[RIFT] Click Healing Guide

[Alge]

RIFT Click Healing Guide by Alge

Credit: the original idea behind this guide is due to ZorbaTheGeek. You can find the original WoW version of this guide at http://www.dual-boxing.com/showthread.php?t=33614.

Disclaimer: This document is a guide, not a step-by-step walkthrough. It assumes some familiarity with ISBoxer and important ISBoxer concepts. It also assumes you largely know what you are doing and can troubleshoot problems. However, it does contain links to supplementary information where relevant for those who are still learning ISBoxer and wish to dive in regardless. I am prepared to provide support to people who have shown some indication of familiarity with the contents of this guide and who ask specific questions. I will probably just ignore you if you are too lazy to put some effort in to working this out or just ask vague questions. That being said, there may be errors or omissions in this guide and I would appreciate being informed of an issues you discover.

I. The Destination

The picture above shows what I am aiming for in this guide. Three regions will be overlaid on the raid frames which provide different behaviour on left and right clicks. Of course, you may set yours up differently, this is just a guide.

I use the right region for small heals, the middle region for medium heals and the left region for large/emergency heals. Some people may prefer a single region and to use modifier keys + mouse clicks. My raid frames are larger than normal size so that the regions are not too small as to cause mis-clicks.

II. Overview

The major components of setting up Click Healing for RIFT include:

1. The ability to use the RIFT raid frames. I run a team of 5 so I am always able to ensure that I can convert my group to a raid. Despite the warning in the raid frame itself I have not noticed any reduction in experience or gold when the raid consists solely of one party.
   
   Use of the raid frames is required to ensure that all characters have their UI elements at the same location and in the same order on their respective screens at all times (we will do this in Part V). The ordering of RIFT party frames varies from party member to party member and so cannot be used for this purpose.
2. A Click Bar. The Click Bar receives mouse clicks and uses them to trigger a number of ISBoxer Mapped Keys. The Click Bar overlays the RIFT Raid Frames so that clicking the Click Bar can result in a spell being cast on the character whose UI element is currently under the mouse.
3. A Key Map containing Mapped Keys that will be activated by clicking (optionally with modifiers) on the Click Bar. These Mapped Keys perform two Actions: synchronise the cursor location of the healer to that of the active character using a Sync Cursor Action and send a Keystroke Action to the appropriate Targets.
4. RIFT Macros on each character that cast a spell on the player character whose UI element is under the mouse. The crucial part of the macro is the command “cast @mouseoverui <spell>”. This is a recent addition (Patch 1.2) to RIFT and avoids the previous issue where the raid frames being over a character in the world resulted in unpredictable behaviour.

The key bindings of these macros in RIFT must match the keystrokes sent by the Mapped Keys.

For those experienced in using ISBoxer the above outline may be enough to produce a working Click Healing setup. More detailed instructions follow. Note that the components are best created in the reverse order to that described above.

[Alge]

III. Rift Macros

For each healer you wish to use Click Healing with you will need to follow the steps below:

1. Create macros. Examples are provided below. Note that the stopcasting step of the macros is optional and I use it in some macros only.
   
   On my Purifier/Sentinel at level 29 I use 3 macros:
   
   1. Name: MOHealingFlame
      
      

      Code:

      #show Healing Flame
stopcasting
cast @mouseoverui Healing Breath
cast @mouseoverui Healing Flame

      
      
      This macro is my quick heal. If the cooldown on Healing Breath is up it casts a small instant heal otherwise a 1.5 sec cast Small Heal.
   2. Name: MODecurse
      
      

      Code:

      #show Cauterize
stopcasting
cast @mouseoverui Sterilize
cast @mouseoverui Cauterize

      
      
      This macro is for decursing. Every 45 seconds I get the version which removes all curses/poisons instead of just one.
   3. Name: MORestorativeFlame
      
      

      Code:

      #show Restorative Flame
cast @mouseoverui Ward of the Ancestors
cast @mouseoverui Restorative Flame


      
      This macro is my main healing tool. It casts an instant-cast shield when available and a big, slow heal otherwise.
   
   On my Chloromancer at level 29 I use 2 macros:
   
   1. Name: MOBloom
      
      

      Code:

      #show Bloom
stopcasting
cast @mouseoverui Bloom
cast @mouseoverui Flourish

      
      
      This macro is my main non-passive healing tool on the Chloromancer. If Bloom (single target) is still on cooldown (8 secs) then it attempts to cast Flourish (group) instead.
   2. Name: MOFlourish
      
      

      Code:

      #show Flourish
stopcasting
cast @mouseoverui Flourish
cast @mouseoverui Bloom


      
      This macro is my for group healing. If Flourish (group) is on cooldown (20 secs) then it attempts to cast Bloom (single target) instead.
2. Drag the macros from the macro editor onto a visible RIFT action bar.
3. Use the RIFT key binding system to bind a key to each action bar button with a macro on it. You will need to make a note of which macro is bound to which key. I use (and reserve) F6, F7, F8, F9 and F10 for these macros. You can use whatever you like.

[Alge]

IV. Key Map and Mapped Keys

We are going to create a new Key Map to hold the Mapped Keys which respond to clicks on our click bar buttons.

1. In ISBoxer’s top pane, right-click Key Maps.
2. Choose New Key Map.
3. Type the name for the new Key Map. I call mine “MO Heals” (short for mouseover heals).
4. Select your new Key Map in the top pane, then scroll up and drag your character set(s) into the bottom pane so they are enabled for that Key Map.
   The number of Mapped Keys you will need to create depends upon how many buttons you want your click bar to have and how many click combinations you want your buttons to respond to. I use 3 buttons on my click bar and just use left and right clicks, so I will be creating 6 mapped keys called:
   
   • Left Small
   • Right Small
   • Left Medium
   • Right Medium
   • Left Large
   • Right Large

You could have as few as 1 mapped key or many more if you wish to use clicks + modifiers or want to separate your heals out more than I do.

To create a mapped key for use with click healing:

1. Select the Key Map (MO Heals) in the top pane in ISBoxer.
2. In the bottom left pane, right-click on Mapped Keys (under MO Heals) and select New Mapped Key.
3. Enter the appropriate name for the new Mapped Key.
4. Click on the name of the new Mapped Key to select it.
5. In the bottom right pane, set “Hold any Keystroke Actions while Hotkey is held” to Off, and “execute a Step when the Hotkey is” to “pressed OR released”. Note: you do not need to set a Hotkey as this Mapped Key will be triggered by clicking.
6. In the bottom left pane, under Steps, select 1.
7. Right-click on Actions in the bottom right pane, and choose New Sync Cursor Action.
8. Use the Target drop down to select the Character or Character Slot that will be casting a heal in response to this mouse click. Note: if you wish multiple characters to respond, then you will need to create an Action Target Group and use that as the Target of the Sync Cursor Action.
9. In the bottom left pane, right-click on steps and select New Step.
10. In the bottom left pane, under Steps, select 2.
11. Right-click on Actions in the bottom right pane, and choose Keystroke Actions, New Keystroke Action.
12. Set the Target drop down to the same target as in Step 8.
13. Click on the “<” under Key combination and enter the key binding of the appropriate macro.

You do not need to repeat all of these steps for each Mapped Key. Instead, right-click a Mapped Key in the bottom left pane and select Make Copy. Then just change the name and re-do Steps 8, 12 and 13 so that the appropriate Target receives the appropriate Keystroke.

Once you have set up your Mapped Keys, the Key Map should look something like this:




Note: In the above screen shots I have used an Action Target Group rather than individual Characters or Character Slots as the Target.

[Alge]

V. Click Bar

Now we create the Click Bar that responds to mouse clicks. Getting the size of the Click Bar correct will require a process of trial and error.

To create the Click Bar:

1. In the top pane of ISBoxer, right click Click Bars and select New Click Bar.
2. Enter a name for the Click Bar. I call mine “MO Click Bar”
3. Add your Character Set to the Click Bar (same method as adding a Character Set to a Key Map).
4. In the bottom left pane, click on Buttons under your new Click Bar.
5. In the bottom right pane, change Grid to 1x3 and Cell to 20x150.
6. In the black area below “Cell”, click the leftmost Button (Cell) to select it.
7. With the left Button selected, change “Name” to “Large” then click the rectangle to the right of “Color”. Enter “0” for the hex value to create a transparent button.
8. Click the “Copy” button.
9. Select the middle Button in the black region, name it “Medium” and click the “Paste” button.
10. Select the right Button in the black region, name it “Medium” and click the “Paste” button.

The next step is to associate Button clicks with Mapped Keys.

1. With the left-most Button of the Click Bar selected, left click and then right click that button. You will now see the mechanism by which a Mapped Key can be associated with a click, as in the picture below.
   
2. In the area with “Left Click” showing, click the “<” to open the Mapped Key Picker. Select Target as “Window: Current”, Key Map as “MO Heals” and Mapped Key as “Left Large”.
3. In the area with “Right Click” showing, click the “<” to open the Mapped Key Picker. Select Target as “Window: Current”, Key Map as “MO Heals” and Mapped Key as “Right Large”.
   
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for the middle and right Click Bar buttons, selecting the appropriate Mapped Keys.

Finally we need to size and position the Click Bar and our raid frames in-game.

1. Export from ISBoxer, launch your character set, log in, invite your team and turn on raid frames.
2. On your main character, position your Group 1 raid frames where you would like them. Don’t worry about the position of the raid frames on your slaves yet. Make sure “Lock Raid Frames” is enabled in your Raid Window.
3. Depending on your setup you may or may not see the Click Bar you created on your main character. If not, hit Ctrl+Alt+Shift+G to open the ISBoxer Control Panel, select the Click Bars tab and press the Show All button.
4. Drag the Click Bar via the title bar so that its top left corner is aligned with the top left corner of your Group 1 raid frame, like so. Click Save As “Auto”. Hit Ctrl+Alt+Shift+G again to close the ISBoxer Control Panel.
   
5. Now switch back to ISBoxer and change the cell dimensions of the Click Bar buttons. Export and check whether the Click Bar completely covers the raid frames. Repeat until it does.
6. Now re-open the ISBoxer Control Panel. Click the Sync button in the Click Bars tab and then switch to a slave. Click Save As Auto.
7. Now swap to a slave, open the ISBoxer Control Panel, click Show All if your Click Bar is not visible. The Click Bar should appear in the same position as on your main. You can now use the position of the Click Bar to make sure your Group 1 raid frame is in the same location on your slave as on your main.
8. Repeat Step 7 for each slave. Make sure to Lock Raid Frames for each character.

You’ve now finished setting everything up. Well done!

[Alge]

VI. Testing

You should now test that all your heals work as expected. For testing purposes you can promote your slaves to Raid Assistant and add a line to their macros to send a raid warning each time the macro is triggered.

If you discover that it isn’t working, go back through this guide and double-check each step. One small omission can mean the difference between a working click healing system and nothing. If you still need further help you can try either the ISBoxer Chat Room or the ISBoxer forums. In either case you should provide a link to your ISBoxer profile so I (or someone else) can check you have things set up correctly. Instructions for doing that are here.

VII. Demo

I have created a video demo (best viewed in 1080p full screen) of me using the method described in this guide on my mixed team. I have left the raid warnings in my macros so you can see and hear when I am clicking on the click bar. Note that I use almost fully transparent images for my click bar buttons so I do not get the white border around them. I just know where they are.

In this video you can also see that I make fairly heavy use of Video FX (formerly video feeds). That is how I get the mana bars on my raid frames and how I see my slaves’ casting bars and targets.

absolutely great guide just what i needed thanks alot alge your very smart.

[hephaestus]

Awesome guide Alge, this will definitely free up a lot of my hot keys. Your set up with the cast and mana bars made me want to put my fourth account back on my main computer to use video feeds, the cast bars were an amazing idea and really let you see whether characters are doing what they are "supposed" to be doing at the right time - spectacular and clean setup. I love the three regions idea as well, since that makes it easier to use modifier keys in the healing macros that maximize our very limited number of available macros in Rift (which I am sure I don't need to tell other multiboxers about -- 25 macros for 4 or even 5 specs is getting kind of silly).

If I was going to stop spamming my normal buttons when click healing and wanted to have the clicks also send my basic spam to my other DPS related action target groups, would there be anything wrong with "holding hot key actions while the hot key button is pressed" or does that screw up something with the click bar (or is there a simple way to have the action target groups for my healers ignore my normal any normal key spam from my G13 when the mouse is over the click bars for healing, which would probably be simpler)? I really like the use of the synch cursor using target action groups instead of a repeater or video feed, it is much, much cleaner and seems more responsive.

[Alge]

If I was going to stop spamming my normal buttons when click healing and wanted to have the clicks also send my basic spam to my other DPS related action target groups, would there be anything wrong with "holding hot key actions while the hot key button is pressed" or does that screw up something with the click bar

Off the top of my head (I'm at work) I can't see why you couldn't just put the DPS Spam Actions in Step 1, or, even simply just call your DPS Spam mapped key from Step 1 with your DPS as the appropriate targets.

(or is there a simple way to have the action target groups for my healers ignore my normal any normal key spam from my G13 when the mouse is over the click bars for healing, which would probably be simpler)?

With a Click Bar you have the option of activating a mapped key on mouseover. That Mapped Key should have two steps and activate on press or release. When you mouseover the click bar, step 1 gets run, when you mouseout step 2 gets run. So, in Step 1 you could disable your normal spam key(s) and in Step 2 you would re-enable them.

The way I do it is that I keep pressing my spam key even while click healing. I have a separate toggle for my healer to toggle her DPS key spam. I also use stopcasting in some of my macros so I can interrupt casts for emergency heals - though generally they require 2 quick clicks.

Thanks for this guide im liking it a lot and helped me understand the power of the click bars, so thank you very much for this

[hephaestus]

I have everything set up, and the macros and click bars work properly, except for the synch cursor, whenever it synchs, the cursor opens at the exact correct spot on my healer target group, then jumps away as I click and never triggers the macros. I reset my window layout to use a Video feed so there is no chance that there would be resolution issues, and that did not fix the problem. Anyone run into something similar or have any suggestions for a fix?