Disabled guy needs mod help

Gimpygod · 05-05-09, 09:24 AM

I am a disabled guy (rare form of muscular dystrophy so I have sensation throughout my body but effectively quadriplegic due to lack of musculature) who just found world of war craft on March 10, 2009... my life is changed forever. I've never been able to walk or even scratch my nose yet inside this world I can go anywhere and actually explore. I have loads of fun just walking and looking around, fishing, cooking; the minutia is entertaining to me. (if you want to check that I'm not just pulling your leg I was part of the "everyone has a story" series on the today show in October and featured again in December)

The way I have to play is rather unique in that I have a mouse which controls cursor movement via a camera monitoring my head movement. Meaning if I turn my head to the left the cursor moves left at the corresponding speed. I can only access left and right mouse click buttons which are placed under my thumbs -- left click left hand, right-click right-hand. While I can do many things with this arrangement some fundamentals are currently out of my reach and I wonder if anyone here would know of an add-on which could help or might consider developing some of my ideas so others with disabilities could more easily partake of the joy. Heck, some of my ideas would actually improve the game for many. Stuff I need:

1.) Probably the easiest but unavailable within the game would be the ability to move the shift key somewhere I can get at it. I call this the "looky" button because I tell my nephew, "hey, hold the looky button so I can see what this is worth at auction." I could move the jump button over to the numerical keypad so I can access it by poking with a stick in my mouth. (an altogether different problem because when I move my head to jump the cursor moves making me run in a different direction... drag). Forgot to mention that I have the keyboard in front of me but turned 90° so I can access the numbers and other keys clustered right there with a mouth stick. If I could move shift-key over to the*or - I can do a lot more by myself or at least not have to scroll through 20 pages to see what bronze bars are currently valued at.

2.) Chatting with people would be awesome! Currently I have an action bar full of macros so I can relate to people that I'm unable to type but can do voice if we are in a party. If there was a pop up keyboard that allowed me to type by clicking with the mouse that would be awesome... if it looked somewhat medieval that would be nice so the overall ambience wasn't ruined.

3.) Currently I am only able to run straight forward and turn by holding both the left and right click in simultaneously and jumping is unbelievably difficult, takes a lot of time and only useful to get over stationary objects. Meaning I am being completely crushed at battlegrounds and other player versus player material. Here are some of my ideas to increase mobility:

Right now I'm holding the left click to look around and then press right simultaneously to begin moving. Would it be possible to hold right click and then press left to move backwards? If that doesn't make any sense please say so and I will try to be more specific.

If there was a little circle at the bottom right hand side of the screen that worked as a proportional joystick that would be unbelievably awesome. If you could just left click in the circle and hold then move the cursor around for up, backward, left, and right that would be unbelievably cool. In this scenario the right-click could be then used to jump. Again, I'm not sure how much sense this makes that I could clarify if necessary.

I have more ideas but this first message has gotten ponderous so I will cut it short and say thank you for reading, hope someone can help and most of all enjoy your World of War Craft adventures.

Sekrin · 05-05-09, 09:41 AM

I'm not sure if it still works or not and I'm not sure if it'll be of any use to you, but perhaps you'd like to try MovePad?

Gimpygod · 05-05-09, 09:58 AM

Originally Posted by Sekrin

I'm not sure if it still works or not and I'm not sure if it'll be of any use to you, but perhaps you'd like to try MovePad?

Thank you so much for the quick reply! This is definitely on the right track of what I'm looking for in the area of movement (although I can't get it to work at all) but the idea is definitely the right direction. If it had eight directions -- diagonals -- that could be accessed by holding left click and then have jump accessible by right clicking, I would be able to run and jump over stuff and maybe even avoid getting shot in the face 70 Bazilion times in the war zones. Can only access gulch and basin currently because my highest level is 49. Any ideas on how to move the shift key around or maybe even just have a right click Looky button?

Again, thank you for being so cool.

Kallieen · 05-05-09, 10:32 AM

If you run Windows, there are some programs you can use to remap your keyboard - the only one I was able to find easily is 'KeyExtender' (http://www.remapkey.com/index.html) which has a 30 day trial, then requires a purchase. Maybe someone else knows of a free one, but I thought I'd toss that up just in case. Hope it helps!

p3lim · 05-05-09, 10:35 AM

If you are using Windows you can use the on-screen-keyboard they have to solve issue number two.
Looks like ****, but it does the job

Also, for the re-anchoring of keys you should get SharpKeys (by RandyRants).
It lets you do the registery-hacking of key mapping much easier.
(I use it myself to reanchor many buttons (mac keyboard on windows), set functions to keys and disabling the caps lock button completely (DIE!)
More info and download: http://www.randyrants.com/sharpkeys/

RandyRants also has more neat tools that might help you.

Good luck

**Seerah** · 05-05-09, 11:29 AM

Hello, Gimpygod. Welcome to WoW, and welcome to WoWInterface.

I thought of some addons that may be able to help you (I'm not sure which you are using, if any, currently.)

Auctionator: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...ctionator.html

No need to shift-click or type the name of an item to search for it in the auction house. Go to the "Sell" tab which this addon adds to the auction house, drag your item to the box, and it will be automagically searched for. Results are displayed on the same tab. If you see something in those results that you would like to buy, you can select it and click the "buy" button.
Use the new "buy" tab to save a list of items to search for. The name will only need typed in once, and you can save it. From then on, select the item from the list and click "search" (or it might automatically search for you - I forget). Select from the results what you would like to buy. --OR-- you can use this tab to keep track of price history for items.
View auction price history and vendor prices in tooltips with this addon as well, while you're away from the auction house.

OPie: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...9094-OPie.html

Might require some setup, depending on how much you would like it to cover, but could be well worth it.
Use this addon to combine many actions into one keypress. Add actions to a ring (some are already created by default), bing the ring to a key, hold the key down with your stick and move your head (mouse) to select an action from the ring. Release the button to select the action. (edit: thinking about this again, I'm not sure how well it would work, since you would need to hold the key down while you move your head... But give it a try. )

tekKompare: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...ekKompare.html

View the compare tooltips for gear items without having to hold down the shift key.

Combuctor: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...Combuctor.html

All-in-one inventory so that you only need click once to view all of your bags' items.
Also has the ability to sort by item quality (click on a colored circle) or item category (click on the tabs along the right). There is also a text search that works with partial words/names and searches automatically as you type.
Comes with other plugins to allow you to view your bank (or your alt's bank/inventory) from anywhere in the world, and adds this information to an item's tooltip. (ex. - Mageweave you: 17 bag, 20 bank bankalt: 40 bank)

Quick Emote: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...uickEmote.html

Categorizes the standard emote menu (the button on the chat frame).
Displays whether they are animated or have voice clips, also displays the text of the emote.

CustomEmotes: http://www.wowinterface.com/download...tomEmotes.html

Some more humorous custom emotes and pull warnings, taken from movies, etc.
Accessible through a button menu on-screen.

Dridzt · 05-05-09, 11:37 AM

Would the default option "Click to Move" make things any easier?

This works in such a way that you right-click the environment and
this sets a "waypoint" that your char will try to run to next.

This is found in the default game options it is not an addon.

**Seerah** · 05-05-09, 11:43 AM

Oh yeah - forgot to mention that.

Not sure how well it would work for pvp purposes (as I don't use click to move myself), but also worth a try.

shkm · 05-06-09, 01:36 AM

I tried to understand exactly what kind of access you have, but may have failed somewhere along the lines. I'm probably a little ignorant, so keep that in mind with this post.

Perhaps you could invest in a more convenient, disability-oriented keyboard for convenience? X-keys have a number of interesting and potentially useful products.

On the subject of keyboards, the program AutoHotkey is excellent for mapping just about any key to just about any action. The program is a little controversial under gaming because it's very versatile and could lead to some questionable actions, hence why I haven't linked it. Either way, I'd imagine it could be very useful to you.

Definitely check out OPie, it was the first addon that came to mind, and Seerah already mentioned it above. It should make things much easier for you on the whole, giving you access to many more actions.

Perhaps this is obvious, but there seem to be a few bindings that you could simply do with the default binding interface. For example, have you tried binding something to autorun?

As for chat, have you tried voice recognition? I'm not sure how this would work with a speech synthesiser, or if there's any PC-based solution regarding that, but you didn't mention anything about speech.

All in all, I hope you find something to make your gameplay experience easier. I think it's wonderful that you're getting so much enjoyment out of the game, and clearly you're putting in a lot of effort into getting around WoW!

***Cairenn*** · 05-06-09, 01:51 AM

Hi Gimpygod, welcome to the site! As you've already seen, we've got a really good community of people here who are more than happy to try and help, make suggestions, etc. We've also got a number of users who are also disabled in many different ways and to varying degrees. I have no doubt that they'll be able to come up with stuff that will make your gaming easier.

For my part, I'll poke Slouken and point him to this thread, see if I can't get him to update MovePad.

tsadok · 05-06-09, 02:46 AM

Welcome to Warcraft and the forums. I think it's fantastic that what I think of as an idle amusement can give new experiences to people who can't do things most of us take for granted.

If you can demonstrate that WoW has been such a great experience for you, perhaps you could contact your local MD association or another disability organisation and get them to "commission" some UI features that squeeze the maximum utility from however many inputs are available. It would then be available for you and anyone who wanted it.

I have mild cystic fibrosis, and the local CF association is always looking for ways to improve the lives of CF sufferers. Being another relatively common disease, I imagine MD associations are generally well-funded.