What's the best way to move and fight at the same time?

[skchurch.3047]

I know this is a noob question, so please be nice, but I am kind of confused about how people move and fight at the same time? I am aware I can use key binds (and also have a Razer Naga Trinity Mouse that I can assign to as well). But, here's where I get a bit confused though:

1.) If I setup to use my mouse for navigation (and not use WASD to move), the upside is that it is pretty easy to move around with my mouse hand (right) and use my left hand to press the weapon, utility, and profession keys. The downside is it seems like I really kind kite as well because that method "runs around" targets as opposed to strafing them, which I have assigned to AD (so I am actually facing them when I kite around them), and it's pretty tricky to use the mouse to then target AoE weapons/skills. I also notice it doesn't seem as precise when doing a jumping puzzle (which I often find hard).

2.) If primarily use the keyboard for movement (WASD) and weapon, utility, and profession keys, that gets really tricky because I am not sure how you press WASD while also hitting the right weapon, utility, and profession keys and using the mouse to AoE (so much happening), and does that mean that W is always pressed down while I am, with the same hand but different finger(s), pressing weapon, utility, and profession keys?

2.) If I setup my MMO mouse to have the weapon, utility, and profession keys (or use good key binds) the upside is I have all of my combat on my mouse hand, and then use my left hand primarily for movement (but still have been using my Right-click to point in the direction I want to move (but not holding down both mouse buttons now, because "W" moves me forward in that direction), I just find I am not as great hitting all the weapon, utility, and profession keys assigned to the grid of 12 small mouse buttons on the MMO mouse, and seem to be much slower in my reaction.

They should make a video of what it looks like when someone plays GW of the keyboard and mouse...I am not sure how it all comes together, and so many people seem to move and fight with such fluidity? So how do you guys do it?

[Khisanth.2948]

"Too many buttons" is actually the reason I went with a Naga Hex instead. It only has 6. On the other hand I end up with a bunch of keybinds that uses modifier keys in combination with some of the mouse keys.

I havemovement on WASDF1-F5 on ZXCE, capslock the capslock key is remapped to F5 using http://www.randyrants.com/category/sharpkeys/heal on Q

Some people shift things over and use ESDF so they can also use the surrounding keys for skills. For me this would not work well because the ways the keys on my keyboard aligns it leaves me without any comfortable place to rest my left pinky.

[BlueJin.4127]

There’s an auto run keybind. It lets your character continue to run forward while you press other keys.

[Blocki.4931]

holding down both mouse buttons that also counts as walking forward and allows you to move. holding down rightclick allows you to move the camera only, very helpful and it's how i move around in battle where i need my key presses on time

[rng.1024]

The keybinds are a little weird when it comes to movement, as you'll want to use the finger to the left of your middle for the 1, 2 and 3 weapon skills (thereby only allowing you to strafe in a counter clockwise fashion in order to use your autoattack) and the one to the right for the 4 and 5 weapon skills.

However in combat running straight ahead for a prolonged period of time is rarely a good tactic both against ranged and melee. Most make use of A and D while holding the right mousebutton down in order to strafe, or you can just rebind Q and E (strafe buttons) directly to A and D in order to not depend the mouse. This opens up room for your other fingers to more easily hit the weapon buttons.

If you're using the 12345678910 keybinds I strongly suggest you change them into something more easily reached so you don't strain your hand. An example of this is heal on Q, utility 1 on E, utility 2 on R, utility 3 on F and your Elite on C, if you need ideas looking up Gw2 PvP tournaments on youtube can help you find what keybinds fit where.

I also strongly suggest you rebind your dodge key to your mouse, as it sounds double-tapping can be a challenge during certain actions and it's better learnt sooner than later. You shouldn't rely much on your mouse except to turn the camera, strafe, dodge or at most retargeting. Which means don't use it to attack (use your weapskills instead), don't use it to place AoE's (double tap the AoE button instead, it's a gamechanger. Also there is an option in settings to make them instacast at your cursor location on button release), dodging and a few optional mechanics like weapon swap, stow weapon and f-skills.

The whole point of remapping things this way is to allow every action to be done whilst doing another important one. For instance using your left hand to cast mesmer's Gravity Well? You can now pop Distortion with your right to become uninterruptable. Popping your weap 5 skill with your left hand? Interrupt it with a weaponswap on your right hand. The point is you don't need to move your fingers at mad speed with your left hand to perform several functions, and all keys should be adjacent to eachother for ease of use allowing you to mainly focus the left whilst in combat since that's where your movement and utilities are.

Also sounds lile you will benefit (alot!) from turning on Free Camera in the settings, as this will ease the attention required to control the camera every time you move.

[Dawdler.8521]

Wasd for movement, mouse with dodge+swap. A deathadder is enough for me. Weapon skills the normal 1-5, skills on erty and elite on g. F1 is bound q and thats the only think that gives "issues" for me but its not really that bad. I often opt for simpler builds without so many F keys.

[JonnyForgotten.4276]

Switching to Action Cam mode may help as well. That makes it so that mouselook is always on and right click is targeting. I use it with traditional WASD movement, all my weapon skills on 1-5, utilities on letter keys, heal on tab, dodge on shift, and weapon swap on mouse 4 or 5.

[Biff.5312]

I use WASD for movement and the mouse for selecting skills to execute or to adjust camera only, and have no problems doing it that way. I often use left hand for selecting skills 1-5 as well, and the only time it's a little tricky is when strafing and executing these skills, but it just means twisting your finger a bit. Either way, I could just use the mouse all the time for skill execution.

[AliamRationem.5172]

@"skchurch.3047" said:I know this is a noob question, so please be nice, but I am kind of confused about how people move and fight at the same time? I am aware I can use key binds (and also have a Razer Naga Trinity Mouse that I can assign to as well). But, here's where I get a bit confused though:

1.) If I setup to use my mouse for navigation (and not use WASD to move), the upside is that it is pretty easy to move around with my mouse hand (right) and use my left hand to press the weapon, utility, and profession keys. The downside is it seems like I really kind kite as well because that method "runs around" targets as opposed to strafing them, which I have assigned to AD (so I am actually facing them when I kite around them), and it's pretty tricky to use the mouse to then target AoE weapons/skills. I also notice it doesn't seem as precise when doing a jumping puzzle (which I often find hard).

2.) If primarily use the keyboard for movement (WASD) and weapon, utility, and profession keys, that gets really tricky because I am not sure how you press WASD while also hitting the right weapon, utility, and profession keys and using the mouse to AoE (so much happening), and does that mean that W is always pressed down while I am, with the same hand but different finger(s), pressing weapon, utility, and profession keys?

2.) If I setup my MMO mouse to have the weapon, utility, and profession keys (or use good key binds) the upside is I have all of my combat on my mouse hand, and then use my left hand primarily for movement (but still have been using my Right-click to point in the direction I want to move (but not holding down both mouse buttons now, because "W" moves me forward in that direction), I just find I am not as great hitting all the weapon, utility, and profession keys assigned to the grid of 12 small mouse buttons on the MMO mouse, and seem to be much slower in my reaction.

They should make a video of what it looks like when someone plays GW of the keyboard and mouse...I am not sure how it all comes together, and so many people seem to move and fight with such fluidity? So how do you guys do it?

I'm sure people have different methods, but for me I unbind turn left/right and just use strafe. I like to offset my movement keys from WASD to ESDF. This frees up the W and A keys for binding skills. Remember that you can also use modifiers like shift and alt to apply more than 1 skill to a key (e.g. shift+A, etc.). But even better than keybinds are mouse buttons, especially if you have a good gaming mouse that you find comfortable to use. I would still keep my movement to keybinds, though.

It does mean that you're going to have your fingers on those movement keys pretty much all of the time, but as long as you change the skill bindings to the keys within easy reach + mouse buttons, this shouldn't be an issue. However, it doesn't work out so well using the default setup as number keys 6-0 are quite a stretch if you have your movement keys at WASD or ESDF!

[Paradox Reaper.7249]

@"skchurch.3047" said:I know this is a noob question, so please be nice, but I am kind of confused about how people move and fight at the same time? I am aware I can use key binds (and also have a Razer Naga Trinity Mouse that I can assign to as well). But, here's where I get a bit confused though:

1.) If I setup to use my mouse for navigation (and not use WASD to move), the upside is that it is pretty easy to move around with my mouse hand (right) and use my left hand to press the weapon, utility, and profession keys. The downside is it seems like I really kind kite as well because that method "runs around" targets as opposed to strafing them, which I have assigned to AD (so I am actually facing them when I kite around them), and it's pretty tricky to use the mouse to then target AoE weapons/skills. I also notice it doesn't seem as precise when doing a jumping puzzle (which I often find hard).

2.) If primarily use the keyboard for movement (WASD) and weapon, utility, and profession keys, that gets really tricky because I am not sure how you press WASD while also hitting the right weapon, utility, and profession keys and using the mouse to AoE (so much happening), and does that mean that W is always pressed down while I am, with the same hand but different finger(s), pressing weapon, utility, and profession keys?

2.) If I setup my MMO mouse to have the weapon, utility, and profession keys (or use good key binds) the upside is I have all of my combat on my mouse hand, and then use my left hand primarily for movement (but still have been using my Right-click to point in the direction I want to move (but not holding down both mouse buttons now, because "W" moves me forward in that direction), I just find I am not as great hitting all the weapon, utility, and profession keys assigned to the grid of 12 small mouse buttons on the MMO mouse, and seem to be much slower in my reaction.

They should make a video of what it looks like when someone plays GW of the keyboard and mouse...I am not sure how it all comes together, and so many people seem to move and fight with such fluidity? So how do you guys do it?

just flank

[Rattengeist.8165]

I had the same issue, pressing all the buttons on the keyboard was overwhelming and most gaming mice seemed to be even more complicated. When I look at the Razer Naga Trinity Mouse I fully understand why you said that hitting the right tiny buttons is difficult. For me, the Razer Naga Trinity Mouse looks like a nightmare.This is why I choosed the ROCCAT Tyon mice - the extra mouse buttons are in much better placement. You can easily remember where they are and you can use pretty much all of your fingers to use them instead primaly the thumb.I suggest looking up different gaming mice like the roccat tyon, basically ones that have the extra buttons on different places on the mice instead of a big clutter on the left side that you can only access with your thumb.

My keybinding looks pretty much like this:left hand: WSAD, dodge (V), select target (TAB), special skill - like the light of deldrimor (^), skills 1 - 3 on their respective numbers 1 - 3, interract/talk stays on (F), two F skills are on (Q) and (E), auto run on ®. Left and right mouse clicks also stayed the same (left to click on stuff, right to move the camera around)

And that's it. Basically, I don't have to move my left hand at all. All other skills are keybind on my mouse. I don't have to stretch my fingers at all!

/Edit: Of course, if you play weaver, this keybinding wouldn't fit at all, but it works pretty well on most classes that have less skills (it's especially easy on my revenant)

[skchurch.3047]

Thank you everyone for your posts, there were many great suggestions in them and I am experimenting with them to see what works best for me. I am playing a Elementalist (mostly Tempest, sometime Weaver), so that means really having to master all the weapon, sill, and profession keys in addition to movement. When I play my alt, a Mesmer, it's actually super easy for me. So perhaps this is also just the difficult in the class. I really appreciate how many of you replied, and sharing how you move + fight, and I hope if I keep playing (I've done pretty well getting through a lot of the solo PVE content), I will get to a place where it's just second nature lol. I am also playing some other MMO's (ESO, BnS, BDO, and FFXIV), and they all have a little bit different movement and combat system, so that's probably adding to the confusion/difficulty, but I'm having fun trying to figure it all out. Many thanks!

[DeanBB.4268]

@"skchurch.3047" said:I am also playing some other MMO's (ESO, BnS, BDO, and FFXIV), and they all have a little bit different movement and combat system, so that's probably adding to the confusion/difficulty...

How do you guys have time for that? :open_mouth:

I use a razer tarterus for my left hand, so movement is the thumb directional button, with the big button below for "run" and attack keys mapped to the pad. My mouse is a Logitech G300s with 4 extra buttons up top (similar to the mouse referenced earlier) for jump, reverse, mount. I don't use the keyboard for anything combat related.

[jakt.9381]

Razer Orbweaver. You use your thumb (otherwise useless) to move and your fingers are free to use abilities 100% of the time. Idk how the hell you guys press those small mouse buttons or WASD while you use abilities. It changed my game big time.

[skchurch.3047]

I just got a Razer Tarterus v2, hoping to see how that works/feels this weekend...maybe that will make a Weaver more doable, lol.

[Nanners.9428]

Too many buttons is the reason why gw2 is not a true action oriented rpg but a traditional mmo. My solution is to use ICM:https://wesslen.org/ICM/This allows u to keybind left click, right click, wheel up and wheel down as skills instead, thus free up more movement associated keys into skill keys.

My keybindsMovement: WASDWeapon skills: left click, right click, QERUtility skills: 123Heal skill: wheel downElite skill: wheel upSelect target: wheel middle clickProfession skills: mouse side buttons

As you can see, with this setup, my left hand is stationed on WASD and only need to extend fingers to press weapon and profession skills without affecting movement. My right hand controls where to aim and camera view. Thumb for profession skills and other keys like mounts, push to talk, special action key etc.

Hope it helps!

[Cuks.8241]

Never saw GW2 as a overly complex on the amount of keybinds so never really had problems.I always try to not get to far on the number buttons, 5 is max for combat skills. And I have long fingers. 6 and beyond I use for mounts and other non essential stuff. I rather use buttons around WASD like Q, E,R,F...

The most important thing for fluent movement in combat imo is not using double tab to dodge, it's clunky and disrupts movement and can't dodge jump. I use mouse button so I can dodge anytime without affecting my movement with WASD.

I would like per character keybinds though. In other games I usually use same binds for similar skills. Like movement increasing skills or dashes are usually on mouse 3...

Btw like in mobas you can change the casting of ground targeted skills (skill shots). You can set it on quick cast or on "on release". These are much faster and don't require extra mouse click. You have some other helpful setting for targeting like can't target beyond range or snap to target which is completely useless for pvp but might be good for pve.