Hey there, I'm collecting a little bit of feedback about why you play Vanguard using two accounts. I log in with two characters so that I always have my own healer with no questions asked! Why do you multi-box?
I dont, but.. If this is a lead in to gather feedback about possibly adding merc's in, well, I for one beg, Do NOT do it
Zatozia wrote: I multibox a monk/shaman/bard because ... 1. I have a group whenever I want. 2. I have a group to do whatever I want. 3. I have a group for as long as I want. 4. I only have to answer to myself if I make a mistake. 5. I don't have to fight with anyone over loot.
I just recently started doing it to have a healer handy. I'm not very good at, can't go into too many dungeons etc., but it does give me access to content I might not see soloing.
I play a Warrior, Rogue and Shaman as my main 3 box crew. I mainly 3 box because its alot of fun, aswell as challenge. It helps get groups started. I will always back out any character if another player wants to join the group as I much prefer playing with others.
the only reason that i multibox is to level up buff bots. when i am forced to go without bear shaman endurance buffs i am reduced to a weepy little child curled in to a ball sucking his thumb while crying for BUTTERED TOAST!
I have never multiboxed, I just prefer not to for several reasons. First off it takes away from me interacting with other players and working as a group. Also I don't like the feeling I am playing a single player MMO. By multiboxing that is exactly what I am doing. Players multibox to control the loot drops and it is instant gratification for grouping instead of playing and MMO and getting other players.
Exsequor wrote: ^^ this. To answer the question: I don't, in Vanguard. There's not really any reason to at low and mid level, and high level... I mean you CAN but there's not that much trouble finding real groups. Everquest I did because it got to be near impossible to find groups later on in the game's life. And unlike Vanguard, solo content in EQ was vanishingly scarce until mercs if you weren't one of a very few classes.
I do for a variety of reasons. I first started multi-boxing in SWG, which was awesome. I did it there to do some of the end game collections that not many people wanted to do. It was much easier to spawn huge amounts of the creatures you needed to to kill with a 3+ person group. It ended up being a challenge for me to see what I could "solo" with my alt-army. I was eventually able to multi-box most of the game. Fast forward to VG. Here I started doing it because of a lack of people playing. Having a pocket healer or a pocket bard allowed me to do things that I wouldn't have been able to do solo, particularly with non-solo friendly characters. My computer doesn't support dual-monitors, so I'm a bit more limited than others who do it, as I have to tab back and forth, which on my machine sometimes ends with me dead. In short; I do it for fun, because it provides a different sort of challenge, and to help with certain quests with a low rate of loot drop (i.e. Hunter's League Turtle Shells).
+1 no Mercs please. I only mulit box for harvesting skill ups and run the toon down to assist with any rare/ultra rare nodes. I never have nor likely ever will multi-box actual play in any mmo.
I multi-box to camp Lorestones with my families group so our actual playtime is not wasted sitting in one boring spot.
Dielle wrote: I'm currently boxing a six man team. Basically I do it for the same reasons as Dielle. Although, I would add that it also provides another layer of difficulty and sense of accomplishment to any game. Ultimately though I have a limited amount of time to play and I want to make the most of it. Multiboxing allows me to accomplish just that. However, I am not anti-social and still prefer to group with others. No multiboxer is as good as a group of real people. Especially in a game like Vanguard.
A lot of the time I do it when I am farming for faction or specfic loot. I don't want to do the grind myself, let alone have others come do it - unless they are after the same goals as me. This means you not only need to find people for the group but also have people comiitted to often some endless grinding. Also, from a selfish point of view, if any of those rare pieces drop, I can give it to one of the number of different classes that I have boxed.
I multi-box for harvesting. That is pretty much it. If I can't find a group I find a way to solo the content anyway.
Locte wrote: I wouldn't call it selfish. A few years ago MMO's decided to incentivize grouping by adding small group xp bonuses (i.e. if 1 person kills a mob, they get 100%, if 2 people kill a mob, they each get 55% of the xp value, 3 people, 40%, 4 people, 35%, etc...) TBH, it was almost never good enough to compensate for 'dead weight' such as an extra unneeded support class, or an underperforming player (low level, low gear, low skill, low-at-the-keyboard time, etc). Some games did make the bonus juicy enough. I think in Shadowbane, you could have groups up to 10, and when a mob died, everyone got 50%. While primarily a PvP game, as long as you could offer something, no matter how small, people would add you to their group. A lot of VG's loot mechanics are shrouded in secrecy, but afaik, VG does not have a 'group loot' bonus. The only bonus you get to loot is that you kill faster, so the loot should drop more often. But if you aren't killing faster, (slow respawn, deadweight, etc) you basically just have more mouths to feed. If my goal is to get 'rares', I need to make that group efficient. As for whether this is a Merc issue, the thing with Mercs in EQ is that they were relatively, 'too good.' They had a decent programmed healing script, and demanded a small fee per hour. When you tossed in the other bonuses (never complained, never randomly afk'd, never ninja quit, never vomited excuses, etc), a cleric merc was better to have then a cleric piloted by a player. And well, when you have a generally feisty, touchy playerbase such as a bunch of EQ clerics, the merc was just like cheap foreign labor Before mercs, you had to put up with their idiosyncracies, their RL issues, etc, but all you wanted them to do was heal w/o fail. The mercs did that for pennies on the dollar w/o problems. And yes, that in a sense killed groups, but tbh looking back, I'm not sure if dealing with everyone's RL problems that pervade in game (on top of the million of other issues), as the main reason to stop mercs.
I don't mutlibox due to the fact I don't own more than one computer. I don't think that some players multiboxing kills groups. I have been in groups and raids where players were multiboxing. Example: So my group of 6 characters had 4 players. It filled the group, we completed our group tasks and it was fun. As far as players asking for Mercs. Mercs are in Vanguard already! Earn them, buy them and use them till your hearts content. Go ahead, multibox and use Mercs. Vanguard is Free To Play. Your Way. And Many thanks to the multiboxers before FTP that helped keep Vanguard on life support by subscribing to multiple accounts!
Dielle wrote: For these exact reasons I also multi box, usually a: DK, Bear Shaman, Cleric & Psi (for 55 boxing) but I have many other combos for lower than lvl 55 boxing. Please don't add Mercs! More accounts = more money for SOE Mercs will most likely equal a SC one off charge or hire fee which is ridiculous, Vanguard does not need Mercs, it will ruin the game.
Enkur wrote: I just wanted to point out that you don't need more than one computer to multibox, I multibox on an old machine that's falling apart. It is possible to load more than one instance of VG on the same computer.
