14 replies to this topic

[grendeldog]

Hey there! So I myself no longer count myself as a new player. I've been at it for over a month, can get up to five kills per game, once topped 1000 damage, etc. But my buddy is totally new to the game, and I've been pestering him over and over that he needs to check this game out and give it a try.

Finally he downloaded the client and installed it. But he bounced off of it immediately because he is a leftie, and uses left-handed keybindings for the other games he plays (currently obsessed with Red Orchestra, but also Starcraft and Team Fortress). He was trying to set up keybindings before even going into the testing grounds, which sort of makes sense I guess. But because he has yet to play / yet to drop a mech into the testing grounds, he didn't know what keys to bind to what actions since he doesn't yet know what those actions mean.

Anyway, I was just wondering if there was anybody out there who also uses a left-handed keybinding setup, and if so if they would mind sharing their keybinding list with me, so I can then pass it on to him. He also has a Razer MMORPG-style gaming mouse - the Naga if I recall correctly - so if there are any left-hand-oriented bindings for such a mouse that would be cool to hear also, like maybe putting the acquire target (R key), zoom (Z key), and a few throttle levels on the Naga's copious buttons perhaps, in addition to the weapon groups on the mouse perhaps.

Anyhow, the TL;DR is that I'd really appreciate it if anyone who uses a left-handed keybinding setup could share their mappings, so I could pass that on to homeboy. Thanks!

Edited by grendeldog, 10 April 2015 - 02:30 PM.

[Des61]

Hi Grendel,
I'm also a VERY left-handed player. While others can use the WASD keys I have to bind my movement keys to O, K , L and ;.

I don't like having to do big hand movements so I bind all of needed actions to those keys I can easily and quickly reach. With that said - MWO doesn't accept modifiers (Shift, CTRL, ALT) so to be honest I simply don't use the keyboard for much. I ended up getting a joystick and use that as a replacement. I had an old Saitek ST290 Pro laying around and it works great.

Don't let anyone tell you differently - a joystick works great (and it's a little more immersive). I also use a Naga 2014 Left-handed Edition mouse so there are a ton of bindings there.

He really just needs to sit in a map and decide what's important for him to bind. There are ton of "potential" binds but not all are important all the time - just like any other game.

Sorry that it's not a list of binds but I hope that your buddy sees that he's not alone!

07 Salute!

Edited by Des61, 10 April 2015 - 02:43 PM.

[ArchMage Sparrowhawk]

I'm a JIKL player. just use the u for targetting the t for talk, the y for team, the r for squad..etc. The home pad is for consumables, and the numpad controls throttle.

[Banditman]

Mouse 1 = Fire Current group
Mouse 2 = Fire Group 2
Numpad 0 = Arty Strike
Numpad 1 = Show Target Overlay
Numpad 2 = Reverse
Numpad 3 = Fire Group 3
Numpad 4 = Turn Left
Numpad 5 = Push to talk
Numpad 6 = Turn Right
Numpad 7 = Target
Numpad 8 = Jump Jets
Numpad - = Throttle down
Numpad + = Throttle up
Numpad Enter = Toggle Zoom 2
Numpad Del = Advanced Zoom

[Stealth Fox]

Two Atari 2600 controllers are your best friend, You only need those 4 buttons.

Nah I kid, Naga 2012 or 2014 left handers are a great way to go.. my mouse hand does all of the shooting and my keyboard hand handles all the movement and other less important things.

IJKL is what i use when I need to for things my self when i play lefty (I'm moderately Ambi so I switch it some sometimes. )

[Darth Hotz]

Being lefthanded myself i had years of struggeling with the wasd setup on all games. My solution was to buy a little extra gaming keyboard, the Hama Crux (aka. Ideazon Fang). Its not build anymore but amazon still has some left for 26.99€. I bought mine at ebay for 12€. Very ergonomic, can be used plug and play but also able to do macros with the special driver. An awesome piece of hardware that i recommend to all mwo players left or right handed but also great for all kinds of games.

As a mouse i have the razer naga left handed edition but i switched to a mionix avior sk by now.

[Ironicus]

I'm a lefty, I notice in the thread no-one uses arrow keys?

Anwyay,

I usually use:

LMB: Weapon Group 1
RMB: Weapon Group 2
Wheelmouse/MMB: Zooming / Advanced Zoom

Arrow Up: Forward
Arrow Down: Back
Arrow Left: Turn legs left
Arrow right: Turn legs right

Right Shift: Lock/Unlock Arms
Right Control: Jump Jets

Delete: Weapon Group 3
End: Weapon Group 4
Page Down: Weapon Group 5

Num 1: Arty Strike

Lock target is on a button on my mouse which is bound to my C key, I can hit it with my thumb with ease. .

All these keys seem to fit around my right hand perfectly and don't detriment my gameplay or take 'too long to press'. I guess it's a matter of what keyboard you have. I've had some really strange ones in the past.

Any other Mech functions are usually bound to the letter of the key - i.e. Override Shutdown = O or Power down = P etc.

[grendeldog]

That Hama Crux reminds me a bit of the Razer Orbweaver / Nostromo. I kinda lust after the Orbweaver, but it's crazy expensive when I realistically use the keyboard only for turning and throttle. I got a Corsair M65 for this game, so I should probably not spend more cash on peripherals. And with that mouse I try to keep below four weapon groups, and as a medium pilot that's easy, so I have weapon groups one two and three and left, right, and middle mouse button, zoom on the stupidly-huge ZOMG SNIPER button on the side, group four on the front thumb button and target acquire on the back thumb button.

I don't know if I could realistically handle twelve thumb buttons. Maybe it's just having no history with MMORPGs, but I have no idea how my buddy can use twelve buttons under the thumb.

Thanks for the suggestions people, keep them coming if you want; I appreciate the different input because my friend's an idiosyncratic dude and one possible binding could not possibly be enough possibility space.

[RazorbeastFXK3]

I've printed out a quick reference keymap for those times when I forget which key does what.
http://static.mwomer...me/controls.png
You can view the keymap and then adjust the settings to what makes you comfortable with using.

I do miss the Mechwarrior 3 days when the arrow keys controlled the throttle/direction and the right-mouse button allowed me to cycle through the weapon groups.

[Keira RAVEN McKenna]

its hard to believe they havent made something like this yet!?



This may help though... http://www.cybersnip...rds/gamepad.php

Edited by Keira RAVEN McKenna, 11 April 2015 - 03:38 PM.

[Omi_]

I play MWO right-handed using keybindings that I based off TheCore project, which is a custom hotkey setup designed for Starcraft 2. If I were to adapt my system to a left-handed variation, I would do this:

Position:
- Use ESDF as your WASD and bear with me. In my right-handed setup, I use OKL; for WASD
- Place the thumb over both the Left Ctrl and Shift keys, so that it can easily press both
- Rest the pinky on the V key.
- Note you will have to rotate the right side of the keyboard away from you in order to accomplish a comfortable position.

Some example keybinds:

Left shift: Center Legs
Left Ctrl: Jumpjets
E/D: Throttle up/down
S/F: Turn left/right
W: Target Lock
Q: Overlay
R: Toggle Max Zoom
T: Toggle Weapon Doors
A: Heat Vision
G: Night Vision
V: In-Game Push-To-Talk
B: Scoreboard
Spacebar: Battlegrid
X: AMS
C: ECM

Mouse Left/Right: Weapon groups 1/2
Middle Mouse: Consumable Slot 2 (Whatever)
4: Consumable Slot 1 (UAV for me)

This setup takes advantage of the button-mash nature of the thumb and sticks it over two big keys, and the nimbleness of the pinky in reaching out for less accessible keys to the right of the main control area.

[Anunknownlurker]

um....I just moved the keyboard over to the right and stuck with the default key binds

[dr lao]

Jimmy DiGriz, on 14 April 2015 - 04:17 AM, said:

um....I just moved the keyboard over to the right and stuck with the default key binds

same here yes Dr lao is a lefty i all so lilt it to the side the right side higher then the left the only thing i have a problem with is the consumables keys I really half to look off screen to hit the ins or home key and I use my meddle finger to hit the fire button or left mouse .

Edited by dr lao, 14 April 2015 - 08:26 AM.

[Anunknownlurker]

yeah, consumables are a problem - normally though I have enough time to find the right key to drop arty or pop a UAV. I don't normally use the "shift keyboard to the right" solution but, for some reason, it seemed to work ok for me in MWO

For most other games I use the arrows for movement and ins -> page down (using +crtl to give me 12 keys within easy reach) for weapons/spells etc

Guess I was just to lazy to mess around with them in MWO

[Ano]

I'm a lefty using WASD -- I just bias my keyboard a little further to the right for gaming. I actually think for many things, WASD works better for lefties than righties. I can hit the various modifier keys (shift, ctrl, alt and windows/command, assuming you've unbound it from the windows key default) plus space with my thumb, and then I can easily pick out the letter keys to the right of WASD with my pinky finger. Sliding that arrangement over to the right side of the keyboard loses you thumb access to the modifier keys but makes spacebar a little easier.

The other thing I do is try to keep my firing groups to a minimum so I can map them all to mouse buttons (I have a few deathadder LHs). I generally have primary/left side on LMB, secondary/right side on RMB and a chainfire group on button 4 (the back button on the side). I'll use more buttons if absolutely necessary but more often than not, that works for me, in conjunction with using a keyboard shortcut for alphastrike.