Extra Power Tray

Question: do you guys think most players that are not MMs or Kheld Tri-forms still don't use the mouse for power activation that much? If not, I guess I would be sort of surprised. I would've thought the majority of game play for most players was via the mouse.

I know it is for me. I just can't mentally connect with keybinding all my powers for some reason. I don't feel like I'm terribly inefficient using a mouse for most power activations; maybe I am and just don't realize it haha.

I do make a few macros, esp. for my MMs, but otherwise the only keybind I use is one that for my space bar to toggle on Ninja Run when pressed down, and toggle on Combat Jumping when released.

Truthfully, it seems that if you have to resort to binds and macros to get the most out of certain ATs hints, then it hints at bad game design, at least to me *shrugs*

I can't tell you about "most" players, but I can tell you about those with whom I play and know in the real world.

I can't remember ever using a mouse to activate the main powers. Ever. It was just intuitive for me to associate slot number with a number key. Now the secondary and tertiary trays? Sure. I'll use the mouse for those, but then I also relegate non-combat or long recharge powers to those trays, keeping attack chain powers in the lower tray.

My wife hardly uses a mouse at all. She uses the arrow keys for movement and the number keys for the primary tray. The mouse activates secondary/tertiary powers and selects enemies.

Both my parents use the mouse mainly for movement, as well.

Having said that, I am the only one I know who uses keybinds (including binding my wife's warshade trayswap commands). I tried to get my parents (and my sister and brother-in-law) into kheldians, but it was the keybinds that in the end drove them away. Just too non-intuitive.

I almost exclusively use the mouse to click my powers, as opposed to the numbers of my keyboard. For some reason, pressing numbers never works well for me.

That said, I do use binds for the following keys: Q, E, C, V, G, T, ALT+Q, ALT+E, and Shift + click. No, I can't really explain how I can have 8 regular keybinds, but not like hitting the numbers.

Since I usually keep my Travel powers on the bottom bar, I do use the Number Keys (not Pad) for a few things...

*Number 2 turns on/off my Main Travel Power - convenient cuz it's right above the W.
*Number 1 turns on/off secondary or supplementary travel power, depending on toon (flyers it's often hover, others it's often sprint)
*Number 3 is boosted travel power, such as Afterburner, or Steam Jump for toons using Ninja Run as Travel Power

These keys being close to the movement keys q/w/e/s (which I use in tandem with mouse) works out pretty well for quick travel toggling, in or out of missions

for my PB, I also have a Bind for the Tab Key, to provide a target preference to Kheld Enemies (ie Voids). If those are near, they'll get targeted, otherwise the nearest foes do.

After someone in game was kind enough to point me to this thread where I was overjoyed to find how to bind to the server tray, I created (and then tested) the following files.

-----------File Name: WSHuman.txt-------------
P "powexec_toggleon Dark Nova$$bindloadfile d:\keybinds\WSNova.txt"
O "powexec_toggleon Black Dwarf$$bindloadfile d:\keybinds\WSDwarf.txt"
1 "powexec_slot 1"
2 "powexec_slot 2"
3 "powexec_slot 3"
4 "powexec_slot 4"
5 "powexec_slot 5"
6 "powexec_slot 6"
7 "powexec_slot 7"
8 "powexec_slot 8"
9 "powexec_slot 9"
0 "powexec_slot 0"
CTRL+LBUTTON "powexec_name Shadow Step"
ALT+LBUTTON "powexec_name Shadow Recall"

-----------File Name: WSNova.txt-------------
P "powexec_toggleoff Dark Nova$$bindloadfile d:\keybinds\WSHuman.txt"
O "powexec_toggleon Black Dwarf$$bindloadfile d:\keybinds\WSDwarf.txt"
1 "powexec_serverslot 1"
2 "powexec_serverslot 2"
3 "powexec_serverslot 3"
4 "powexec_serverslot 4"
5 "powexec_serverslot 5"
6 "powexec_serverslot 6"
7 "powexec_serverslot 7"
8 "powexec_serverslot 8"
9 "powexec_serverslot 9"
0 "powexec_serverslot 0"

-----------File Name: WSDwarf.txt-------------
P "powexec_toggleon Dark Nova$$bindloadfile d:\keybinds\WSNova.txt"
O "powexec_toggleoff Black Dwarf$$bindloadfile d:\keybinds\WSHuman.txt"
1 "powexec_serverslot 1"
2 "powexec_serverslot 2"
3 "powexec_serverslot 3"
4 "powexec_serverslot 4"
5 "powexec_serverslot 5"
6 "powexec_serverslot 6"
7 "powexec_serverslot 7"
8 "powexec_serverslot 8"
9 "powexec_serverslot 9"
0 "powexec_serverslot 0"
CTRL+LBUTTON "powexec_name Black Dwarf Step"
-------------------------------------------------------

Obviously you'd have to change the paths to match where you put the files. I use the bindloadfilesilent instead of bindloadfile when in actual use; the above were for testing.

It all works great and it makes it very simple. The only problem is when you die your files get out of sync until you get yourself back to the human file. Easy enough to do while you're dead, but slightly more difficult if you wait until you're alive again. If you use them you'll see what I mean.

I'd be grateful if any of you would give me a shout about how you modify them for your own use so I can steal any good ideas you might have. Since I have little experience at either binding or Kheldians, I'm sure you'll all have some much better ways of doing things.

Robin.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Techbot Alpha ...I have the patience of a coffee-fueled flea...

This is what gets me about the extra tray for those of us that use the keyboard. This:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smiling_Joe Nova: /bind e "powexec_toggleon bright nova$$bind 1 powexec_serverslot 1$$bind 2 powexec_serverslot 2$$bind 3 powexec_serverslot 3$$bind 4 powexec_serverslot 4"

Seems so much more complicated than this:
Nova:
/bind e "powexec_toggleon bright nova$$goto_tray 1 3"

You put your nova powers on tray 3 and when you activate nova form your bottom tray swaps to tray 3, no need to rebind any keys all the time. And if you die and things get out of sync you can at least see that your bottom tray is still on your nova powers and it's easier to get back on track.

I'd much rather wait until the devs change it themselves, honestly. Still using the "old school" kheldian binds, and having an extra power tray above a functional one doesn't really bother me all that much, especially since it's only for one character out of many.

I never click my powers- I use the numers at the top of my keyboard, and a lot of the time, I use the default alt+number and ctrl+number to control the top couple of trays. The only things I'll click are travel powers, inspiration macros and obviously extra stuff like Megalomaniac. I do have binds set up on my PB to switch forms and gototray, and I have a target dead corpse+unchain essence bind on my Warshade. Oh, and I use a bind to target dead allies on my characters with Vengeance. On characters without travel powers, I have binds set up to toggle between Ninja Run and Combat Jumping, and I use the commonplace shift + click for Shadow Step.