3 fire buttons?

smartroad · Apr 14, 2015

I was wondering, should there be 3 fire buttons?

Mostly I have a 3 way weapon loadout - 2 lasers, 1 canon/multi-canon, 1 missile battery. Normally I fire lasers to get shields down, once they overheat switch to multi-canons until they cool and then fire off a missile or two when they are close enough. The trouble is I have to shift between 2 loadouts to do that. What do people thing of a 3rd fire button? Primary, secondary and missile?

Just a thought that ran into my head!

pdizzle · Apr 14, 2015

smartroad said:
I was wondering, should there be 3 fire buttons?

Mostly I have a 3 way weapon loadout - 2 lasers, 1 canon/multi-canon, 1 missile battery. Normally I fire lasers to get shields down, once they overheat switch to multi-canons until they cool and then fire off a missile or two when they are close enough. The trouble is I have to shift between 2 loadouts to do that. What do people thing of a 3rd fire button? Primary, secondary and missile?

Just a thought that ran into my head!

But what about the console players!!!

Radicus · Apr 14, 2015

I've had the same problem... would like to utilise those extra buttons on my mouse for something.
Only way so far is to switch firegroups.

the-monk · Apr 14, 2015

I would welcome a 3rd fire button withing the fire groups.

It would open up a lot more configurations for me. You really need them piloting the bigger ships with more gun placements.

Morbad · Apr 14, 2015

Ideally, I'd have a separate trigger for every weapon.

Jockey79 · Apr 14, 2015

Got an x52 which has a double point trigger, and lots of buttons - I'd love an extra fire button !!!

Derpster Frey · Apr 14, 2015

pdizzle said:
But what about the console players!!!

What about them?
They have just as many buttons as my HOTAS and could easily fit a third fire button.

pdizzle · Apr 14, 2015

Derpster Frey said:
What about them?
They have just as many buttons as my HOTAS and could easily fit a third fire button.

You must not have taken part or seen that discussion. It was said that the reason for only two fire buttons was due to only having two triggers on a gamepad. Purely speculation, of course.

Chevy66 · Apr 14, 2015

Don't really care about extra fire buttons, but I want a separate key for KWS and any other scanners etc that go in a fire group

B0xCutter · Apr 14, 2015

Chevy66 said:
Don't really care about extra fire buttons, but I want a separate key for KWS and any other scanners etc that go in a fire group

If we cant get an extra fire button, this would do! Just like the Chaff, heatsink, shield cell bank have their own mappable buttons

Saool · Apr 14, 2015

The devs have said it won't happen. The whole system and hud is designed around two fire groups.

Briarée · Apr 14, 2015

Chevy66 said:
Don't really care about extra fire buttons, but I want a separate key for KWS and any other scanners etc that go in a fire group

+1000 like we have dedicated buttons for SCB / chaff etc.... it would make life so much better

Ancipital · Apr 14, 2015

This keeps coming up, and Michael has said that it's a deliberate design decision (modelled after military aircraft), and that there is no intention to change it.

pdizzle said:
You must not have taken part or seen that discussion. It was said that the reason for only two fire buttons was due to only having two triggers on a gamepad. Purely speculation, of course.

No, nor is it due to the malign influence of the Bavarian Illuminati.

Magic Man · Apr 14, 2015

Not happening, been done to death, use the search...

starsphinx · Apr 14, 2015

Would definitely like to have a mappable for KWS - I currently have it mapped onto my laser trigger and have to hold the trigger even though the laser has over heated and I would prefer to let off. I simply do not find it practicable to switch between firegroups in the middle of battle. Its one thing to have FDS and D scanner on a separate firegroup as I can switch as I come out of frameshift but when something is firing at me and I am trying to kill it jumping around between scan group and weapons is stupid. Having it on the trigger for cannons would be even more daft as it would waste ammo.

marktay · Apr 14, 2015

I think that the more pilot aids you introduce, the less skillful the pilot needs to be. If you had a button for every weapon, scanners, menu options etc., why not just have an auto-kill button that kills your enemies for you as well? The really good combat pilots (and you can see them on Twitch and YouTube) manage to fight, fly, aim with fixed weapons, manage power, fire-groups and select sub systems, fire shield-cells, chaff and heat-sinks all while being fired upon by a wing of bad guys. That is the essence of the game for me (at least from a combat point of view).

figola · Apr 14, 2015

Exactly. You take managing several aspects away and sooner than later you have an arcade shooter.

Magic Man · Apr 14, 2015

starsphinx said:
Would definitely like to have a mappable for KWS - I currently have it mapped onto my laser trigger and have to hold the trigger even though the laser has over heated and I would prefer to let off. I simply do not find it practicable to switch between firegroups in the middle of battle. Its one thing to have FDS and D scanner on a separate firegroup as I can switch as I come out of frameshift but when something is firing at me and I am trying to kill it jumping around between scan group and weapons is stupid. Having it on the trigger for cannons would be even more daft as it would waste ammo.

Have a firegroup with the KWS on secondary alone, and a weapon on the primary. Then switch to a full weapon firegroup when the KWS completes.

- - - Updated - - -

Morbad said:
Ideally, I'd have a separate trigger for every weapon.

<facepalm> sorry, but it is.

Ericlas · Apr 14, 2015

As said before, not going to happen.

Mike Evans said:
This isn't going to happen. We've chosen to use a two trigger system and as a result we've based a lot of the UI layout and functionality around this concept. We would not add another fire button unless we also redesigned the way the hud works to accommodate the fact that you can't just do a left/right split to show which weapons belong to which trigger. Likewise we'd need to extend the functionality of the fire group UI to add the new trigger. Having two triggers forces you to group weapons sensibly and to utilise the fire group switching functionality skilfully to maximise your ability in a fight. It also doesn't penalise those players that don't have access to extra buttons they could bind to a third trigger when such an option would be considered integral if it was available.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=93906&p=1828787&viewfull=1#post1828787

Bladesteel · Apr 14, 2015

pdizzle said:
You must not have taken part or seen that discussion. It was said that the reason for only two fire buttons was due to only having two triggers on a gamepad. Purely speculation, of course.

That certainly doesn't make sense. Both ps4 and xbone gamepads have 4 "triggers" by my count.