Wildstar: Utilizing Mice With 5+ Buttons - Unconventional Keybindings For automatic Mouse Look

After starting WildStar for the first time, I spent almost a week to find a decent keybinding setup before actually getting to play as I always do in video games. After all, this game plays fairly different from any other MMO I've played so far, with those telegraphs and whatnot. The default controls felt terribly awkward to me even using the Automatic Mouse Look mode which, in this game, I feel is almost mandatory.

The issue I have with WildStar's default controls is a fairly standard MMO one: WASD movement takes away the flexibility of how you use your left hand. The classic WASD setup forces the left index, middle and ring finger into more or less fixed positions that they still have to leave to press the buttons 1 to 4. That said, if you need to press the hotkey 1, you are, unless able to bend your fingers like cooked spaghetti, limited to a combination of two among moving forward, backward and strafing right.

In your standard tab targeting gazillion active abilities per class MMO, that's a negligible issue. WildStar's targeting system, however, revolves around positioning yourself and thus your telegraphs properly and flexibly for maximum efficiency, hence this limitation poses a perceivable disadvantage in WildStar. It can even have repercussions when playing PvP: Considering you only have eight abilities in your LAS, opponents you face multiple times might realize you're using certain abilities only while strafing in a certain direction, never while you strafe in the other. It makes your behavior more readable. In duels and arena matches, opponents usually observe your patterns more closely than in large-scale PvP, so it isn't that unlikely to happen in those modes.

With all that in mind, WASD or anything comparable to it is completely out of the question. WildStar requires an entirely different approach to movement. Using my Logitech G700s, I found that for me, the solution was to...

TL;DR

Move the WASD functionality to the mouse. Yeah, sounds crazy, also felt crazy at first, but it made everything else so incredibly much easier and fun once I got the hang of it. That's why I decided to share the joy. To do it too, you'll need to have a mouse with at least five buttons (preferrably left, middle, right and two thumb buttons) and define movement keybindings in the Mouse Look column of keybindings for certain keys. How well it works will, among other things, depend on your mouse, so your mileage may vary.

Essentials: this is the key portion of this setup. ... Ha. Got it?! ...right, moving on.

Make sure to set these keybindings in the Mouse Look column.

Move Forward - Mouse Button 4

Move Backward - Mouse Button 5

Strafe Left - Left Mouse Button

Strafe Right - Right Mouse Button

Stun Breakout Up - Mouse Button 4

Stun Breakout Down - Mouse Button 5

Stun Breakout Left - Left Mouse Button

Stun Breakout Right - Right Mouse Button

The core idea is to be able to press any two buttons for directional movement that make sense together (i.e. any combination other than back & forward or left & right) comfortably and at the same time to be able to switch directions without delay. You'll have to keep that in mind if you have more than two thumb buttons available or intend to use non-thumb mouse buttons other than left/right. Play around and try to find the combination for each forward/backward movement and strafing left/right that feels most comfortable and natural to you. If you feel adventurous, you could even try to use left/right mouse buttons for forward/backward and map the additional mouse buttons to strafing - after all, what feels good depends on your hardware, hands, fingers, sleight of hand and more. Size matters. And shape. And, uh... Yeah, I guess I won't get out of this one anymore.

Everything else is optional and should be tailored to your preferences. Yay, trial and error! There's three other things you most probably will want to do, though.

One, binding Suppress Mouse Look Toggle to some reasonably accessible key or additional mouse button. Automatic Mouse Look is incredibly fun, but sometimes you just have to click something the old-fashioned way. This is your means of doing so.

Two, disabling Double-Tap to Dash under Controls in the game's Options and using the Directional Dash keybind. Double-tap dodging is highly disruptive with WASD movement already, but with this control scheme, it's somewhere between unusable and ragequit-inducingly frustrating.

Three, transferring the Default mappings for the above movement functions to the Mouse Pointer column. That way, you'll still be able to react immediately when you have to move or break out of crowd control while, say, feng shui-ing your inventory in the wild. Closing all those windows can take a bit too long for comfort, after all. Also, if you map something to some key in the Mouse Look column, the game for some reason unbinds anything that was previously bound to said key in the Default column. Since you're most definitely going to bind stuff to WASD in the Mouse Look column, this is going to happen. That said, pay attention to any replacement alerts while you're setting up your own Mouse Look controls.

All done with the setup? Sweet! Now go create a new character and get used to your new controls while leveling rather than failing in dungeons, raids or PvP while you're struggling to learn the new control scheme. Ahem. No, really, it takes at least a week of getting used to during which you should avoid playing together with or against others, but don't let that discourage you because heck it's worth it!

Thoughts on mice with more than five buttons: this is about the G700s, but largely applies to other mice as well.

For me, Left/Right Mouse Button for strafing, thumb buttons G5 for Mouse Button 5 (move backward) and G7 for Mouse Button 4 (move forward) worked best, but that mostly depends on how you're used to holding your G700s. Either way, since your thumb, index and middle finger will be busy with movement, with one exception, you won't be able to use your other buttons for jumping, abilities, consumables or other things you will want to do while moving/fighting. That means the movement related sprinting and jumping are still going to be part of the left hand's domain, but oh well.

I found those excess buttons to be useful for Mount, Suppress Mouse Look Toggle, Toggle Auto Run, Toggle Movement Mode and Interact/Vacuum Loot - in short, things I want to be readily accessible, but usually use outside of combat or jumping shenanigans. Interact and Vacuum Loot fit nicely together on the Middle Mouse Button; just bind Interact and Vacuum Loot to two different keyboard keys, record pressing both in sequence using the Logitech Gaming Software and map the Middle Mouse Button to that sequence. Just make sure to disable "Move to Activate" in the Controls section of the game's Options or prepare for random surprise strolls while looting.

This leaves four programmable buttons on the G700s. Personally, I always reserve one (G11) for my global TeamSpeak microphone toggle and another one (G10) for that handy "show battery level with side LEDs" function, so there's just two more buttons I'm going to discuss: the exception mentioned above! No matter which direction you traverse in, you'll never walk left and right simultaneously. That said, one finger is always going to be free to give the mouse wheel a nudge. So, if you map both Tilt Mouse Wheel Left and Right to the same keyboard key, you can use that very keyboard key for Directional Dodge. It works exceptionally well for me.

Done! Whew, what a lot of text. That TL;DR sure was strangely placed, eh?

In closing, I want to thank FranBunnyFFXII for this guide on how to utilize a Razer Naga or Logitech G600 as I drew some of the inspiration for this control scheme from the Naga Movement mapping presented there.

I hope I was able to help some of you to find a not only entertaining, but also efficient alternative to the conventional control schemes. For me, it is such an alternative, but if you're going to give this or a similar setup a shot, I'd be happy to hear about how you like it. Either way, have fun!