later :)