Guild Wars 2

For anyone not familiar with the term, RSI is Repetitive Strain Injury. It usually manifests in typists as Carpel Tunnel Syndrome, but can cause other problems too. And its shockingly painful if you’re not used to it…

Anyway. :-) I’m a programmer / SysAdmin, so its important that I don’t kill my wrists/hands. Until now, I’ve been able to manage in Online Gaming by participating in the non-traditional formats – such as Myst Online and Eve Online – as well as more social platforms like Second Life.

And in trying this game over the months, I’ve realized I have a problem – GW2’s command concept (as a whole) does not work for me physically; I cannot use my pinky or ring fingers (of either hand) for very long without killing them. That’s huge here – it means the 1/2 weapon commands are very hard to work regularly. And the large number of key commands needed are not helping either.

So, is there a way to get around this? I’ve been seeing the occasional discussion of re-mapping analog controllers, and I’m very intrigued by it. I already have one from Logitech (which I bought for something else and then shelved), so it should be pretty easy to setup.

Thanks in advance. o7

You have already mentioned what I was going to suggest which would be to get a controller that is more friendly to your hands and remap any controls you struggle with to it. It will take some tweaking but I am sure you will find a way that works. I know of the razer naga gaming mouse which may help aswell, look it up, it is pricey but it should help a LOT if you are willing to spend the money.

Good luck!

I use a Logitech Flight Controller (of some kind, don’t remember offhand) It is software programable. There are 4 buttons on top of the stick, a trigger, and a side button. The top hat has 8 positions and is controled by the thumb( I only use 4 positions) The Logitech mouse in the right hand has two side switches, left and right selection and a push button for the scroll wheel. I programed the left and right scroll wheel for crtl and alt so I can get many key combos programed in the game. I don’t need to touch the keyboard. I can move and simultaneously do anything else at the same time.

Update…

I got a reasonably nice controller to work from (since I found the old one had a bad dead zone in it). But, in setting up the Xpadder config, I realized something – where are people mapping the PTT (Voice) key?

This is kinda paramount if I want to go back into WvW, or even longer dungeons, Fracts, etc. But it appears that Windows 7 is too good in relating keys to voice programs, and will only relay the direct keypress instead of what Xpadder created.

Either way, its a good start. We’ll see how it pans out in a bit.

Also, any out-of-game suggestions for keeping one’s wrists sane between activity? I do have some stretching exercises, etc, and considering looking for a CMT again (which helped a lot when I was also involved in MMA).

I don’t use the PTT, I have a headset with a mute button, and my audio in ts3 is activated when i make a sound. It takes some time to adjust it properly, but in the end you get a situation where you only have to mute to sneeze and couch. Off course this only works if you dont have to do much out of game talking.

I work at day at computer desk as well and I know that the trick for me is to follow all the rules at work, but not at home. The rules are great, but shifting often is more important. So im sitting on a char thats too low, a desk thats too high, but it is relaxing for me and I don’t have to think. I’ve tried following the rules 24/7 but that actually caused RSI for me.

I don’t have RSI (yet … /crosses fingers). However, I have found the easiest key to use for PTT is right hand ALT. It’s near the space bar, doesn’t get used for anything else (though splitting stacks of mats means I must use the left ALT or something goes funky), and only gets hit when I intend to. I’m moving with my mouse so using that key for PTT just means not firing off spells when I talk.

An interesting controller you might want to try is the Peregrine Glove. It involves tapping thumb and fingertips together, with plenty of different tap spots. It just maps keyboard to your chosen tap spots so it’s not going to macro etc. I tried it out in an attempt to be more responsive in WoW raids and found the learning curve a little too steep as once I have a muscle memory it’s very hard for me to replace it with a different action. Most people report that it quickly becomes second nature, however, and given GW2’s reduced number of control keys it might work quite well for you.

You could always setup something you hit with your foot, a USB pedal or something.