[Ego]

great post, i think i read it in the war forums as well :D i to am trying to fix my keybindings as per the post in the chanter forums, but i have found that traditional wasd or even esdf like you recommend i use in war is not flexible enough for aion pvp combat. since we need to have wings, no wings, raise and fall bound to 4 extra keys within easy reach of your standard movement keys.

so i have gone back to wasd for movement, q/e for wings, r/f for raise/fall with space used for the standard jump/glide.
now i have found that doing this i can use shift and alt for modifier keys to expand my keyboard and by moving none insta cast abilites over to the right of my keyboard since i can't move anyway i have about 10 unmodified keys to play with, or 30 with modifers and could make it 13/39 with a little finger/thumb stretching for 6yhb on the outer arc for skills that are not constantly spammed. i'm still having problems finding a comfortable way to do this while still changing chants though, hence the post on the chanter forums.

what do you think to this set up and how will you be modifying your own keybinds for the flight mechanics in aion?

[Munken]

You only need the one action button to open and close wings :), plus myself personally , i only use ascend on my mouse button and if i need to drop i either close my wings then glide or just aim down and fly(since im using my mouse to fly anyways)

[logandilts]

Ego said:

great post, i think i read it in the war forums as well :D i to am trying to fix my keybindings as per the post in the chanter forums, but i have found that traditional wasd or even esdf like you recommend i use in war is not flexible enough for aion pvp combat. since we need to have wings, no wings, raise and fall bound to 4 extra keys within easy reach of your standard movement keys.

so i have gone back to wasd for movement, q/e for wings, r/f for raise/fall with space used for the standard jump/glide.
now i have found that doing this i can use shift and alt for modifier keys to expand my keyboard and by moving none insta cast abilites over to the right of my keyboard since i can't move anyway i have about 10 unmodified keys to play with, or 30 with modifers and could make it 13/39 with a little finger/thumb stretching for 6yhb on the outer arc for skills that are not constantly spammed. i'm still having problems finding a comfortable way to do this while still changing chants though, hence the post on the chanter forums.

what do you think to this set up and how will you be modifying your own keybinds for the flight mechanics in aion?

basically i do everything just like i've said in the guide... i have all the flying actions bound to my mouse.. so the keyboard is used pretty much the same way it was in WAR... if you don't have a mouse with a ton of buttons though it could be a lot more difficult for you.... and like munken said, you can use just one button to toggle wings on or off, which helps a bunch.

[Ego]

well i had my hots and detaunt bound to mouse keys in war, i suppose i could rework around using mouse 6 for wings and mouse 7 for raise to free up more space. cheers for the tips :)

[Unzeal]

Nice guide man!

[Daemian]

Interesting setup. I'm going to try it out for the next beta

I haven't gotten into setting up macros for Aion too much, any tips for that?

[FenixStryk]

I'm really not fond of this guide's recommendations. It is important to have at least one direction you can move towards at all times regardless of what abilities you are using, and mapping hotkeys to left of the rest position prevents that.

I wrote a hotkey guide for Warhammer Alliance quite some time ago. The message still applies, so I will repost it here to both further my personal agenda and guide those who need proper assistance.

_____ ____ ___ __ _


In any game, using the right control scheme is of great importance. A great control scheme can make movement and using skills on the fly a very fluid process, while lackluster keybindings can do quite the opposite. It can take between days to months to get used to a good set of keybinds, so I feel now is the best time to help you out; leveling with the right controls in WAR will make the learning process that much easier.

This guide mainly caters to those who are right-hand computer users. Those who use the mouse in the left hand will have to pay special attention to the concepts I will talk about and flip/reverse/mirror them as necessary.



Basics:
The basics of any good control scheme layout are usually easy to remember. Lateral movement such as strafing and moving forward/backwards is centered around WSAD (or EDSF depending on preference), while turning and other camera adjustment methods are left to the mouse.

Many FPS games use a WSAD/mouse combo because it allows both fluid movement and accurate shots. While accuracy won't be as important due to the nature of attacking in MMOs, facing your opponents is still key to success. This is especially true for WAR, where RvR is the main focus and directional AoE attacks are common for each class.

WSAD is ideal for a couple reasons. For example, it has easy access to all three modifier keys (Shift, Ctrl, and Alt) which at times must be used if you wish to map every single ability to your keyboard. Clicking skills in an MMO (while somewhat acceptable for PvE-centric games) can slow your reaction times and limit combat mobility. I strongly recommend that you map every skill your class has to a key (e.g. 4) or key combo (e.g. Shift+3, Ctrl+R) so that you can stay mobile and avoid clicking skills altogether.

Furthermore, a large cluster of keys are to the right of your WSAD rest position. This means that you won't need more than your index finger to access any of your skills, which allows each finger to have a more streamlined role assignment.



Your fingers should mainly be focused on the following actions:
Pinky: Modifiers. Shift and Ctrl.
Ring: Movement. Mainly strafing left. (A)
Middle: Movement. Mainly moving forward. (W)
Index: Hotkeys.
Thumb: Spacebar and Alt.





Keybinding your Attacks:
Many MMOs today use unorthodox default keybinds when attack hotkeys are concerned. WoW, for example, expects you to reach all the way to 9, 0, - and = to use some of your attacks. This is quite frankly the wrong thing to do in almost every scenario. Fortunately, there are two areas where attacks should be bound.

The first area is what I like to call the Dead Zone, which is comprised of the keys that are directly above, below, or to the left of your WSAD rest position. Examples include ~, 1, Q and Z. While it is completely acceptable to map abilities to these buttons, it is strongly recommended that these keys are used only for abilities with either extremely long cooldowns or functions that are mostly used out of combat. This is because Dead Zone keys cannot be pressed using the index finger.

The second area is the Sweet Spot, which starts at the keys to the right of WSAD and ends at the keys that your index finger can reach when fully extended. The Sweet Spot is roughly the shape of an arc or triangle and is extremely easy to access on the fly. Depending on hand size, the Sweet Spot can either fit every ability onto a hotkey or only a majority. The rest will have to be mapped in the Dead Zone or require use of modifiers.

Common keys that are in the Sweet Spot are 4, R, F and V. While I will suggest my personal keymapping below, it is important that you map your 12 hotkeys to buttons that YOU have the easiest time pressing on the fly.

In WoW and WAR, I use the following hotkeys for my abilities:
2, 3, 4, 5. E, R, T. F, G. X, C, V.

Obviously 12 buttons won't be enough for any class, so modifier keys will need to be brought in. With proper usage of Shift, Ctrl and Alt, these 12 keys can be stretched to have 48 different functions, which is often more than enough to work with.

Modifiers, while necessary, should always be avoided if possible. Pressing 4 will always be faster than pressing Shift+4 or Ctrl+4, and Alt+4 is often even slower. In severe cases, you may have to double-up modifiers. Using Shift+Ctrl+4 for an ability is, to be blunt, extremely uncomfortable, and it will limit mobility if it needs to be used in combat. As such, try to map skills like out-of-combat buffs on modifier-heavy keybinds, and only as a last resort.

After you've taken care of learning the basic controls and mapping your abilities to hotkeys, the last thing to do is to squeeze menus into the remaining keys. You should probably put the more important menus like Inventory, Map and Quest Log in any extra Dead Zone buttons you hven't used. Otherwise, you'll have to put those menus on Function keys (F1, F3, etc) or on keys to the right of the Sweet Spot.



Although the core of the guide is through, there is one final thing to touch on: equipment and peripherals. A more advanced mouse is likely to have multiple side-buttons which will be easy to access, and would be ideal for keybinds or even modifiers. Make good use of them.

I hope you found some of this information useful. ;)

This post has been edited by FenixStryk: 10 July 2009 - 09:18 PM

[idrfc]

This is a stupid question...

How do you actually change the keybinds? xD
I tried looking in options and it only gave it for the things like inventory or quests.. maybe i missed it?
And how would you do the same with the mouse?

Thanks!

[Devarona]

logandilts said:

i could have used the regular keys for movement and the d-pad for abilities... but that just seemed to defeat the purpose of having a nostromo in the first place.

The SpeedPad is best used when using the mouse to move not the keyboard. (imho) Once I had the movement keys (including strafes) rebound to my mouse, it was all gravy. :study:

-------------------------

idrfc said:

This is a stupid question...

How do you actually change the keybinds? xD
I tried looking in options and it only gave it for the things like inventory or quests.. maybe i missed it?
And how would you do the same with the mouse?

Thanks!

Options/Key Mapping







etc...

This post has been edited by Devarona: 11 July 2009 - 01:14 PM
Reason for edit: Automerged Double-Post.

[idrfc]

hmm i know how to change the stuff like that, but how would you add attack skills to lets say.. Q or E?

[zellogs]

nice effort by logandilts with the OP. I agree having streamlined key bindings is a step towards much more refined play style especially for pvp, though personally I'm a bigger fan of wasd for movement as it lets me have easier access to ctrl, I find it uncomfortable using esdf and using the modifiers especially I find some of the keys become awkward and less effective.

I agree more so with how FenixStryk has his keys setup I can't really flaw that, but I do come from fps background so perhaps I'm heavilly biased from there but I do feel and I did give esdf a fair shot over quite a few months but I reverted back to wasd for more comfortable and fluid key choices. I'm always able to be moving while using every single ability available to me which is crucial especially in a pvp based game.

My usual keys are wasd for movement, q+e for the most important instant cast spells. 1234 for cast time spells usually, rfc for instant cast spell usually or my most used spells, z x for more uncommon / cooldown orientated spells tgv are usually cast time spells also. I also sometimes for the modifiers use cast times bound to modifier + movement keys, since you can't actually be moving when you cast it's my preferances to use ctrl+w for a nuke/main healing spell it is very effective and I feel that people under-use their movement keys with modifiers for spells with cast times but I would highly recommend it. I have a g9 mouse so I heavily re-map my mouse with the software they give you, I re-map my increase/lower dpi keys to usually dispelling abilities.

Overall thanks to both of you for putting in the effort to share this with people though I favour fenix style it's definitely a good start to getting people to stop clicking their skills! So thanks to both of you and I really agree that putting emphasis on streamlined bindings is such a good way to play better. :skip:

[logandilts]

Thanks Zellogs.

FenixStryk's setup is interesting... but i still think ESDF is better for movement. with WASD you have basically 12 buttons in easy reach of your left hand... with ESDF you have 14... try putting your hand over WASD and then counting the easily accessible buttons (not including tab/capslock/shift).. with normal sized hands you should come up with 12... now move your hand 1 key to the right, to ESDF and try counting again... you should get 14... once you add in the shift modifier, that 14 becomes 28.. instead of the 24 available with WASD... in my experience those 4 extra keys can be a huge help.

honestly i don't see how people use ctrl + key for any combat abilities... maybe it's just me, but it's just not comfortable to reach my pinky allll the way down to ctrl and then try and stretch another finger in order to use an ability... non-combat stuff maybe, but in the thick of combat i've just never been able to effectively use ctrl as a modifier.

also, it seems like people are saying that it's easier to move and use abilities at the same time with WASD... I've never had a problem with moving and casting using ESDF.. and i always play kiting classes and am very very rarely caught standing still.

with ESDF you open up A, Q, and Z which can all be used with your pinky, which is not used for movement... so it seems to me that you could have more freedom of movement with ESDF than WASD... with both combos you still have to remove a finger from movement keys to hit certain abilities.. so i don't really see where WASD gains any advantage.

i guess with WASD you use your index finger primarily, with ESDF you have to use the rest of your fingers more in order to take full advantage of the setup... it's all about personal preference though... as long as you take the time to figure out the setup that is best for you, then that's all that matters.

[idrfc]

zellogs said:

My usual keys are wasd for movement, q+e for the most important instant cast spells. 1234 for cast time spells usually, rfc for instant cast spell usually or my most used spells, z x for more uncommon / cooldown orientated spells tgv are usually cast time spells also. I also sometimes for the modifiers use cast times bound to modifier + movement keys, since you can't actually be moving when you cast it's my preferances to use ctrl+w for a nuke/main healing spell it is very effective and I feel that people under-use their movement keys with modifiers for spells with cast times but I would highly recommend it. I have a g9 mouse so I heavily re-map my mouse with the software they give you, I re-map my increase/lower dpi keys to usually dispelling abilities.

how did you "program" q+e for instant cast spells ):

[BradKing]

Tdhz > esdf > wasd

[Seagull]

Interesting guide, and I may consider adjusting my setup if it becomes a problem. However, wasd and alt as my "shift" feels a bit more comfortable at the moment (though it may be due to the condensed nature of my laptop keyboard.)

[Foxdie]

Quite nice.

I use modifiers with alt 1-4, ctrl 1-6, shift 1-4,f,g and numbers 1-6,0,f,g with WASD of course. I like this setup alot cause my pinky reaches the control (took quite alot of CS playing to make my pinky bend to my will). But now its fine using control as a modifier as well.

But I havnt binded them all yet. I guess time will tell how will my skills go on to the bars. And probably a few complete skill wipeout from bars, to set them in more suitable order (usually easy keys for the ones that are most important, then the amount of being used). And when leveling just put skills somewhere where there is still some room left.

But I believe the above posts and instructions will help those quite alot who have not been using shift,alt,ctrl etc buttons already. And learning to use those will make your gaming more efficent.

[FenixStryk]

logandilts said:

honestly i don't see how people use ctrl + key for any combat abilities... maybe it's just me, but it's just not comfortable to reach my pinky allll the way down to ctrl and then try and stretch another finger in order to use an ability... non-combat stuff maybe, but in the thick of combat i've just never been able to effectively use ctrl as a modifier.

I feel WSAD is superior for two reasons:

1) It does not limit mobility. By mapping every hotkey to the right of rest position (WSAD), it allows your pinky and ring finger to be dedicated to modifiers and Strafe Left 100% of the time. This is especially important for ranged classes, as you can kite to the left 100% of the time regardless of what key or key combo you have to press.

2) It does not limit use of modifiers like Ctrl. EDSF gains its extra keys by shifting rest position to the right... but modifiers like Shift and Ctrl cannot be shifted. In essence, this means that EDSF has to reach an extra key for every ability mapped to a key combo (Ctrl+4 on WSAD becomes Ctrl+5 on EDSF, etc).

Using the OP's example, EDSF limits him to 28 keys since he can't use Ctrl. Since WSAD can comfortably reach Ctrl, it has the advantage with 36 keys to choose from (48 if you use Shift+Ctrl+__ for some abilities!).





Like the OP and I have both said, however, hotkeys come down to preference. I can preach my setup all I want, but if you can't get used to it it won't do you any good. These are only recommendations.

[Wotan]

I recently started using ESDF and while it takes some time to get used to (fingers have a tenancy to slip back to the familiar WASD position :D) I feel that I have to be able to reach the extra keys. I can't really agree with the above posters comment with the modifiers being more easily accesible when using WASD, but this might have to do with the size of my hand and my keyboard. (My fingers are pretty long) How does a TDHZ keybinding work? I can see how the fingers rest naturally on them, but you are pretty restricted in reaching some of the numbers.

[Flambergius]

Nice guides in this thread.

Selecting the right approach to keybinding is very contextual, meaning that it depends a lot on the game, class and playstyle. In some games the number of in-combat skills are vary quite a bit from a class to a class. What's situations Aion? How many different keys should I plan for? I find it much better if I get the general approach right the first time with a given character, single skills can be moved occasionally but its a pain if I have to bring is additional modifier keys late in character development.

[idrfc]

*gives up asking:dazed:*