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Macro Like A Boss, Or How To Get Banned From Mechwarrior


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#1 LordNothing

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 12:38 AM

people have been using macros for awhile and its totally fine according to the tos. but i built a monster. traditionally macros are 100% software, whatever the manufacturer of your mouse, keyboard or joystick provided. in my case i built a physical device. a number of arcade buttons a couple toggle switches and a rotory encoder stuffed into a box with an arduino pro micro.

Posted Image

this is the prototype, il give it a fancier case sometime down the road when i figure out how to cut acrylic straight without a saw. my 3d printer doesnt have the build area (maybe if i play around with layout idk) and it always takes me forever to model things anyway. inside is a mass of wire that looks like it was laid out by a lunatic. buttons matrixed and leds charlieplexed. leds can be individually addressed and each can run their own brightness value (the greens are a little weak and need lower value current limiting resistors).

now i wrote a lot of code over the past week to get it all working. the first things i got out of the way was all the interrupt driven stuff, the led brightness control code and the rotory encoder code. both run in the background. the rotory encoder is kind of a configuration device, i can select one of the control modes, and can control settings in some modes. the computer sees it as a native usb hid keyboard.

the first control mode was pretty basic. the missile switch arms the big red button, which fires an alpha strike. pretty basic stuff. the other switch toggles between turbo and direct. turbo mashes the buttons for me when im feeling arthritic. the other mode just treats it like normal firing keys. the white button is actually set up as a toggle, this is useful for tag lasers, i can hit it and forget it (if you saw me running around with my tag on durring the last event, this is why).

technically this is a macro, just ignore that its written in c++ (though there are a few lines of asm in my interrupt service routines, for speed, but thats mostly to keep the leds blinking smoothly). mode 2 is where things start to get evil. this is my gunboat mode. the small buttons are really just arming toggles which correspond to each weapon group. when armed the big red button can fire them. the missile switch enables alpha mode, but when down the code cycles through the guns in sequence and fires them. if i flip the small toggle it enables uac mode, and double taps each button before going on to the next. the buttons throb in glee when this switch is set. inside the case ive epoxied a bar graph display from an old 80s stereo i dismantled. this displays a binary number indicating the firing rate. its a 10 bit number, and the lower half appear dimmer than the upper half, and they blink back and fourth. needless to say it is not easy to read without doing math in your head (maybe get one of those $2 i2c oled displays off of ebay, i didnt use my i2c lines).

mode 3 is a super evil way to bipass gauss charge, by making sure a gun is always ready to fire. the catch is it needs at least 3 of them to do it. its the least developed mode that is kind of buggy. you flip the toggle switch and it goes through the charge of each gun in sequence, of course it holds it slightly longer than the amount of time the gun will stay charged, so the guns dont fire. if i hit the red button, all armed gauss rifles will be unleashed in evil fury. this can be repeated until all guns are in cd. its great for those occasional pop shots, like when a light darts across your screen. its nice to be able to tap off a round or two on a moments notice.

the other 2 modes remain undefined, will probibly use those for kerbal space program.

i dropped in a match using the latter 2 modes, and each kind of made me feel guilty afterwards. i cant say i did exceptionally well. i always said macros were a crutch, but in my case its somewhat of an impedement. especially since i need to remove a hand from my throttle to hit the big red button of doom. im sure its only a matter of time before i come up with a way to pass the mouse commands to the device, and use them to trigger events, i can send serial commands up the cdc port and trigger an event on the device, but i need to figure out the pc side of harvesting mouse events. but still i dont want to get banned. so i probibly wont use it for anything but mode 1. in fact im seriously concerned i might get banned for such shenanigans. il just consider my hellbox another lesson in control systems (and blinkenlights).

Edited by LordNothing, 10 September 2016 - 12:39 AM.


#2 Khobai

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 12:48 AM

so you made a ghetto keypad, which everyone else already had, and you think it breaks the game?

#3 LordNothing

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 12:52 AM

View PostKhobai, on 10 September 2016 - 12:48 AM, said:

so you made a ghetto keypad, which everyone else already had, and you think it breaks the game?


pretty much. i wouldnt say it breaks the game. but it is nice to be able to tap a button and have a gauss rifle fire that very millisecond. i legged a spider in the one match i used it on. usually when i try to leg a spider with a gauss rifle i miss completely. of course because my hand was on the button and not the throttle, i walked into an enemy formation and died 3 seconds later.

Edited by LordNothing, 10 September 2016 - 12:55 AM.


#4 El Bandito

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 01:13 AM

I applaud your effort, but I can basically let my Razer mouse do whatever you programmed to do in there. Without taking my hands off the mouse and keyboard.

And stop being dramatic. PGI isn't gonna ban anyone for using macros, no matter how complicated it is.

Edited by El Bandito, 13 September 2016 - 06:57 PM.


#5 627

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 01:25 AM

maximum viable keypad :D

#6 H I A S

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 01:26 AM

View PostLordNothing, on 10 September 2016 - 12:52 AM, said:


pretty much. i wouldnt say it breaks the game. but it is nice to be able to tap a button and have a gauss rifle fire that very millisecond. i legged a spider in the one match i used it on. usually when i try to leg a spider with a gauss rifle i miss completely. of course because my hand was on the button and not the throttle, i walked into an enemy formation and died 3 seconds later.


lol

#7 Gladius Vittoris

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 01:41 AM

I want pedals to kick croches..... but sadly we cannot have nice things nor melee


Stefka.

#8 Parmeggido

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 01:49 AM

I want a big red alpha button... with an oled screen that plays a short nuke explosion animation every time I push it... In all seriousness though, I think this is pretty cool, and something I wish I had the knowledge and cashflow to do. Tinkering is such a satisfying thing, especially if it works.

#9 MOBAjobg

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 01:57 AM

Looks like I might need to single you out as a priority target in my games.

#10 Yosharian

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 02:01 AM

Bypassing the gauss charge mechanic is really lame.

Edited by Yosharian, 10 September 2016 - 02:01 AM.


#11 dervishx5

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 02:05 AM

It's cool you can do something like that. But it seems like an unnecessary step given keyboards like mine:

Posted Image

#12 El Bandito

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 02:45 AM

View PostYosharian, on 10 September 2016 - 02:01 AM, said:

Bypassing the gauss charge mechanic is really lame.


It's not really that effective, since he can snap off only one Gauss shot, while having to carry three.

#13 Tier5 Kerensky

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 03:15 AM

The mode 3 sounds very cool. What's the max how many Gauss a mech can carry?

#14 Tier5 Kerensky

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 03:22 AM

View PostEl Bandito, on 10 September 2016 - 02:45 AM, said:


It's not really that effective, since he can snap off only one Gauss shot, while having to carry three.


And that one is more then zero.

Plus after firing one the system will continue to throttle the 2 remaining, which will give it possibility to fire another, unless it hits into the small time during which neither are triggered to be ready.

With 4 gauss, it could have nearly always 2 or minium of 1 gauss ready. Done well enough, that would be quite good.

#15 Appogee

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 03:33 AM

Posted Image

#16 El Bandito

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 03:49 AM

View PostTeer5, on 10 September 2016 - 03:22 AM, said:

And that one is more then zero.

Plus after firing one the system will continue to throttle the 2 remaining, which will give it possibility to fire another, unless it hits into the small time during which neither are triggered to be ready.

With 4 gauss, it could have nearly always 2 or minium of 1 gauss ready. Done well enough, that would be quite good.


And listen to Gauss charge sound every second of the game? No thanks. I prefer silence so I can focus better.

Edited by El Bandito, 10 September 2016 - 03:56 AM.


#17 EvilCow

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 04:05 AM

It is a commendable example of embedded programming regardless the intended purpose.

#18 Mechwarrior Buddah

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 04:22 AM

anyone know how to macro it so the ppcs fire at the end of the gauss charge? I wanna get gud too

#19 sneeking

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 04:42 AM

A nostramo a good mouse n a ordinay keyboard is all ya need...

I don't see the point In all of this.

#20 JC Daxion

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Posted 10 September 2016 - 04:53 AM

Dude.. Now i so wanna MOD my key board and add 4 big THUMB buttons bellow my space bar to use for a few things.. Not even macro's,, Just to hot key, things like airstrike, or alpha, or something.. so much easier than hitting the little key board buttons..


You know for all of us with 3 button mouse.. maybe one day i will get a better mouse.. :P


(anyone have any mouse recommendations? )





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