Keymapping off - only in FFXIV

Hello,

this is going to sound absolutely insane but since approx. 1 week ago, when playing ffxiv, some of my keyboard input is read wrong (win11, steam version, alienware keyboard with up to date drivers).

I have a set-up that uses the function keys for my hotbars, and since a week ago, the F6 key is read as the C key in game - it constantly opens the character tab instead of executing the hotbar action. I tried to redo my keybind in-game, but when I press F6 to (re)assign it to Hotbar 2 - Slot 6, it comes out as C, with the warning that C is already assigned to Character. C is still read as C. If I remove the F6 keybind, its impossible to reassign.

I first noticed while crafting and thought maybe it was a weird new crafting mode thing, so I shrugged it off even though it was annoying, but I was just practicing with the practice dummy at my fc house and realised this was a more general issue.
1 week is an approximation because I don't always have an action on F6 on the class I'm currently leveling so it may just have gone unnoticed.

No other key has this issue (that I'm aware of), and this doesn't happen outside of ffxiv. I haven't done or changed anything to my pc (no updates or anything - that I'm aware of), and my mouse&keyboard set-up has been steady for years. Rebooting the game or my pc doesn't change anything.

Does anyone know whats up with this? I appreciate any help at this point because I've tried everything I could think of and my friends are stumped too.

Good afternoon! Thank you for posting in the Final Fantasy XIV Technical Support Forums.

We apologize for the trouble and inconvenience you have been experiencing. We understand that the keyboard appears to only be experiencing issues with Final Fantasy XIV.

We would like to recommend some troubleshooting solutions that may resolve this issue:

1. You may want to try plugging the device into different ports (both front and back) to see if it helps.
2. Uninstall and reinstall the device drivers.
3. Disable all other device drivers, leaving the mouse and keyboard as the only devices active.
4. Please try using a different keyboard to see if it the keybind issue persists.
5. Try unplugging all other devices and only plugging in the mouse and keyboard.
6. Make sure Windows has been fully updated from the Microsoft/Windows Update website.

We hope we can be of assistance in helping you enjoy the exciting world of Final Fantasy XIV!

Good evening!

Number 2 seems to have done it for now, which is really weird because it was all up to date but I'm not going to complain about driver weirdness if I can go back to playing!

Thank you for the help and have a great day!

Good morning and thank you for the reply, DamnDam!

We are happy to hear that that your issue has been resolved through the assistance of the SQUARE ENIX Customer Support Team.

This thread will be moved to the 'Closed Concerns' sub forum as a result. Hope to see you online!