Spellcast For Dummies!

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Spellcast for Dummies!
 Sylph.Dasanuffadat
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By Sylph.Dasanuffadat 2013-07-08 00:27:49
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Apologies for the necrobump but just wanted to say thanks. I was reading GenesisX's tutorial and then just gave up midway through because I stopped understanding things he was saying. Looking forward to working with your guide for my DNC and especially SCH and GEO to make even more efficient use of my obis and twilight. I might even use my WAR more now if I can maximize some of the JA swap gear >.>

Super excited though and thanks again. I finally understand SC for the most part after attempting for a few years xD


Although now I'm facing a problem:
Code
      <if mode="and" Spell="*step"  notbuffactive="Presto" MLvlGT="77">
            <if mode="or" notbuffactive="Finishing Move*" buffactive="Finishing Move 2">
                <var cmd="set CurrentStep %Spell" />
                <cancelspell />
            <cmd>input /ja "Presto" <me>;wait 2.0;input /ja "$CurrentStep" <t>;</cmd>
            </if>
        </if>


I keep getting a parsing error telling me that line 5 isn't closed off properly. Not sure why, copied it straight from the front page. I saw someone else had the same issue but no solution was put in public view that I saw >.<
 Lakshmi.Byrth
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By Lakshmi.Byrth 2013-07-08 19:39:42
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<me>
& lt ;me& gt ;
(remove the spaces)
[+]
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 Asura.Mymytaru
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By Asura.Mymytaru 2013-09-05 20:04:39
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is it possibal if someone has a Whm Spellcast list can you send me the file so i can edit it to my taste. would apperciet it.

thank you
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 Asura.Cambion
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By Asura.Cambion 2013-10-12 13:33:33
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Extremely outdated since I've stopped playing, but:
Code
<?xml version="1.0" ?>

<spellcast>                     
        <sets>
                <group name="Whm" Default="true">       
                        <set name = "Idle" >
								<ammo>Incantor Stone</ammo>
                                <head>Nefer Khat +1</head>
                                <neck>Orison Locket</neck>
                                <lear>Loquac. Earring</lear>
                                <rear>Roundel Earring</rear>
                                <body>Heka's Kalasiris</body>
                                <hands>Serpentes Cuffs</hands>
                                <lring>Paguroidea Ring</lring>
                                <rring>Sheltered Ring</rring>
                                <back>Shadow Mantle</back>
                                <waist>Witful Belt</waist>
                                <legs>Nares Trews</legs>
                                <feet>Serpentes Sabots</feet>
                        </set>
                        <set name = "PreCast" >
								<ammo>Incantor Stone</ammo>
                                <head>Orison Cap +2</head>
                                <neck>Orison Locket</neck>
                                <lear>Loquac. Earring</lear>
                                <rear>Roundel Earring</rear>
                                <body>Heka's Kalasiris</body>
                                <hands>Serpentes Cuffs</hands>
                                <lring>Ephedra Ring</lring>
                                <rring>Sirona's Ring</rring>
                                <back>Tempered Cape</back>
                                <waist>Witful Belt</waist>
                                <legs>Orsn. Pantaln. +2</legs>
                                <feet>Cure Clogs</feet>
                        </set>  
                        <set name = "MidCast" >
								<ammo>Incantor Stone</ammo>
                                <head>Orison Cap +2</head>
                                <neck>Orison Locket</neck>
                                <lear>Novia Earring</lear>
                                <rear>Roundel Earring</rear>
                                <body>Orison Bliaud +2</body>
                                <hands>Bokwus Gloves</hands>
                                <lring>Ephedra Ring</lring>
                                <rring>Sirona's Ring</rring>
                                <back>Tempered Cape</back>
                                <waist>Witful Belt</waist>
                                <legs>Orsn. Pantaln. +2</legs>
                                <feet>Serpentes Sabots</feet>
                        </set>						
                </group>
        </sets>
		
		<variables>
		</variables>
		
        <rules>			
			<if status="idle"> 
                <equip when="idle|aftercast" set="Idle" /> 
            </if> 
            
<!----------Weapon Skills   	     --> 
            <if type="weaponskill"> 
                <if spell="Hexa Strike"> 
                <action type="CastDelay" delay=".5"/> 
				<equip when="precast" set="Hexa"/> 
				</if>
            </if>
			
<!----------Cures             --> 
            <if spell="Cure III|Cure IV|Cure V|Cure VI|Curaga|Curaga II|Curaga III|Curaga IV|Curaga V|Cura|Cura II|Cura III|Cure II|Cure">
				<action type=equip when=precast set="PreCast" />
				<action type=equip when=midcast set="MidCast" />
			</if>
			
<!----------Regen             --> 
			<if spell="Regen III|Regen IV">
			<equip when="precast"> 
				<hands>Orison Mitts +2</hands> 
			</equip> 
		</if>	
		</rules> 
</spellcast>
 Ramuh.Anesti
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By Ramuh.Anesti 2013-10-24 02:48:55
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Anyone have suggestions on locking gear?
Looking to lock gear for specific zones.
Any ideas would be appreciated, thanks
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 Sylph.Peldin
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By Sylph.Peldin 2013-11-25 10:11:35
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Hey Cambion, I just first wanted to say that I really enjoyed reading your beginners guide on spellcast. It has definitely helped me to understand how to use variables more clearly. I wanted to point out a few things in your guide to help and also to get some clarification on (if you are still interested in either).

Quote:
*Note: For Jig we used 2 *, once before, one after.
For Utsusemi we only used 1 after.
To be perfectly honest, I'm not positive why, but I assume it's because:
*Jig* has to account for alternate names before, and after 'Jig'
The asterisk (*) is used to allow for a variety of words or characters. For Jig, you don't need 2 of them because there is nothing that follows the word "Jig." So to account for both Chocobo Jig and Spectral Jig, you can just use one * before the word "Jig" like this: *Jig

In Part 3, you talked about weaponskills and added in this line of code without explaining it until you talk about variables
<castdelay delay="$Delay-JA" />
I recognize this is part of a variable, but I would suggest leaving this out of your early example codes then adding it in later, when you actually explain what it does in your Variables section.

In Part 7, you describe how to use the Cancel plugin in conjunction with spellcast. My only suggestion in this section is to not use both <command> and <cmd>. For the sake of consistency and to relieve confusion for beginners, I would use the the shorthand version <cmd> and then explain that there is a longhand version <command> and that all you did was simplify it.

In Part 6, you show a lot of single-gear swaps. This may just be my personal preference, but I never use single-gear swaps in rules themselves for one main reason - it's easier to identify all the gear you use if it's all in your sets. This becomes important if you decide to download and use Gear Collector among other reasons. Also, as the game progresses and you decide to add more and more gear for that specific ability, it's much easier to just already have it in a set.
Another good reason to use a set, is because you can do things like equip evasion or PDT gear when using a Samba or Waltz. Which leads to my next suggestion.

I think it would be good to talk about the following code:
Code xml
				<set name = "Flourish" BaseSet = "Step">
					<head>Charis Tiara +2</head> <!-- Climactic Flourish -->
					<body>Etoile Casaque</body> <!-- Violent Flourish -->
					<hands>Charis Bangles +2</hands> <!-- Reverse Flourish -->
				</set>

I used the command BaseSet to effectively inherit the set "Step" in to the set "Flourish." Basically what I'm telling spellcast to do is this:
When I use my "Flourish" set I want these items in these slots, but I want to use my "Step" set in whatever slots I didn't specify.
That way you can effectively use different gear besides TP or Idle gear during the use of Job Abilities.

There was something else that was confusing to me. In Part 9, you go in to combining gear swaps and cancel commands. Your code for Jigs starts with an <elseif> statement, but previous to this, you had left your audience with an <if> statement for Jigs. I would suggest leaving it as an <if> statement even if it conflicts with your current spellcast (unless the <if> statement doesn't work for some reason).
I noticed that when you sum up what the code should look like up to this point (before Part 10), you also have your Steps and Utsusemi rules starting with <elseif> just like Jigs, yet for Flourish and Samba rules, they start with <if>. I don't see a reason to use <elseif> since these rules are independent of each other.


Ok, so the last thing I wanted to ask about isn't really specific to your post, but I am still curious about variables.

Instead of using a variable to replace an item when a buff is up, why can't I just make a rule that does the same thing?

Using Cambion's example with Fan Dance...

He changes the back in his TP set to this:
Code xml
<back>$TPBack</back>

And he adds this variable:
Code xml
<var name="TPBack">Atheling Mantle</var>

Then the rule for the variable:
Code xml
<if Buffactive="Fan Dance" >
        <var cmd="set TPBack Shadow Mantle" />
</if>
<else>
        <var cmd="set TPBack Atheling Mantle" />
</else>


So my question is, why not just make 3 rules like this:
Code xml
<if Buffactive="Fan Dance" >
      <equip when="aftercast|engaged" set="Fan Dance" />
</if>
<elseif Buffactive="Saber Dance" >
      <equip when="aftercast|engaged" set="Saber Dance" />
</elseif>
<else>
      <equip when="aftercast|engaged" set="TP" />
</else>


Would that not work as long as you made a set for Saber Dance and Fan Dance?
 Fenrir.Motenten
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By Fenrir.Motenten 2013-11-27 00:24:31
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Peldin said:
The asterisk (*) is used to allow for a variety of words or characters. For Jig, you don't need 2 of them because there is nothing that follows the word "Jig." So to account for both Chocobo Jig and Spectral Jig, you can just use one * before the word "Jig" like this: *Jig

You're forgetting about Chocobo Jig II. Though honestly, a better way to trap for it would be: type="Jig". No ambiguity or pattern matching needed.

Peldin said:
In Part 6, you show a lot of single-gear swaps. This may just be my personal preference, but I never use single-gear swaps in rules themselves for one main reason - it's easier to identify all the gear you use if it's all in your sets. This becomes important if you decide to download and use Gear Collector among other reasons. Also, as the game progresses and you decide to add more and more gear for that specific ability, it's much easier to just already have it in a set.
Another good reason to use a set, is because you can do things like equip evasion or PDT gear when using a Samba or Waltz.

The arguments you make are valid, but there's also a reason to keep the single gear equips in the rules: Every additional set you have listed increases the amount of time Spellcast takes to process each action, because each time it searches for a set, it has to check each one sequentially every time. The more sets you have, the longer that takes. The explicit sets within the rules bypass that problem.

Granted for simple xmls it won't be a huge hindrance, but it definitely has an impact as things get more complicated.

Peldin said:
I noticed that when you sum up what the code should look like up to this point (before Part 10), you also have your Steps and Utsusemi rules starting with <elseif> just like Jigs, yet for Flourish and Samba rules, they start with <if>. I don't see a reason to use <elseif> since these rules are independent of each other.

It's because they are independent of each other that they should use <elseif>. If we can say that (for example) a Jig can never, ever happen if we determined that the move was a Flourish, we should minimize the number of extra steps the code tries to process so that it doesn't even look at the Jig section.

Of course the summary isn't quite that clean, and only manages a partial implementation of that programming idiom.


Regarding your last question on variables: Yes, that would work. Neither way is really 'right' or 'wrong', but use of equipment variables can be useful when you specifically -don't- want to be creating new sets, or when the number of options for a single piece of replaced equipment seems excessive for the purpose of creating new sets (eg: the old elemental stave rules).
 Bahamut.Clolien
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By Bahamut.Clolien 2013-11-27 14:11:19
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I have to say this is probably the most easiest guide to spellcast to use and understand i have read anywhere, every other one i have managed to find seems to be written as if you have some basic knowledge of how it all work and for a xbox player turned PC user for FFXI i was and still am a complete nooblet in respect of spellcast and windower in general. I only recently have used spellcast for very simple gear changes as the rules and variables just went clean over my head. thanks for submitting this and regardless of the amendments and suggestions made by ppl, its still helped me understand it a helluva lot more. Personally i think the windower site should have something like this on it.
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 Bahamut.Predatory
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By Bahamut.Predatory 2014-04-21 14:04:07
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So I guess you didn't make it for us really stupid dummies. I pressed ctr+esc to stop using spellcast skillup .xml and now i don't know how to load spellcast back up, i've tried the //sc r thingy listed in montnen's post but that doesn't actually load spellcast plugin while I'm ingame, the only way I can find to actually reload the plugin is to /shutdown and reboot the game. Am I missing something, or is there no way to actually load the plugin while you're ingame?
 Ragnarok.Sekundes
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By Ragnarok.Sekundes 2014-04-21 14:30:10
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Bahamut.Predatory said: »
So I guess you didn't make it for us really stupid dummies. I pressed ctr+esc to stop using spellcast skillup .xml and now i don't know how to load spellcast back up, i've tried the //sc r thingy listed in montnen's post but that doesn't actually load spellcast plugin while I'm ingame, the only way I can find to actually reload the plugin is to /shutdown and reboot the game. Am I missing something, or is there no way to actually load the plugin while you're ingame?
//load spellcast

If the plugin is unloaded, //sc commands won't do anything, and that //sc r is only to reload the current xml not the plugin itself.
 Bahamut.Predatory
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By Bahamut.Predatory 2014-04-21 17:18:27
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Thank you, I'll give it a try when I get back ingame
necroskull Necro Bump Detected! [82 days between previous and next post]
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By RoxiValefore 2014-07-12 23:49:18
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Hello!

If anyone is still reading this thread, I am confused how to get my spellcast to work. I have tried to make my own using this as a base. When I load spellcast nothing happens, I tried using what is mentioned above, still didn't work. Logging out and Logging in doesn't work either.
 Quetzalcoatl.Wakmidget
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By Quetzalcoatl.Wakmidget 2014-07-12 23:58:53
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RoxiValefore said: »
Hello!

If anyone is still reading this thread, I am confused how to get my spellcast to work. I have tried to make my own using this as a base. When I load spellcast nothing happens, I tried using what is mentioned above, still didn't work. Logging out and Logging in doesn't work either.

Spellcast is dead, they stopped supporting it. Most people using another addon called Gearswap now.