Which gun needs the fastes, quickest reflex draw?

[jigglyboobs]

In QL you will always have a weapon out, so the first trick is to know the right weapon to have out for a given situation:

If you know your opponent will be at long range have out your rail.
If he is at mid range, and you don't mind being noisy, have out your lg.
If he is going to be close, use RL.
If he is low on health and you want to get a quick shot without aiming, use sg.
If you want to be a jerk, have out your gaunt. :P

If you are walking up to a doorway, and you might be jumped, take out your RL.
If you are approaching a door way and you have LG, make sure to look through the doorway from some distance before you go through.

OK, switching weapons. This is mostly done when you are actually in the middle of the fight. The trick here isn't really reflexes so much as quick decision making, with a couple of exceptions:

Reflexes:

If you are LGing someone and they use the push back to dash away from you out of LG range, you can switch to rail instantly and hit them with a shot.
If you want to rocket jump and then switch to a different weapon to shoot someone while you are in midair, you should do it immediately after you do the rj.

Decision making:

Most of the time, however, you'll find your self in a situation where you are fighting someone and you don't like the effectiveness of your weapon. The trick here is to quickly form a simple plan and execute.

If you are fighting him with rocket and he's lging you for more effective damage, you can quickly escape and shoot him with a rail as you back up.
If you are in a rail fight with someone at close to LG range and you've both just shot off a rail, you can break out your LG and advance towards them.
Etc.

The key here is to make a decision faster than the other guy can make the decision (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop), and then have the reflexes to execute smoothly.

Finally, some situations where you should NOT switch weapons.

You're fighting with rail, you've just fired a shot, and and someone with a good deal of health closes on you with LG. In this case, you can try to switch weapons, but the problem is that weapon switch can only happen after the weapon finishes its reload cycle. With rail this takes a long time. Meanwhile, the other guy is basically shooting you while you are defenseless. This is why you need to run away or concentrate on dodging. If you can't, it's better to just wait for the rail to finish reloading and shoot him again. At least you will get in 70 damage before you die.

Etc.

[jigglyboobs]

Oh, and don't learn strafe jumping with defrag maps.

1. It's more important to be able to move smoothly forwards, backwards, up, down and sideways through maps you actually fight in.
2. In most game modes the important thing is to shoot accurately while you move quickly. This means you need to build up reflexes for aiming and dodging while strafe jumping. Just do CA, CTF or FFA while paying attention to your movement.

[*Frya]

Thank you guys for extensive tips!

I have another questions:

1) How key weapon binds are affecting dodging? Is that important factor? Pressing R means lifting index finger from D key (right strafe). Just for a fraction of a second, but that surely delays player movements.
Is that the reason, why Cypher has RG binded both to Q and R?
Similar to this, using 2 key for weapon bind makes player lift his finger from W key.
On the other side, using mouse wheel for binding 3 weapons might cripple aiming.

2) How important is too use your left hand thumb to switch weapons? Is it a must/essential ability?
"The top 5 easiest keys to hit with WASD are Q, E, F, C, R."

I assume, that you press C and V keys with thumb.
The thing is, I never felt comfortabe with using thumb to press this keys.

3) Bad/good/pro hand, wrist and thumb placement on a keybord? Way of handling the mouse (wrist/arm)? Proper sitting position? What is this about?
I've watched some 2GD stuff recomended by filo, 2GD said something about the need to relearn the game again with another wrist placement...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...Hgi8UM#t=1599s

What's that about, is there a guide or some article about this?

4) Binding jump to right mouse button or a wheel. It feels uber awkward for me, but I know that some players do it. Good or bad idea?

======

I know this questions are kind of strange, but I think playing Quake good is somewhat like playing musical instrument, player needs to build proper, most effective connections between his mind and his hands and fingers. Imprinting good habits right from the start.

[jigglyboobs]

Thank you guys for extensive tips!

I have another questions:

1) How key weapon binds are affecting dodging? Is that important factor? Pressing R means lifting index finger from D key (right strafe). Just for a fraction of a second, but that surely delays player movements.
Is that the reason, why Cypher has RG binded both to Q and R?
Similar to this, using 2 key for weapon bind makes player lift his finger from W key.
On the other side, using mouse wheel for binding 3 weapons might cripple aiming.

I don't think it matters unless you are playing at an extremely competitive level.

2) How important is too use your left hand thumb to switch weapons? Is it a must/essential ability?
"The top 5 easiest keys to hit with WASD are Q, E, F, C, R."

I assume, that you press C and V keys with thumb.
The thing is, I never felt comfortabe with using thumb to press this keys.

You should do what feels most comfortable to you. In the early stages it's more important to learn movement, positioning, tactics and aim. Most of the time that fraction of a second doesn't matter because weapon switch is not instant.

3) Bad/good/pro hand, wrist and thumb placement on a keybord? Way of handling the mouse (wrist/arm)? Proper sitting position? What is this about?
I've watched some 2GD stuff recomended by filo, 2GD said something about the need to relearn the game again with another wrist placement...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...Hgi8UM#t=1599s

What's that about, is there a guide or some article about this?

Right, this could actually be quite important. What you want to do is to maintain a good constant posture that let you both move your wrist and also your arm to some extent. I like to have my elbow rested on my chair's arm-rest slightly lower than my mousing surface. The way you aim is of course influenced by how your hand and arm can move, which is in turn influenced by your posture. You want to be able to move the mouse freely while keeping your arm relaxed. What you don't want to do is to have to fight against friction, gravity, or wrist strain.

I also use a low sense with low mouse accel. In the early days when I played QL, I sued no mouse accel, but later I found that mouse aiming actually feels much more natural and intuitive with a little bit of accel (.13 ish).
Keyboard for me is on the same level but some people like it on their lap.

4) Binding jump to right mouse button or a wheel. It feels uber awkward for me, but I know that some players do it. Good or bad idea?

Jump should be either space or right mouse button. Should not be the wheel because it takes too much effort to press and can fee weird as you need to counteract its tendency to move.

I know this questions are kind of strange, but I think playing Quake good is somewhat like playing musical instrument, player needs to build proper, most effective connections between his mind and his hands and fingers. Imprinting good habits right from the start.

These are good questions. Also be sure to check out threads on here regarding system tweaks. Those can easily give you an extra 10 percent accuracy with all weapons.

[Lorfa]

I have another questions:

1) How key weapon binds are affecting dodging? Is that important factor? Pressing R means lifting index finger from D key (right strafe). Just for a fraction of a second, but that surely delays player movements.

Not really. Most people switch weapons before they enter a fight, and in the case where they really want to switch weapons during the fight such as from RL to SG to finish off an opponent that is low on health, they can usually manage by either using the other movement keys during the switch time or just suffering through that split second.

Remember, the switch time of the weapon is greater than the time it takes to select it.

Is that the reason, why Cypher has RG binded both to Q and R?

Pretty sure he just uses Q, and R is a left over bind that he just never got rid of.

Similar to this, using 2 key for weapon bind makes player lift his finger from W key.

I actually use the ring finger _or_ the index finger for this key-hit depending on the situation.

On the other side, using mouse wheel for binding 3 weapons might cripple aiming.

For 3 weapons, maybe. Two weapons seems fairly common. I know at least a couple very very strong players that play this way. I seems quite crazy to me but it can work.

2) How important is too use your left hand thumb to switch weapons? Is it a must/essential ability?

In all of my gaming history I've always only ever used my left thumb to hit space bar, nothing else.

"The top 5 easiest keys to hit with WASD are Q, E, F, C, R."

I assume, that you press C and V keys with thumb.

No! Definitely the index finger. You would use the index to hit V when typing for sure. You're supposed to hit the C key with your left middle, but people often cheat and use their index.

The thing is, I never felt comfortabe with using thumb to press this keys.

Me either.

I use ALT for crouch, and hit it with my pinky. Of course I use ESDF so this is a little easier than it would be using WASD.

3) [B]Bad/good/pro hand, wrist and thumb placement on a keybord?

As for the keyboard just rest your hand the same way you would for typing. It's a good idea to make sure your wrist doesn't rest too much, or rests on something high up to reduce strain, like make your wrist level with the keyboard.

Way of handling the mouse (wrist/arm)?

It's up to you. When I was younger using the wrist completely didn't bother me, but now it bothers me greatly. So I use either 100 % arm, or more commonly 80 % arm and 20 % wrist.

Proper sitting position? What is this about?

Ergonomic and comfortable. That way you can take your mind off the physical aspect and focus entirely on the game.

There are many setups, see youtube for examples.

I've watched some 2GD stuff recomended by filo, 2GD said something about the need to relearn the game again with another wrist placement...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...Hgi8UM#t=1599s

What's that about, is there a guide or some article about this?

Not that I know of. There should be I guess. It's just that everyone is so different, people are afraid to give advice in the fear that it may not be right for someone.

4) Binding jump to right mouse button or a wheel. It feels uber awkward for me, but I know that some players do it. Good or bad idea?

Terrible idea. Use space, or mouse1/mouse2. I've heard of people using their pinky for jump, but that seems crazy to me.

[jigglywiggly]

ignore all replies

how 2 get good:
play at low sens, like really low sensitivity for a good while. This will teach you better mouse movement

then you can go play at higher sens again. I play at lowish sens with insane amounts of accel now. Before I used none.


Timing in duel, I never do, all by feelin. OFC I am the best dueler though.

Speakin of duel, I always wanted to vs lorfa in ZTN, he never plays me. I only play gud when there's an audience or my rep is on ze line, or super high elo and gota prove i am ze best. otherwise no point in trying.
lots of ppl dun believe me ofc

[Limbless_Pony]

1) Should I learn moving, strafe jumping by playing Defrag?

Optimal, but pretty much unnecessary. QL has several community-made maps suitable for mastering strafe jumping. Applying it to fluid movement through maps comes with experience. That's pretty much it (provided, of course, that you practice strafing properly in the first place).

Lorfa's (? cba to backtrack) idea of "playing CA and trying to move as fast possible" will turn you into a stupid rocket jumping monkey with no clue whatsoever on how to move properly. So don't. ESPECIALLY if your target gametype is duel ;>

[*Frya]

I made a comparison of weapon key binds used by best players:
http://pastebin.com/azN7DLHR

rapha and toxijq use their own systems, not based on WASD, so they are not included.
Strenx uses ESDF, but it's easy to guess corresponding WASD keys.

So the most used keys are:
e, f, q, r, x, c, 3, 2

2 key is used for MG, it's a leftover default binding, I guess that players ignore MG. I don't think it's a comfortable key at all. It's pressed by ring finger, the one used for W key, so it interrupts movement.
3 key is also default, but I think it's easy to reach with index finger. 4 is exotic, but not a bad option too.

I figured that I draw guns faster with my index fingers.
E, R, X keys are pressed with index fingers.
F key is also index key, but needs some strech or maybe even wrist movement it's a bit slower than E, R, X.

I used Q for a Push-to-talk for a long time in games, so I'm very used to it.

C key is pressed with thumb, by players that use SPACE for jump, Cypher and Fatality.
I think it's a good solution for SPACE jumping players.

Best: Q, E, R, X, Mouse 3
Good: F, C
Not that bad: 3, 4 (I have long fingers, so I can reach them easely.)

I've seen a discussion about using Plasma, that it's a weak/tricky gun.
Anyway, players that supposedly used it good, Cypher and Strenx, have it on F key. Cooller has it on F too.

So my binding:
-CUT-
quakestreme said that my binding (q, e, r etc...) was dangerous for new players and old players don't give a dime.

The key here is to make a decision faster than the other guy can make the decision (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop), and then have the reflexes to execute smoothly.

Nice link, this OODA thing is totally new to me.

[quakestreme]

lol. I just have to laugh out loud at you using Q, the easiest to use, most critical button apart from the movement buttons themselves, for chat. What a noob.

[*Frya]

Relax, in some casual games, you don't need to use anything above WASD and 3-4 keys. Not every game is so hardcore like Quake.
Caps is also very easy to use key with pinky, and its not used.