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Comment by 0cf8612b2e1e | Hacker News Reader

What do these keyboards do? Presumably it is something more sophisticated than a key combination macro.

In this instance one of the things they do is ignore keypresses at certain times

> Razer and Wooting’s SOCD features both let players automate switching strafe directions without having to learn the skill. Normally, to switch strafe directions in a first-person shooter, you have to fully release one key before pressing the other. If both are pressed, they cancel each other, and you stand there for a moment until you release one of the keys. SOCD means you don’t need to release a key and you can rapidly tap the A or D key to counter-strafe with little to no effort. [1]

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/20/24224261/valve-counter-st...

Huh. That seems like such a weird, minor advantage to attempt to ban. I expect most anyone playing FPS would pick this up naturally.

Also seems impossible to ban given the ubiquity of custom keyboards running something like QMK. Those run user code and could send a fake vendor id to the host.

> Huh. That seems like such a weird, minor advantage to attempt to ban. I expect most anyone playing FPS would pick this up naturally.

With a regular keyboard its very possible for a person to not release one key before pressing the other in a tense situation when they have less than 1 second to react. For example even a professional baseball player making millions of dollars can drop a routine fly ball.

it's the same thing with fighting games. your controller has to be socd compliant

It’s actually less sophisticated - it’s merely the choice of what key input is reported when two keys are physically in the down position, simultaneously.

“Report last key that was activated” means that rapidly switching/alternating between, say, A and D to switch movement directions is a matter of just pressing the next key instead of coordinating the lifting of the other key.

AFAIK this has existed as an autohotkey script for a long time, but it’s so simple a legitimate hardware implementation detail can be another vector, and wouldn’t fit in the “unauthorized software” definition of cheating so needed a separate callout.

Essentially the keyboards have software that will allow the user to override keypresses at inhuman speeds. This allows users to switch left/right direction extremely fast, which is very relevant in CS2 due to peeking mechanics.

Specifically, if I'm holding A (moving right) then I press D (move left), in most games in I would stop since I now have both keys down. These keyboards automatically raise the A key even if you're still holding it, allowing an immediate swap of momentum.

Not really, and valve has also banned these at the macro level.

They just allow you to set them up such that when you start strafing (ie moving) in an opposite direction by pushing an opposing key (ie you're holding down "move right" -> "d", but now start holding down "move left" -> "a") that there is no overlap between the "d" and "a" being held down, as some games (CS) punish having both down at the same time. Valves idea is that minimising the time gap as you switch directions, while never having the two keys overlap as pressed, is an important learned skill that novices should not be able to do as cleanly as pros, and have said that keyboards that support this seamless transition will be banned.

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