Here is a short practical guide on how to prevent yourself from getting RSI or CTS when playing Starcraft 2.
Mouse Sensitivity A lot of people seem to think that having a very high mouse sensitivity will make you play faster and better. This may be true but in the long term, having a high sensitivty requires a lot of strain on your wrists to maintain accurate control.
As a point of reference, when you move your mouse pointer from one side of the screen to the other, if your mouse moves less than a centimeter I can guarantee you will get RSI if you play at that sensitivity for long periods of time.
Doing other movements It's important that if you have been doing the same motions for hours, its important that you do other motions with your wrists. It may be during downtime or in between games or a combination of both. Stretching, playing guitar or sleeping are great activities to change up your wrist's movement schedule's.
Mouse Positioning A lot of people like to put there wrist on the edge of the table to get a good pivot point to control the mouse. It's a lot better for your wrist if you lay your arm on the table and spread your keyboard and mouse apart to maintain control. It will feel weird playing like this but it will be invaluable in the long run.
Hardware Obviously you want a mouse that suits your hand well. You must make sure that it is not too heavy like a stupid Microsoft gaming mouse though. It can be a good idea to have just a small amount of mouse acceleration so that you don't strain your hand too much when trying to make very small movements.
Simple stretches: Make your arm strait and then pull your wrist back .
Reach behind and grab your thumb and then pull it back. pull your wrist back as well
Do the same stretch but in reverse. So instead of reaching around, flip your hand towards your thumb and then pull your thumb with your other hand
Extra Things like hand warmers, are ok in the short term, but if you are getting carpal tunnel, they are not going to solve your issues. Although nice to have you need to find other solutions
As soon as you feel your wrists are getting sore, start stretching them strait away, even if you are in the middle of a game.
hey, i am a master level terran player who was once at the top of my master league playing about 5 hours a day, watching replays for 1 hour, and watching streams/tournaments for 1 hour. basically i was spending a ton of time. when i got a 2 week break during college i bumped my play up to 9-10 hours a day to get into the top rankings of us ladder(sidenote: i was eating fast food, candy, drinking alot of soda everyday, and i wasn't excersising at all). i was playing in a ton of tournaments and all of a sudden my forearms began to tighten up mainly in the extensor area and my wrist began to ache in pain. aching in the hands soon followed. i played with my wrist at the edge of the table with a small mouse called the razer orochi at 2000 dpi. i know i tense up alot when playing. i remember having this pain one time during beta but i took a 3 week break and it went away. this time this pain was constant all day everyday for 6 months. and here i am 6 months later with the same pain. i have been to doctors and they say its rsi. no carpell or tendonitis. just little soft tissue damage and rsi. so i took a month off and did physical therapy and nothing worked. it got a little better and i went back to play and made it worse. how long does it take for this to heal? and what am i going to have to do.. its extremely irritating. i may have to take a full month off from all computer use and start strengthening my arm/wrist/finger muscles. does anyone have experience with this? how do i get back to 100%?
i know tlo has had my same problem for a year now and from what ive read its all cleared up now.
I've played video games sense I was 5 years old and I've never had an issue with any wrist injuries and I've not been doing any of the things you suggest. I highly believe wrist injuries are mainly due to a mental fear in people. (To be clear I played Quake 3 at 5 years old, my dad was into it and wanted me to play next to him ^_^ so the games I played were somewhat strenuous even tho I never played at a pro level 10 hrs a day on Quake 3 I eventually got into Unreal and Starcraft and now Starcraft 2 where I play atleast 4 hrs a day and most days playing 10-14 hours a day.)
I think the biggest thing is stretching, Just before/after ladder matches stretch and if your wrists are "feeling" weird for a extended period of time go to a doctor and ask and you won't have any issues.
Also I'm certain this thread has come up before. The big things are just stretch and ask a doctor if you feel pain for extend time even while stretching before/after games (like for a week or so)
Day9 talked about carpal tunnel in one of his dailies and showed a couple of stretches you can do. I take ~5 minutes every night before I go to bed to stretch my wrists, shoulders, etc.
Any sport is bad if you overdo it badly. The problem with gaming though is that there is no physical fatigue that prevents you from continuing training, hence player tend to overdo it much much more often.
Beware if following the above information. Always check a real ergonomics guide or wrist specialist. Please check google and find real ergonomic guides/informatin from a reliable source
His advice on placing the entire arm on the desk is completely wrong.
I don't know if it helps carpal tunnel specifically but I play with a wrist band now and my wrist doesn't hurt anymore. The problem wasn't because of my mouse movement, but just the fact that my wrist was on a hard surface for 9+ hours a day.
On August 01 2011 00:58 untilMay wrote: I've played video games sense I was 5 years old and I've never had an issue with any wrist injuries and I've not been doing any of the things you suggest. I highly believe wrist injuries are mainly due to a mental fear in people. (To be clear I played Quake 3 at 5 years old, my dad was into it and wanted me to play next to him ^_^ so the games I played were somewhat strenuous even tho I never played at a pro level 10 hrs a day on Quake 3 I eventually got into Unreal and Starcraft and now Starcraft 2 where I play atleast 4 hrs a day and most days playing 10-14 hours a day.)
I played games for 20 years to with no problems until suddenly out of the blue I got problems. It has nothing to do with mental fear. I don't kno wwhy you think it does.
Anyway, Imostly stopped using the computer for about a month and did some stretching exercises fairly regularly (many times a day) like putting my arms out straight then pulling the wrists back as much as you can for 10-15 secs, then pulling them down for 10-15s a couple of times, and also just stretching out my fingers and then clenching my fist. I don't have any problems atm so it seems to have worked.
I mostly had pain in my fingers and forearm, not wrists though.
On August 01 2011 00:58 untilMay wrote: I've played video games sense I was 5 years old and I've never had an issue with any wrist injuries and I've not been doing any of the things you suggest. I highly believe wrist injuries are mainly due to a mental fear in people. (To be clear I played Quake 3 at 5 years old, my dad was into it and wanted me to play next to him ^_^ so the games I played were somewhat strenuous even tho I never played at a pro level 10 hrs a day on Quake 3 I eventually got into Unreal and Starcraft and now Starcraft 2 where I play atleast 4 hrs a day and most days playing 10-14 hours a day.)
I think the biggest thing is stretching, Just before/after ladder matches stretch and if your wrists are "feeling" weird for a extended period of time go to a doctor and ask and you won't have any issues.
Also I'm certain this thread has come up before. The big things are just stretch and ask a doctor if you feel pain for extend time even while stretching before/after games (like for a week or so)
RSI is a real problem for people who sit at the computer alot. Trying to just blame it on "mental fear", whatever that means isn't productive.
If you played Quake 3 at 5 years old you can't be more than 20. RSI doesn't show until you're older and just cause you don't have problems now doesn't mean it wont catch up to you in the future. I've played videogames all my life (i'm 27) and had no problem whatsoever until like a year ago. Now i can't play at all and it sucks.
On August 01 2011 00:15 opiemonster wrote: Here is a short practical guide on how to prevent yourself from getting RSI or CTS when playing Starcraft 2.
Mouse Sensitivity A lot of people seem to think that having a very high mouse sensitivity will make you play faster and better. This may be true but in the long term, having a high sensitivty requires a lot of strain on your wrists to maintain accurate control.
As a point of reference, when you move your mouse pointer from one side of the screen to the other, if your mouse moves less than a centimeter I can guarantee you will get RSI if you play at that sensitivity for long periods of time.
Doing other movements It's important that if you have been doing the same motions for hours, its important that you do other motions with your wrists. It may be during downtime or in between games or a combination of both. Stretching, playing guitar or sleeping are great activities to change up your wrist's movement schedule's.
Mouse Positioning A lot of people like to put there wrist on the edge of the table to get a good pivot point to control the mouse. It's a lot better for your wrist if you lay your arm on the table and spread your keyboard and mouse apart to maintain control. It will feel weird playing like this but it will be invaluable in the long run.
Hardware Obviously you want a mouse that suits your hand well. You must make sure that it is not too heavy like a stupid Microsoft gaming mouse though. It can be a good idea to have just a small amount of mouse acceleration so that you don't strain your hand too much when trying to make very small movements.
Simple stretches: Make your arm strait and then pull your wrist back .
Reach behind and grab your thumb and then pull it back. pull your wrist back as well
Do the same stretch but in reverse. So instead of reaching around, flip your hand towards your thumb and then pull your thumb with your other hand
Extra Things like hand warmers, are ok in the short term, but if you are getting carpal tunnel, they are not going to solve your issues. Although nice to have you need to find other solutions
As soon as you feel your wrists are getting sore, start stretching them strait away, even if you are in the middle of a game.
to add to stretches...
squeeze pinky and thumb together (mouse hand), then extend out again, repeat.
Also keep in mind that many get it in their "keyboard" hand. So focusing on easing the problem for only one hand is not going to make the problem go away.
On August 01 2011 01:06 dacthehork wrote: His advice on placing the entire arm on the desk is completely wrong.
I just want to echo this. After learning to play with my wrist resting on the edge of the table, I've felt that my arm has been feeling a lot better. It used to be kinda sore after long sessions.
On August 01 2011 01:06 dacthehork wrote: His advice on placing the entire arm on the desk is completely wrong.
I just want to echo this. After learning to play with my wrist resting on the edge of the table, I've felt that my arm has been feeling a lot better. It used to be kinda sore after long sessions.
Plus my mouse accuracy got a lot better.
i have really bad pain for along time now. i posted my story on first post of this thread. so what is it that you learned about resting the wrist on the edge of the table?
yeah the main ergonomic problems are due to wrong arm angles. Having an adjustable chair will really help in finding the correct angle. I would say 80% of desks/chairs are at the wrong level and will cause wrist problems especially with a game like sc2. Really use ergonomic guides and information and get the correct angles/placements.
It's actually pretty simple to get an idea for ergonomics. Just air type with different elbow and wrist angles. Anytime you air type with a wrist angle other than flat you will note less comfort and morre weird feelings.
the whole point is to be in a neutral and unstained position as possible (flat wrist angle) and not hunched over. This is basically elbow at 90 degrees and wrist angle flat. Which really requires exact height adjustments (usually on the chair).Basically as long as you are in good angles / neutral state you should be well off. Arm rests are okay if you have them and they are adjustable so you can get correct angles.
Also it depends on each person if they get problems and how serious.
Man I've been to RSI land and back just recently. Basically had to stop playing all together for about two months, and was really careful at work from that point on.
Try to be extremely mindful of your posture while at the computer for long periods of time, and be especially careful not to be making all of your mouse movements from the wrist. It's very uncomfortable, and feels like you're lacking a bit of control at first, but moving the mouse with your whole arm is much better.
The other thing that really, really got me, was hunching my shoulders in front of the computer. Especially while playing SC2. It's hard to notice when you're in the heat of a game, that suddenly you're pushing your shoulders way forward and hunching your back. Bad, very bad.
Be mindful of how you move your mouse, and your posture. You should be good to go, and be on the road to healthy in no time with a decent break from computers if possible.
I should also point out that the chair you are using is an important factor as well! If your chair is busted, or just a piece of crap... toss it! Get a new one. Part of the reason my posture went haywire at work was because my chair was broken, and I had no back support. I also had a shitty chair at home, so I didn't even notice. One day the cleaning crew came in and ended up switching all the chairs around and I got a new one. That was amazing, and I haven't had troubles since.
I play at 3400x3700 dpi, which I consider to be fairly high. I found that I had a lot of strain on all my hand and wrist muscles because I was used to making much larger motions and I had to tense up my hand a lot to make such fine motions at a fast speed.
As I trained more, however, I learned to use my fingers more to move the mouse, and make as little use of my wrist as possible. Now I use a combination of wrist and finger motions to control the mouse, which causes a lot less stress because it simply isn't possible to make the fingers move the mouse as far, so I don't need to strain my hand to get it to stop moving.
So if you raise the sensitivity but continue to rely on your wrist (which is for course motions), you will obviously strain your hand. Raising the sensitivity allows you to control the mouse with your fingers (which are for fine motions), which causes less strain to the wrist by dividing the strain between more muscles. Just raising the sensitivity without changing how you use the mouse is pointless.
On August 01 2011 01:09 SentinelSC2 wrote: I don't know if it helps carpal tunnel specifically but I play with a wrist band now and my wrist doesn't hurt anymore. The problem wasn't because of my mouse movement, but just the fact that my wrist was on a hard surface for 9+ hours a day.
I do the same thing. I mean, CTS is caused by basically a collapse of the bone around the carpal tunnel (which is that little nub at the base of our palm that we all love to use as a pivot), so it makes sense that if we cushion that point in some way, it'd reduce the risk of getting it.
To clarify, when you put your wrist on the edge you tend to tense up a lot more than when you just put your whole arm on the table
you should still keep your wrist as your pivot point on the table to maintain accuracy. It's so much easier to relax when you have your arm on the table
Just try switching from wrist on the edge to arm on the table and see how it can be so much more relaxing. Feel the stress in the top part of your wrist when you lean on the edge.
On August 01 2011 02:18 philipov wrote: I play at 3400x3700 dpi, which I consider to be fairly high. I found that I had a lot of strain on all my hand and wrist muscles because I was used to making much larger motions and I had to tense up my hand a lot to make such fine motions at a fast speed.
As I trained more, however, I learned to use my fingers more to move the mouse, and make as little use of my wrist as possible. Now I use a combination of wrist and finger motions to control the mouse, which causes a lot less stress because it simply isn't possible to make the fingers move the mouse as far, so I don't need to strain my hand to get it to stop moving.
So if you raise the sensitivity but continue to rely on your wrist (which is for course motions), you will obviously strain your hand. Raising the sensitivity allows you to control the mouse with your fingers (which are for fine motions), which causes less strain to the wrist by dividing the strain between more muscles. Just raising the sensitivity without changing how you use the mouse is pointless.
Try this
Try moving your mouse a very tiny little bit up and down
then try moving your mouse about a centimeter
notice the chance in stress.
Obviously your wrists are going to get stronger over time, but there is a big limit with how your muscles grow and how your body is strained.
On August 01 2011 02:33 opiemonster wrote: Try this
Try moving your mouse a very tiny little bit up and down
then try moving your mouse about a centimeter
notice the chance in stress.
Obviously your wrists are going to get stronger over time, but there is a big limit with how your muscles grow and how your body is strained.
well, when I move the mouse up and down only a tiny bit, I do it by just making a slightly motion with my thumb and not moving the rest of my fingers or wrist at all. When I move more, I have to use all my fingers, but my wrist still doesn't move. When I move the mouse left or right, I can do this either by translating the mouse with my wrist, normally, or by rotating the mouse with my fingers. As I get more comfortable using the mouse entirely with my fingers, and as my fingers get stronger and more precise, I don't have to strain my hand as much.
Strain is caused by compensating for imprecision by tensing all your muscles up so they can't move as much. You need to deleverage your motions so you can make finer ones. Instead of doing this by tensing up my wrist and hand muscles, I attempt to do it by replacing my wrist muscles with my finger muscles, and then learning to use both together. This reduces the strain by distributing it among more muscles.
As for your last point, if I'm understanding you correctly, this is the foundation of my plan. I feel that wrist injuries are the result of not exercising your hand/wrist/arm enough and pushing yourself past your limits. I don't think enough players do specific exercises to improve muscle strength, nor give their arms enough rest to let the muscles heal themselves between exercise.
If you raise your mouse sensitivity and don't retrain your hand motions to be more precise (by using your fingers) and strengthen your muscles overall, of course it will lead to injury. Simply playing a lot is enough to do that too.
On August 01 2011 00:58 untilMay wrote: I've played video games sense I was 5 years old and I've never had an issue with any wrist injuries and I've not been doing any of the things you suggest. I highly believe wrist injuries are mainly due to a mental fear in people. (To be clear I played Quake 3 at 5 years old, my dad was into it and wanted me to play next to him ^_^ so the games I played were somewhat strenuous even tho I never played at a pro level 10 hrs a day on Quake 3 I eventually got into Unreal and Starcraft and now Starcraft 2 where I play atleast 4 hrs a day and most days playing 10-14 hours a day.)
I played games for 20 years to with no problems until suddenly out of the blue I got problems. It has nothing to do with mental fear. I don't kno wwhy you think it does.
Anyway, Imostly stopped using the computer for about a month and did some stretching exercises fairly regularly (many times a day) like putting my arms out straight then pulling the wrists back as much as you can for 10-15 secs, then pulling them down for 10-15s a couple of times, and also just stretching out my fingers and then clenching my fist. I don't have any problems atm so it seems to have worked.
I mostly had pain in my fingers and forearm, not wrists though.
Yea for sure I understand about RSI but I was talking more CTS. Sorry to hear that and yea you're right I'm 18 so I haven't encountered issues in my wrists due to aging. However i was trying to add by saying stretch a lot and go to the doctor very soon after a max of week long pain in the wrist (or fatigue). I wasn't trying to flame the discussion
sensitivity is an amorphous concept made up of a number of different components that aren't always consistently classified. I define sensitivity as the distance your mouse has to cause your cursor to move a certain number of pixels. The base sensitivity is determined by the dots-per-inch, which is the physical resolution of your mouse's sensor. The sensitivity most people are familiar with is the software multiplier on DPI. 6/11 in windows is the middle setting and means there is no multiplier. If the mouse has 1000 dpi and moves 1 inch, the cursor will move 1000 pixels. If it's set higher, you'll skip pixels which will decrease your precision, so it's always better to increase your sensitivity by raising the DPI of the mouse itself.
As for whether 2100 DPI is too high, that's entirely dependent on the strength and precision of your fingers. I'm comfortable browsing at 3400x3700 dpi (more sensitive horizontal scale to compensate for widescreen.), but it took quite a bit of pain and soreness to get there. The same kind I get when riding a bicycle uphill; it's important to know the difference between that and injury.
I once knew a guy who was very much into isometric exercises and martial arts, and his policy was to train hard 6 days a week, but have 1 day where he simply did no physical labor at all, to let his body regenerate. Muscles grow and become stronger by being torn apart in small ways, and then healing. That's how exercise works. But I think because people aren't used to treating the hands as something you would exercise like you would your arms and legs, they don't give it the same considerations. Injuries naturally result from exercise when you don't give your muscles time to regenerate.
even better, low sensitivity is even better for accuracy and precision, since fore-arm movement is more consistent and precise. (you are not going to feel that right after switching from wrist, but you will)
having played cs1.6 (basically as much as i could, from gr 7 - gr 12) i can guarantee you that fore-arm movement is the way to be pro, as i started out with very high sensitivity when i was a n00b, but later realized all the pros were using whole arm wide movements and big big bigass mousepads...
anyways, i would suggest a big steelpad qck+, and your mouse, from left of screen to right, should move alteast 4-5inches (if not more)
On August 01 2011 03:01 jHERO wrote: even better, low sensitivity is even better for accuracy and precision, since fore-arm movement is more consistent and precise. (you are not going to feel that right after switching from wrist, but you will)
Arm, Wrist, and Fingers, acting in coordination, is what it takes to be a real super mouser.
i really like and agree with the OP's tip on laying your forearms on the table while you're playing; this is 100% invaluable advice. to add to it, there are two ways to aid in forcing yourself to get used to playing like this that i've learned after having played broodwar since 98, sc2 for the last year, and doing software development throughout school and now as a fulltime job.
first, rip the arms off your chair. this will remove the need to support your arms from the elbows while pivoting on your wrists. it actually forced me to move my keyboard into the table more, and now i pivot from my forearms.
also, to help, you shouldn't use the little risers on the back of the keyboard. play with the keyboard flat. this will cause you to curl your fingers more to use the keyboard, which is actually a strategy that's taught to a lot of piano players to avoid issues with carpal tunnel syndrome (from what i've been told) -- the strategy being curling your fingers, not taking risers off keys
since i started doing this stuff, i stopped losing feeling in my pinkies while playing or programming, and i also don't suffer from elbow pain nearly as quickly as i used to when i rest them while driving. you should actually avoid resting them while driving too; that's the next habit i've been working on breaking to avoid CTS :-)
On August 01 2011 00:45 imSOZO wrote: hey, i am a master level terran player who was once at the top of my master league playing about 5 hours a day, watching replays for 1 hour, and watching streams/tournaments for 1 hour. basically i was spending a ton of time. when i got a 2 week break during college i bumped my play up to 9-10 hours a day to get into the top rankings of us ladder(sidenote: i was eating fast food, candy, drinking alot of soda everyday, and i wasn't excersising at all). i was playing in a ton of tournaments and all of a sudden my forearms began to tighten up mainly in the extensor area and my wrist began to ache in pain. aching in the hands soon followed. i played with my wrist at the edge of the table with a small mouse called the razer orochi at 2000 dpi. i know i tense up alot when playing. i remember having this pain one time during beta but i took a 3 week break and it went away. this time this pain was constant all day everyday for 6 months. and here i am 6 months later with the same pain. i have been to doctors and they say its rsi. no carpell or tendonitis. just little soft tissue damage and rsi. so i took a month off and did physical therapy and nothing worked. it got a little better and i went back to play and made it worse. how long does it take for this to heal? and what am i going to have to do.. its extremely irritating. i may have to take a full month off from all computer use and start strengthening my arm/wrist/finger muscles. does anyone have experience with this? how do i get back to 100%?
i know tlo has had my same problem for a year now and from what ive read its all cleared up now.
Did they give you an EMG? I got one and they now they think I have radial tunnel syndrome. I also have pain in my extensor area, but also above my elbow. Wrist pain isn't too bad (although there is some sometimes). I'm going to start physical therapy soon so we'll see how that works out.
Guys, at the end of the day some people have a predisposition to RSI and CTS. Not everyone will get it even if they have bad posture of the wrists while playing. I've been playing RTS games for at least 4 hours a day for like 10 years now and I doubt I've had the right posture most of the time, yet I'm fine.
I use my arm to drag the camera around with middle click, and if I lowered the sensitivity, middle click dragging the screen would be very slow. I'm not sure FPS games make a good comparison to starcraft because of the difference in the range of precision required for each game.
FPS games have much more common use of course motions to turn yourself combined with fine motions to aim your weapon. It seems natural that you would use your arm for the course motions because you're using your wrist to do the fine control. If you set the sensitivity too high, you'll be relying on your fingers alone to do the work of finely aiming the crosshairs. It took me a long time to train my fingers to be as precise as my wrist for controlling the mouse in regular situations.
In comparison, starcraft has a much wider range of precision, but you usually only use one band at a time, and it's not as demanding at the finest end of the spectrum. I use my fingers for very fine control in small areas of the screen, my wrist for moving between different parts of the screen, and my arm for moving the screen across the map very quickly. (It's as good as clicking the minimap in most situations). There are 3 levels of precision instead of just 2, and while you don't really need to use them at the same time, you must be able to switch between them very quickly.
On August 01 2011 03:18 Blizzard_torments_me wrote: Guys, at the end of the day some people have a predisposition to RSI and CTS. Not everyone will get it even if they have bad posture of the wrists while playing. I've been playing RTS games for at least 4 hours a day for like 10 years now and I doubt I've had the right posture most of the time, yet I'm fine.
It does not need to be determined in your gens. I just made a weapon for cosplaying and was sawing for several hours plus filing and sanding. The next day my wrist felt like my hand would weight several kilos and it hurted A LOT. I never had any problems what so ever with my wirst before (played DoD very competitvly, with high dpi/sens as sniper).
Those things can occur just because you played/worked/whateva too much OR can be caused because u are more likely to get such things because of your nature.
Injuries naturally result from exercise when you don't give your muscles time to regenerate.
The best pianists have to spend 10+ hours a day practicing. At high levels, that's 10 hours with a functional "APM" of at least 400. Piano keys take 20-100x more force to press (don't actually know how much), In other words, the amount of strain is probably hundreds of times more than what it requires to play Starcraft, and RSI are big problems with amateurs because of it.
There is ONE thing that professionals need to do to prevent carpal tunnel. it's the only thing that matters; and if you don't do, it, no amount of stretching and other techniques will ward it off. All you need to do is play (piano or Starcraft) with a relaxed body. It's harder than it sounds, but you hardly need to use any muscles at all to move a mouse or keyboard. Just relax - there's no need to perform any action with more effort than is required. Most players tense up in the heat of a game and clench all the muscles in their hands and wrists and shoulders to try to force themselves to go faster. It might feel good in the short term, but it's just going to cause injuries in the long term.
Watching players like TLO, it's completely utterly obvious why he has problems with his wrists. He's ridiculously tense when he plays. On the other hand, watch HuK;s stream and look at his mouse. He's touching it so, so, so lightly that the cursor just seems to flutter about the screen. Anyone have videos that show his mouse hand?
no they never did. 3 doctors i went to kinda sucked. i also have pain above the elbow and inside the elbow above the inner forearm area. what exactly is an emg? i may need to go to a 4th doctor...
On August 01 2011 00:45 imSOZO wrote: hey, i am a master level terran player who was once at the top of my master league playing about 5 hours a day, watching replays for 1 hour, and watching streams/tournaments for 1 hour. basically i was spending a ton of time. when i got a 2 week break during college i bumped my play up to 9-10 hours a day to get into the top rankings of us ladder(sidenote: i was eating fast food, candy, drinking alot of soda everyday, and i wasn't excersising at all). i was playing in a ton of tournaments and all of a sudden my forearms began to tighten up mainly in the extensor area and my wrist began to ache in pain. aching in the hands soon followed. i played with my wrist at the edge of the table with a small mouse called the razer orochi at 2000 dpi. i know i tense up alot when playing. i remember having this pain one time during beta but i took a 3 week break and it went away. this time this pain was constant all day everyday for 6 months. and here i am 6 months later with the same pain. i have been to doctors and they say its rsi. no carpell or tendonitis. just little soft tissue damage and rsi. so i took a month off and did physical therapy and nothing worked. it got a little better and i went back to play and made it worse. how long does it take for this to heal? and what am i going to have to do.. its extremely irritating. i may have to take a full month off from all computer use and start strengthening my arm/wrist/finger muscles. does anyone have experience with this? how do i get back to 100%?
i know tlo has had my same problem for a year now and from what ive read its all cleared up now.
You need to learn how to play without so much tension. Strengthening and rest may help, but the problem won't be fixed until you change the bad habit.
Work on improving your muscle tension awareness, not just in your forearms, but also the rest of your arms, shoulders, etc. Make a habit of noticing when muscles are tense and relaxing them. Learn the feel of relaxed mouse/keyboard use, and make a habit of it.
I'd say take a break from SC for at least a short while to work on that, then ease back into it slowly, making sure you aren't getting tense again.
On August 01 2011 03:37 Musketeer wrote: The best pianists have to spend 10+ hours a day practicing. At high levels, that's 10 hours with a functional "APM" of at least 400. Piano keys take 20-100x more force to press (don't actually know how much), In other words, the amount of strain is probably hundreds of times more than what it requires to play Starcraft, and RSI are big problems with amateurs because of it.
There is ONE thing that professionals need to do to prevent carpal tunnel. it's the only thing that matters; and if you don't do, it, no amount of stretching and other techniques will ward it off. All you need to do is play (piano or Starcraft) with a relaxed body. It's harder than it sounds, but you hardly need to use any muscles at all to move a mouse or keyboard. Just relax - there's no need to perform any action with more effort than is required. Most players tense up in the heat of a game and clench all the muscles in their hands and wrists and shoulders to try to force themselves to go faster. It might feel good in the short term, but it's just going to cause injuries in the long term.
Watching players like TLO, it's completely utterly obvious why he has problems with his wrists. He's ridiculously tense when he plays. On the other hand, watch HuK;s stream and look at his mouse. He's touching it so, so, so lightly that the cursor just seems to flutter about the screen. Anyone have videos that show his mouse hand?
On August 01 2011 03:37 Musketeer wrote: The best pianists have to spend 10+ hours a day practicing. At high levels, that's 10 hours with a functional "APM" of at least 400. Piano keys take 20-100x more force to press (don't actually know how much), In other words, the amount of strain is probably hundreds of times more than what it requires to play Starcraft, and RSI are big problems with amateurs because of it.
There is ONE thing that professionals need to do to prevent carpal tunnel. it's the only thing that matters; and if you don't do, it, no amount of stretching and other techniques will ward it off. All you need to do is play (piano or Starcraft) with a relaxed body. It's harder than it sounds, but you hardly need to use any muscles at all to move a mouse or keyboard. Just relax - there's no need to perform any action with more effort than is required. Most players tense up in the heat of a game and clench all the muscles in their hands and wrists and shoulders to try to force themselves to go faster. It might feel good in the short term, but it's just going to cause injuries in the long term.
Watching players like TLO, it's completely utterly obvious why he has problems with his wrists. He's ridiculously tense when he plays. On the other hand, watch HuK;s stream and look at his mouse. He's touching it so, so, so lightly that the cursor just seems to flutter about the screen. Anyone have videos that show his mouse hand?
ya i have very bad pain for past 6 months. i was first post on this thread, u can read my story. but i tense up a ton all game. after a year of playing i just got injured so bad
On August 01 2011 03:37 Musketeer wrote: On the other hand, watch HuK;s stream and look at his mouse. He's touching it so, so, so lightly that the cursor just seems to flutter about the screen.
I don't watch Huk's stream, but this is also the direction I'm trying to move towards. I found I had to put in a lot of effort increasing the strength of my ring and pinky finger to be able to do it though. People try to use the mouse with just their wrist, but the wrist doesn't provide enough strength, which is why they have to tense up in order to get accuracy. Using the wrist together with your fingers lets you use a lot more muscles for the same motions, which increases strength and precision.
Also, if your muscles are weak and flabby, you're going to have no way to stop your motion accurately without tensing them up. As my pinky and ring fingers get stronger though, I feel like the mouse is becoming weightless and momentumless and I simply don't have to strain to achieve the same motions.
On August 01 2011 03:52 imSOZO wrote: no they never did. 3 doctors i went to kinda sucked. i also have pain above the elbow and inside the elbow above the inner forearm area. what exactly is an emg? i may need to go to a 4th doctor...
It's just a test they use to measure your nerve conduction or something like that so they can see if a nerve is damaged or is being pinched/pressured.
On August 01 2011 03:52 imSOZO wrote: no they never did. 3 doctors i went to kinda sucked. i also have pain above the elbow and inside the elbow above the inner forearm area. what exactly is an emg? i may need to go to a 4th doctor...
On August 01 2011 03:37 Musketeer wrote: The best pianists have to spend 10+ hours a day practicing. At high levels, that's 10 hours with a functional "APM" of at least 400. Piano keys take 20-100x more force to press (don't actually know how much), In other words, the amount of strain is probably hundreds of times more than what it requires to play Starcraft, and RSI are big problems with amateurs because of it.
The first thing you learn when you want to start the piano is hand movement and positioning (which is what most gamers lack off). I play keyboard (and learnd piano the classic way for about 2 years) and when i played for some hours, my handmovment in sc2 feels way more fluent and "better"(in terms of how many wrist/hand feels after long games). Why? I figured out that i transition my "pianohand" to my keyboard and mouse hand. I will make a cup with my palm and fingers automatically and have straight shoulders which are relaxed. Those things help piano players a lot and things like that prevent serious longterm damage.
I agree, it's extremely important to be relaxed when playing. It not only helps in preventing injuries but also improves your play. A good posture and a calm mind are the first steps to playing without stress. Awareness of you body is also really helpful.
Stretching (correctly) and giving your body time to recover also help.
Stress in general is just not good for you body. Bad eating and sleeping habits together with very little body exercise (common elements in a gamers life it seems) are all causes of stress so working on those areas can also help prevent these injuries and improve your game. It's part of the reason why pro gamers work out, you keep your body healthy and your mind calm and you play better and injury free.
Your forearm shouldn't touch anything. All that will do is restrict blood flow or put pressure on tendons.
Spreading out your mouse and keyboard adds no benefit over having them close together in terms of injury prevention.
Playing guitar to rest your hands after long hours of play sounds to be counter productive.
Also, stretching strait away when you feel your wrist getting sore is not a good idea with CTS. If you stretch out an inflamed tendon, it won't aid in getting rid of the tingles. If you have carpal tunnel for real, you should probably consider hot and cold water. If you hand is falling asleep, your nerve is pinched from inflammation, so icing it to reduce swelling, and switching to warm water to relax the tendons will help most. RSI is different, and has nothing to do with your nerves. Stretching will help you with that, much like cramps in your calves from running.
The best thing you can do to prevent these issues is to focus hard on playing completely relaxed. The more you tense up, the bigger you are at risk of getting injured. This goes for anything physical. People who tense up in car wrecks get hurt, sprinters who tense up tear ligaments, musicians who tense their hands get RSI (much like people with a mouse and keyboard that are looking at this).
If you are trying to play faster, then let your body move faster for you. Relaxation is the best thing for muscles. If you want to play like the pros, then get in good physical shape. It will help you relax easier, and greatly help prevent, or cure, injury.
On August 01 2011 04:26 Gooey wrote: Some of that advice in OP not so good...
Your forearm shouldn't touch anything. All that will do is restrict blood flow or put pressure on tendons.
Spreading out your mouse and keyboard adds no benefit over having them close together in terms of injury prevention.
Playing guitar to rest your hands after long hours of play sounds to be counter productive.
Also, stretching strait away when you feel your wrist getting sore is not a good idea with CTS. If you stretch out an inflamed tendon, it won't aid in getting rid of the tingles. If you have carpal tunnel for real, you should probably consider hot and cold water. If you hand is falling asleep, your nerve is pinched from inflammation, so icing it to reduce swelling, and switching to warm water to relax the tendons will help most. RSI is different, and has nothing to do with your nerves. Stretching will help you with that, much like cramps in your calves from running.
The best thing you can do to prevent these issues is to focus hard on playing completely relaxed. The more you tense up, the bigger you are at risk of getting injured. This goes for anything physical. People who tense up in car wrecks get hurt, sprinters who tense up tear ligaments, musicians who tense their hands get RSI (much like people with a mouse and keyboard that are looking at this).
If you are trying to play faster, then let your body move faster for you. Relaxation is the best thing for muscles. If you want to play like the pros, then get in good physical shape. It will help you relax easier, and greatly help prevent, or cure, injury.
"Your forearm shouldn't touch anything" how do you do that?
"Also, stretching strait away when you feel your wrist getting sore is not a good idea with CTS" It's not about 'what to do when you have cts' its more about 'what to do to not get cts', if you know what I mean.
'Playing guitar to rest your hands' Obviously you don't play guitar to "rest your hands". you get repetitive strain injury from repetitive strain. duh. simply moving your muscles in different ways can reduce tension ALOT.
"Your forearm shouldn't touch anything" how do you do that?
If you're sitting with a good posture, and you've got your wrist positioned on a pivot point, that pivot point will also bear the weight of your forearm, which will naturally be suspended above the table in order to reach your body. If you even have the slack in your arm to lay your forearm on the table, you're either slouching, or your chair is too low and should be adjusted.
My elbows touch my arm rest on my chair and only my elbows. My forearms don't touch anything. The doctor told me not to have my forearm laying on the desk the desk or arm rest while playing. The elbow and bone on the palm of my hand are the only things that touch now.
I agree with the prevention of injury with stretching, which is the same in every type of physically strenuous activity. It just sounded like in the "extras" section where the advice was given, that it was in the context that you are already carrying the injury. That was the reason for my response.
On August 01 2011 06:16 Gooey wrote: My elbows touch my arm rest on my chair and only my elbows. My forearms don't touch anything. The doctor told me not to have my forearm laying on the desk the desk or arm rest while playing. The elbow and bone on the palm of my hand are the only things that touch now.
the elbow should actually not be touching anything. doctors have given me advice that's contradicting what you've been told, apparently. forearms resting such that the hands are nearly flush with the keyboard is desired, but laying elbows on anything is not. there shouldn't be stress on the shoulders either, which is why the forearms should be in a resting position. i'm not sure what tendons you're stressing by laying your forearms on the table like you mentioned in a previous post, but i think it's apparent that both resting your arms and pivoting on the nerve that crosses the point where the elbows rests is not good. from related experience, the bone supporting the nerve at the elbow is the 2nd target for surgery related to CTS. the first target is the pair of tendons housing a nerve that are right above the bone-nub on the inside of the wrist that aid in supporting the thumb.
also, i think the point about doing things like playing guitar was provided to emphasize varying the movement of muscles and tendons. it also does a great job with stretching and flexibility as well. i don't think it was intended to go along with the necessity of hand/wrist R&R, since that would make no sense as was pointed out :|
On August 01 2011 06:16 Gooey wrote: My elbows touch my arm rest on my chair and only my elbows. My forearms don't touch anything. The doctor told me not to have my forearm laying on the desk the desk or arm rest while playing. The elbow and bone on the palm of my hand are the only things that touch now.
I agree with the prevention of injury with stretching, which is the same in every type of physically strenuous activity. It just sounded like in the "extras" section where the advice was given, that it was in the context that you are already carrying the injury. That was the reason for my response.
You have to watch out resting your elbow on anything. You are actually cutting off the bloodflow through the Ulnar nerve and can easily get cubital tunnel syndrome or another ulnar nerve related RSI. It's the sister RSI of carpal tunnel, the nerve that gives feeling in the pinky and half of the 4th finger (while the Carpal tunnel controls the rest). If you ever get a tingling sensation in these fingers it's from your elbow if its being rested (think funny bone sensation, thats the ulnar nerve)
OP forgets that the most important thing to avoid RSI is back posture... if that is correct, it really doesn't matter what other things you do half way...
DO NOT get a cordless mouse, the weight from the batteries = extra work for muscles
DO learn how to use the mouse with your other hand for non-gaming. You will quickly adapt. At work I use the mouse left-handed (with right-handed mouse button setup). At home I only use right hand for gaming.
On August 01 2011 03:37 Musketeer wrote: The best pianists have to spend 10+ hours a day practicing. At high levels, that's 10 hours with a functional "APM" of at least 400. Piano keys take 20-100x more force to press (don't actually know how much), In other words, the amount of strain is probably hundreds of times more than what it requires to play Starcraft, and RSI are big problems with amateurs because of it.
There is ONE thing that professionals need to do to prevent carpal tunnel. it's the only thing that matters; and if you don't do, it, no amount of stretching and other techniques will ward it off. All you need to do is play (piano or Starcraft) with a relaxed body. It's harder than it sounds, but you hardly need to use any muscles at all to move a mouse or keyboard. Just relax - there's no need to perform any action with more effort than is required. Most players tense up in the heat of a game and clench all the muscles in their hands and wrists and shoulders to try to force themselves to go faster. It might feel good in the short term, but it's just going to cause injuries in the long term.
Watching players like TLO, it's completely utterly obvious why he has problems with his wrists. He's ridiculously tense when he plays. On the other hand, watch HuK;s stream and look at his mouse. He's touching it so, so, so lightly that the cursor just seems to flutter about the screen. Anyone have videos that show his mouse hand?
This advice if a moot point. Relaxing comes at a cost... you need strength and flexibility in the muscles involved in typing to 'relax'; on the same vein, if you have strength and flexibility in such muscles -- from the back to the finger tips -- I don't think you'll ever get RSI.
this guide is decent but it lacks alot of important things. The OP treats carpal tunnel as something that can be prevented solely with proper wrist positioning. But the causes of carpal tunnel and other wrist injuries arise from your entire body, not just your wrists.
For example if your postures poor, you put unnecessary strain on your wrists. The same goes for your mouse, keyboard, and chair setup. If your chairs too low it will strain your wrist, if your mouse is too far away, it will damage your wrist.
Stretch before you play, keep your back straight while playing (imagine a string going from the top of your head to the ceiling.) Stay relaxed. Sit in your playing position, and simply feel if there is strain on your body. Then adjust your chair, mouse, keyboard accordingly.
Does playing piano make your hands more durable? Idk i play piano and have never experienced these hand problems (occasionally i need to stretch a little though). Then again i only play 3hours max at one day.
i have this thing when i bend my forefinger it makes a faint click and instead of going down smoothly it jerks down, is this anything to do with carpel tunnel or am i just a mutant?
I do software dev for a living so RSI was a problem even without gaming in the equation.
I find that having proper posture really helps with it overall -- sit up straight, get your chair high enough so that your elbows are are close to a 90 degree angle as possible.
Also important -- take breaks. I try to take at least a 10 minute break every 2 hours when I'm playing for a long time. Some friends and I have even started doing 1 pushup per lost ladder point... (I'm really sore from last night)
I think getting exercise is also an important thing, just to keep the blood flowing. For instance, I rock climb, and I find that when I take breaks from climbing (3+ weeks), my RSI starts acting up immediately, though when I climb regularly I don't have any problems.
Only problem I have is when I write a lot with a pen, since I rarely ever write and I suddenly have to write an exam (which is easily 5-7 pages) I tend to feel an intense hurt in my fingers.. Is that something I should go to a doctor with?
This guide is helpful, but I disagree with the "heavy mouse" statement. I've had a bunch of gaming mice and I think it sometimes has to do with shape of the mouse. G500 is god awful heavy, but I have to admit, playing with Copperhead led to a lot of more pain than G500 in long sessions. Ambidextrous mice for some reason isn't very comfortable.... I think that's also the reason why Deathadder is pretty popular, since ergonomically it is superior than other ambidextrous mice. (a good laser sensor also helps. =P)
On August 03 2011 05:45 beHispid wrote: Also important -- take breaks. I try to take at least a 10 minute break every 2 hours when I'm playing for a long time. Some friends and I have even started doing 1 pushup per lost ladder point... (I'm really sore from last night)
I think getting exercise is also an important thing, just to keep the blood flowing. For instance, I rock climb, and I find that when I take breaks from climbing (3+ weeks), my RSI starts acting up immediately, though when I climb regularly I don't have any problems.
This is really good advise. Excersise is really important not only for the RSI but for your general health, I also do the push ups & sit ups post game.
Not to mention getting the blood flowing helps you think; and who doesn't want to be at their A-game mentally when playing sc2.
EPT
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