Swiching from joystick to mouse

Weylin · Post by **Weylin** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:10 am

I prefer mouse on account that my joystick takes too much exertion to keep it from flipping over on its side and the deadzone is totally $#@!ed
How the hell do you achieve any sort of accuracy with a stick? It's so clumsy feeling. The transition from leaning one side to the other has that rut in the center and makes it incredibly annoying to make fine tuned adjustments.

Only time I hate the mouse is on those games where you have to keep sliding it over and over to make a turn, when the mouse isn't moving, it centers, which is really annoying. I like the way allegiance handles it.

Capital ships though, I would prefer the joystick as the low turn torque makes it difficult not to start spinning out of control without heavy use of numpad 0

Picobozo · Post by **Picobozo** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 7:11 am

I used to use a variety of very expensive joysticks to play Allegiance, but when I moved to NY I didn't have my stick with me so I learned to use the mouse. There were drawbacks for me (especially when I first started), but the precision with which I can adjust my aim is much higher with a mouse. Possibly because i've been an FPS player since theres been FPS.

The drawbacks were that the sticks I used to use had many many buttons that I custom mapped and allowed me to keep my hands mostly off the keyboard. Also keeping the mouse up while I could maneuver my ship was a plus, but not that big a loss.

The only buttons I remapped on my keyboard were the thruster keys and a secondary booster mapping to my middle mouse wheel button. Other then that i'm completely stock.

ratak · Post by **ratak** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:05 pm

I use joystick... BUT if your joystick has a huge deadzone, as a lot of them have, you will find it almost useless to play. There are few cheap JS, like Logitech ones that have a good response.

RealPandemonium · Post by **RealPandemonium** » Thu Nov 12, 2009 6:13 pm

Using esc-esc to stop all turning also helps when you are spinning out of control in a ship with high turnrate and low torque or zoomed in a turret.

Post by **aem** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 5:49 am

lol when I tried to switch from joystick to mouse is pretty much when I stopped playing Allegiance. After having used joystick for many many years in Allegiance I felt I was never going to be a very capable fighter unless I switched to mouse to make it easier to aim. Even though I mouse and love mousing in every other PC game I've ever played I just couldn't get the hang of it in Allegiance. It was better for aiming but everything else felt weird so I tried doing a hybrid system, using joystick except when I'm shooting.

I guess I just wasn't up to taking enough time to getting used to mouse and didn't feel like going back to just joystick so basically stopped playing.

Adept · Post by **Adept** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 3:15 pm

AEM wrote:QUOTE (AEM @ Nov 13 2009, 07:49 AM) I guess I just wasn't up to taking enough time to getting used to mouse and didn't feel like going back to just joystick so basically stopped playing.

AEM, put up $50 for a decent joystick, and get back in the saddle!

TeeJ · Post by **TeeJ** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 3:23 pm

@adept; Have that one...but a wireless version.

The JS to Mouse transition was a bitch for me to get used to...but it eventually happened. I just stuck with a scout during that time (that was all I flew back then anyway). It was like logging in for the very first time when I switched.

The reason I switched is because I went through several joysticks and frankly got tired of buying them. That, and a mentor of mine was struggling to help me get better since he used mouse, and I used JS. I will never go back.

Paradigm2 · Post by **Paradigm2** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 3:30 pm

I played with mouse for about a year after my MS Sidewinder FFPro2 died. I definitely aimed better with mouse, but I could not control my ship nearly as well and was thus a distinctly worse pilot.

I tried a few joysticks in the meantime but they were worse than mouse, and I finally gave up and bought another FFPro2 off of Ebay about 2 months ago. Allegiance is fun again!

Adept · Post by **Adept** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 4:00 pm

TeeJ wrote:QUOTE (TeeJ @ Nov 13 2009, 05:23 PM) @adept; Have that one...but a wireless version.

The reason it's not the same is the adjustable centering "spring" strength on the Force Feedback version. Having to wrestle with the stick does horrible things to accuracy.

When R5 rolls out us JS pilots will have an even nicer time, as the "smallest" deadzone rocks.

Dorjan · Post by **Dorjan** » Fri Nov 13, 2009 5:11 pm

I can use both a mouse and JS depending on mood/if my joystick decides to work.

If I don't feel like dogfighting I'll just cruise around with my JS else it is my £3 mouse. `4