region based keymaps for formations (stack and diamond)

did you know about the region-based keymaps that popped up in v1.9?

using them, you no longer have to use wow keybindings to do formations. no matter which character is the lead, the formations always work.

one formation i use regularly is 'form.stack'... which brings all my alts right onto my main. i tied 'form.stack' on my region1.keymap to COMMA (,)... then i mouse-mapped the COMMA to my xbutton2. doing this, i just drive up to my firing position, tap xbutton2, and start firing. when the mob gets within melee range... ALL my characters are in melee range. (definitely helps on my DKs)

i also regularly use 'form.diamond'... which spreads out my alts into a diamond while 5 boxing. i tied it to PERIOD and mouse-mapped that to xbutton1.

here are the keymaps:

• region1
• region2
• region3
• region4
• region5

these would be useful even if you are not 5-boxing. instead of a diamond, you would get a triangle if you are 3-boxing. and stack is always useful.

to use these, just right-click/save-as into your keyclone folder. then go to your keyclone/setup/maximizer and for each region, left click the center of the region to select it, then hit the 'keymap...' button at the button. select the appropriate keymap and hit 'open.' once you have done this with all your regions, hit 'ok' to get out of setup... and start your wows normally.

if all is good, you should see the keymap associated with each wow in your keyclone list:

http://solidice.com/keyclone/screenc...on_keymaps.jpg

another useful trick would be to map your mouse buttons to trigger the formations. to do this, go to keyclone/setup/mouse-map, click into the 'mouse-action' field, hit the button you want, then click the key field, and hit the associated key (COMMA for stack and PERIOD for diamond)... then click the '+' button to add the mouse-button-to-key mapping.

if all is good, your mouse-map might look something like this:

http://solidice.com/keyclone/screenc..._mouse_map.jpg

(the LCTRL+EQUALS is my /follow key. so i just hit ctrl+left.button and my crew gets in tow)

:!: note:
i believe wow defaults XBUTTON2 (or MouseButton4) to 'toggle auto-run'. if you wish to use this button for the formation, make sure you clear that keybinding in wow for all your characters.

if you have any questions, please feel free to drop me a note.

good luck and have fun!

Rob

Thanks rob! Can't wait to get home and play with this, since I never really knew what all the mapping shit was for or how it worked! :) yay

I am loving the stack idea, I was under the impression the slaves would (after hitting period) walk up to the main (whoever is leading) and stack on the target.

What is happening is (when I hit period) the slaves will walk just a hair passed the main or even passed him a great deal, which is kinda nice in AB when everyone under sun targets the main it confuses them a bit.

But is this right or did I retard something up?

err... how far they will walk depends on you. just tap the key, don't tap and hold.

I've tried inputting the hotstrings but when added to my keymap editor it seems to add a fullstop instead of the closing bracket eg. k(190.0.0.:hs(form.stack.

As you can see the closing bracket is replaced with a fullstop.

No matter what I do I can't seem to get the hotstring working, I press period key and nothing.

i'm not sure what you are doing, but the keymaps mentioned above would just be saved into your keyclone folder. to use them for region-based keymaps, in the maximizer, left-click to select the region, then click the 'keymap...' button, selecting the appropriate keymap file. then hit ok. no editing keymaps required.

Rob,

Awesome idea, but how do they interact with my current ToonA.kcl files? or am I missing something. I have ToonA,B,C etc with all of my FTL keys bound. When I fire up keyclone each .kcl file is then associated with a given version of wow. How do I make this formation thing work in conjunction?

Thanks

with v1.9 there are now 2 keymaps possible on any one application. the one you are use to... and a region based keymap.

the region based keymap stays with the region when you pip swap your windows. this allows for formations to work properly even after pip swapping

to set the region based keymap, in the maximizer... at the bottom, there is a field for keymap. when you have the region selected, hit that button and select your keymap

don't try to mix your keymaps with the region ones. they are separate and you will see the two keymaps listed in the list (pic above shows 'keymap(r2.)' ... you normal keymap would be loaded to the right of the '.'

this is all fine and dandy, but i've found that when setting this up, the keybindings for strafe, move forward, and move backwards, NEED to be the same as what you have them keybound to, and i've changed all those keybinds.... perhaps i have to re-edit the kcl files for the keymaps so that they match my strafe options ?

mkay i tried playing with this a little bit, and i have no idea how to edit these files to fix the strafe/movement issues im having lol. I've got my strafe keys unbound on my alts and or set to something alternate(dont like using white lists and stuff as i cant type across all characters and spam people like crazy lol) and i havent a clue how to get the .kcl files to match my current keybindings so everyone moves the same! rob! help! lol <3

:D

ok... first off, for each wow, you need to get the keybindings working properly for wow. go to wow/menu/keybindings and find:

move forward W
move backward S
rotate left A
rotate right D
strafe left Q
strafe right E

once that is set back to normal, you should be able to use the kcl files i listed above. just re-download over your existing (in case you've edited them), then link to their appropriate region.

if all goes well, you should see each keymap listed next to the region... and hitting the associated button will trip the formation.

personally, i've been using these fairly extensive... the most useful being 'stack'. i have also tied both to mouse buttons so its just a simple button click to bump them forward and start going to work.

if you're still confused, you can try giving me a call and i'll try to walk you thru the fix (please try after 6pm tomorrow night... RL will be a bit busy until then)

only problem is that most of those keys are unbound and used for different things in game(ie spells and abilities) Is there a way to make my own setup so that i can still use a formation keymap, but with my own directional keys... for instance if i were to rebind my secondary movement keybinds to the arrow keys or something? It would be an entire new learning curve if i were to have to rebind all the original keys lol, as i use S for my targeting nearest enemy key, and my strafe keys are unbound on my alts so that i can only strafe on my main(for tanking purposes) since my team is all melee.

oh, you can use any directional keys you wish... you'll just have to tweak the region keymaps from above (or make your own)

if you're having issues getting that set up, just let me know and i'll try walking you thru the setup

OK so i just have one question that i am sure all the nub nubbingtons of keymaps and hotstrings are wondering when trying too figure this out.. even though what instance of wow you are running in a given region changes the hotstrings and keymaps assosiated with that region stay the same soo

if you dual box
r1 |wow1 |hotstring set1
r2 |wow2 |hotstring set2
and you switch
r1 |wow2 |hotsring set1
r2 |wow1 |hotstring set2

is this correct?

yes, that's exactly how it would work

I'm trying to wrap my head around this keymapping thing. But I am lost.


Where do I define it all??

Where is the actual code for the hotstring.

I need a place to start.. editing the .kcl file?? It's 2 lines, there is no place for me in there to change what keybindings I currently have.

I have strafe set to other things, and would like this formation to work. But I am really lost...

Any help would be appreciated.. or a link to some documentation, my searches show me nothing.

Thanks in advance!

please make sure you are using v1.9i ... i am also assuming you have your maximizer and commands working


go to keyclone/setup/maximizer and LEFT click a region to select it. once selected, click the 'region keymap...' button and select the 'keymaps' folder... then the region you are setting up. (the files are region1.kcl, region2.kcl, etc)

repeat for all regions.

hit ok and start your commands.

in the keyclone list you should see something like "keymap(r1.)" next to each wow. to the left side of the dot (.) in the parens is the region based keymap description. on the right side would be any command/wow based keymap.

at that point, your keymaps are in place. by default, when in-game, hit PERIOD or COMMA to see your wows utilize the keymaps. (personally, i mouse map PERIOD and COMMA for convienence)

if you want to tweak a keymap, go to keyclone/setup/keymap-editor ... then 'load'... select the keymap... then start tweaking it. remember to reflect your changes accordingly across all keymaps.

i hope that helps,

Rob

The first part I do understand.. and if I had the original keybindings it would probably work. But I don't.


And when it comes to edit the keymap file.. it's 2 lines. Not that much to edit unless the numbers in there stand for something.

WHere is the actual code for: "form.stack" for example? And where can I define other keybindings?

you're not expected to edit the files directly.

please go to keyclone/setup/keymap-editor ... hit 'load' ... select region1.kcl (or whatever file you are using)... and tweak that. select a line, change the key, or hit the DEL key to delete an entry from the list. remember to save the file.

if you change or add a hotstring, remember to add it to all the other keymaps you are using

How do you actually "tweak it" ??

I'm sorry... but I'm not getting it.

I understand how to assign a key to the hotstring.. but how do I edit the hotstring??


I have other keys bound to strafe.

I would love to be able to map keys more freely
eg define:
when I press 'X', send:
Client / Region 1: 'Y'
Client / Region 2: 'Y'
Client / Region 3: 'Z'
etc

If I understand correctly, then 1.9i Keyclone functionality falls short of this in two respects:
- The key to be sent to the focused window has to be the one which is pressed
- Cannot press 'X' in order to send 'Z' to client 3 if 'Z' is already used by another keymap for that client (I think there there is a work-around by setting wow keybindings to 'Z', and keymapping to 'Z' in the first map, 'Shift-Z' in the second, etc)

It would also be far more intuitive .. but the big question is .. can it be done?
Or did I miss / misunderstand something?

That said.. loving the region specific stuff thanks :D

The few lines of code.. can someone just walk me trough what it is I am looking at?

Code:

---

r3
k(69.0.0):hs(form.diamond)
k(87.0.0):hs(form.stack)

---

r3 = Region 3 (This I get)

k?
69.0.0 ?

:hs ?

Any explanations or documentation on this?


Thanks!

I hope I get this right.. :p


r3 - this is just the name. You could call it OMGWTFBBQ, it would still work, as long as you associated the file with region 3 in the Keyclone maximiser settings.
k(69.0.0) - This means the E key
:hs(form.diamond) - this means that the E key is associated with the string "form.diamond"

What that means is: when region 3 is focused and the E key is pressed, then whatever key is associated with the string "form.diamond" for region 1 is sent to that region. (The r3 keymap file gives it the E <-> "form.diamond" link. The r1 keymap file takes it the rest of the way for that region.)
Similarly, the "form.diamond" keys for each other region are sent to those regions.
In that way, the E is mapped via "form.diamond" to a different keypress sent to each region.

eg focus region 3 and press E
E <-> "form.diamond" (in r3 keymap file)
"form.diamond" <-> COMMA (in r1 keymap file)
So E is sent to r3 and COMMA to r1.

Conversely if COMMA is pressed with r1 focused then E is sent to r3 (this is the intended useage for this particular set of keymaps)
So the user is expected to unbind COMMA in all wow clients. Now, with the main region focussed, pressing COMMA makes the toon in r3 strafe right (ie COMMA -> form.diamond -> E when sending from r1 -> r3). The other regions are sent different keystrokes in order to send those toons in different directions, and the main toon remains at the centre of the diamond (he doesn't move because COMMA has been unbound).


By using the keymap editor, it is easier to tell that k(69.0.0) means E. You only see the numbers if you edit the keymap file directly (using notepad or a text editor). The keymap editor is not polished but it helps a lot.

It is possible to map keys like this between regions by associating each region with a different keymap file.
You can also do it between 'Commands' (think 'Clients') with the options available in the command editor section.
The distinction becomes apparent when you swap clients from one region to another.


If you wrap your head around this enough to be comfortable with it, have a look at the FTL system, but only if you don't mind spending a lot of time setting things up (and getting a headache) ;)

I see.. It's starting to clear up now.

But I just can't seem to get the keymap editor working.

How do I actual change the values there? The 69.0.0 values?

I seem only to be able to change the key >>hotstrings.. I can map it, but can't change any values.


I seem to be missing some fundamental thing here--

http://www.coupas.be/pics/keymap.JPG



This is how it looks in the keymap editor..

I would like to thank you for your patience.


I finally got it.

It was much much easier then I thought hehe.. That was probably the problem!


Thanks again! It's crystal clear now.

Ah. haha, while I was heavily editing my post I completely missed your 3 replies below >.<

TBH I never understood anyone else's explanation (plenty have tried) so I had to work it out by myself.
I'm slightly surprised I managed to help. Glad you got it sorted!