Brain re-wire / controller setup

[Ser Xav]

So I’ve been using a stick and throttle setup for a while, with rudder pedals.

The stick has twist function which I use for yaw, in addition to roll and pitch.

On my pedals I have vertical thrust and lateral thrust. The throttle manages forward and rear ‘thrust’, but as throttle, not true thrust.

I want to go to a dual stick setup, with throttle.

Basis:

1) stick and throttle for general moving around and super cruise.

2) For combat, landing, and mining, I’d like to then switch over to dual stick where the second stick provides actual thrust control that the throttle unit cannot achieve (primarily for better thrust control, but also as I enjoy the intellectual challenge of controlling the ship this way - acknowledge it’s not necessarily the best way).

The ‘problem’: the new stick I purchased for the primary stick, that I will use for roll and pitch, does not have a twist yaw capability. My ‘old’ stick will become the secondary stick.

So I am trying to test out different setups where yaw is mapped either to the rudder pedals or to the other stick.

Whatever combination I try I simply cannot get my (inferior) brain to overcome the change from not having yaw on the primary stick - and the associated remapping of the other thrust axes.

I can do it whilst testing on asteroids, but when it comes down to actual ‘action’ I can’t undo the muscle memory or brain wiring I have learned and used until now.

Does anyone have any tips for re-learning control schemes and any recommended techniques for changing time tested control techniques? Thanks all

 

[Jaggid Edje]

I use this setup and actually disabled the twist on my primary stick (which was originally a 2nd mapping for yaw).

I'd honestly just recommend that you give it time, it can take a few days to adjust to any new control scheme but this being just one change shouldn't take that long. Just do what you normally do (except maybe skip any PvP for a few days) and you'll get proficient quicker than you might think. Yaw is probably one of the least important control aspects for flight anyway, so it shouldn't lead to any rebuys as you adjust.

I went through something similar a few months ago in that I had been playing with gamepad and keyboard and then replaced it all with your current control setup. That was a very significant change, obviously, and involved completely relearning every single control and hotkey of the game. It took me about 5 to 6 days of frequent play to get totally comfortable and competent.

 

[Hullreaver]

I had the problem when going from twist yaw on my stick to rudder pedals for yaw, as well as steering my srv. It took be almost 4 weeks before I no longer had to think about it. What I finally did is I just went to an asteroid field and started flying around rocks for about 30 minutes and that seemed to do the trick.

 

[Vedmo]

Lots of different practices have lots of different opinions on what it takes to change a habit in regards to motor control. It probably depends on many factors from person to person, but could take anywhere from several hundred to tens of thousands of reps to change/correct an action to the point it is second nature.

Competitive shooters might not feel comfortable with a new gun until 10,000 rounds, but a martial artist may be able to alter the mechanics of a technique in just a few hundred reps.

For me with gaming, be it ED or other games I've made drastic control changes to, I usually feel comfortable again after a week or so of regular play. Last year I took about a 4 month break from ED, and coming back to the HOTAS I was absolutely lost at first, but after my second day of playing it was like I never forgot it, which was a weird thing to realize.

 

[Tarman]

Yep, just keep working at it. I used to have my vert thrusters on digital buttons on my throttle, but a good while back I had some help setting up the CH software to put the verts onto the pedal toe buttons for full analog input (the lats are all on the throttle thumbstick). Took a while to get used to after a couple years with button input, but now it's second nature the "new" way.

 

[Ser Xav]

Thanks for the replies all, very good to hear other people’s experiences.

Yeah I guess I need to just get stuck in to a new control scheme for a while.

Question is, which control scheme. I have a ‘minimal’ option that keeps everything as is but transfers the yaw to the secondary stick from the primary.


Obviously only I can answer the ‘which one’ question.

If I put yaw on secondary stick then when I’m using the Tootle-Around Scheme of stick and throttle, I won’t have my usual yaw control as my secondary hand will be on the throttle and not a stick. Is this a big deal? Maybe not, as all other axes are covered by primary stick and rudder pedals.

If I go with one of the more fundamental changes to the options for the ‘Action Scheme’ - such as lateral and yaw on the pedals, and vertical and forward thrust on the secondary stick - this is where my brain starts to really fry in action scenarios, as the muscle memory kicks in uncontrollably.

I’d like to go more fundamental and use the secondary for some of the key translational thrust axes, as this stick has 3 axes on it (it’s my old primary, remember)

It’s interesting ‘watching’ how my muscle memory works - it kind of takes over and it’s like someone else controlling, except the controls are all different and it all goes wrong!

I realise I am extremely reliant on yaw for both normal flying (pulling away from a star or planet, aligning in supercruise, landing, mining) and in ‘action’ flying ( aligning the target in combat) so managing without this on the primary is the key. I find that all my turns are (subconsciously) coordinated turns, to use an aviation term (roll and rudder combined to make the turn).

But more fundamentally I could simply do the wholesale change to the way I fly. Long term, probably the better move.

My new primary stick is an amazing stick with perfect weight, feel and controls/buttons, so I think this will be worth it for overall better control of the ship’s systems.

I think I might have over-thunked it

 

[DragonIV]

The one thing I can add is this: don't switch back to the old setup at all while you're remapping your controls memory. That's right up there with crossing the streams of proton pack wands.

I was guilty of this when transitioning from the HOTAS-X to the T16000 FCS. That was a Very Bad Idea, as it turned out.

 

[Ser Xav]

Hmmm. It’s official: I can’t fly ED without yaw on my primary stick. I simply cannot undo years of yaw on Z (ED, and flightsims prior to rudder pedals).

I have a multitude of options available, but the new stick I wanted to use on primary has no yaw capability.

I have a control scheme option where yaw is put to pedals, but then in this scenario when I’m flying stick and throttle, I don’t have 6 DOF via analogue axes. My ‘old’ setup (or at least, the ‘current’ one I’m trying to transition away from) gives me 6DOF from one stick (roll pitch yaw), one set of pedals (lateral and vertical) and the forward/back thrust from throttle.

Losing yaw from the stick means I’m at 5DOF with a stick pedals throttle configuration.

Flying dual sticks for combat and mining is easy to set up and get used to.

But for general flying around like landing, departing, and then the harder manoeuvres - like navigating to some planetary coordinates in the pitch black of the dark side of the planet, flying on the HUD numbers alone - I can’t do this on dual stick, for me it has to be stick / pedals / throttle combo.

Yes there are bigger problems in the world.... But this one is bugging me :-(

Does anyone play this game with no yaw at all, and if so, how? What are the techniques and workarounds?

 

[Shiro Akai]

As usual - practice, practiice and even more practice. I recently upgraded from simple stick + Logitech G13 to fully fledged HOTAS. Before change all movement I had on stick (pitch, yaw and roll) and HAT controlled strife sideways and up/down. Got X52Pro where strife thrust was under left hand index finger (on throttle). I had to switch it to stick's HAT for I couldn't get rid of habit.

What I found - use tutorials as practice ground. YOu get Sidewinder and a scenario to complete. Forget about scenario, just fly and develop new muscle memory. Even first tutorial will do, asteroid field, lots of place to practice and maneuver.

Another thing - try to implement changes slowly. No everything at once, totally remapping all buttons. Make a single change, test it, get used to it. Then make another change, test it, get used to it. After 3rd change you'll master first so you won't be even noticing it was changed.

Drawback - takes some time to fully transit from old setup to new. But tutorial ground gives you free and stress-free environment.

 

[leeG]

I've found to do the dual stick setup you need two twisty sticks and a separate throttle axis.

I do dual sticks using T.16000 joysticks.
Pitch, roll and yaw on the right stick.
Fore/aft, left/right, up/down maneuvering thrust on the left stick.
Left stick thottle slider is normal cruising-flight forward-thrust throttle.

With this setup, just cruising around I use the right stick and throttle slider.
When docking I use both sticks with the throttle set to zero.

 

[DT006]

I've found to do the dual stick setup you need two twisty sticks and a separate throttle axis.

I do dual sticks using T.16000 joysticks.
Pitch, roll and yaw on the right stick.
Fore/aft, left/right, up/down maneuvering thrust on the left stick.
Left stick thottle slider is normal cruising-flight forward-thrust throttle.

With this setup, just cruising around I use the right stick and throttle slider.
When docking I use both sticks with the throttle set to zero.

New to ED. Do you mind sharing your key bindings config? I have the same setup and importing the cfg would be great!

 

[VR Jay Le Chardon]

Hook up your new controller(s), jump in an eagle, or better yet an iEagle as they are faster, and go to san tu, where there is a large sceintific installation with CQC style tunnels and cool things to do some piloting-parkour in. Goof about at that and you'll learn to get good with your controllers. Once you think you are getting good at that, you can go to the advanced acclimitasition program, go to an ocellus station, and slalom through details on the structure like the like the flying buttresses at the outside of the toastrack, or over and under the glowing red rings at the perimiter of the spherical body. When you have that nailed, go to a coriolis, and get inside the latticework,

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWM06-xJGOI

 

[Ser Xav]

So I have made some progress here I think. Having not played Elite for about 9 months, and with lockdown in place, I decided to try to get dual sticks up and running again. This had been partly successful and partly unsuccessful, as follows.

the successful part is that I think I have nailed a control scheme that works and I have adapted to instinctively without having to think about it.

Stick 1: X: Roll, Y: Pitch (2 axes)
Stick 2: X: Lateral thrust, Y: forward/back thrust, Z: Yaw
Rudder Pedals: Main: Vertical Thrust, Toes: Lateral Thrust*
Throttle: Throttle control

In terms of forward/backward movement, I use the throttle for supercruise mainly, and Stick 2 forward /back for all other flying (docking, dogfighting, mining, etc)

The main change to my previous setup was to 1: learn how to use the forward/backward thrusters on a stick (I used to rely on throttle for this), and 2: to learn the lateral thrusters on a stick (I used to have these on the toe pedals)

And 3: I have also got used to Yaw being on a different stick to pitch/roll; putting it onto the stick with forward/back and lateral thrusters made a lot more sense in terms of coordinating the movement with the lateral thrusters. Lateral thrust on the stick provides much better close control than on the toe pedals.

What's surprising is that it didn’t take too long to get this into my head as a natural movement in terms of brain/muscle memory (maybe 3-4 hours practicing with tutorial scenarios), and, that I tried a few different variations along the way, which meant that I actually learned how to be able to just switch my brain between schemes. All in tutorial situations, mind, but still, wasn’t expecting this.

I used Joystick Gremlin* to link the rudder pedal toes to the Stick 2 X axis for Lateral thrustto give me the same ability if I’m on Throttle control, for whatever reason. Joystick Gremlin is a fantastic piece of software.

I think not playing for 9 months has obviously helped in the ability to transition to the new control scheme. I think I have a much better set up now

The negative is that I now appear to be terrible at dogfighting. Not sure if this is due to being out of practice, or, if there is some underlying issue with this control scheme for dogfighting. For example, I cannot get behind the enemy, and stay there, on the Advanced Combat Competent tutorial (I’m in a Viper, enemy is a Cobra..!) but I will keep practicing. For all other flying, I have it down naturally.

I just hope the control scheme allows me the same, if not better control, in dogfighting than previously. I suspect it’s to do with the use of the forward thrusters as opposed to throttle control.

Anyway, will keep practicing then head out into the real universe to pick up where I left off 9 months ago.

 

[leeG]

New to ED. Do you mind sharing your key bindings config? I have the same setup and importing the cfg would be great!

My config requires running a Thrustmaster T.A.R.G.E.T script to function. My script program merges the two joysticks into a single virtual Thrustmaster Combined device and uses functions only available with script programming, like the short/long button press protocol.

 

[Vedmo]

I think not playing for 9 months has obviously helped in the ability to transition to the new control scheme. I think I have a much better set up now

Reminds me of a weird one that happened to me with WoW. Picked it back up a while back to check out Classic. I bound an ability I had not used for a class I had not played in maybe 10 years, and in the heat of the moment I was furiously smashing the key for what I had it bound way back then.

I do agree a break makes it easier to switch though, did that myself when I came back to the game this last time with a different flight stick and it felt more like learning new habits instead of breaking old habits.

 

[VR Jay Le Chardon]

Yaw being on a different stick to pitch/roll

That would confuse the flack out of me.... Given what you've described, and the fact yo hve a left twist stick and pedals, why not try:
Right stick
X-Axis = Roll
Y-Axis = Pitch
Pedals = Yaw
(ignore the toe brakes)

Left Stick
X-Axis = Lateral Thrusters
Y-Axis = Fore / Aft Thrusters
Z-Axis = Vertical Thrusters

 

[Hanerib]

It can take a few months to re-wire your brain, you just need to practise daily. Even a few minutes will do, maybe 15 minutes, but ideally you'd have a couple of longer sessions weekly. When you've done it a couple of times, you are better at assessing what you can do with different controller setups, and what you want to achieve from doing that. Learning the stick for non-dominant left hand can be difficult, because there is no muscle memory, but I'm sure you'll find it amusing after some time.

 

[Ser Xav]

That would confuse the flack out of me....

LOL yes that's exactly what the 'old me' would have said! I can't explain it. I was trying out exactly your proposed combo of Yaw on the Roll and Pitch stick. It's my absolute default all the years and to now the single biggest stumbling block to me changing control schemes.

The only reason to try Lateral on the non Roll / Pitch stick was that it felt quite natural to have Yaw and Lateral linked when tracking an enemy craft. Or at least, it didn't feel wrong. Right now I could easily switch between the two. What surprises me is that this doesn't bother me. There is no 'dominant' handedness happening.

The epically way bigger thing to mention here is that - somehow - I can now do Flight Assist Off very well. This evening I was flying through the trenches and nooks and crannies of the Coriolis space station with relative ease. I've never been able to do this before. Somehow it just felt natural. I think of a direction or a route through station structure, and I could just make it happen. I think when moving to a thrusters only control scheme (ie, no throttle) with Flight Assist On, it somehow preps you up for FA Off, as under this scheme, all moves are incremental, even if FA On pulls you back to stability when you let go of a particular thruster.

FA Off, by comparison, 'simply' requires you to correct and adjust the moves. It's all about small inputs. I'd seen countless video on YouTube and wondering how these gifted humans could do this. Now with the right kit and control scheme I can understand how it's done. I think a large part is in me not having two axes assigned to my rudders to control via the pedals - I now have only Vertical thrusters, previously Vertical and Lateral. The second stick provides far more immediate an instinctive response with Lateral .

I'm doing things I've never been able to do, or thought possible for me to do. I feel like I'm 'flying', to sound a bit dramatic and emotional about it. It's a release, it's a freedom. It feels like a total transformation of the same game. It feels like a proper 'Sim'. FA On by comparison suddenly feels like it's on rails and constricted. There is a magic in feeling the pure 6 degrees of freedom and understanding it and controlling it. Coming into the star port to land with FA Off is a beautiful experience. It's like what you imagined when you played the first Elite on BBC and Amiga back in the day, but with the scenes from 2001 A Space Odyssey playing in your mind. I can't explain it without sounding silly, but it literally feels like a shackle has been removed. It's like the world should be, like you realised you've been doing it all wrong. Like seeing the light. (I know how gushing and emotive this sounds...!)

Seeing a planet rotating in the background whilst you're flying down a thin trench within the Coriolis station's structure provides an amazing juxtapositional sense of scale and perspective. It's amazing and mind expanding. It's easily made it's way into my 'top 10 most profound and spiritual' gaming moments ever experienced. I've never felt this sense of scale in Elite until now.

I realise the kit I have helps a lot to this degree. I have two high quality sticks and rudder pedals. They provide a great feel and feedback to inputs. Stick calibration dead zones are quite key to achieving the best degree of control. If there are no dead zones set, this equates to a lot of random and unintentional manoeuvring which is a problem I probably suffered from in the past. It is critical to know when you are implementing an input.

I also realise I haven't ventured out back into the real world of the game, have stayed on all the tutorials so far, but nothing about what I've developed so far worries me for the time when I get back into the main game. I will need to do a lot of 'research' here and report back. However I also know that combat will need a massive amount of work to attempt of FA Off and I think it may never truly be possible without assist in place.

What I find amazing also, is that Frontier decided to put Flight Assist Off in the game. It's a stroke of genius. I now like to think they probably designed the game to be with FA Off as standard, and then reluctantly implemented FA On, to account for the reality, understandably, of most common gaming set-ups, and the relatively large learning curve required to fly in space 'naturally'. It's a beautiful simulation of space. Forget all the ancillary angst this game attracts, at this level it's an amazing simulation that gives you an incredible sense of realism and achievement.

But wait, there's more.....

The additional 'bestest best' part is that, whilst doing all this, I had installed the amazing Amazingly Realistic Immersion mod that @Old Duck has posted, and I happened to have removed the 'vector' space dust you see when flying in normal space.

This wasn't intentional as part of my control scheme exercise, rather just purely coincidental. Without the dust, it's again like a breath of fresh air. You realise you simply don't need this. Space is very, very big. It really doesn't matter if you can't see the localised space dustlets flying past your windscreen. It doesn't matter if you're floating around a little bit loosely.

What matters is your local frame of reference, be it a space station or an asteroid or an enemy ship. The omission of space dust emphasises the reality of space, a big black vacuum. Realism is definitely increased amazingly well by this mod. The only thing that I need to read my ship vectors is the visual relation to the target, whatever that may be. Realising you don't need the nannying effect of the space dust is immense. It is as if the shrouds have been lifted from your eyes.

I'm feeling a spinning motion in my head as I type this. Similar to when you've gone water skiing, or swimming in a rough sea, or snowboarding, in the day - your mind is still feeling it at night, the motions playing in your head. It's like a kind of post processing in your brain, I've always thought.

Will post back with more developments and findings, and apologies for the gushiness of this post, but this evening was a epiphany moment in video games for me, and those are rare and definitely far between. And there's nothing sweeter.

 

[VR Jay Le Chardon]

If you've dipped your toe into the world of flight assist off, I can totally understand the emotion and gushing in your last post. I went flight assist off 2 years ago, and I still rememeber the sense of something awakening inside of me as I became one with the fluid motion of FAoff. Even yet I still get a fluttery feeling with tingly fingers and forearms after a good flight session.

You mention deadzones, honestly, you are best to have negliglble deadzones, you do not want the deadzones to go any further than the point at whcih you feel your joystick weight up on that axis. What you do want is pitch response curves that are very flat in the middle for finessing gentle touches, but accelerate to the extremities of movement. Personally I just use them on roatation axis' and keep the traverse joystick axis linear, but you can set the up for all six if you prefer?

The sort of curves I'm describing should look like the yellow line in this ultra professional paint.net diagram, with the exception that you may electively decide to make them symmetrical

The horizontal axis is physical stick movement, and the vertical axis is input signal strength, so near the centre the stick is less sensitive, but as the stick moves towards its extremities, the signal strength grows exponentially until it catches up with 1:1 ratio. So at the start of the sticks movement, you could have 10% movement = 3% signal strength, and it 20% = 9% etc until the curve gets to a point whereby at 40/45 percent its 1:1 as in 45% stick movement = 45% input signal.
You can use your joysticks own software, or third party apps like "Joystick Gremlin" or "Joystick Curves" (does exactly what it says on the tin). I cannot comment on joystick gremlin, but with Joystick Curves, its not immediately obvious, but you only plot half the curve, as in 0% --> +50%, the software mirrors the curve, and flips it vertically (obviously) to cover 0% --> -50%.

Since you enjou FAoff, forget about a fleet carrier, your next credit sink should be a disposable sidewinder, and do this course:

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6zIXu52RnA&list=PLIQVVKXGd78AiYjhGUNZL9dFm23hYgc8R


For the final assignment, rather than faff about with cargo canisters, I was using degraded emissions / encoded emissions / high grade signal sources and scooping up the mats.

Big slow ships are easier to fly in FAoff as you don't pick up as much energy to get yourself in trouble with them, small nimble ships are more rewarding. Keep FA toggle on a button, its very handy to use as "space brakes", although others will advocate the use of landing gear or cargo hatch, the FA is sharper decelleration, and mind that in FAoff acceleration is doubled, but decelleration is halved. Conversely in FAon Acceleration is halved but decelleration is doubled.

PM me when you get through Hobbs' course, I've got another couple of excercises I developed for my own amusement that I'll share with you.

 

[VR Jay Le Chardon]

A better diagram for pitch curves where the 4 centre squares are hashed out with finer sub-grid divisions is where you want the accuracy, so you reduce joystick sensitivity in this region using the curves:

• Red dotted line is linear response for super accuracy of those ever so delicate inputs for aiming / steadying a ship
• Yellow dashed line is super flat in the middle but more sharply transforms towards linear for the extremities
• Green curve is more organic, and may feel most natural, but not necessarily as precise for combat aiming as the yellow curve

The diagram is still not perfect, it was knocked up in Microsoft Powerpoint rather than a graphics program, but it should give you an idea of what I am trying to explain, even though the grey fine subgrid hatchings don't quite line up with anything else, and the yellow curve has a slit lump in it at the centrepoint.