How do you circle strafe?

As a fledgling monk I'm trying to learn how to circle strafe with reasonable precision.

I have my weaponskills on the number keys and right now I have A and D set to left strafe and right strafe respectively. Mouse is legacy. When I want to circle strafe, I press A or D and hold down the right mouse button to swivel my view.

So my question is, is this more or less the way everyone else is doing it and it just takes practice or there's some much more efficient way of doing it.

I know that everyone will find their own way of doing things, just wondering if there's something obvious I've overlooked.

Thanks.

That's how its done, and you change the arc by using the mouse to turn your character into either a tighter or larger circle. With a bit of practice it'll be so natural you won't even need to think about the motions to do it, you'll just do it.

/keybind
Movement
Lock Camera on Target

While locked on, moving left/right will move you in an arc around the target, maintaining your distance.


You really don't need to do this though, and I would highly recommend against it because of the added step of un-locking before running away. Auto attacks work no matter which way you're facing, so just move around the mob as normal without locking on.

I have the strafe movements bound to my mouse wheel side pushes. Feels really natural, and makes circle strafing easy. (I never used strafe before I did this, now I use it all the time.) Plus, it freed up two keys for other things.

You're doing it the right way. Legacy movement is a must, imo, because of the freedom of movement it gives you, especially when escaping AoEs. Make sure auto-face target is on as well so your non auto-attacks will still work if you're slightly off angle. It feels very natural once you get used to it.

My movement is a bit different than most as my keybinds use Q-Y and 1-6 with Shift and Alt variants. I strafe with A and D, but my forward movement is done by holding down both mouse buttons, but strafing is still pretty much the same.

Thanks for all the comments and help.

Per Rongway, I've tried using Lock Camera on Target which, although it feels a bit like training wheels, is helpful, and since it's a toggle I can run away or change target without much trouble. I may keep it on for a while until I'm more confident I can circle on my own.

This is the most active job I've tried but I think I'll like it. Dragoon may start feeling dull by comparison.

Thanks again.

I don't really try "circle strafe" unless explicitly required. With legacy camera and auto-face on I just run to where I want to be with A-W or D-W the shortest way possible. Eventually aligning the camera.

And maybe this is just implied and im missing something, but you dont actually need to move all that much to hit your positionals. If youre standing in the right spot to begin with you can switch from flank to rear and back with just a step or two. I dont have it handy, but theres a picture floating around that someone did of the targeting circle showing how to read it and therefore where the sweet spot is.

my method of circle strafing is pretty much like you op, A and D for strafe, hold right mouse button to adjust the camera when you doing it

there is not really technique or "how to" to do so, i think its all about experience in your game time. i mean circle strafing in the very basic is basically target/aim at someone and you just run in circle around them aka orbiting.

for me that kind of thing is pretty much a natural thing to do because iam waaay used to do it like bazillion times back in my time playing counter strike or any fps game where circle strafing is a must when you confronting an enemy.

or maybe you can try the lock on system? the lock on feature pivots you at the target so left and right make you circle it while back makes you backpedal away from it, this works even with legacy.