Logitech G13 - how would I set this up?

I've had a Logitech G13 game pad/keyboard/whatever for a while now, and I have yet to install it. Largely because after I got it home and really started thinking about it, I can't see how I can set it up. I don't mean how to assign the keys, I'm sure the utility for that is fine. I mean, how do I set it up when nearly all of my characters (and there are a lot) have a different layout of powers? Even the ones that are the same AT have different powers, different travel powers, different pets. Even if I took the time to somehow standardize all the powers trays, there are going to be ones that just *won't* fit the same layout. Like my Illusion Controllers. (And then there's the fact that I occasionally play several different games, most of which have at least a few noticeably different UI features.)

I've poked around online a little, and the few posts/blogs I've found about setting it up are exclusively about setting it up for *one* character. (Also usually for a completely different game, so knowing how to precisely map and bind the thing for a Bear Shaman really isn't that great for my purposes anyway.)

To be honest, I'm not sure I have the right playstyle to use the thing to begin with. Aside from the fact that I jump from game to game whenever I get bored, I make lots and lots of characters, most of whom have very little in common. I won't use keyboard turning, so setting up the thumbstick would be a problem regardless. (I use mouselook to turn, and the keyboard for forward/back and strafe from side to side.) I only use binds on a handful of characters, mostly so that shift+Lclick teleports, and a very simple setup to for the two Kheldians. (Q shifts to Nova and the "Nova" power tray, E does the same thing for the lobster.) I use up to three power trays, but I don't make use of any of the floating trays.

In short, the more I think about it, the more it seems like I'd have to basically totally relearn how to play to even make use of the thing, and I'm not sure that it's worth the effort for me.

So, my question is (more or less) has anyone else managed to set this accessory up so that it works across many characters, and several different games? Or have I acquired an expensive dust catcher?

The Logitech has profiles. You can have one profile per character, though if you have a ton of characters, I have no idea what the upper limit of profiles is.

I have a G15 keyboard (the original one with 18 buttons). I just use them for generic things - G1 through G8 are teamselect #, and G9 through G18 are ports, universal powers (Sprint, Rest, Shadowy Presence, etc) or powers that I take on pretty much everyone (Recall Friend, etc), and some empty buttons. I have a couple characters with special profiles that map even the empty buttons.

The G13 doesn't have as many buttons so you can do all your "universal stuff" on it and forget about specialty binds if you want.

Remember that in order to bind to the G keys, you either have to record a macro of you typing out the bind, or bind in-game to some weird combination (like ALT+P) that you won't type in normal play and then bind the G keys to those combinations.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.

I have a G11, but mostly I gave up on programming the G keys. At one point I had the binds to combine inspirations or gulp one on the top six, but sometimes the profile would misload and I eventually just moved on, though I've been meaning to start using it, thus my interest in the thread, and also get my Belkin Nostromo out.

[note: the Nostromo will not work if you load the drivers, in case you have one. Also, I have an N50, I believe the N51 hates Vista/7 and is a paperweight with a USB cable.]

I rolled a warshade recently and I'm thinking that the extra keys might really help. Though, an aside about the warshade, I really suck at WS.

What I did do was assign macros to obscure key combinations, like Alt+q/w/e/r/t/y/u/i/o and have G1+ activate those. I did the top three as "combine insp to xxx" and the one directly under it to "gulp xxx."

But that's all I've done.

*The G11 is a G13 w/o the little screen.

I'd been looking for this thread.

I have the G510 keyboard and have been itching to get my 18 G keys going.

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

I've had a Belkin Nostromo Speedpad for a long time and have migrated away from using it for anything but repetitive things like my Thermal MM buffing all of her pets of a buffer character buffing all the group in a row using a macro.

Even with those things I have the F1-6 keys mapped to a PopMenu for Pet Buffs and the Numpad 1-8 keys mapped to a PopMenu for Teammate buffs in case I just need one or two refreshed.

I have a G110 and what I did was set the 12 programmable keys to correspond to standard keys that I don't use (I used the NumPad keys, but if you use those then using chord keys is a good way to generate "extra" keys) and then for each character bound those keys to whatever I wanted to do. If you have some set of keys you'll be using the same for each character than making a bind file to rebind them is a simple solution.

I have one of them (not sure exactly) but it has 2 rows of G keys right next to the keyboard on the left. Since I touch-type I was constantly hitting one of them instead of Tab, shift, and control. I eventually had to program them to emulate the key they were sitting next to so I didn't have to worry about it.

The only one I still have programmed differently is the one next to the escape key which I use to target nearest. Since I had gotten in the habit on my old keyboard of pressing Escape + tab to target nearest my fingers were already trained to hit that general vicinity and all I had to do was retrain them not to hit tab immediately afterwards.

Here's a quick visual rep of all the Logitech Gaming series keyboards/pads.

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

The only problem I have with Logitech keyboards are their ridiculously little standoffs to incline the keyboard. There's almost no difference between a flat lay and the feet up. Maybe 5 degrees. If that.

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

Might be regional difference, been using keyboards since late 80's early nineties and apart from function keys and windows/choord keys changing and minor changes in size (left shift seems to shrink over time) my current MS keyboard is not a lot different from the IBM keyboard I started out on... (All EU/UK Keyboards.)

As for the thread (why I searched, just got a g13) I'm migrating from a nostromo as I refuse to pay £30 extra just for updated software and a back light (N52 classic now costs ~£20 N52ti costs ~£50... G13 cost me £50 (£49.99) .

I use thumb area and G5,6,13,18 for powers 0-9 (1-10) G15 = Ctrl, G16 = ALT. Normal WASD layout for movement.

I was looking for ideas about what to do with all the extra unused keys.