Throughout the years, MMO skill bars have evolved. Older MMOs, think World of Warcraft or Final Fantasy XIV, generally have a huge skill list for each class, and your character enters battle with all of those skills available, spread across multiple hotbars.
On the other hand, many of the newer MMOs, like Throne & Liberty or New World Aeternum, use a limited-slot action bar. As you level up, older, less powerful skills are replaced with more powerful variants, and only the most potent skills are slotted for battle. So which one is better, limited action bars or a 30 skill rotation? Both systems can be fun, but this is MMO Friday Fights, so there can be only one.
Small Action Bar
Keep it simple, stupid. No matter how many skills you acquire, Small Action Bar MMOs require you to shave your list down to the bare necessities. Most of these MMOs will give you six to eight slots for all of your abilities. That means at any given time, you will have three or four primary attacks, some sort of stun, and possibly a heal. Then, to round out your skill bar, you have to choose whether you want some sort of temporary buff, a class-specific movement skill, and possibly a class Ultimate skill.
A small number of skills doesn’t mean there isn’t anything to do. While MMOs with an abundance of skill slots have many of the skills on a long cooldown timer, most of the limited action bar skills are on quick cooldowns. All of your abilities are streamlined, leaving you enough brain power to dodge the onslaught of boss attacks and their red polygons of death.
30 Skill Rotation
So, 30 skills may be on the high side, but you know what I’m talking about here. While newer action-oriented MMOs use a small six to eight-slot bar, many of the older MMOs require multiple hotbars to hold all of your skills and abilities. You have one bar for your basic combat rotation. Beyond that, your character has stuns, interrupts, gear-based skills, heals, and who knows what else. There are one-off skills for every situation and then some. Heck, there are some MMOs where I have multiple skill bars just for my pre-combat buffs.
The main allure of so many skills is the ability to deal out maximum DPS or heals. If you’re playing a support class, it means you have multiple skills to actually support the group or control the battlefield. Anyone can faceroll their main skill bar, but a true master of their class knows precisely when to use each of their skills for maximum effect. Having multiple skill bars is like playing chess, while limited action bar MMOs are akin to checkers.
My Take
I prefer the big skill bar MMOs. I’ll save my limited-slot action bars for Diablo IV or Path of Exile. If I’m going to take the time to group up with other players, I want to have a wide array of skills in my toolbox. I may not have the same fast reflexes I had when I was younger, but I still have enough dexterity and muscle memory - not to mention a nice MMO mouse - to manage 15 to 20 skills during a boss fight. And if I’m going to master a character’s skills (I usually don’t), I want to be able to show them off (I usually just end up dying).
