The A button on the XBox controller

The one plague of running PoE on console. The A button is used both to pick up items, and is also used to assign a skill.

But it's inevitable, when I want to pick up an item with a mob nearby, I end up using the skill assigned to A-Button. Yet, when I want to attack nearby mobs, I pick up nearby items instead. Like clockwork, the A-Button performs the opposite action I intended.

Even tried a work-around, such as assigning to the A-Button a skill I can't use due to a trigger support, or even just leaving it blank. Unfortunately, this doesn't default the A-Button to exclusively pick up items.

My quick fix is to assign an AoE skill or just my fastest action skill to the A Button, so that my character isn't a sitting duck to incoming mobs in my pitiful attempts to pick up items on the run.

A toggle feature to favor attack when items are nearby or vice versa would go a long way to fixing this.

In my experience I just unslot the button. Then its only used for picking up items. A little annoying to move skills around anytime you swap skills out or remove gear and put it back on, BUT atleast you know if the skill slot is empty then youre all set. I swear they used to have a pick up item option you could put there but maybe im remembering something else. All in all, just leave it blank and it should do just fine.

Yeah so i just leave it blank otherwise it gets frustrating. Just get used to the idea that you only have 11 skill slots and not 12 and the problem is solved. Not ideal losing a skill slot but better than the alternative problems it causes. Just remember every time you slot a new skill gem it will auto assign it to the empty slot so you will need to clear it again.