Setting Up Controls
In addition to keyboard & mouse, Daggerfall Unity supports most game controllers without the need for any external tools. Following are steps to help you configure your preferred control scheme.
On launcher screen check the Enable Controller option. This is enabled by default, and can be disabled if you don't plan to a controller or you want to disable controller input.
If you plan to play with a controller, you should enable click attacks. On launcher set the Weapon Swing Mode to Click or Hold as shown below.
To quickly summarise each mode:
- Vanilla - this is the standard Daggerfall gesture attack mode where you must hold down the right-mouse button (attack binding) and drag the mouse in some direction to initiate an attack.
- Click - every click of the attack button will trigger a random attack.
- Hold - hold down the attack button to repeatedly trigger a random attack.
Start a game and press the Escape key to open pause menu. Then click Controls button.
This will open the standard Controls UI where you can bind keyboard, mouse, and controller actions. Note the Primary button outlined at top-right. This button can be used to switch between Primary and Secondary control bindings.
The recommended setup is to configure keyboard & mouse on Primary and game controllers on Secondary
To bind a key/button to an action, check you have the correct Primary or Secondary selected at top-right, then click box next any to action name. The current action will be cleared and start waiting for a new binding. Now press the key/button you want to bind to that action. If all goes well, this will become the new binding for that action.
Note that Daggerfall Unity supports combo bindings. This means for example you can bind an action to a key combo like Ctrl+A or a controller combo like LeftTrigger+X. This is very useful as Daggerfall has a great many actions to configure.
Repeat process for all controls you want to change. If your binding is displayed in red this means you have a binding conflict that must be resolved before your control scheme can be accepted.
Once you've setup your basic bindings, there's a few more stashed away on the Advanced Controls UI. Click the Advanced button on the Controls UI to open the following screen.
Here you can setup additional bindings unique to Daggerfall Unity, such as autorun, quick save and load, and screenshots. Note this also will follow the Primary or Secondary setting on main Controls UI.
Tip: It's recommended not to rebind/clear Escape binding on Primary, as this can make it difficult to return back to settings.
Following are the suggested bindings for a game controller. As mentioned above, these are best configured as Secondary bindings.
- Cast Spell: B
- Recast Spell: LT + A
- Use Magic Item: LT + B
- Ready Weapon: X
- Swing Weapon: RT
- Switch Hand: R2
- Status: D-Down
- Character Sheet: D-Up
- Inventory: LT + Y
- Jump: Y
- Crouch: L3
- Autorun (Advanced Controls Window): L2
- Run: LT + L2
- Rest: Select
- Transport: R3
- Steal Mode: LT + D-Down
- Grab Mode: LT + D-Up
- Info Mode: LT + D-Left
- Talk Mode: LT + D-Right
- Activate: A
- Sneak: LT + L3
- Logbook: LT + R2
- Notebook: LT + X
- Automap: D-Left
- Travel map: D-Right
- Pause (Advanced Controls Window): Start
- QuickSave (Advanced Controls Window): LT + Start
- QuickLoad (Advanced Controls Window): LT + Select
Sometimes things don't go to plan. Here are some solutions to common problems when setting up bindings in Daggerfall Unity.
If a binding is displayed in red like below, this means the binding has a conflict. Note that two actions are both bound to F in below screen.
Conflicts can happen across Primary and Secondary controls, and in Advanced Controls, so you might need to check all these locations if conflict is not obvious.
To resolve conflicts, rebind one of the conflicting keys to something different that is not already bound.
Sometimes you just want to clear a binding, for example you want to clear a Secondary binding so it no longer conflicts with a Primary binding.
To clear the binding for an action, right-click the current binding and confirm when prompted.
Sometimes it's easier just to reset things back to defaults and start again. To do this click the Default button and confirm when prompted.
If you get completely stuck and your keys aren't working at all, or you've accidentally cleared the bindings for Escape to reach menus, you can delete the KeyBinds.txt file in your persistent data path.
The persistent data path is where your saves, logs, and settings are stored independently of your Daggerfall Unity install. The location of this folder varies by platform. The following link should help you locate it.
https://forums.dfworkshop.net/viewtopic.php?p=27552#p27552
Once you've found KeyBinds.txt, delete it and restart Daggerfall Unity. A clean new KeyBinds.txt file will be created on next start. You can also keep a backup of the file if you want.
First make sure you have your weapon unsheathed. This is the Ready Weapon action binding in the Controls UI screenshots above. By default this is the Z key.
When your weapon is ready to attack, it will be visible like in the screenshot below. If you have Click or Hold attacks enabled, all you need to do now is click or hold the attack button to trigger attacks.
If you prefer to use classic gesture attacks (click and drag mouse) and have trouble initiating, you might need to decrease mouse movement threshold for weapon gestures. On the launcher click Advanced > Gameplay to access the following screen. Then click the number to right of WeaponAttackThreshold and type in a lower value. The minimum is 0.001, and the default is 0.005.
Note that too low of threshold value will make it more likely that the wrong gesture will be triggered. For example, if you are dragging mouse forwards to trigger a thrust attack, any slight diagonal movement might trigger a slash attack instead. Adjust the WeaponAttackThreshold in small increments up and down until you find the right balance.
If you find gesture attacks to be no fun, try setting Weapon Swing Mode to Click or Hold from launcher as shown in Step 1a above.
This isn't technically a problem related to controls, but still worth covering quickly for new players. If you find that you can't hit anything with your attacks, here are some general tips that might help.
- Centre crosshair on enemy at close range: Make sure your crosshair is centred on enemy and you are within range for melee attacks.
- Daggerfall attacks are based on dice rolls: Every time you attack an enemy, a random dice roll happens in the background to determine if you hit or miss. Every attack has a chance to miss and get blocked by enemy.
- Use the right weapon for your skills: When creating a character, your class should have a weapon skill in at least one type of melee weapon. Be sure to use the right weapon for your skills. If your class is skilled in Blunt weapons, they probably won't hit very often with Long Blade weapons.
- Weapon material contributes the most to hit: When rolling dice to hit, Daggerfall factors in several different variables to the hit formula. The variable which contributes most to hit is weapon material. Iron weapons have a penalty to hit and higher material grades give bonuses. Tip: When answering background questions during character creation, keep an eye out for the fabled Ebony Dagger and always take this when offered. Even if you aren't skilled in Short Blade weapons, the Ebony hit and damage bonuses will make starting out much easier.
- Some monsters require higher grade weapon materials to hit. Some enemies, like the imp in starting dungeon, require Silver or even higher grades of weapon materials to hit. A message will be output to HUD when your weapon is ineffective. If you don't have a weapon of the appropriate material or better, consider running away. Tip: Hand-to-hand attacks can hit all monsters, even those requiring higher materials.
Daggerfall can be a challenging game for new players. Search out some information to help get started, like the Daggerfall Unity Bible on UESP below.
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Daggerfall_Mod:Daggerfall_Unity/Bible
If you're still stuck, try reaching out to the wider community on the Lysandus' Tomb Discord or Daggerfall Workshop Forums.