The issue of multiboxing finally made its way back into my gaming life. I’m playing on Ragefire beta right now, the new EverQuest progression server, and it’s already apparent that lots and lots of people will be playing multiple characters at once.
I used to multibox in Dark Age of Camelot. I did so after Graev quit and I took over his account. I used the account to follow me around and help heal/buff my Savage. This is how I became personally familiar with how game-breaking and community-breaking such a practice can be.
Multiboxing can reduce the need for real players fulfilling a role. If I really wanted to play the role of a buffer, teleporter, healer, etc., but people have so many secondary characters that they make just to fill these roles then there isn’t a need for me to do those things.
Multiboxing removes the grouping feature. No that’s not a good thing. If someone doesn’t need to group then they artificially advance up further through the game without having to participate in the established social structure. It dilutes the system for everyone when people no longer need to rely on each other.
Multiboxing makes finding camps harder. If people are allowed to multibox then more camps are occupied by less people. One person running three account could technically camp 3 rare spawns at once. The world is big, but it’s not big that big.
Multiboxing leads to MacroQuest. In EverQuest, macroing became a big issue when people crossed the line and started to automate (through the use of macros) their gameplay. Entire raids could be handled by just a few players.
Not everyone does it to abuse the rules or ruin the fun of others. I know that some people are cool and would drop a box to fill a spot with a real person. There are people who would let a real person have the camp if they had multiple camps occupied. But for every one of those nice people there are thousands of people who use the system to get ahead in a virtual world, and those people ruin it for everyone.
This is one area where P99 will always outshine Daybreak’s TLP server. P99 actively works hard to ban multiboxers. It’s a big rule for them to preserve the integrity of the game’s design — a design that is thrashed when people multibox. I would be a fool to think Daybreak would even consider implementing this rule; one person paying for multiple accounts seems great on paper.
I used to 4 box in EQ but it was only during off times. The other 3 characters actually belonged to RL friends. Sometimes they would log on and already be in my group 🙂
There really wasn’t many people around to compete or group with since again, it was the off time. Still I did have the occasional early bird join my group.
I remember when multiboxing became a big deal though and seeing people 6 box a full group definitely took away from the game.
Big time mixed bag for me, I am a pretty much full time multiboxer. I love, absolutely love multiboxing.
I box in nearly every single mmo i play. However, I completely see your point with EQ classic. Im not sure how I feel about 6 boxing here. And tbh I think the most I would do would be 2box (something like shaman + a dps).
The games I have enjoyed multiboxing the most are games with instanced parties. Because tbh I dont like to sit around to wait for a group. And part of the fun of boxing is making myself more efficient and see what I can “solo”.
I am 100% against automation, If i am boxing I am controlling everything, thats 1/2 the fun.
I do agree that multiple people running around 6 boxing and ignoring the need for other players is an issue. Which is why at most I see myself duoing, because I enjoy just starting up a game and going out and “soloing” as fast as I can, I dont want to spend an hour of my 2 hour play window looking for a group.
I don’t agree with this post. I feel if the company is willing to pay money for XP potions, then it just makes sense they would be ok with people wanting to pay 60x the subscription cost per month just so they can solo bot the raids.
Since they are now allowing a plex like credit in the game, you’ll have botting squadrons of players that rule the markets of every piece of gear and farm plat until the economy is useless.
Why wouldn’t you want to play in a game where it is filled with bots? I mean look at WoW and Honor buddy. That was a great development, when the game plays itself and your players are still paying for it. Best business plan ever. No reason to worry about a customer service department when 80% of your subscriptions are bots.
From a player perspective, sure it might be annoying when that swarm of locusts fly down and camps everything you would have enjoyed for 5+ hours until they move onto their next feeding ground, but you are one subscription vs twenty, but that is the part of the game that give its charm. If you didn’t want that to happen go play a single player game. MMOs are not about player interaction and building friendships, those times are past, we have facebook to do that now. If you want a real interaction with a person go play a board game, seriously they are much better
So, you won’t get groups anymore because you play a class that everyone just runs a macro for, that is your fault for playing a broken class and enjoying it. Learn to Deeps scrub! You don’t see any dedicated support/healers in Skyrim do you?
Honestly they should get rid of the game aspects and just allow players to buy the top armor, XP, and trillions of plat for money what is the point of making players “play” a game anymore if you can just give them the feeling of accomplishment for swiping their credit card and downloading a macro. XP pots aren’t going far enough let them buy levels… On a hell level pay 10 dollars to skip it. Look at WoW you can buy a level 90 for 60 bucks and it works out well for them. Want to have a cool mount? Pay for it. What about some awesome looking armor, ca-ching! Want to see all those cool raid cut scenes and a cool title above you head, just $4.99.
Daybreak is a company that sells games. It is not a game developer. They are not in this business to have a fun experience, they are in this business to make as much profit as possible with the least amount of effort, using the least possible amount of resources, while maintaining the bare minimum required customer satisfaction as that it doesn’t impact the profit margin. All within the shortest amount of time possible. If you think that Daybreak cares about any game you are wrong.
Multboxing is just too much like hard work for my liking. The nearest I ever really got was having several characters on autofollow in EQ2 and trailing along soaking up xp like sponges behind a high-level, who did all the fighting. I only did that because EQ2 was F2P and for political reasons within the game I had several accounts at the time. Even that idiot version of multiboxing is off the table now that EQ2 characters get xp according to participation not just attendance.
This is why I’m a huge fan of NPC mercenaries. They are good enough to do a job of work when you aren’t in the mood to group, can’t find a group, are playing at antisocial hours (as I often do playing on US servers from he UK) or are just trying to get things done that no-one else is interested in. On the other hand, mercenaries are rarely so good that you wouldn’t be ready to give them the night off if an actual player turned up asking to take over their responsibilities. Mercs are not that flexible but they still take a full cut xp and some of the loot. Also, unlike another Player character played by yourself, they don’t as a rule feel like your own character.
Multiboxers, however, are fully engaged in what amounts to an entirely separate, highly rewarding game where they play whole teams of their own characters and gain 100% of the rewards with no obvious penalty. Since most players have a high regard for their own skills they probably feel they can do a better job playing the healer than another player would anyway, plus multiboxers seem to really love the process, so there’s next to no incentive for them to make room for other players.
As you rightly point out though, for the company it’s money in the bank, even more so on Ragefire, where every account in play will be paying a subscription. Daybreak would be crazy to do anything to deter people from multiboxing, always provided those players abide by the general “Play Nice” rules.
This comes down to personal preference, I feel.
I agree with all your points about it detracting from how the game was MEANT to be played in a social way of course.
But personally, I loved playing two separate characters at a time in DAoC. For PvE stuff of course, it’d be downright silly to try to PvP that way. But having a cleric/shaman/druid with me whenever I was out and about was a blessing.
I don’t personally see how macroing eight accounts together could be fun (Team Wizzy etc), but again I’m sure that’s just personal preference. That probably does make the game funner for some people.
In the end though…. it really boils down to whether there are enough people playing said game. If the population is large and diverse enough, multiboxers wont be forced to group with randoms, and the social folk like yourself, Keen, will have enough other people in the world to be able to group and play without waiting forever.
@Yotor: I see what you did there.
@Bhagpuss: Yep, agreed.
@Rawblin: Is it fun? Yeah it can be lots of fun. I totally loved having a Shaman to buff the crap out of my Savage in DAoC. It just ruins the overall game, though.
@Keen: I’m just being a realist. You have hopes for a company to make good specific design choices that are going to go against their short term bottom line. They will not make those “good” choices, they are going to make the worst, the most game breaking, community breaking choices for the hope a quick few bucks.
P99 crowd is a juicy unpicked niche-fruit waiting to have its wallets squeezed. To use an analogy to describe the interaction i foresee between Daybreak and the “Classic EQ community”. It will be a broken an battered relationship where Daybreak constantly abuses its player base and they will lap up any attention from a developer because they have been so neglected.
@Yotor: I’m definitely not disagreeing with you. It’s sad, though, that it has to be that way. The short term bottom line in this industry makes me facepalm.
@Keen: The more I think about this idea of a progression server, I wonder. Does Daybreak actually employee people who play classic everquest on P99? Or have they just seen the success of P99 and said, “We can make money off of this.”
Yotor, this is the 3rd progression server that EQ has done. It’s a money grab pure and simple for Daybreak. They will get a bunch of people to resin for a few months and possibly a few of those to keep their subs. The big question I have is how is P99 making money from this. They postponed Velious for Daybreak when they didn’t have too.
I was excited about this new TLP server and I appreciate the efforts to recapture the magic of EQ in it’s early days. It was my first MMO and still the one I compare every game to. Unfortunately, I just don’t think it’s possible to re-create what existed back then. Things have changed too much. We have more tools, more knowledge, and different expectations. I applaud the effort but think I’ll just enjoy the good memories I have and stop chasing the dragon.
I do not multibox. I’ve tried it a couple times and it completely decimates any immersion I have in the game, which is my primary reason for playing MMORPGs. Tiny things can take me out of a game world – seeing someone run by with a funny colored hat that I know can only be purchased by a player with dollars, and not a character with gold, is enough to ruin immersion for me. Tabbing between characters is about a million times worse and I don’t think I’ll ever bother trying it again.
As for other people, on EQ Mac there were a ton of multi boxers. I didn’t mind them at all, because the server was fairly sparse and all of them went out of their way to be helpful. It was an excellent community. On a new, crowded server where people are competing for camps in a race to be first, I’d prefer to not see too many boxed parties.
I’m fine with mutliboxing for a completely different reason: if your game is designed such that someone with a bunch of toons on /follow is on par (or better) than a group filled with real people, the game wasn’t very well designed to begin with. I know we’re talking about EQ here, but still, if the “buff role” can be filled with you pressing Alt-Tab occasionally, how much of a role is that really? Someone camping three rare spawns with three toons just highlights the absurdity that is camping rare spawns at all as a legit activity. And so on.
I will admit the lines get a bit more blurry once you factor in certain multibox software were one keystroke activates eight separate abilities. And I get the moral hazard of the whole scenario too. But… I dunno. One of the best ways to combat multiboxing is to make your game complex enough that it’d be better for a human to sit in each chair. If it’s not… well, that’s the kind of game you’re playing.
P99’s reward in this is that the ever present possibility of a Cease and Desist shutting them down at any moment is now gone. I wouldn’t be surprised if some time down the line they are able to make money for themselves and Daybreak somehow but the short term benefit is that threat of being shut down is gone now.
@Gringar: If that was even in the cards for them to put P99 down it would have happened when Daybreak had Sony lawyers. I don’t believe this was a “hey just push your expansion release out a few months and we’ll let you live” play.
There used to be a very strange guy back in the mid 2000s who had something like 12 bots following him around in EQ. I wonder if he’s still around. Although again he was very strange and likely got hit by a bus by now.
While there was a short period of time I had access to a friends cleric to follow me around and heal, it’s not something anybody did at go live of EQ. So this, plus the xp pot buying, is yet another dagger in the heart of the whole “classic” EQ experience.
They are calling this not really EQ thing a beta?
This seems common with “Classic” Server launches.
DAoC once did an official classic servers launch…. but it wasn’t really anything of the kind. It took out Trials of Atlantis, but left in Labyrinth of the Minotaur (an even later expansion than ToA), and left in certain items from LotM that gave bonuses equivalent to what ToA artifacts gave, which was why they left ToA out….
Overall, it was a hot mess of failure at being anything close to classic DAoC.
Going out on a limb, I’d say this EQ server will be the same kind of thing.
@Baba Black sheep
Sammancer Deathwalker? Killing that guy on Sullon Zek was comedy gold.
Gotta love content sensitive ad’s…
https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=4E669F9A57F8B4AF!8919&authkey=!AGRADZP_LPqA4uk&v=3&ithint=photo%2cpng
Ha I think it was sanmancer Deathwalker. All his bots were female. Tons of them.
@Baba black sheep I looked it up and Deathwalker in the end was arrested for some disgusting things. And had 24 bots.
Omg 24 bots! Not surprised about the arrest though.