Thread for ideas to help get round physical disabilities

ElysaDjinn · April 7

I don't know if such a thread exists; I have had a bit of a look but certainly can't see anything recent - if I've missed it, please let me know!

I have a lot of physical problems, can't use a controller, have difficulties with my hands so lots of mouse clicking and button pushing can be difficult. While I'm doing some vet trials as healer with my lovely friendly guildies, there are a lot of things I can't do at all - such as basic tanking because of not being able to right click enough, so blocking isn't feasible. The one-bar sorc works for me if I want to play DD, I'm looking into arcanist as well, but I often feel I am trying to reinvent the wheel because other people must have had the same thoughts and found solutions.

What I don't want here is an argument about accessibility versus making the game too easy, or players without disabilities using things like Oakensoul to achieve huge DPS or whatever. There are plenty of places where that kind of discussion is already taking place, as I saw earlier. But if people have ideas for things that have worked for them, or for a friend, maybe they could be added to this post? Ideally, stating the difficulty to be overcome and a solution, or partial solution.

I'll start with the obvious (well, obvious to me): Oakensoul is a game-changer and makes it much more possible for someone who struggles with a lot of button pushing or clicking to achieve decent DPS. Teamed with a one-bar build to remove the need for bar-swapping it has meant I can do vet dungeons as DD.

fred4 · April 7

As a rule of thumb I find healer the easiest role. They have to deal with the fewest mechanics overall and missing skills in their rotation frequently has no immediate effect on survival nor damage. At the same time a standard healer does have a rather heavy rotation and they do have special responsibilities, just overall fewer than the tank or even the DDs. They're only truly stressed at the highest difficulties, which is how you may get by with not playing perfectly in mid-tier content.

I would say check out Hyperioxes latest one bar videos (YouTube). He is currently in the business of soloing 4-man vet (hard mode) dungeons, but don't let that put you off. If you're looking for accurate combat information, he is a good source. In particular, he's made the point that Oakensoul is not always, objectively, the best choice for one bar builds. You can make better one bar builds without it. This may give you some new build ideas and may solve the bar swap problem in Cloudrest / Relequen for you, e.g. you could use the same weapon and skills on both bars, cause you ditched Oakensoul.

Aside from heavy attack builds, Arcanist and Velothi-Ur may be the thing to use, e.g. because the beam lasts for ~5s and light attacks are unimportant. Hyperioxes probably has a 1-bar Arcanist. He tends to use Pale Order for soloing. This would not apply in groups, so Velothi-Ur would be a go.

There may be peripherals other than a controller or standard mouse and keyboard that may suit you better.

fred4 · April 7

By the way, nothing says that you must do light attacks, blocking, and bashing / interrupting with the mouse. You can remap all of that to keyboard keys in game. I can recommend the following to any player:

Bash / interrupt / break free: Remap from pressing both mouse buttons to a single key.
Bar swap: Remap from pressing a toggle key to two distinct keys for front bar and back bar.

The latter is to deal with lag, but is also just a more positive action when you can repeat a dedicated bar key without the risk of swapping back and forth.

My own keyboard assignments are entirely weird, but suffice it to say, I rest my left hand on the keyboard so that it doesn't have to move. The middle finger always rests on the "move forward" key, "E" in my case, while the other fingers are free to stretch to various other keys. Now maybe that is exactly what you do not want for your condition, but for what it's worth, I use a non-standard keyboard / mouse and layout, described here:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/8282060#Comment_8282060

ElysaDjinn · April 8

Thanks for your suggestions, Fred4.

I really like the idea of remapping bash/interrupt/break free to a single key, that might help quite a bit. Previously I have rearranged some of the controls but hadn't considered changing things from dual to single action like that, thanks!

I've been playing healer for several years now, and really like it even though it can be a bit intensive for a vet trial. I know there will always be times I have to scale my activities right back, so as not to overdo things, but it is good to be able to try the harder content (not trifectas except for FG1 and similar

)

Hyperiox sounds interesting, I'll definitely have a look at his ideas. I already have Velothi, though haven't tried using it yet, and will explore!

Thanks again

Nestor · April 8

Tab Targeting and using Arrow keys might help too. I think you enable Cursor mode to do the Tab Targeting. The arrow keys would be an alternative to the mouse for direction, but might be easier to move the mouse around to establish direction for movement or targeting.

Mik195 · April 8

I don't know how they work on PC, but Microsoft just released a new adaptive joystick. I think they have a couple of controller options too. Maybe one would work for you.

allochthons · April 8

TheGameroom.TV (https://www.thegameroom.tv/sorcerer-builds) has been making some builds that might be of interest. Search for "one button" "two button" and similar terms, but every build for a class is on one page, so it's easy to scroll to see if there's one that fits you.

I use this arcanist build a lot these days: Two Button Solo Arcanist. I've adjusted it a bit for myself, but it's really easy on my hands, and has crazy survivability.

I wish accessible controllers weren't so expensive:
Hori Flex Controller
Playstation Access Controller
X Box Adaptive Controller

ElysaDjinn · April 10

One of my difficulties is precision in a small space - so a controller hasn't worked out for me as I can't do tiny movements reliably. My powered wheelchair has a giant squishy ball for the joystick partly for that reason, also because my finger joints are tender and it's not a good idea to put pressure on them too long. Thanks to people who've suggested controllers of various types (and I agree it's appalling how expensive some of these are).

What other things have people found that helped them? (They don't have to be good for me, it could be this thread might help lots of people with different needs.)

AcadianPaladin · April 13

As you said, the biggest help is Oakensoul. I will never play two bar builds again simply because of the buff management that Oakensoul helps with. Another tiny benefit of Oakensoul is that it frees up a key that is no longer needed for weapon swap which simplifies my keyboard/mouse mapping.

One thing I do that simplifies things is slot Dawnbreaker as the ultimate for the Fighters Guild passives and never cast it. By keeping my ultimate always at 500 and slotting Strategic Reserve (from the red cp tree), I have a completely passive health regeneration of about 2500.

I've tried mice with numerous buttons on the side for the right thumb and settled one that only has two buttons on the side. Any more and my thumb not only gets lost looking for the right button but also the joint in my thumb quickly gets sore from overuse with more than two side buttons. Even the two buttons I use are not constant quick click (walk/run and stow weapon).