Comprehensive Guide To Battle Mode

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Disclaimer: This guide may be out-of-date and/or biased and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the jRO staff or wiki editors. As this is a player created guide, it is based on the opinions and experiences of its author(s). Please do not make any major changes or alter the original intent of the article. Thank you!


The following guide was created by Tynne Harbl on November 2007

Ragnarok Online -
Comprehensive Battle Mode Guide 1.0
Written By: Serenity
Created: October 28th, 2007


Contents

1. Introduction to Battle Mode
2. Setting Up Battle Mode
3. Practicing Battle Mode
4. Combining Battle Mode with Macro Hotkeys
5. Practicing Battle Mode with Macro Hotkeys
6. Tips and Tricks of Battle Mode

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- Section One: Introduction to Battle Mode
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First of all, let's discuss what Battle Mode is and what it means to you as a player, in both supportive and offensive situations.

Battle Mode is a special feature of the Ragnarok Online gaming client that allows you to escape the restrictions of the F1-F9 keys, and instead allows you to create up to 27 hotkeys, by splitting up the three hotkey bars into three rows of keys, while using alternative keys to that of F1-F9.

For Supportive roles, Battle Mode allows classes such as Priests, Sages and Bards, the opportunity to utilize their supportive skills more efficiently and effectively. Sometimes F1-F9 just aren't enough, especially in a party scenario. Heal, Blessing, Increase Agility, Impotio Manus, Lex Aterna, Lex Divina, Recovery, Turn Undead, Magnus Exorcimus, Decrease Agility, Aspercio, Angelus, Magnificat, Gloria, Cure ... It's very obvious that Priests have a lot of skills, and having to quickly switch through three different hotkey bars is.. well, it makes the job of supporting party members extremely difficult.

For Offensive roles, Battle Mode allows classes such as Wizards, Knights, Assassins and Hunters, to opportunity to utilize their offensive skills more efficiently and effectively. Again, just like with Priests, Wizards have a very wide range of skills. Storm Gust, Lord of Vermillion, Frost Diver, Meteor Storm, Cold Bolt, Fire Bolt, Thunder Bolt, Jupitel Thunder, Quagmire, Heaven's Drive, Earth Spike ... Do you see a repeating pattern here?

Personally speaking, once I learned the uses of Battle Mode, I've never played the game without it since, and have been teaching how to use it as well.


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- Section Two: Setting Up Battle Mode
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Whether you're aware of the older commands used in Ragnarok Online's gaming client or not, please note that there are many "/" commands, such as /nc and /ns for No-Control and No-Shift, as well as emoticons such as /lv (Love), /meh (Teasing Face) and /fsh (Shiny Eyes). However, we're not using any of those.. what we're using happens to be, of course: /battlemode (or /bm for short).

So, what do you do?

First off, type /battlemode or /bm, and press ENTER.

You'll note that your text field has become locked. This is to prevent your Battle Mode hotkeys from accidentally going into the text field.

Now that you have Battle Mode enabled, what does this mean?

Well, let's start by placing our left hand on the home row keys, "ASDF". Just like in standard professional typing, this becomes the root for your hand placement for Battle Mode.

On your home row, you'll be using the "3" hotkey bar. The row below home row is the "1" hotkey bar, and the row above home row is obviously, the "2" hotkey bar.

Doesn't make much sense the way that Gravity coded Battle Mode in this sense, but, you get used to it, I promise.
So, to translate it for you, the setup looks like this:

Broken image links removed.

And of course, the keys you're using are as follows:

Broken image link removed.

But, I won't stop there, I'll further simplify it if you're not following with what goes where as far as the hotkeys are concerned:

Broken image link removed.

Hopefully you'll understand the following:

Keys Q-O are hotkey bar "2".

Keys A-L are hotkey bar "3".

Keys Z-. are hotkey bar "1".

Re-read and ask questions if you get confused by any of the above information.

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- Section Three: Practicing Battle Mode
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Probably the biggest mistake players make after attempting to convert to the usage of battle mode is jumping straight into high-level battles right away thinking, "Woo! I'm going to be leet hax now that I'm playing more like a true pro!", and because of that, many people fail right away and think, "Battle Mode stinks.. screw that.", then return to the silly F1-F9. Trust me, I know- I thought Battle Mode was horrid at first, then after ten minutes of thinking about it, I fell in love with the concept behind it, and realized it'd take my playing to a whole new level.

So, what do I suggest?

Depending on your level, and of course the dificulty of monsters that you're comfortable "practicing" against (don't feel ashamed if this means practicing on Lunatics and Porings, or Zombies, Familiars and Skeletons in Payon Dungeon), go somewhere that you can concentrate. It does take a while to learn how to use battle mode, but fighting monsters that are easier for you to begin with makes the transition extremely easy as compared to running straight after an MVP your first time using Battle Mode.

Practice Makes Perfect!

I can't stress that enough, just practice, practice and practice some more! You'll eventually get the hang of it, and it'll definitely improve your playing ability over time.

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- Section Four: Combining Battle Mode
with Macro Hotkeys
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Macro's, are, in a nutshell, basic command lines that you hotkey, like skills, so you can make a few keystrokes instead of typing out the entire command line.

To enable to Macro Hotkey "Shortcut" window, press: ALT+M

Broken image link removed.

I type in similar to what's in the example above, and as the Macro on the left demonstrates, you'll press ALT and the number that corresponds to the command you'd like to use. It takes a little bit of time to master your shortcuts as well, but they make turning Battle Mode on and off a breeze, as well as saying different things and using different emoticons.

Try it out!

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- Section Five: Practicing Battle Mode
with Macro Hotkeys
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Just like when practicing Battle Mode initially, go someplace easier for you to practice running your Macros along with your Battle Mode hotkeys.

It may take some time to get used to, and may seem pointless to some, but practice definitely makes perfect, and the more you practice, the better you'll become at running different Macro Hotkeys while playing in Battle Mode!

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- Section Six: Tips and Tricks of
Battle Mode
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There's just a few tips and tricks I have that'll definitely help you out depending on your character build, classes, and the items you want to use.

- If you're playing in a WoE or PVP scenario, it's a great idea to hotkey different gears (elemental weapons, armors, headgears, accessories, etc). This is known as "swapping", and the use of Battle Mode makes it easier than ever before to perform quick changes in your gears! To utilize this, just simply drag and drop the icon from your inventory window to the hotkey location you wish to place it, just like when hotkeying skills!

- If you're trying to type to other players, and don't wish to turn battle mode off, press ENTER once before typing your message, and the text field will become re-enabled. After you send the message, it'll go back to normal Battle Mode state. It's annoying at first, but it helps when you're in a party fighting with others, that Battle Mode snaps right back into action after sending a line of text to your fellow players.

- Don't have support skills to heal yourself, or buff yourself with? Well, don't forget, you can drag useable items from your inventory such as potions and other healing type items, as well as spell scrolls (both offensive and supportive scrolls). Having a multitude of different potion types helps you to not waste your more potent potions for the instances you just wish to heal a little, instead of a lot.

- Frustrated that you "can't turn Battle Mode off"? Using the Macro Hotkey method, if you create a Macro for turning Battle Mode on, just simply re-use that Macro Hotkey to turn it back off!

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- Section Seven: Credits and Contact
Information
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This guide was written by Serenity, and is intended for use to educate players of the Battle Mode system in the Ragnarok Online gaming client.

The reproduction of this guide is prohibited unless otherwise stated by the author.

To contact me regarding permission to use this guide elsewhere than where I've posted it, please contact me at [email protected]