Please add Mode Shifting to Bumper Buttons!

[landonaaronp]

Currently the only buttons that don't have mode shifting are the right and left bumper buttons and the start and select buttons. The bumper buttons are often used in games to cycle through different pause menus or player inventory/option screens, but have a different function during actual game play.

If you are using xinput likely won't need mode shifting for the bumper butttons because the game already has this context sensitivity built in for the Xbox 360 gamepad. However with mosue and keyboard controls developers often eschew using the same button with several different context sensitive functions, and instead take advantage of the large number of buttons on a keyboard to assign each function to a separate key, or at least give the player the option to do so.

The problem is when using the steam controller you don't have as many buttons as on your keyboard. Some developers are smart and while they allow you to assign a different button for each function they also allow you to assign the different functions to the same key, basically giving you the same context sensitivity as a gamepad. However just as many games aren't so smart and have a strict one function per button limit, and if you try to assign multiple function to the same button you will see the previous function become unbound as soon as you assign the new one to a key that is already in use.

Furthermore even when developers are smart and allow you to assign multiple functions to a single key, a Steam Controller user may wish to take advantage of Steam's Activators options to convert a "press and hold" type key to a toggle on/off assignment type key for the gameplay portions of a game, while retaining the "regular press" behavior of the key in other portions of the game, like menu screen and player inventory and map screens.

Take for instance Metal Gear Solid V The Phantom Pain. The right bumper buttons bring up your binoculars, or when aiming a scoped weapon cycles through the magnification levels, or if you have your idroid open it changes tabs. Fortunately Metal Gear Solid V allows you to assign all these functions to the same keyboard key, so even when using Mouse and Keyboard Controls this button can behave properly in all contexts. However, the binoculars in game require you to hold the right bumper for as long as you use them. I however prefer to toggle the binoculars on and off. However if I change the right bumper button to "Toggle On" it will effect the right bumper button in all situations. If I had a mode shift assignment available, I could set the right bumper to the same keypress in both mode shift modes, but have one mode as "toggle on/off" and the other mode "Press and Hold". I would use the "Start Button" as the mode shift button, coincidently setting it to toggle as well so that I press Start once to toggle the mode shift on, and open the idroid, then press start again to close the idroid and toggle the mode shift back to normal.

So steam please make mode shifting available for all buttons, especially the bumper butttons.

Also please consider allowing users to create more than two mode shifiting modes in the future. I could do some pretty cool stuff with my games and it would help alleviate alot of issues I am experiencing with Metal Gear TPP if I had just one more mode shift for some of the buttons.

[Vagrant]

Maybe there's no mode shifting for those, but in revenge, you can use Activators....

i.e. I use Select to Quicksave, when I hold Select, it Quickloads. Quickload is programmed as a Longpress.

2nd alternative is to use Action Sets and tab between each action set. Set up a key that will change your action set live in-game.

[landonaaronp]

Yes Action Sets is the best alternative currently. I have tried Long Press and Double Press activators, but I couldn't ever get them to behave in a consistent manner.

One thing Action Sets can't do though that mode shifting can, is bind a toggle on/off key to the same button as the mode shift or action set activator.

For instance say I want my left trackpad to mode shift when the left grip is pressed once, then mode shift back when it is pressed again. I just set up the mode shift activator under left grip as a toggle. If I bind some other function to the left grip as a toggle as well, that mean everytime I call that function in game Left Pad will mode shift, and every time I disable that function in game left pad will mode shift back to its default behavior.

With Action sets I can set left grip to cycle to and from my 2nd Action Set with left grip, but if i set another function to toggle on the left grip it will not behave correctly.

[ugafan]

adding an action set is a good option.

if you don't want to do that, try setting the binoculars to a regular press. toggle on with interruptible on. then add a long press for the other binding. lower the long press time so it feels more like a regular press. then when you tap the bumper it should toggle on the binoculars and when you do a normal press it should activate whatever you have set to long press.

[elboletaire]

+1 for the mode shifting for any button. Because it's not the same as using activators. Or I've not been able to do what I want with them:

What I would like is to change the behavior of the LG button when I'm using the right pad. That's in the reverse order as I can do it now: I can change the behavior of the right pad when pressing LG (or any other button), but, as stated, can't be done backwards.

If anyone knows how to do it, please, let me know. Otherwise, please Valve/Steam developers, add that functionality!

[•]

Also, multibutton modeshifting must be great. I suppose that it's hard to implement, but it really rocks.
Aside from common bumper+A,B,X,Y to mod left touchpad also make it order sensitive, like, if you press RB+LB it shifts to one "set" and if you press LB+RB it shifts to another.

[ugafan]

Originally posted by El Boletaire:

+1 for the mode shifting for any button. Because it's not the same as using activators. Or I've not been able to do what I want with them:

What I would like is to change the behavior of the LG button when I'm using the right pad. That's in the reverse order as I can do it now: I can change the behavior of the right pad when pressing LG (or any other button), but, as stated, can't be done backwards.

If anyone knows how to do it, please, let me know. Otherwise, please Valve/Steam developers, add that functionality!

i agree that all buttons should have mode shifts. currently, the only way to "mode shift" a grip to something else is to use another action set. if you want to use the right trackpad as a mouse, here is the setup you would use:

default action set
lg - whatever button you want
right trackpad - single button. touch press. start press change to 2nd action set.

2nd action set
lg - whatever button you want
right trackpad - mouse. touch press. regular press change to default action set.

turn off display and beep on action set change. turn off haptics.

and that's it. the only problem is there will be a slight delay as the controller switches action sets. which could be a problem for any game that requires quick swiping. you can test it out for yourself to see if the delay is too much for you.

[elboletaire]

Does not fit for what I need... plus I need it to be fast, because I just want to change the action of the button when I'm aiming using the right trackpad.

[Tired Maggot]

I would also very much like to be able to hit Right Bumper + Left Bumper to do ultimate abilities and whatnot.

[austinp_valve]

You should try using action set layers. That could be implemented using two layers - one activated by LB that binds RB and one activated by RB that binds LB.

At this point I think action set layers can be used as a more powerful mode shift any time you'd use a mode shift.

[Mennenth]

Originally posted by austinp-dev:

You should try using action set layers. That could be implemented using two layers - one activated by LB that binds RB and one activated by RB that binds LB.

At this point I think action set layers can be used as a more powerful mode shift any time you'd use a mode shift.

Almost any time, but mode shifts still have their place.

Take for example the approach of using the right pad click to change the pad from a mouse/joystick to a button pad for abxy, so you never have to lift your right thumb from the pad.

Could be accomplished with a layer, but then you'd need to bind apply layer to the click and then each binding in the button pad layer would also need a release press activator to remove the layer to reset it back to the base. Thats configuring 4 additional bindings, because "hold layer" doesnt work for this (if the pad click engages the layer and the layer changes the pad, the software will never see the release part of the hold because the hold would no longer exist and therefore it will get stuck with the layer applied... but imo thats working as intended and no need to change that).

Meanwhile the modeshift function is right there, and in this use case works exactly like the apply/remove activators to function like a hold without the need to configure all the additional activators/bindings.

Layers may be more powerful overall and I think the inclusion of them is awesome, but there is also something to be said for simplicity. Before layers were a thing I was in the camp that the all buttons needed modeshift capabilities, not excluding some seemingly arbitrarily. And I still am in that camp. More configuration options can only be a good thing for this controller.

[Tired Maggot]

Originally posted by austinp-dev:

You should try using action set layers. That could be implemented using two layers - one activated by LB that binds RB and one activated by RB that binds LB.

At this point I think action set layers can be used as a more powerful mode shift any time you'd use a mode shift.

Please explain to me how I would do this? The action layers do not have tool-tips like a lot of the other controller configuration options have. Effectively, I use holding the left bumper to turn my ABXY buttons into various combat ability keybinds, but right now I am using left bumper and left trigger for ultimate, and I would really prefer to hold left bumper then hit right bumper to do my ultimate, but I can't figure out how to get it to operate as a different button while left bumper is held and return to being what it normally is when left bumper is released.

[ugafan]

1. add layer for ultimate
2. in ultimate layer, bind right bumper
3. in default action set, add binding to left bumper to hold ultimate action layer

[austinp_valve]

In the latest beta we've added a Chorded Press Activator. The Chorded Press Activator requires another input to be active for it to fire. This can be combined with other activators and either interrupt them or not based on those activators settings. So a regular press can optionally fire or not based on the chorded state, while a long press can optionally interrupt both for example. Chords require the chord button to be pressed first to activate (like shift or control would on a keyboard).

[Neato]

Originally posted by austinp-dev:

Chords require the chord button to be pressed first to activate (like shift or control would on a keyboard).

Yeah I am currently trying to use this for use in For Honor. I am trying to bind the Guard Modes to these two buttons. The Guard mode requires a Left, Right and Top button press. So my goal is Press the left bumper for the left guard, right for right and both for top. I have it set up like this so far. Regular press for the left and right guard, then each with a activator chord for top. It's not working. What am I missing?


Yeah I can't use Mode shift on these buttons for symmetrical secondary (alternate) button press. Like pressing left and right together means up. But I think it'd need to be symmetrical, so order of operations isn't an issue.

I am using mode shifting on my left trigger, to change the right pad to a 4 way directional for guarding atm. I was skipping the mode shift, then using it as a mouse pad. Though I think this maybe more effective, for the games responsiveness and correctness. I think it help reduce confusion to the game about what direction I am trying to guard in. (I was having problems with the guard changing directions when getting to close to one zone (I mean if I hold diagonal, it switches between top and left or right depending.) . I still am, though it's greatly reduce.))

[shadowboy813]

Use action layers. It's like mode shifting but more flexible.