[Duke of Hazzard]

Basically, this. I want to play classic fps games on my newly acquired laptop (surprisingly it runs Duke3D beautifully on DOSBox) and I don't know of a good config to play without mouse. I may acquire a mouse along with a small table to help me in the long run but it'll never be the same as a desktop...

So, for all of you pure keyboard players, what's a good mouseless WASD config for old fps? Or do you play with classic controls (Ctrl for shooting, A for jumping, and so on)?

[Daedolon]

Q and E to strafe.

[Duke of Hazzard]

Daedolon, on 29 April 2014 - 09:48 AM, said:

Q and E to strafe.

But if I plan to use WASD, I'd strafe with the A and D keys...

What about firing? And quick kick (in Duke)?

[Daedolon]

For lots of one handed experiences WASD for regular turning/moving and Q and E to strafe is very comfortable at least for myself. Then you have all the Z-X-C-V-B keys free for your thumb for extra controls (like opening doors etc.).

It's kind of pointless to do something like this if you have a mouse, but I sometimes purposefully map controls this way in older games so I can just chill and play them one handedly.

[Plagman]

Mouseless doesn't mean one-handed. The way to play this is to use two hands on the keyboard; having turning and strafing on the same hand is very limiting and goes against all the muscle memory training you've acquired over the years. My preferred way to play Duke3D is to use WASD for movement and the arrow keys (or numpad if you're into that) for turn left, right, jump and crouch.

[Daedolon]

Of course not, but I've grown so used to doing WASD+QE for moving that it makes no sense for me to use two hands just for movement.

[Duke of Hazzard]

Thanks guys.

What about shooting and interaction (opening doors)?

[Darkus]

I usually use the classic default keyboard layout in Eduke32: arrows keys for right hand, and fire/open/strafe/jump/crouch with left hand.

I even recorded a demo for a similar thread http://forums.duke4....post__p__139614 to show it was feasable.

[MusicallyInspired]

Before I was forced to use a mouse when the true 3D era came upon us (Quake, Half-Life, Unreal), I used the keyboard exclusively for everything up to Shadow Warrior. Even tried Quake 2 with it once. Didn't work out well.

Anyway, I pretty much used the stock scheme carried over from Wolf3D. Arrows to turn and go forward/back. Alt as strafe modifer, space to open, Z crouch, A jump, Shift run, tilde quick kick. I was pretty good with that too for a long time.

[oasiz]

I just replace the mouse with arrows on the right hand for turning (left / right for turning). You do not need to aim up and down with games like D3D anyway as it's going to adjust Y axis automatically.

With games like tekwar, the mouse code is so quirky that it's actually easier to play with just the keyboard, I prefer to have fire bound to up arrow (down can replace alt fire and such) and L/R for turning. WSAD and the rest can be precisely the same as usual got the left hand.
Only problem is when keyboards dont support many simultaneous keys, this is something you should test on yours.

Anyway, this layout does work surprisingly well with a lot of games.

[Duke of Hazzard]

Thanks everyone for contributions. I'm trying WASD because I tried the original config and failed miserably. On my desktop the original config isn't so bad, in fact I beat Duke3D a few times on Come Get Some with it, and played Doom exclusively mouseless for much of my gaming career. But in this laptop it sucked, so I think WASD would work better since it gives me ready strafe buttons as opposed to the original config in which they're awkwardly placed, so I used the alt strafe key along with the arrow keys for strafing.

Also nice to see some keyboard players. I like playing with the mouse as well but the keyboard gameplay brings back good memories.

[Daedolon]

If it doesn't have to be wasd, I often just default-key games. Duke3D included.

[Striker]

WASD for Moving/Strafing, Arrow Keys for Turning, F to Use, Space to Jump, Right-Ctrl to fire. (Use with thumb)