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qoncept
Junior Member

Posts: 154
Registered: 12-11

I playe Doom for 18 years using nothing but the keyboard with the default controls. A couple weeks ago I switched places with a buddy while we were playing Plutonia in my basement and used his mouse controls. After about 10 minutes I was better than with a keyboard and I've kept using the mouse.

I didn't realize you could turn off mouse look. Where can I do that in ZDoom? I tend to wander up and down with the mouse and fall off platforms every once in a while.

01-30-12 15:14 #

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Relic
Mini-Member

Posts: 83
Registered: 01-12

qoncept said:
I played Doom for 18 years using nothing but the keyboard with the default controls. A couple weeks ago I switched places with a buddy while we were playing Plutonia in my basement and used his mouse controls. After about 10 minutes I was better than with a keyboard and I've kept using the mouse.

I didn't realize you could turn off mouse look. Where can I do that in ZDoom? I tend to wander up and down with the mouse and fall off platforms every once in a while.

Wow u played for 18 years and you're switching now ? At least now you understand why keyboard + mouse is better.

Also, fairly sure it's a simple option in zdoom's mouse options to turn off mouse look.

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01-30-12 15:50 #

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qoncept
Junior Member

Posts: 154
Registered: 12-11

Relic said:

Wow u played for 18 years and you're switching now ? At least now you understand why keyboard + mouse is better.

Also, fairly sure it's a simple option in zdoom's mouse options to turn off mouse look.

You know.. as a kid when I first started playing it, I grabbed the mouse to see how it worked (move up to move forward, left and right to turn) and said to myself "wow, that sucks. I'll use the keyboard." And that was it. For whatever reason I never even considered using the mouse AND keyboard. By the time games came out that used the mouse+keyboard as the "normal" config and I considered it for Doom, the source ports were out and I equated the mouse with mouselook, which, in the original iwads, is cheating.

I also didn't realize for a LONG time that there were strafe keys (I always ALWAYS used alt+left/right). When I played on PSX I thought the controls were so much better because strafing with the shoulder buttons was so easy.

I've never been one for customizing my controls in games. Most games I don't spend enough time with to bother. Or I install, uninstall, reinstall so many times that I get tired of redoing everything.

01-30-12 16:32 #

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SAV88
Member

Posts: 308
Registered: 11-10

I'm a keyboard-only player, and my control was very clumsy, very limited when I started breaking Compet-N records (7+ years ago). But the more years I spend polishing my keyboard-button reflexes, the more maneuverable I become, and now the technical limitations of keyboard don't hinder me at all. One of the speedrunners even said that my Scythe MAP28 Nighmare record (0:27) looks 100% like it's done with mouse.

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01-30-12 17:31 #

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Maes
I like big butts!

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qoncept said:
You know.. as a kid when I first started playing it, I grabbed the mouse to see how it worked (move up to move forward, left and right to turn) and said to myself "wow, that sucks. I'll use the keyboard." And that was it. For whatever reason I never even considered using the mouse AND keyboard.

Lol that's the exact thing I did years ago. To be fair however, my experience was totally ruined by two things:

Trying to use left-handed arrow-keys with mouse...not very comfortable.
Extremely sensitive mouse input which just sent me spinning as soon as I touched it.

Of couse I also thought "That's bullshit" (or rather "'Doom is easier to play with a mouse' [sic] my ass!!!" and stuck to the tried & true default keyboard controls (with which I also played Wolf3D and Quake. Plus I used arrows + ctrl + alt + space for a LOT of other games as well, so I was well-conditioned). Some people claim that they had discovered the WASD+mouse layout since 1994, I don't blame them for claiming that playing Doom that way with a mouse was superior, but the way I tried it surely wasn't.

The weird thing is that when I was into modern shooters (Quake III, Battlefield 1942), I used WASD+mouse with no problem, but I didn't think of using that layout with Doom. I even beat HR and Absolution with the traditional layout until I said to myself "Why do I only play Doom like this?" and switched, somewhere in 2005. I can still play "the traditional way" if need be, though.

01-30-12 17:58 #

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qoncept
Junior Member

Posts: 154
Registered: 12-11

Duh, it was Wolfenstein that had me conditioned to use those controls! Can't believe I didn't make the connection. I don't remember what I did in Quake (never played it a lot) but I think I must have started with the keyboard.

I bought Turok for N64 and while I had trouble at first, I learned to really love the controls, and that was probably my mouse+keyboard primer. It used the center joystick to look (left hand) and the 4 camera buttons to move (right hand). They were backwards and I think they really would have been better reversed, but the concept of strafing with buttons and looking with an analog device makes a lot more sense to me now.

01-30-12 18:04 #

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Relic
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Posts: 83
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qoncept said:
I've never been one for customizing my controls in games. Most games I don't spend enough time with to bother.

Ok, that's understandable why you didn't switch then...

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01-31-12 00:22 #

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Ledmeister
Junior Member

Posts: 242
Registered: 10-03

I've played almost all PC FPSes keyboard-only, default controls, since Wolf3D.
Console-wise, when I got PlayStation Doom I got used to its controls, enough so that I'd start remapping other console FPS game controls the same way (or as close as I could) whenever possible.

I know using/adding mouse to PC games would be a huge help in some cases; and I use mouse plenty in other games... but Doom muscle-memory's stubborn, and I usually give in to the Old Ways. %)

01-31-12 04:30 #

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Vortex Lord
Warming Up

Posts: 12
Registered: 10-11

Keyboard only! Always!

01-31-12 06:36 #

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Shadow Dweller
Forum Regular

Posts: 715
Registered: 04-06

When I first played I started using only the mouse, then I went to keyboard only, and now I use a combination of the two.

01-31-12 14:50 #

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Pirx
Member

Posts: 560
Registered: 11-04

SAV88 said:
I'm a keyboard-only player, and my control was very clumsy, very limited when I started breaking Compet-N records (7+ years ago). But the more years I spend polishing my keyboard-button reflexes, the more maneuverable I become, and now the technical limitations of keyboard don't hinder me at all. One of the speedrunners even said that my Scythe MAP28 Nighmare record (0:27) looks 100% like it's done with mouse.

yep, it looks like mouse control with low sens to me. i guess you use separate strafing keys (like A+D in a WASD setup) and steer with the arrows. that's far better than what i used as a keyboarder, ALT+arrow to modify turning into strafing, which made circle strafing impossible, the best result was a kind of clumsy square strafing.

there's still one leftover of keyboarding in my setup: i don't use WASD, but ASD for strafe left / back / strafe right, and run forward with the right mouse button (or middle button on my wingman-mod) because somehow right hand middle finger = run forward remained hardwired in my brain when i switched to the mouse.

i began experimenting with the mouse in duke3d, but made the switch when quake came out and required 3d aiming. actually i started wolf3d with a mouse, but kb only was easier so i stayed with it until quake came.

so keyboarding in doom works well thanks to vertical autoaim, but do you keyboard only players also play newer games that require vertical aiming, and how?

01-31-12 21:54 #

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SAV88
Member

Posts: 308
Registered: 11-10

@Pirx:
For strafing I use mostly LAlt + 4(Left) / 6(Right), but separate sidestepping keys (A and S) also help me a lot. I press them for executing Strafe50 (which I do many times per minute), and also for circular moving. Only a year ago I learned to fully effectively use strafe-on-turn for increasing my smartness, so my later demos have a snappier movement and a higher level of optimization than the ones done in 2010 or before. My ancient records are too slow for my current standard, and improving many of them is a part of my life-long to-do list.

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Last edited by SAV88 on 01-31-12 at 22:27

01-31-12 22:10 #

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hex11
Senior Member

Posts: 1481
Registered: 09-09

Pirx said:

so keyboarding in doom works well thanks to vertical autoaim, but do you keyboard only players also play newer games that require vertical aiming, and how?

I occasionally play Quake 1 in SP with controls very similar to my Doom bindings:
ESDF (instead of AWSD) for moving
J/L = turning left/right
K = jump (in Doom it's to run, in Quake I always run)
A/Z/Q = look up/down/center
G/B = swim up/down (but jumping also swims up)
Space = fire
I = use (for Doom only)

It's not as keyboard-friendly as Doom, but I can get through the game in "easy" mode without much trouble. Maybe the other skills are possible too, with some practice. But DM is probably right out (too much precise rocket-jumping...)

02-01-12 01:16 #

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Maes
I like big butts!

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Pirx said:
i began experimenting with the mouse in duke3d, but made the switch when quake came out and required 3d aiming. actually i started wolf3d with a mouse, but kb only was easier so i stayed with it until quake came.

I think at least the original DOS version of Quake allowed some leeway by still having a vertical autoaim mechanism in place. Dunno about the sequels though (well, Q3A doesn't for sure).

02-01-12 09:04 #

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Pirx
Member

Posts: 560
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Maes said:

I think at least the original DOS version of Quake allowed some leeway by still having a vertical autoaim mechanism in place. Dunno about the sequels though (well, Q3A doesn't for sure).

that was only in quake when it came out, probably id assumed people wanted to play it with autoaim as they were used with doom. iirc it was enabled by the server variable sv_aim 0 and disabled with 1, and soon having no autoaim became standard. this also made more efficient use of the (already powerful) rocket launcher, as rockets could be shot at the floor, guaranteeing damage even in case of a miss.

02-01-12 21:13 #

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hex11
Senior Member

Posts: 1481
Registered: 09-09

QuakeForge lets you set sv_aim to 0 if you want (default is 0.93). It helps a bit, but not with the grenade launcher...

02-02-12 00:31 #

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Face23785
Junior Member

Posts: 171
Registered: 04-11

alot of people said said:
WASD

Am I the only one who uses ESDF?

02-04-12 17:56 #

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Pirx
Member

Posts: 560
Registered: 11-04

Face23785 said:

Am I the only one who uses ESDF?

WASD is more "standard" as many games come already with controls mapped to this scheme. but actually, ESDF gives you a few more keys to the left for your weapon binds. i thought about trying ESDF, just never really had the time or incentive to do it.

02-04-12 19:18 #

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phi108
Member

Posts: 507
Registered: 03-08

I used Esdf for a long time, then switched to TFGH as the E key got sluggish.

Now I'm at RTY-Space, to have 1 finger on each move button all the time, though I think I'd prefer the left Alt as backward, instead of space.

I also tried keyboarding with Leftarrow-Del-PgUp-num7 for my right hand, so each hand is positioned identically on the Keyboard, but I think I'm too used to the arrows for that to be effective.

02-04-12 19:56 #

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Mr. Chris
The term is "prehensile"

Posts: 3663
Registered: 07-02

Keyboard for saving/loading/movement and mouse for everything else.

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02-04-12 20:33 #

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Face23785
Junior Member

Posts: 171
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Pirx said:

WASD is more "standard" as many games come already with controls mapped to this scheme. but actually, ESDF gives you a few more keys to the left for your weapon binds. i thought about trying ESDF, just never really had the time or incentive to do it.

I think your observation about the weapon binds is good incentive. Start a movement. You can have all the credit. I'm too lazy.

02-05-12 07:48 #

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gravager
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Posts: 72
Registered: 10-10

I used keyboard only when I first played the shareware, but that was just dicking around blasting the monsters with godmode. It was years before I got the full game, after I'd played Half-Life and other PC games with WASD & mouse. I found that to be a fine setup for Doom as well.

now it's most convenient to use my PS3 dualshock with ZDoom, because I play on the couch with a netbook connected to a large monitor. Zdoom allows for analog stick movement (i.e. nudge to walk or turn slowly), and the dualshock3 has enough buttons for all the essential commands plus hotkeys for all the weapons, quicksave, automap toggle, and navigating the menus. I miss more shots without mouse aim and get hit from behind sometimes because I couldn't turn around fast enough, but overall my Doom skills aren't good enough for the gamepad to be a "bottleneck". We've already seen that some guys play well with keyboard only, so I guess whatever way you prefer & practice with is the best way.

02-05-12 08:51 #

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DuckReconMajor
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Posts: 3847
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Hmm. Has anyone tried using the left stick of a gamepad and a mouse? for analog movement and looking?

02-05-12 14:29 #

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baronofheck82
Junior Member

Posts: 122
Registered: 02-10

Keyboard and mouse all the way. Although back in the day I used only the keyboard. I wonder now how I did that, because keyboard and mouse is so much easier for me.

02-05-12 17:03 #

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glenzinho
Mini-Member

Posts: 70
Registered: 09-11

I always used to play with the keyboard, the old style ones without the Windows buttons, where there was a nice big fat space between the left alt and ctrl buttons. I never used the default controls, though, left alt was my fire and left ctrl was my use button, used my middle finger for running and used my little finger to hook on to the spacebar for strafe, on and off. I became pretty good at this method until those Microsft bastards came out with Win95 and their shite new keyboards!

Anyways, I first played Doom in 1994, it consumed me for all of 1995, and by 1996 I'd had enough. Stopped by briefly in 2003 to see zDoom had been created. Rediscovered Doom again last year..... back to the same keyboard method but on the laptop, which was near impossible for me! I became a mouse user when I finally had to check out Doom 3 and seeing I had no chance with the keyboard, I finally learned the marvellous WASD + mouse method.... OMG!! As a staunch keyboard only, how the f@#k can you use a mouse kind of bloke, the freedom of movement with speed and precision was a revelation!! Now I am thankful that where I work I have a lot of spare time to play all of the excellent WADs that have been made in my 15 year absence... Original Doomer reconverted, thanks to WASD, mouse and all of you great bastards making these awesome maps!

(Bit long but I've been holding it in a while now.... ;)

02-16-12 10:57 #

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Csonicgo
This post is probably useless

Posts: 3960
Registered: 03-04

Trivia: Randy Heit uses QWE+ Mouse 2. I never got the reason why.

02-16-12 11:19 #

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myk
volver� y ser� millones

Posts: 14421
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DLRArchangel said:
I don't use the mouse to play doom. I've used the keyboard only since I was a kid. I use the mouse in all other fps games though. It's not like you can look up or down in doom anyway so I never saw the benefit of switching. I was just wondering if anyone else does this?

I guess you're green in the NM demos you posted, then, as the 1st person perspective (indigo, which must be superman) is using a mouse. I watched from the other perspective and green is indeed using only the keyboard.

02-17-12 00:11 #

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Pirx
Member

Posts: 560
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Csonicgo said:
Trivia: Randy Heit uses QWE+ Mouse 2. I never got the reason why.

interesting. see my post on page 1, it might be the same reason.

02-17-12 02:01 #

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Malinku
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Posts: 512
Registered: 12-08

I used to be a fairly good keyboard player (Using just the standard control setup). I Moved to using mouse + keyboard when I started playing muiltplayer (sometime in 2008). I just use WASD and a 5 button mouse with the two side buttons being jump and crouch.

I only switched to WASE when I was using a laptop with a broken D key.

02-17-12 03:20 #