Quick Weapon Selection

In the Quake series and many more other games, online players can be seen quickly swapping along their arsenal without mild pauses or switching them in a row until they have the desired one. Most of the players find this sort of quick switch rather odd, as their mettle will be tested if they were to try same thing.

The answer is easier than it looks, players playing online set a customized array of alternative keys for quicker reach. While some players prefer a few binds around default movement keys; other players prefer 1-2 binds for the specific quick weapon swap to their mouse to not hinder any sort of movement at the heat of combat.

Most common approaches to be seen are; Q-E-R-F keys, may be even Spacebar around the default movement buttons or MWheelup, MWheeldown and some other third-fourth mouse button for most core weapons.

Doing this in Quake III Arena and later games is easier since each weapon configuration keys can be changed from the menu, in older Quake games you will need to either create a custom .cfg file with the desired weapon binding, or do so from the console. Below is an tutorial on how to do so.

Quake and Quake II
For the first two entries it is recommended to create a custom .cfg file in order to quickly swap weapons using the desired keys, a simple method is creating an "autoexec.cfg" file inside the game's base game folder (id1 for Quake, baseq2 for Quake 2). Note that mods may have their own autoexec.cfg that overrides the one found in the base folder; the standard autoexec.cfg is used in the event that there is none located in said subdirectory. Note that Mods may have their own custom bindings, making it advisable to have a separate autoexec.cfg with all settings (including those found in the original autoexec.cfg) for each modification.

Below is an simple example of an autoexec.cfg for Quake 1 with quick weapon selection for the Rocket Launcher, Thunderbolt and the Grenade Launcher. Create a autoexec.cfg file inside the game's data folder, then copy and paste the text shown below. Change these keys as needed, e.g. bind e "impulse 8" instead of "z" will swap to the Thunderbolt.:

bind q "impulse 7" // pressing q swaps to the Rocket Launcher bind z "impulse 8" // pressing z swaps to the Thunderbolt bind x "impulse 6" // pressing x swaps to the Grenade Launcher.

A more complicated solution (and thus only recommendable for intermediate players that are used to gameplay mechanics) can be constructed through the use of the "alias" Console Command. The player can set up a key that does a couple actions, such as rapidly swapping to the Rocket Launcher and firing a shot before swapping back to the Double-Barrelled Shotgun. This can lead to some intricate bindings based on the player's abilities that do numerous things, one of the most common being the aforementioned situation.

alias killemall "impulse 7 ; +attack; wait; impulse 3; -attack" // defines the alias bind h killemall // binds it to a key so the alias can be called at any time

Another use for the alias binding is to create a cycle that avoids the weaker alternatives for each Weapon, thus allowing the player quicker access to the more powerful choices. This can easily be modified around if the player wishes to retain the Grenade Launcher, but avoid using the Nailgun unless they specifically press a button to go to it.

alias w_cycle w1 // sets the default behavior of the cycle alias w1 "impulse 3 ; alias w_cycle w2 " // DBS, tells it to prepare for SNG alias w2 "impulse 5 ; alias w_cycle w3 " // SNG, tells it to prepare for RL alias w3 "impulse 7 ; alias w_cycle w4 " // RL, tells it to prepare for Thunderbolt alias w4 "impulse 8 ; alias w_cycle w1 " // Thunderbolt, tells it to prepare for DBS bind c w_cycle // binds it to a key so the alias can be called at any time