Can you move abilities on your hotbar?

[Alilei32]

Can you change the position on your hotbar where the abilities are located? I like my most commonly used, spam attack always being on 3 for example, and it has been in every MMO I have played so Im used to it being there. Also I use my index key to mash it which is easier than hitting 1 with my ring finger. I also like my AoE attack being on 4 but it seems most classes have their AoEs on 5. Can you move abilities around or is the only way to rebind them?

[Herecius]

I'm fairly sure you can't move them, but you can most certainly rebind them. That'll have to do.

[Alilei32]

I'm fairly sure you can't move them, but you can most certainly rebind them. That'll have to do.

Dont see why they wouldnt let you do this. Oh well guess I will just have to rebind.

[iCandy]

Dont see why they wouldnt let you do this. Oh well guess I will just have to rebind.

Why would you need to? You can keybind them all, so why would you need to move them around? If you're a mouse-clicker then this is your time to learn a new skill.

Besides, they way that different weapons change your skills around when swapping, it could get messy.

[Zipzo]

Dont see why they wouldnt let you do this. Oh well guess I will just have to rebind.

I actually like this because it will allow people to better refer to abilities on professions once everyone is experienced by using their according action bar #, kind of the way they do in League of Legends "Shyvana's W".

IE. "Guardian's Sword 3 is a great attack" etc etc

[Ixuzcc]

Why would you need to? You can keybind them all, so why would you need to move them around? If you're a mouse-clicker then this is your time to learn a new skill.

The symmetry of having your first spell in the order be your number 1 button is what I'd go for. Yeah sure, keybinding works just fine but it throws of the symmetry somewhat.

[Alilei32]

The symmetry of having your first spell in the order be your number 1 button is what I'd go for. Yeah sure, keybinding works just fine but it throws of the symmetry somewhat.

This. Having 3 being the first number just looks dumb.

[Triage]

I actually like this because it will allow people to better refer to abilities on professions once everyone is experienced by using their according action bar #, kind of the way they do in League of Legends "Shyvana's W".

IE. "Guardian's Sword 3 is a great attack" etc etc

Agree. I've been watching videos and whilst both me and commentator/narrator don't know the exact skill name - we both know what, say, Guardian Shield 5 is.

[iCandy]

This. Having 3 being the first number just looks dumb.

Hmm. Never noticed it as an issue. I rarely look at my bar unless it's for a quick cooldown confirmation.

[papajohn4]

Why would you need to? You can keybind them all, so why would you need to move them around? If you're a mouse-clicker then this is your time to learn a new skill.

Besides, they way that different weapons change your skills around when swapping, it could get messy.

if you play for years and have used in a specific keybind order it is difficult..for example my bar look like this

Q E R F T G C

so when I quickly look on my bar to check for cooldowns and see the second bar ability I immediately know is my E keybind. When I see the fourth it is the F key..through years I have trained on this to be quite fast, I can't just make my bar keybinds E F Q T C R...

Now comes the second part. In all my previous games I categorize abilities and bind them to specific keys. For example R is usually my spam aoe, F is my Blink/charge kind of spells, T is always my stun/Daze e.t.c. So if it happens in GW2 the second weapon skill to be a ground target AOE it is a problem.

1.I am not used to hit E for a target aoe ability, this is my hard-hit single attack
2.I cannot rebind abilities because my eyes, when look at by action-bars can automatically identify every keybind by its position on the bars...
3.It gets worse because on weapon swap you have to do with different type of abilities again. So lets say I play Elementalist and I finally get used that my R keybind is not an AOE as used to be on other MMOs I play for years and it is a single target spell. Then I switch to Air for example and now R is AOE again...

I don't know if you understand what I want to say, but it really would be very very helpful if you could move skills on action - bar. I really don't know why you shouldn't be able to do this, is very basic UI customization

[Zogarth]

I never even considered this a problem... but i think it would make it wierd when you weaponswap

[Nerio]

I don't know if you understand what I want to say, but it really would be very very helpful if you could move skills on action - bar. I really don't know why you shouldn't be able to do this, is very basic UI customization

The idea of moving stuff around gets a little weird when you switch weapon sets, or class attunements. Say, for example, you're wearing a staff and you want to switch your 4th skill to the second slot. What happens when you switch to a second weapon set that uses 2 different 1 handed weapons? Does the action bar become mixed up with the first ability from your offhand switching to the second slot and the second ability of your main hand switching to your fourth slot? Or does each weapon combination have it's own "profile"? With elementalists, you're looking at 20 or so "profiles" if thats the case, warriors maybe more since they can use so many different weapon combinations.

I'm sure this is something they tested with users, and found that it's not as difficult to get used to as people imagine.

[papajohn4]

The idea of moving stuff around gets a little weird when you switch weapon sets, or class attunements. Say, for example, you're wearing a staff and you want to switch your 4th skill to the second slot. What happens when you switch to a second weapon set that uses 2 different 1 handed weapons? Does the action bar become mixed up with the first ability from your offhand switching to the second slot and the second ability of your main hand switching to your fourth slot? Or does each weapon combination have it's own "profile"? With elementalists, you're looking at 20 or so "profiles" if thats the case, warriors maybe more since they can use so many different weapon combinations.

I'm sure this is something they tested with users, and found that it's not as difficult to get used to as people imagine.

I understand what you say and I agree..it seems they had a hard dilemma here on what to do...I guess I can get used to, but it doesn't seem so alt friendly. If you could bound abilities according to their type (cc,aoe,single,dot) it would be easier to switch through alts..but now you really need to memorize the ability of each weapon combination/attunement in the correct order...and it maybe force people with many alts or casual play and switching to other MMOs, to stick on one weapon type in order to be able to get used to and remember all spells. But I see how both choices Anet had to make was very difficult..

[Naemesiz]

1. Hold shift
2. Drag ability
3. ??
4. Profit!

[Nerio]

I understand what you say and I agree..it seems they had a hard dilemma here on what to do...I guess I can get used to, but it doesn't seem so alt friendly. If you could bound abilities according to their type (cc,aoe,single,dot) it would be easier to switch through alts..but now you really need to memorize the ability of each weapon combination/attunement in the correct order...and it maybe force people with many alts or casual play and switching to other MMOs, to stick on one weapon type in order to be able to get used to and remember all spells. But I see how both choices Anet had to make was very difficult..

Yeah, I do the same thing in WoW. Taunt is the same thing on all my characters, the major oh shit button is the same, damage abilities are the same. I think that because there are only a handful of abilities you can have at one time though, it won't be so bad. In League of Legends, the only thing that's consistent is your R (ultimate); the Q W and E abilities have completely different mechanics to them across champions. While GW2 has a higher number of keybinds that change like that, I don't think it will end up being too bad.

[DrakeWurrum]

I actually like this because it will allow people to better refer to abilities on professions once everyone is experienced by using their according action bar #, kind of the way they do in League of Legends "Shyvana's W".

IE. "Guardian's Sword 3 is a great attack" etc etc

Very salient point, imo. I've never once heard anybody complain about being unable to move abilities in LoL!

---------- Post added 2012-08-24 at 04:34 PM ----------

1. Hold shift
2. Drag ability
3. ??
4. Profit!

Post history leads me to believe you're in the wrong forum.

[papajohn4]

I don't think it will end up being too bad.

Yea I hope so at worse scenario, I will just level 1 to 80 and after that I go with next instead of switching every few levels, if I find it so hard to get used too. At least you can chose the utility skills in what order you want, so this is something too :P

[DrunkenBeard]

They do this because it makes it possible to start calling abilities by the combination of profession/weapon/slot, which is very interesting in PvP and broadcasting. If I'm watching a PvP game, I only need to know what weapons the player uses to identify all the skills in his bars and be able to follow the action. If skills were movable I'd have to waste time figuring out what does what. It just further standardizes the UI, which is again important for eSports.

[DrakeWurrum]

Come to think of it, the only weapon skill names I actually know are Death Blossom and Unload. O_o

[rhandric]

Come to think of it, the only weapon skill names I actually know are Death Blossom and Unload. O_o

Meteor Shower, Dragon's Tooth