Question: Why do players S key?

[nescáfè]

S moves you backwards..

No, "S" makes people fly in a cyclone.

I think people do it because they just don't know any better. It's one of the most accessible buttons you have but people don't keybind as much as they should. People in general do not care/are not good enough and therefore do not need to use it I guess.

[Deleted]

I use both depends what mood im in tought i dont pvp at all and as a tank theres not much turning around needed from my experience from classic to now atleast apart from some bosses that does the radiance thingy.

[TheEverydayDre]

TBH OP, all i have seen you post is QQ..

on topic, I use it sometimes, so i can keep casting instant cats while walking back..

How is this QQ, im asking a question.

Some people prefer to S'key, i dont. Id like to understand why some do this. Am i QQing for trying to understand other players styles?

Nah man.

[unholytestament]

If your standing at the edge of a fire, your telling me turning around running 1 inch and turning back around is faster than simply tapping s? This makes no sense. If your running out of aoe and backpedal thats different, but cmon now.

I have this odd feeling you don't know what "strafe" means.

Next time you are in game, hold down the Q button. If you have not changed your keybinds, your character should move to the left but continue facing forward. Combine this with rotating your mouse a little and your character can now technically be moving backwards from his original position without losing sight of his target and, more importantly, without having sacrificed important time moving really fucking slow.

[Deleted]

i use it when navigating the raid frames and healing, and i need to move backwards.

[Deleted]

As a tank I use it to make sure they don't hit me in the back. Other than that I rarely use it, sometimes it happens when I don't really think about it, short distances in situations it doesn't matter.

[TheEverydayDre]

Well i have some experience tanking... I used to strafe. Never had any problems with getting crit and killed.

I use the probably more out of combat... while in combat im all mouse, and A,W,D,Q,E.

I find backpedaling to be slow and cumbersome. Yet some players dont have a problem with it, or see skeying as a problem. Guess its all about what style you prefer.

[cetarari]

My 's' key is bound to Hammer of Wrath and Hammer of Justice (with modifier), I also don't have left and right bound, just strafe. I rarely used left, right and back in any case, so I figured I'd bind the keys to other stuff instead.

[Mister K]

Tbh only acceptable way to use S key is when you are tanking and kiting the mob backwards...Anything else should be used through mouse turning since its ALOT faster.

[Stanton Biston]

I really despise these topics because they suppose that all players have an equal knowledge of game mechanics and the possibilities of how the game can be played.

From a realistic point of view, strafing should be slower than running, or even running backwards, so in terms of how someone might move, it's not something that readily comes to mind. Strafing is an artifact of gaming.

And as someone who has kited any number of dragons across continents, I will say that jump spinning is a dangerous enterprise unless your latency is incredibly low. I know that at around 150ms, I can jump spin a moonfire and have the animation appear that I cast it forward facing. As a result, it's not always the best bet for kiting.

Finally, not everyone uses the same key bindings. I know I don't. When I read the topic, I thought it was about strafing, since I was an ESDF player for like 5 years.

Now my forward and backward movement keys, as well as strafing, are solely bound to my arrow keys. Leaving my alpha-numeric keys free for binding abilities.
(Since I don't use my keyboard to play anymore.)

[rabbimojo]

One other thought, which I didn't see anyone mention while skimming the thread: Not everyone binds Q/E to strafing. Personally, I use Q/E (and alt-Q/E, ctrl-Q/E, shift-Q/E, a-c-Q/E, s-c-Q/E, a-s-Q/E, to demonstrate how many binds I get out of it) for various hotkeys. When I want to strafe, I use A/D with mouselook. The only real problem with this comes if I need to click something while I need to back up, which is rare enough that I don't care. (click a target, click one of the handful of rare things I don't have keybound, etc.).

[Deleted]

Well i have some experience tanking... I used to strafe. Never had any problems with getting crit and killed.

I use the probably more out of combat... while in combat im all mouse, and A,W,D.

Well I started tanking in Cata and I was always told by everyone to never turn my back on the enemy, has worked out great so far.

S moves you backwards..

i have set A and D to strafe.. and turn with my mouse only

Don't really understand why everyone is using A and D for strafing when Q and E are the default settings for it. Might be that I don't play many other game that use this sort of movement other than WoW...

[Iracor]

If your standing at the edge of a fire, your telling me turning around running 1 inch and turning back around is faster than simply tapping s? This makes no sense. If your running out of aoe and backpedal thats different, but cmon now.

It actually is faster once it becomes your natural reaction. If you need to get out of some "fire" mechanic then it has probably spawned on top of you so you wouldn't need to only move "just an inch". If fire spawned on someone else and you're right at the edge then you're standing too close to someone. What I'm trying to say is most of the situations you're describing are actually tank positioning issues as opposed to back-pedaling vs. strafing.

[Nexxia]

I have this odd feeling you don't know what "strafe" means.

Next time you are in game, hold down the Q button. If you have not changed your keybinds, your character should move to the left but continue facing forward. Combine this with rotating your mouse a little and your character can now technically be moving backwards from his original position without losing sight of his target and, more importantly, without having sacrificed important time moving really fucking slow.

Im just laughing at the ridiculous idea, that some one that moves backwards using s for an incremental movement is a bad player. I know what strafing is, side to side movement. So explain how turning sideways and strafing is better or faster if i need to move 1/2 inch or less because something spawned in front of me but not on me. If theres a big puddle of something and Im in the middle stafe or run yes, but if a spot spawns in my direct front and my toe is in it, whats the problem with tapping S key?

[Zacksauce]

I do both. I paly my holy pally in a very weird fashion. I jump around SO much while I am healing its crazy. It's just my tick to move. So same thing in grim batol i will back peddle with S or mouse turn depending on where he is at. I will do both. I know when the right time to mouse turn is. Like I said I HAVE to move around while I heal. Ask my guildies I am always running around while casting my instants. Running behind the ranged, behind the tank, Using the S key to move around.

Now that I think of it my post is very un not on topic I would guess.

[Deleted]

i use it if im slacking, half the time im barely playing wow and watching tv or soemthing at same time and i use keyboard to turn :P unless ofc were on a boss or pvp

[shagguar]

The answer is simple really...

80% of wow players use default binds ("1" through "="), and nothing more. And out of those they probably only use the first 6-8 keys reliably, meaning they use their mouse to click everything else. If you're using your mouse to click abilities on your screen, it would seem impractical to use your "keyboard turn" key, to turn enough to strafe away, therefore they "s" key away instead.

Yeah, to anyone not retarded... and wanting to better themselves, realizes that this type of play makes you terrible, and binds their abilities instead... and realizes that there is no use for a backpedal and a turn key (if you're a tank, backpedaling is okay to a certain extent). But most WoW players are retarded, and couldn't give 2 shits about bettering themselves and progressing as a player. Therefore they yell at others in random heroics and pugs, thinking their pro because they have "Light of the Dawn" or some other wotlk title at the end of their name, and continue to click... kb turn... and backpedal, and look at this post and nto understand what the big deal is, and try to defend themselves... so there really is no point.

So there you have it, /thread.

[unholytestament]

Im just laughing at the ridiculous idea, that some one that moves backwards using s for an incremental movement is a bad player. I know what strafing is, side to side movement. So explain how turning sideways and strafing is better or faster if i need to move 1/2 inch or less because something spawned in front of me but not on me. If theres a big puddle of something and Im in the middle stafe or run yes, but if a spot spawns in my direct front and my toe is in it, whats the problem with tapping S key?

Because backpeddling is slower. Period.

And since the odds of the bad shit spawning just far enough away that you're on the edge of it are pretty damn slim, it's better safe than sorry to use the faster option.

[Quill42]

Ive been trying to understand why some players s key as apposed to using their mouse to turn around.
...
Is there a reason for this style of play? Where does the desire to s key come from?

Are you kidding?! The fact that whoever you're complaining about actually *moved* puts them among the ranks of "advanced" players. Most of the WoW population is still trying to grasp the "STANDING IN FIRE IS BAD" concept

[Pyronius]

Because their daddy taught them good.