I find myself making these suggestions on the official boards every so often and figured that this might be a good place to discuss such issues since they are completely UI related and there are some rather intelligent minds at work here.
Considering the Maintained and Spell Effects windows, both serve similar purposes with varying results. For example, both windows have a variation of spells that you cast on yourself. This causes some of those spells to be placed in one window but not the other while some spells will be duplicated in both windows. This causes a problem considering the 30 icon limit as well as for those, such as myself, that keep the Spell Effects window on Mouseover only.
What I would suggests is:
1. Icon Limit needs to either be removed, raised or let us "turn off" certain icons that we don't feel necessary for viewing. The later option being my most preferred but either way this isn't a full solution to the issue.
2. It would be nice if Maintained actually showed certain icons that currently only show in the Effects window. Some examples would be Spirit of the Wolf, Food and Drink. If I cast Spirit of the Wolf then it really should be in the Maintained window since it's a buff that I need to Maintain. In other words, there are icons showing in the Effects window that really should be moved to the Maintained instead. This also holds true for some totems and potions that will inconsistently show within one window but not the other. Meaning that if I cast a totem or potion it should show in the Maintained window, while currently some totems show in Maintained, some show in Spell Effects and some show in both. This really needs to be worked out.
3. No duplicates. I can't understand, especially with an icon limit, why certain icons should show in both windows. I can understand that they might technically be considered Maintained and Effects at the same time but that's not enough since All Maintained would be Effects. If an icon appears in my Maintained window then I don't need it in my Effects windows. This would make tracking both much easier.
As a final suggestion (considering the recent addition of the Detrimental Effects window) I would really like to see the 3 icon windows broken down into 4 instead:
1. Maintained Effects
2. Maintained Detrimental Effects
3. Effects
4. Detrimental Effects
Any thoughts on this subject would be highly welcomed, especially if your forum name starts with SOE
