Server Discussion - Non Truebox rule set.

Discussion in 'Time Locked Progression Servers' started by dreamweaver, Oct 25, 2019.

  1. Fyerie New Member

    I started on Rodcet, returned to the game on Vulak, rerolled on Fippy after Vulak became a ghost town, returned to Vulak to a box guild, seen that guild banned for using scripting programs which are now apparently de facto legal since DBG doesn't enforce this at all anymore, and have been on Ragefire since, i.e. I've never played on a Truebox server.

    Everyone boxes and helps each other in our guild the same way we would if we weren't boxing. We just pay 1-24x the monthly fee to play the game while we do it.

    I will take this opportunity to say that people running script programs, the sort that can be found on a certain crimson strategy website, which remain illegal to use, are ENTIRELY RAMPANT AND SHOULD BE ADDRESSED. Legal input routing using autohotkey or IS with a G keyboard is not the same as having the computer sniff packets in order to target and heal and perform combat on its own.
  2. Xhieron Elder

    I think it's a tricky issue because there's a line of acceptability somewhere between "a player with one extra box is probably okay" and "there goes the mage army" that's different for everyone.

    Personally, I prefer truebox to non-truebox because I believe the risk of a server being overwhelmed by box armies outweighs the benefit of me having the liberty to play a second account without another computer on my desk, but in an ideal scenario the choice wouldn't be between truebox or not. It would be between an officially-sanctioned, regulated server where third-party tools are effectively prohibited, and elsewhere. Truebox doesn't stop automation, and automation is the enemy here, not alts.

    The problem is like gun control in the US. We want the out of control gun violence to stop, but we lack the political will to actually stop it because its presence lines the pockets of the people making the decisions. So instead we get half measures that mitigate but never really fix the problem, because the worst offenders will break the rules no matter what they are.

    So Truebox is better than non-Truebox because it's better than nothing, but at some point you have to wonder if it's really worth the trouble. We have this fight every year on the eve of the next round of TLP, and it's the same exhaustion tactics the 2010s were known for everywhere else in public life. Eventually a lot of people just throw up their hands.

    Would I play on a non-Truebox TLP? If it was a Selo or Mangler but with unlimited boxing, probably not. I'd stay on Mangler. I'd prefer not to see a Selo again under any circumstances. I burned myself out way too hard in the first month (and I'm still burned out on Classic-Velious anyway, despite skipping them on Selo and Mangler both). If it had something else going for it--like FV loot--then I'd probably move with the rest of the population, understanding that the economy would be a nightmare and the bot armies would sadly abound, but at least it would be something different.

    AOC/MOTM should stay forever for all TLPs, and honestly I'd like to see some changes to /pick as well. Especially if you're going to just give up the fight when it comes to box armies, the rest of us should at least have a realistic option to avoid them and not have to compete for content with them. One version might be to have an AOC for every single non-city zone in the game (hell, maybe even cities too; it's past time we bring back banker murders) and allow any group of three people to use one (or a version of /pick) to spawn their own zone complete with its own drops and named mobs. That would explode the quantity of drops entering the game, but with FV rules that's not necessarily a bad thing. I think we're well past the point at which scarcity in EQ means what it did in 99, and competition for spawns is often more toxic than it was in 99.

    At the end of the day we just want to play EQ. There's no way we're going back to the golden age, so we've got to innovate. If you can't afford GMs, then automate content access to do what they would. If you can't afford to stop automation, then let people avoid the automaters if they so choose. If that means spinning up an instance of LGuk for every Tom, Richard, and Harry who wants a shot at frenzy, is that really the worst thing in the world? God knows with a game this age we've certainly got the server hardware to do it (although I'd concede that perhaps we might not, in fact, have the software).

    So non-truebox? Sure. Just make a server that actually accounts for the consequences of non-truebox.
  3. malliee New Member

    True box or not doesnt matter to me just hope for 2 month release on xpacs instead of 3 and POP/ldon merged into one so pop isnt so long
  4. Machen New Member


    The problem is that at least right now, they don't have the technical ability to do this. Too many pickzones and the servers crash.
  5. wildone Elder

    I used to 6 box on lockjaw but then the game got into expansion i dident like,i love 6 boxing in early eq i run 6 different classes and always love my main being a warrior,warrior cleric druid mage wizard and enchanter not the best group on paper but a fun group a lot of people love classic eq i know i can 6 box on live or my 1k aa plus group on lj but its not the same as a new server,db give us a new tlp with boxing and il buy 6,1 year subs.
  6. Aelivaa New Member

    Same, Boxing enables me to keep up on progression of TLPs and start groups where I can replace a box with real playes as i go. For now its just scouting the forums daily for any offical TLP announcment :D
    Xanadas likes this.
  7. Yinla Ye Ol' Dragon

    Which is why they should start enforcing their own rules.
  8. Darchon_Xegony Augur

    Remove Truebox on Phinigel since it’s 5 expansions past mercenaries at this point. That would be neat.
  9. Xhieron Elder

    Nothing surprising about that, but it's something you can stress test for. Whatever the limit, use that limit to decide on a reasonable cooldown or other restrictions to keep the servers from catching fire. I know actually writing new net/load handling code and working on stability is probably out of the question for more reasons than one, but whatever the zone instance limit is, there's an equitable solution within it. The current /pick system is basically a recipe for disaster in the absence of Truebox, since box armies are the ones who profit most from it by being able to force picks open and hop between instances in order to dominate even more spawns/drops.

    Truebox is the solution we have to that, and other, problems. If we're going to do away with it, we need a new solution. For whatever reason ($$$$), the solution can't involve real-time policing, so it needs to be something that can be created and automated with the resources already in place. Maybe the answer is "it can't be done"--but if that's the case, it's a pretty compelling argument that Truebox ought to just be the way of the world from now on, at least for those of us who've had the misfortune of experiencing pre-Truebox with our own eyes.
  10. DalgreathMang New Member

    can i offer the solution to amend trueboxing to allow one more char to be logged in per ip than the current only 1 allowance. Same amount of accounts subbed 5 less physical devices to do it with. No issues with 27 boxers running all on one or whatever.
  11. Oventoaster New Member

    Truebox or not i dont care, but maybe start in velious with 4months till luclin then 3months between expansion. Focus effects enabled, FV free trade on all items and somewhat fast exp rate. Problem i always found on the TLPS is classic and kunark feel like they drag out but once you hit velious + it seems like there is not enough time to gear up. With a full raid raiding once a week not long enough for gear up a whole guild in that expansion.
  12. Machen New Member


    That is literally what they have already done, and why the limits are where they are currently. Prior to the current limits being put in place, (especially instances shutting down with <6 players in them) the aoc servers used to lag out and crash constantly.
  13. HoodenShuklak Augur

    FV loot would be best if they want to deliver something the players want and that's different.
  14. Basak Augur

    TLP not starting in Classic could be fun, I would prefer to start in Luclin or Velious since Luclin is the expansion I missed for the most part, I did plenty of classic-velious and PoP-Omens raiding but Luclin stuck right there in the middle where I keep for one reason or another missing on other TLP servers, then of course beyond Omens I would want to experience upwards too since I have barely touched that content.
  15. Zealot1340 Lorekeeper

    Agent of Agents: Yes
    Launch Level: 1
    Launch Expansions: Classic
    Unlock Format: 3 mo.
    Exp Rate: Fast
    Misc: Normal lockouts
    FV Loot Rules: Don't care
    Truebox: No

    Casual player, would like to box 2-3 chars from one PC. I still play mostly with friends but I get some random play times and 3 lets me get up and running. Faster xp cause I don't have time to grind endlessly. Classic (level 1) or Luclin (level 51) launch or something along those lines.
  16. Duality Augur

    Does the Agent of Agents reside in PoK and give all zone dzs? haha
  17. Machen New Member


    Yes, please this!
  18. Zealot1340 Lorekeeper

    Not sure that's just the format the guy posted at the start that everyone has been using.
  19. Rhek New Member

    I haven't had a lot of positive experiences with multi-boxers on Mangler. I don't want to paint everyone with the same brush -- but I found most of them to be unresponsive to tells and pretty toxic towards people trying to play the game 'normally' (IE True-boxing 1 or 2 characters). The kind of stuff I saw regularly was:

    - Full box groups AFK camped in every pick at rare spawns (Sebilis Crypt was the worse offender I saw for this)
    - Ancient Jarsath camp for VP key exploited by a boxer for weeks and loot rights being sold for 3 krono each. This created a huge bottleneck for Veeshan's Peak.
    - Getting trained by AE Exp Box groups pulling right through our camp (happened for a week straight in Velks). Yes we reported it, no nothing was done about it.
    - Various camp/kill stealing (I know this is technically legal but still a piss-off when you've been sitting at Lord Bergurlgle for several hours and suddenly 6 mages show up and take your kill)

    Take these experiences with a grain of salt-- because I can't confirm if the people in the examples above were using 3rd party software or had 10x PCs set up in their parent's basement. I probably sound like a broken record as there are many threads from people complaining about boxers on true-box servers. Overall, I've had an overwhelmingly positive experience playing on Mangler.

    Does this kind of stuff persist on the other non true-box servers? Or is this just the normal amount of toxicity you can expect from any online game with mechanics to allow RMT?

    My proposal for new the TLP servers would be 1 true-box, 1 non-true box and slightly increased progression from what has been the norm.

    Both servers would have the same rules:
    - Start in Classic or Kunark (There are some great newbie zones in Kunark that are never utilized to their full potential)
    - FV Loot rules (this won't help the RMT problems but would certainly make the server interesting)
    - Slightly increase the expansion release rate roughly 1/6th faster (IE change from 3 month releases to 2.5 months)
    - Adjust EXP rate and AoC instanced loot rate to match faster release rate
    - Lower the threshold to pop a new pick
  20. Machen New Member


    Once again, the reasons for the threshold on picks are technical, not philosophical. They cannot currently do this, without major software changes. Too many picks and the servers start to lag and crash.
    Dythan likes this.