Keybinds, macros and hotbars

One thing with three faces. A macro is a chain of commands with the logic: it waits for the roundtime, it puts you in a stance only when you are not in it, it keeps a reserve back. A keybind is a key for your hands. A hotbar is buttons for your eyes. Both run macros, and a macro also answers to a word of its own on the command line. Nothing is written twice: the macro holds the chain, and the key, the button and the word all point at it.

Macros are made on the Macros page of the Editors window, in an editor with every field explained on hover. This chapter goes through the chain language, macros and what they keep, keybinds and hotbars, the faces, and countdowns, what a button counts on its face.

Aliases

An alias is the plainest of the words: a trigger typed in place of one or more commands, with no logic. ls for look; s for get \1 from my \2, sell \1, stow all, typed as s sword back. Its target is the chain language below, less the behaviour words: commands, waits, rt and ct, with \? for everything typed after the trigger and \1, \2… for its first, second… word. An alias runs typed with Hydra’s symbol too, .s sword back, when the word is not one of Hydra’s commands.

Aliases are kept for everyone and for each character over that, in aliases.json. The Aliases page of the Editors window lists both, with a search; an alias opens as its steps on lines, with a Try with box that shows what a line would send without sending it, Save, a switch between the character’s own and everyone’s, and Take away. .alias edit <trigger> opens the page at a trigger, and .alias on the command line adds, removes and lists without the window.

The chain language

A chain is pieces with a comma between them. Each piece is one of:

stance off, rt, barrage

reads as stance offensive, then wait for roundtime, then barrage. Hydra sends nothing for the stance when you already stand in it, and waits out any roundtime before the stance and before the attack.

A comma inside quotes or brackets is kept, so a Lich command keeps its Ruby: ;e cast(901, "a rat"), look is two pieces. A comma in speech is cut, so write it 'Hello\, friend. A line break or \r cuts as a comma does, as the files Wrayth wrote them did.

Hydra waits on its own clock, which the game keeps: rt ends when the roundtime the game stated does, not after a guess. A wait is at most a minute. .stop stops a chain wherever it is.

The behaviour words

A behaviour word is a command Hydra carries out by reading the game first and the game’s answer after, in a chain: a macro, an alias, a key. A line typed and sent goes to the game as it is. The first behaviour word is stance.

stance <x> takes any of the six stances, or the first letters of one: stance off, stance def, stance gua.

1. Already in the stance asked for: nothing is sent.
2. In roundtime: it is waited for, since the game takes no command then.
3. Otherwise it is sent at once. Asked for defensive in a cast roundtime, the game sets guarded and says why, and that is taken as the answer.
4. Sent, the stance bar is the truth. The step is done when the bar shows the stance. If the game does not show it within a few seconds, the chain stops and the story says why.

Assaults

barrage, flurry, fury, gthrusts, pummel and thrash, with a target or without, are behaviour words too: Hydra sends weapon barrage and the rest. An assault strikes a few times a round over several seconds, so the chain waits for the assault to end, not for it to begin.

1. Not one of your techniques, not enough stamina, cooling down, or overexerted: nothing is sent, the chain stops and the story says why. What Hydra does not know yet stops nothing.
2. Roundtime and cast roundtime are waited out, then the assault sent.
3. The chain goes on when the game says the assault is over: its own last line, or a line that ends any assault (You complete your assault, Distracted, you hesitate, the target already dead). The roundtime after each round of strikes ends nothing.
4. A refusal, such as Barrage is still in cooldown. or You are still stunned., stops the chain with the game’s words.
5. With no end in 20 seconds, the chain stops and says so.

Only the chain waits. Anything else you type, click or run goes to the game as ever, and the game decides whether it ends the assault.

Written with weapon, as weapon barrage, an assault goes to the game as written: nothing is checked and the chain does not wait.

A ...wait

When the game answers a behaviour word with ...wait 1 seconds., Hydra waits it out and sends the word again, at most three times.