The Glade 4.0

So I was looking into finally picking up a second T.16000m (I'd consider mixing the one I've got with a different, possibly pricier stick (like a Warthog?) except I have no idea where the left-handed conversion kit for my current one is), and I discovered two things:
a) There's been an update to the stick in the last few (4-ish?) months. The new version has orange lighting at the base of the stick instead of green, gives the buttons on the base of the stick dimples and nubs to make it easier to tell by feel what button you're on (handy for use with VR goggles), but is the same internals and stick ergonomics (and conversion kit) as the old version.
b) If you so desire, you can get it bundled with a brand new, matching throttle that looks pretty spiffy. And if you're really looking for a deal, you can get a bundle featuring the stick, throttle, AND the decent entry-to-mid-range Thrustmaster pedals that have been around for a while.

So I did that, since I had yet to bother getting pedals for other sims. Now, I get to mix and match between a mouse, 2 sticks, a throttle, and pedals to find my preferred control scheme. Should arrive sometime this week.

I also, um, ordered a bunch of stuff to finally get around to a CPU upgrade, since I was on Newegg for the stick bundle (Amazon doesn't have the 3-piece bundle, that I saw, and their price on the 2-piece HOTAS bundle wasn't great). I had been telling myself that I'd wait until the next major architecture refresh, but as I was poking around review sites, I noticed that Kaby Lake is fresh off the line, and is the middle of a new 3-step cycle, meaning that instead of being 9-12 months away, that new architecture is probably more like a year and a half to two years off, and my aging 2600k isn't going to cut it for me since it's technically the bottleneck for most of the stuff I'm doing already. (VR, unoptimized and CPU-hungry Star Citizen, Tomb Raider, etc.) If it looked like DX12 adoption were going to actually happen at something other than a glacial pace, I might try to stick it out, but... meh.

So hopefully next weekend I'll be building the new PC, and maybe before that I'll be trying out new control schemes in Arena Commander.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

I'm a keyboard and mouse commando I'm afraid.

If you use joystick can you fast switch for fps?

I've got a 4820k and considered upgrading but I didn't want to buy a new mobo and since SC is going to be optimized for 4 cores 8 threads didn't see the reason to go 10/20.

Have fun putting a new beast together

We need to get a website where we can schedule when we are all able to play together now that a lot of our ships are in "game".

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Just ordered a warthog from newegg bet I can't do anything but crash

So my initial review of the Thrustmaster TWCS throttle is pretty positive. Having never been a huge modern flight sim fan (sure, I want to say I played Jane's F-15, maybe?), the longer travel of the throttle was rather revelationary to me in the amount of control it afforded me to keep a close engagement range on targets in pirate swarm mode.

I'm definitely going to have to sit down and do some thinking about keybinding. There are a lot of inputs available, but probably more analogue axes than I actually need. I think looking into the Thrustmaster T.A.R.G.E.T. scripting software might be of help, there, though, allowing me to present some of the analogue inputs (like the throttle's fingertip toggle bar, which I'd love to assign afterburner and boost, or the toe brakes on the pedals) as buttons.

Also, Today I Learned that rudder pedals as roll feels really weird. Next time I fire it up, I'm going to give them a try as strafe.

_________________
"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

So the Joystick is able to be switched over to left handed as I understand it. But I assume if you do that, the throttle becomes super inconvenient for the right hand?

Plus I can't get SC to complete the update atm, it hangs at the end of the download. Might have to reinstall the whole thing.

Yeah, sorry. Southpaws are pretty much screwed on throttles. Maybe there's a CH throttle around somewhere that's ergonomically agnostic.

But you can get the stick and pedals separately (though the pedals will require an adapter to bypass the throttle and go straight to USB). The stick runs $60 for the new one (don't let Amazon Marketplace sellers try to sell you the old, green-lit one for $130+; this new one is almost identical -- a couple of the buttons feel a tiny bit mushier than on the old version, but the ergonomics of the buttons on the base are drastically improved by the texturing), and the pedals are $90 bought alone.

_________________
"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

T.16000m on order today. Maybe it'll spark some more flying in my future!

Yaasss. Finally, you'll be able to have a good lefty stick.

_________________
"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades