Boxing

[Danth]

As I said earlier, I do not oppose boxing--but neither do I support it.

I've seen posters make an argument that boxing becomes necessary when the population is such that players can't find groups. Perhaps that's true. Right now--today--players who want groups can find them. I have yet to go LFG for so much as half an hour without being able to join or build some sort of group. However, this comes with a caveat--I'm trapped on the 'default leveling path' for grouping. If I want to roam off the beaten path, I either bring my own group or don't go at all. As such, the current population may be rated as 'enough', but just barely.

On the other hand, there exist entire deserted dungeons (permafrost, anyone?) where boxers could roam to their heart's content without ever encountering another living soul. That may even benefit the community by making items from those dungeons more readily available on the market. In that scenario I must rate boxing as entirely harmless.

As I said in my earlier post, I don't operate multiple characters, don't find it fun, and don't really see the appeal in it. Most particularly, outside of specific situations (boxed guild clerics) I don't see why someone would multi-box *unless* he intends to primarily solo. That's fine, of course; but let's call a duck a duck, shall we?

Frankly, I prefer that boxers solo. They don't bother me, live and let live, but I don't particularly care for having boxers in my groups. Why? They make lousy group mates. The boxed characters don't talk, don't react quickly to complex situations, and generally act like the half-attended robots they are. A group harboring several such characters makes for a dull evening.

In short, while I don't oppose boxing out of hand, I've not seen a great argument in favor of permitting it at the present time, either.

Danth

[Kreigore]

I would be hard pressed to say we'd reach 500 players, but it could happen.

If we had a solid 500+ non-boxed characters on for approximately 18 hours out of the day, would we need two-boxing? Maybe not.

As it stands right now, raids and high end content will be very interesting - unless there's a fair amount of community cooperation.

Oh well, only time will tell I guess. [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[Yoite]

I look forward to the community coperation for big events and raids.

[President]

Originally Posted by Kreigore [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I would be hard pressed to say we'd reach 500 players, but it could happen.

It feels like just two weeks ago we were hovering at 200-240 Online and last night I saw 300. Thats a pretty decent increase. I think if the word continues to spread we could definitely see 500.

[Reiker]

Eventually once super difficult raid encounters start becoming plentiful (culminating with avatar of war), the devs are going to have to decide between artifically nerfing the power of these encounters and thus making them unlike their original inception, or allow two boxing.

[Danth]

There's option 3, too: Take the EQMac approach. If players can't roster sufficient numbers to defeat an encounter, then said encounter doesn't get beaten.

Danth

[Throttle]

Well, here is how I would apply logic to the matter.

Boxing was possible on Live. It wasn't common at all in the beginning and few had the means to do it, let alone considered the possibility, but that is irrelevant for the purpose of this discussion. What is relevant is that at some point well before EQ was considered a dying game not worth playing, some people boxed. Once computer technology started to develop at the insane rate that it did in the early 2000s, two-boxing became a possibility for just about anyone, and it was common knowledge that some people did this. It was no longer a case of most people not knowing it was possible or not being able to run two instances of the game, and I would venture to claim that there was very few people who wanted to box but could not do it due to the monthly fee. In other words, almost anyone who wanted to box could do so.

The prevalence of boxing grew as the game started to lose players. From expansion to expansion, more and more players started boxing two or more characters. It was directly proportional to the size of the playerbase, and when the playerbase was so healthy that noone had to box due to population-related limitations, very few did so. Once that was no longer the case, more and more players did.

For all intents and purposes, an emulated server is the exact same thing as a Live server where the playerbase has dwindled to whatever size the emu server is. If a Live server has a population that fluctuates between 100 and 300 players throughout the day, you will find a lot of players boxing because they see it as a necessity. When there are three or four clerics online within your level range in the entire game, the gameplay must necessarily be different from what one would find on a server with 5000 players.

People will want to two-box when it becomes necessary. When it isn't, few will do it. There was a time when it wasn't necessary, and few did it. It then became necessary, and more people did it. This is a fairly rudimentary level of logic: if this server's gameplay environment was such that noone felt the need to two-box, few would do it. If it was allowed, the frequency of boxers would be directly proportional to the amount of players, and in the unlikely but theoretically relevant case that the server grew to the size of a Live server in the early 2000s, one could reasonably assume that the prevalence of boxing would diminish to the level that it was on such a Live server. Perhaps slightly more common since this is free to play after all, but with a lesser impact on the game as noone would be able to box three or more characters like they could on Live.

In other words, if Project 1999 allowed two-boxing it would be exactly as common as the game warrants it, no more and no less.

Addendum:
Before you step up to dispute the proposition of two-boxing, take a moment to consider a few things. Do you disagree because of some personal perception of how the game should be? In past experience, has boxing proved to be such an obstacle to your enjoyment of a server that you would disallow at the expense of the players to whom it is a necessity? Is your personal preference more impotant than those players whose gameplay is compromised by this rule? There are some, like me, who do not play on this server because two-boxing is not allowed. Is that better than the alternative?

Someone (Tantalar) once said that two-boxing players were infringing on his gameplay. I say that there can be no greater infringement than excluding potential players, or compromising the gameplay of existing players, by disallowing them the means that make the game playable for them. His statement may have been valid if we were discussing whether or not to place an epic weapon vending machine in each city for those who couldn't bother doing the quest, but since boxing was entirely possible and not that uncommon on Live, and has been a staple feature and proven necessity throughout EQEmu history, I would argue that a different reasoning is necessary.

[President]

Originally Posted by Throttle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

In other words, if Project 1999 allowed two-boxing it would be exactly as common as the game warrants it, no more and no less.

Untrue - I am happy to not two box right now, but if it was allowed, enough people on the server would be doing it(and getting a leg up) that I would have to also.. Or just not play on this server.

Originally Posted by Throttle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Addendum:
Before you step up to dispute the proposition of two-boxing, take a moment to consider a few things. Do you disagree because of some personal perception of how the game should be? In past experience, has boxing proved to be such an obstacle to your enjoyment of a server that you would disallow at the expense of the players to whom it is a necessity?

Yes, actually. On PEQ my buddy and I ended up quitting around the time we got to Sebilis because of pathing issues (which are prevalent on every EMU server in dungeons like that) as it was nearly impossible to get through it using multi box characters, and since everyone multi box'd, no one was around to join our group leaving us with a 4 man team heading through Sebilis. One person playing one character is better than one person playing two characters, no matter how "bad ass" you think you are.

Originally Posted by Throttle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Is your personal preference more impotant than those players whose gameplay is compromised by this rule? There are some, like me, who do not play on this server because two-boxing is not allowed. Is that better than the alternative?

This could be said the same way back to you, is your personal preference more important than those whose gameplay is compromised by this rule? Because I for one would likely not play on this server if it was overrun by two boxers. The alternative so far is over 300 unique people playing on a server at the same time, better than any other EQ EMU server.

Originally Posted by Throttle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Someone (Tantalar) once said that two-boxing players were infringing on his gameplay. I say that there can be no greater infringement than excluding potential players, or compromising the gameplay of existing players, by disallowing them the means that make the game playable for them.

Are you really arguing that the game is "unplayable" because you can't play two chars at once? That's a laughable argument at best.

Originally Posted by Throttle [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

His statement may have been valid if we were discussing whether or not to place an epic weapon vending machine in each city for those who couldn't bother doing the quest, but since boxing was entirely possible and not that uncommon on Live, and has been a staple feature and proven necessity throughout EQEmu history, I would argue that a different reasoning is necessary.

Has it proven necessary through EQ EMU history? Because It looks to me like this server proves otherwise.



Enjoy playing on PEQ with 10 people playing 5 chars each.



*EDIT* Just to add, I am not opposed to EVENTUALLY adding two boxxing. But at this point in the server, it seems NOWHERE close to necessary. I can understand if many months down the road players level 1-40 are so sparse its impossible to find a group, but at our current state, not necessary, at all.

[Wenai]

Originally Posted by President [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

*EDIT* Just to add, I am not opposed to EVENTUALLY adding two boxxing. But at this point in the server, it seems NOWHERE close to necessary. I can understand if many months down the road players level 1-40 are so sparse its impossible to find a group, but at our current state, not necessary, at all.

That has been pretty much been my opinion all along. I think eventually we will level out and the low level crowd will just be non-existant. We can't expect to continue to grow forever. At some point the number of players at low levels will be sparse. But at this point it just isn't a concern.

[Sarkov]

Another point in favor of limiting boxing, for now: forced grouping can be good for the long term health of the server by encouraging people to meet new friends/guilds and become invested in the server community.

Barring a probably unreasonable level of success for the server, I think most people realize boxing will eventually need to be OK'd to maintain viability during the leveling process. But for now, I think the devs have made the right call - its probably worth trading content accessibility for increasing the value of each player to groups/guilds etc.