Strafe seems useless

[Silverbane]

I am configuring an Azeron Cyborg for FFXIV

(mine has brown, not orange paddles, BTW)

using reWASD to do key bindings for it.

The thumbstick on the right allows either 4-way or 8-way digital output. The difference between the two is how diagonal positions of the thumbstick are represented to the computer. For example:

• In 4-way, with standard WASD bindings, up+left is present as the A and W keysboth being pressed.
• In 8-way, I can bind a specific key to up+left, such as Q (left strafe).

However, trying it both ways, it seems to me that strafe is pretty useless.
Yet there it is, bound to Q and E in the default FFXIV keybinds.

Am I missing something?

[EDIT]: the thumbstick is actually analog, and the hardware can be set to do the conversion to keystrokes,
but if I left it outputting the analog data, how would FFXIV handle that?

[BinaryIdiot]

It's the opposite, IMO. The default movement for A and D is slow and kinda useless. Almost like the default WASD is a weird hybrid between a left and a right analog stick.

I always rebind A and D with strafe instead and use my mouse to control the camera. That way all WASD keys move my character.

[Silverbane]

It's the opposite, IMO. The default movement for A and D is slow and kinda useless. ...
I always rebind A and D with strafe instead and use my mouse to control the camera. That way all WASD keys move my character.

I think I may have a different binding to A and D than what you changed away from.

For example, for me, A moves the character left and changes the character's look-direction (if not targeting anything) to the direction of movement. Q on the other hand moves the character left, just like A does, but has the character looking forward (from the camera perspective).
If I switch to 1st person view, it makes a big difference, but from 3rd person view it doesn't.

I don't recall changing the bindings for A and D, but I may have long ago.

[Rongway]

Do you find "strafe is pretty useless" because of the backpedal on diagonals? If you switch to Legacy Mode, you can move back, back-left, and back-right without backpedaling; however you have to rebind a few keys:

The devs have chosen, strangely, to make certain keys function differently between legacy mode and standard mode, rather than maintaining key functionality but just removing standard mode's camera snap. If you change these keybinds so that your keyboard uses the same keys in legacy that you would have used in standard, you might find it fixes any perceived issues you have with legacy mode so that you can use it all the time.

Key    Standard                      Legacy
===    ==========================    ==========================
W      Move Forward                  Move Forward
S      Move Back / Walk Backwards    Move Back / Walk Backwards
Q      Strafe Left                   Move Left / Turn Left
E      Strafe Right                  Move Right / Turn Right
A      Move Left / Turn Left         Point Camera to the Left
D      Move Right / Turn Right       Point Camera to the Right

If you rebind your keys so that Legacy's Move [Left|Right] keys are the keys you were using for standard Strafe, and you bind Legacy's Point Camera [Left|Right] keys to use the keys you were using for standard Move [Left|Right], your legacy movement will become "standard movement, but you never backpedal and the camera never snaps in a disorienting way".

[Silverbane]

Do you find "strafe is pretty useless" because of the backpedal on diagonals?

No, I found it useless because I have apparently already bound A and D to do the same movement (though not with the same posture) as Q and E do.

Anyone have any suggestions for useful things to bind B]Q[/B] and E to in such a situation?