War Thunder Beginner Guide's #0.1 - Controlling Your Plane And Camera 

A word to all those learning: War Thunder is a very hard and frustrating game! It has a difficult learning curve. It may take many weeks, months, or years to master some skills. Don't give up, you can do it! Once you've got ahold of flying, you can get into some very interesting dogfights and fun, intense situations. War Thunder is truly a special game to me and I hope it will become to you as well!

After all these years it's really unnatural to even think about the plane and camera controls. The instinct drives my fingers over the keyboard. It comes with experience for sure.

Unga bunga my camera only point forward. That's where the gun shoot, shoot good gun look see.

Doing the controls has been such an automatic thing for me that at first I thought I was doing something different than in the vid because I never look at my keyboard anymore.

So, I watched and rewatched. I still can't figure out how to turn with me holding C or alt to view behind me. If you could show us in settings that'd be great

I have been suffering from insomnia for 2 years , had many appointments with many different doctors. they prescribed me some medications which couldn't fix it and made me sick. I was just randomly scrolling through youtube and stumbled upon this video. I had my headphones on and was half way through the video and didn't know when i fell asleep. It's 9am in the morning i just woke up and writing this message. Thank you so much.

This guide alone changed how i play the game forever. Just because of holding Freelook(Default C on keyboard) and using WASD+QE (after remapping). I was struggling with mouse flying alone. I was alternating free look to decide what to do with people behind me and then use mouse to turn and fly, then hold C again and look and judge how to continue from that, which puts me at at a disadvantage pausing mid game, sort of(flying in a straight line while looking). I was wondering how people are doing some maneuvers and dodging every bullet i fire at the same time.

THANK YOU!!! Needed this tutorial from you, you’re the best!

Thank you very much for this video. Im almost always top three in air battles but I was fighting one of my controls this whole time. This video helped me to clean things up

I think it's really cool that your making this video! It took me far to long to figure these things out on my own it would have helped me so much to have this as a new player.

Continue the great work! I love ❤️ your videos!!!

Finally, I've been waiting for a tutorial from you on this stuff. Thanks

Probably the best description of the different flight control styles I've seen, thanks mate. Now to apply it lol.

Keyboard layout on screen is great. Good video. Thank you 👍

Nice vid, learnt something new even being +1000hrs player. Would be great if you could talk about loadout controls later on. This is a complete mess for me. I cant handle bombs, laser guided bombs, rockets, balistic computer, AAM, flares and radar while being combat effective. My controla are all over the place and each update, with new top tier gadgets, keeps getting worse :')) Appreciate Defyn

great vid! just wanted to say i changed my free look from alt to spacebar for more comfortable feel. thanks for the awesome vids

Ive been waiting for such a video. I discovered ur channel some time ago

I needed this video and I didn't knew. Awesome stuff!

I’ve been looking for a vid like this!! Thanks to OddBawZ for introducing your channel. Great tutorial! I’ve been struggling with the camera and flying at the same time. The C key has always been awkward for me. Never thought to use the ALT key.

I waited sooooooo long on ur key bindings!!! Thx for that!!!

Thank you! This is exactly what I’ve been looking for! So frustrating to have camera OR aircraft control…now I know how to have both!

I found this to be very helpful, thank you. I have 16K+ battles and already do very well. This will up the quality of not just me but everybody and will improve the game experience many times over.

Thanks DEFYN u r really helping starting to play the game more serious!

Kinda wish you had put youre keybind file in the description

I had no idea about the reticle freezing off camera until this video, thanks!

Been waiting three years for this. Glad to see the keypad on screen

Thank you for this Defyn!!!

this improved my aim significantly, thanks!

Great very clear video, personally got this part down pretty well after 2.5k hours haha but should be very clear for newer players and even some older ones who might have not known some of these things. Still plenty to learn in the rest. Curious about the following videos :D

Thank you for making this video! Before this, I am following controller mouse aim setup on another youtube video. It is impossible for me using his way, he basically dont use your alt key function so it is so confusing to fly and I really dont know where to go just like you said. With your way it is a lot more make sense now, now I can understand why people playing this game. I just tried using my controller to be able to use your alt function and I press that all the time to make it fly like normal aircraft and let it go when I am going to shoot enemies.

This is sooo eye opening, thanks bro i love this game but sometimes it hates me, now not so much I guess.

WOW! Have played for many years and NEVER knew this. THANKS

That was a nice guide, thanks!

I binded my elevator keys on the side buttons of the mouse, it's a great way to have full control on all three axis while keyboard flying

Something you should add for keybinds is that you need unobstructed binds. For example you need to be able to use rudder inputs and ailerons at the same time, no use having it bound to e and r respectively, and theres no way you can access both because both keys require the same finger to press it. That is where most players fail when it comes to setting up their keybinds. Think about what binds are the most important and set them up in such a way, that you can access all those combinations of keys at the same time.

Great learning video. Thanks!

A really good informative video. Looking forward to the next one. Could I put in a request for a video on how to set up and use radar functions please? I am just getting to my first radar jets and I see the list of controls and just don’t know which ones are the most important and which are less important.

I played this game for 10 years and I didn't know how to do that lock mouse thing! very informative!

as someone playing with a track ir, i was always used to looking around with that, and didn't quite see the benefit, i have to say im sold on the neg G aspect, thank you very much

Great video! Very helpful

i am not a war thunder noob but i love all your lessons. keep up the good work

Wow. Super important information. Thank you very much

Very good guide vid. Thank you very much.

please do more vids that show your key strokes like this. there is another who did a video with this displayed, but I have searched for so long and found nothing else. seeing it 8n action with your normal vids would teach a lot, if its possible to do so. (not sure if this program would show over the game as you play in real time, which would make it unrealistic to expect.) missed that very first part, which explains why its a rare thing to see in WT vids

Defyn is the one stop shop for how to git gud at air rb

Love the fact that you fuse your top left logo with the field of view of the plane in your thumbnail

Such a good video ! Finally somebody did it right !

The change to default controls where W and S are for throttle are one of the worst things to come to this game.

Great video thanks

👍 Thanks! 👍 Learning to fly with keyboard keys and free look is the hardest thing, of many...lol, for me to understand and accomplish. 😗 Anyways, looking forward to your in-depth, _Defensive Flying_ video. 😃

Thanks for making this guide it wad helpful

Needed this video lol 👌

From what I can tell after reading the newer comments, i see most people can't really do the thing at 2:50 with the Alt key. I'm also facing a similar problem to which if i change Freelook from "C" to "Alt" i can't really override with "S" or other similar buttons. Perhaps I'm mistaken but maybe Gaijin changed something with the controls and this video might need an update, as unfortunately I'm having a hard time following the guide 🙁🙁 An overview of his controls might help, any other help is also appreciated. Thanks 🙏

I use small autohotkey script for switching to realistic mouse control with one button for turning the plane slowly at high speeds. This is more comfortable than clicking W button many times. Especially when you do one turn at 1-2Mach speed on new maps for 100 seconds straight.

Love your videos Defyn! i strive to be like you in game. Would appreciate a brakedown of your teir 6-7 hotkeys for Aim 7/9's and radar and things. thanks mate

Thanks for guide master ! God bless you

first usefull wt channel i have seen

Hey man, thanks a lot!

Good advice and suggested set-up. Thanks. I've been using MMB-2 for look-around on an older PC. Often in a dogfight I get a glitch where the input isn't received and WarThunder extrapolates from the current mouse position, e.g. I'm turning slightly to follow a target with the mouse, my PC doesn't keep up, and WT then assumes I'm still moving the mouse. End result I'm looking behind me and pulling max-G. I'll try using the alt-key for look around as I don't think the keyboard has the same delay issues as the mouse.

One thing war thunder does great is plane controls. It is very precise while keeping a natural feel

Fantastic video! One thing I would have liked to see added which I noticed you do at least once, is how you utilize negative G's to overpower the G force Overload by simply pressing S for a second or two.

I might try your set up for a few dozen battles to see if it's better than what I have set up. My flap keybinds are on the other side of my keyboard but it's not very detrimental to me since I'm always using the pitch controls. I'll normally be in a dogfight, have my left hand doing throttle, roll, pitch, yaw, and if I need to I'll reach over and change my flaps with the right hand.

Excellent tutorial! I now know what I needed to change in my control settings haha. Since you are such a good pilot, I always wondered why don’t you make sim, DCS or IL2 videos? And do you credit your skills to be mostly from experience or it’s because you read books about air combat a lot?

I'm a veteran and I tried different Keyboard setups this far. But it never once crossed my mind to use the free look camera with Alt, I always used standard C. Fuck this is some big brain shit. just tried it. Way easier to keyboardfly and no crampy hand positioning. This'll also help a ton in Ground Battles. thank you lol

Good video!!!

This video has been extremely helpful, now i just need to git gud at flying with the awsd

If I press ALT, only the cursor apears and I'am not able to look around or control my aircraft.

#0.1 Love that.

Hi Defyn. I would really love to see one or too fights in a prop with this keys showing in the left corner. I know you said it´s a pain in the a. to set this up, but please, it will help so much to learn some maneuver so much faster. Dodging headons or flying energy spirals etc. best reguards

Interesting to see your control scheme, mine is vastly different and is similar to how it used to be in 2014 before they changed the default controls.

I tried changing the camera key to ALT because in my mind it would be easier. But after I tried playing like that for a few matches I changed back to C because I am so used to it being on C. That shows even if it would be easier to hold down the ALT key in my setup it wouldn't work for me. Very great video, love the little keyboard in the lower left corner, it really helps!

finnaly i know how to do long turns without bleeding my whole speed thanks!

thx for the vid. what i'm missing on most of these explanation videos is just a quick screenshot of the settings in the menu. I find it really easy to mess things up, by (un)binding stuff unintentionally. for example when i bind the keys, my plane just throttles up to 47% and then WEP. no idea why

Christ I knew I was missing something simple! I have nearly 2000 hours in this game but somehow never figured out this basic shit. Thanks for this guide, maybe I can actually fly competently now lol

This is a really good guide. I have only one question - when you taping "S" for a slight moment and circle start to move with you cross - it doesn't work for me - circle is just on place where I leave it and plane return to it. I checked my controls (I can turn plane while holding alt) and settings and can't find anything about that

2:50 always wondered whether this is possible! Thanks a lot. Is there a way to obtain this without going off screen? In cockpit view you dont have to look away for the circle to lock to the crosshair.

As a console player I struggled to get a good setup to look around and move the plane too. So I changed it to an ace combat set up and it now works really well.

I’m actually kinda pissed about the timing of this post because I feel like I’ve just fully gotten the grasp of flying by watching your other videos and that’s when you decide to post a video showing me everything I just figured out😂😂😂 but anyways loved the vid

Duelling guide when?

Wish I had this video when I started playing 2 years ago 😁

great guide! I've been struggling with whyh my plane sometimes does what I want, and sometimes decides to prefer mouse, and sometimes keyboard input.

Fantastic vid! Really great quality and structure, well presented! Just one question I was hoping someone could help with; when I hold Alt to look away, tapping S does nothing, I can't seem to get the crosshairs locked. Any help? Thanks

I'm following your instructions, but my mouse cursor won't lock. I'm using the alt key as you do, looking offscreen and hitting the S key, but the cursor refuses to lock. Is there another setting I need to select to enable cursor locking? No matter what key I bind to free look, currently spacebar (I realize C is the default), I still cannot get it to lock the cursor, it still wants to fight me and return to the circle. I think I am following your directions exactly. Please explain. P.S. I also subscribe to OddBawz and saw your game together. Really appreciate your videos! Does this lock feature have to be enabled somewhere else in the controls, or even in settings? I've seen several other posts asking the same question, would be nice if you could reply with an answer. Or perhaps I need to become a Patreon? ;P.

Just here to like the video. I’ll watch it later.

Hi DEFYN, thx for the video is realy good. I just started to play this game couple weeks ago and I try to bind to free look to my alt key like you said but is not work for me. The free look works but if I hold it down the alt key non of other button works for me. Do you have any solution to this problem? Or somewhere I could find your key binds to download?

Can you have this keyboard overlay during some live gameplay to help understand camera and aircraft movement during a dog fight? I think this would be highly beneficial!

Hi , Defyn can you play the sm 91? Also a question , Does the bf109 g14 function well above 5500 metres or is better to stay close to that altitude and develop speed in there just like the G6

at 2:33 i am having trouble locking the cursor to the center. Can you please explain exactly, ive been trying but not sure what the main controller input i should press is.

Thank for this really infomative guide. I have a question. When I do the steps where you move the circle out of view and touch the "s" key, that works for me. But when I try to make the turn like you demonstrated, I still have to make inputs to keep the plane from rolling back to horizontal by tapping the roll axis keys as well as the pitch. I see that your plane does not need those inputs. What setting or what am I doing wrong?

How did you make the bottom left AWSD animation thingy? IT looks amazing :D Also very nice tutorial because your way of playing is very similar to mine :0 (Yes i know who asked lmfao)

Gonna use this tutorial on my ps4

I was trying to do the thing where you control it during freelook, but for me it just locks up the controls and I can't even use wasd to make any movements. How do you work around this?

thanks

Thanks.

can you show us more complex staff ?love the videos btw

I’m struggling with assigning the free look to ALT, I changed my other binds so Alt is linked to anything. I can free look with ALT but cannot control the aircraft with WASD

My experience with controller: I have finally gotten mouse look (alt key for keyboard) to work on my controller and binded the ailerons and elevators to the left stick with elevator controls only working when I held the left trigger to activate mouse look. The aiming for the cursor was done on the right stick, meaning I was essentially having to remind myself that my movement is now separate from the right stick during this and it's only for free looking while I control the plane with the left stick because they would switch If someone needs help with controller setups I'm glad to help as best I can from here, this one change has helped me so much

So, I've tried this but for whatever reason when I hold alt (mouse look) down my plane won't react to any other input, like WASD so I can't fly and look around and also cannot lock my cursor. Any idea why?

nice

Very much OT: Whats the best plane currently to grind the german tree? I kinda just want to get to the G91 R3 for ground RB but jesus, flying the K4 with the current JU 288 spam is just too much. Every match theres 4+ bombers and in most cases just 1 or 2 fighter colleagues while the allies have 2 to 3 bombers at max.