Valve Bans Razer and Wooting’s New Keyboard Features In Counter-Strike 2

The Verge’s Tom Warren reports: Valve is banning Counter-Strike 2 players from using keyboard features to automate perfect counter-strafes. Razer was the first keyboard maker to add a Simultaneous Opposing Cardinal Directions (SOCD) feature to its range of Huntsman V3 Pro keyboards last month, followed shortly by Wooting. Using Snap Tap as Razer calls it or Wooting’s Snappy Tappy will now get you kicked from Counter-Strike 2 games.

“Recently, some hardware features have blurred the line between manual input and automation, so we’ve decided to draw a clear line on what is or isn’t acceptable in Counter-Strike,” says Valve. “We are no longer going to allow automation (via scripting or hardware) that circumvent these core skills and, moving forward, (and initially — exclusively on Valve Official Servers) players suspected of automating multiple player actions from a single game input may be kicked from their match.” […]

Razer and Wooting’s SOCD features both let players automate switching strafe directions without having to learn the skill. Normally, to switch strafe directions in a first-person shooter, you have to fully release one key before pressing the other. If both are pressed, they cancel each other, and you stand there for a moment until you release one of the keys. SOCD means you don’t need to release a key and you can rapidly tap the A or D key to counter-strafe with little to no effort.