I was wondering if it was a normal problem for the shift key to not work in Brood War 100% or the time, or if this is just me having a terrible keyboard. I've never had any problems with it outside of playing Starcraft, but around 80% of the time I'm holding shift to add units to a control group or select additional units the shift doesn't respond and I just end up selecting the other units.

Lightwip

United States5497 Posts

June 27 2010 17:19 GMT

You use the ctrl key for units, the shift key for map hotkeys.

Najda

United States3765 Posts

June 27 2010 17:23 GMT

You can also use the shift key to add units to a pre-existing hotkey. The issue isn't that it doesn't work, it's that it doesn't work consistantly.

Lightwip

United States5497 Posts

June 27 2010 17:24 GMT

Does your shift key always work outside of SC?
Because hotkeying works fine for me.

Guilty

Canada812 Posts

June 27 2010 17:26 GMT

Well....shift should work all the time, I dont know why it would only work sometimes, nor have i heard of this happening to other people. Does shift work consistently outside of SC?

Never heard of this happening, lol.

Taekwon

United States8155 Posts

June 27 2010 17:31 GMT

Shift doesn't work at times for me, but I always assume that it's a problem of me not pressing hard enough rather than a universal problem of the game lol

Plexa

Aotearoa39261 Posts

June 27 2010 17:31 GMT

I think there is a bit of a delay in using shift? My muscle memory tells me to go shift+1+1+1+1 now and that usually avoids any issues for me.

SilentCrono

United States1420 Posts

June 27 2010 17:32 GMT

that happens sometimes to my girlfriend when she's playing on her windows 7 laptop. if you're using w7, just kill explorer.exe while playing. it worked for her.

disco

Netherlands1667 Posts

June 27 2010 17:40 GMT

It's doesn't always show the units in the group right away, but they're there.

tuukster

Finland114 Posts

June 27 2010 18:31 GMT

#10

I also noticed, that the units didn't seem to go to the control groups, when I press e.g. Shift+1, but just like disco said, it actually does work. It just doesn't appear that way immediately after.
I usually just click something else and then doubletap 1, to check that the units really got hotkeyed to the control group.

Thrill

2599 Posts

June 27 2010 18:36 GMT

#11

I do hope you have disabled the "sticky keys" function?

GenesisX

Canada4267 Posts

June 27 2010 18:55 GMT

#12

I usually do shift+(hotkeyx3) so that I know it works, then recall the hotkey once or twice. It works

Deleted User 55994

949 Posts

June 27 2010 19:54 GMT

#13

your problem might be that you can't use shift to replace a control group, only add to it, so if you have too many units shift selected, none of them will be added to the group

lyAsakura

United States1414 Posts

June 27 2010 19:57 GMT

#14

Are you guys saying that if you had 4 units selected and pressed shift-1 which had 8 units, you could add units into a group like that?

Never knew that...

Cow

Canada1104 Posts

June 27 2010 20:10 GMT

#15

^- I've been playing Starcraft for as long as I can remember, and it took me a while to find out too!

Shift should be working 100% of the time. If you're certain that you're pressing down on it hard enough, then I'm not quite sure what the problem would be. The only time I've had a similar problem is when I discover my pinky decided to be a jerk and press the Ctrl key instead.

dhe95

United States1213 Posts

June 27 2010 20:26 GMT

#16

if you use shift to add units to a group make sure that group has enough room, otherwise it won't work

then after you do shift-# you have to let go of both buttons then press the hotkey again in order to see the new group

Epithet

United States840 Posts

June 27 2010 21:15 GMT

#17

On June 28 2010 05:10 Cow wrote:
^- I've been playing Starcraft for as long as I can remember, and it took me a while to find out too!

Shift should be working 100% of the time. If you're certain that you're pressing down on it hard enough, then I'm not quite sure what the problem would be. The only time I've had a similar problem is when I discover my pinky decided to be a jerk and press the Ctrl key instead.

They added that shift key feature in a patch, I forgot which one. ]
And ya, I've had this problem too. I usually do shift+1 multiple times and double check by pressing 1 to make sure the units are added to the group.

Servius_Fulvius

United States947 Posts

June 27 2010 21:40 GMT

#18

If I'm adding units to the first control group I'll press shift-1, hit 1, then hit 1 again. Almost all the time they add. It might have something to do with keyboard response time.

nicoc77

Argentina57 Posts

June 27 2010 21:51 GMT

#19

some ps/2 keyboards only support 2-3 keystrokes at the same time. maybe you are pressing shift+control+anynumber and you keyboard only get the control+number command. this not happen with usb keyboard. sorry about my english.

Grobyc

Canada18410 Posts

June 27 2010 22:02 GMT

#20

On June 28 2010 02:31 Plexa wrote:
I think there is a bit of a delay in using shift? My muscle memory tells me to go shift+1+1+1+1 now and that usually avoids any issues for me.

Same. I notice that sometimes it doesn't work properly when I do it too quickly. I think it's the same way for everyone.