box question

hello all,

back in eq i have 3 account and i guess i am going to trio box cause of my playtime.

I have 2 computer so i am wondering what could i choose as trio box that could be confortable to play for an old guy.

I am thinking of warrior shaman bard as first, with mercenaries cleric rogue and a third depending on what i can manage.
I am not a raider and would love do progression as i m not in a hurry.

Please let me know what you think and thank you

If you want to do progression,, I'd suggest SK, Druid, mage.

Covers pulling, tracking, Call of the Hero, ports, etc. One healer Merc and two rogue mercs.

You could swap the mage for a chanter for crowd control or add a 4th box for chanter.

SK, Dru, Enc, Mage is a great combo and covers almost all utility

First do you want to use 2 computers? Some find it easier to box on one computer, just an idea. I use icons on my taskbar and just click between the accounts that way.

Second are you going to play on a TLP? You have to pay to play those servers and for some you would need 2 computers.

I think if Warrior, Shaman, Bard are classes you like to play then its a good idea. Well rounded. The shaman can cover heals and the bard can do crowd control etc. Its nice to have a merc back up the heals to make it more effortless. Rogue mercs are ok I guess.

thnak you for answers.

I am going to play on live with 2 PC yes. Gonna focus on war + shaman on first and bard on second PC. I dunno if it's the best choice although.

I would put the WAR on PC 1 and SHM on PC 2. I would probably put the BRD on PC1 as well, since it's easier to tab on PC1, but I'd plan on neglecting the BRD some.

Make you SHM heal keys heal to Xtar. Set your SHM Xtar slots to match the group slots on your warrior. Your warrior is always 1 because you are looking at your warrior, so on your SHM, put the warrior in Xtar 1. Then Xtar 2 will be the first character in your group on your warriors screen, Xtar 3 will be the 2nd player in your group on your warriors screen. This lines up with F1-F6 on your warrior.
The hotkey is...
/Xtar 1
/cast #
I did this setup when boxing my cleric and I never looked at my cleric box. I healed my group strictly looking at my own group window. I never had to look at my clerics screen or keep track of the cleric group order. I played the main as if it were a cleric (because cleric Xtar was matched up to my main's group window), I just had to use a second keyboard to make this happen.

For DPS on your SHM, Make your DPS hotkeys on the SHM /assist MAIN (or WarriorName) so that anytime you hit the key it will be on the right target. I have my boxes in a fellowship so the last line is /fsay message.

So 1-6 heals my group (Xtar matching my tanks group order)
7 assist the tank, debuffs/pet, says when done in /fsay
8 assists tank, DoTs, says in fsay when done
9 assist tank and nukes spam
I have audio triggers for my /fsay messages so I can just press Debuff and when the timer is up, I get a ping, then I press the DoT key, get a ping, then start nuking.

This lets me do everything I need to do with the CLR/DRU (SHM in your case) while not looking at the SHM screen at all.

BRD is simple, just have to position it, but you can get good at positioning the mob infront of the bard, then just have to turn the attack on the BRD.

I use fsay so I dont spam the group with messages. You can use a chat channel or something else if you prefer.

This is what I have now. It's solid.

Oh, another tip.

Set your BRD as MA. Then put the MA target on your tank's Xtar
Set your SHM as Main Tank. Then put MT target on your tanks Xtar.

This lets you see what your boxes are targeting without having to look at your boxes windows. You can quickly recognize a targeting problem and correct it. This is very useful when using a key that doesn't have a target in it.

As you can see, my theme here is to be able to mash keys on additional keyboards without looking at additional windows.

You can get a 4th slot by use the mark action on the 3rd box but it's a bit messier.

Many thank for your time

I would set your War to be main toon, with others on /follow. This way War can engage mob and swing around to other side. This leaves your other 2 toons in melee range on the backside of the mob.

Bard is probably your least clicky toon, so put him in a window behind the Shaman. Your bard will just be running melody constantly, since songs that require a target no longer interrupt singing when no target is selected. So basically with Bard, you just need to press one button to engage whatever your main assist is targeting and that's it. I include /assist Main, Fierce Eye, Bellow, Cacaphony and /mercassist in my Bard's attack hotkey.

With 3 toons, you can have 3 healer mercs, so your Shaman wont need to heal a ton. That said, I'd still expect him to be your clickiest toon, assuming you want to drop dots, DD's and do spells to boost the DPS of the other group members.

I don't think your War will be all that clicky in controlled fights, but you want to focus on him the most to deal with unexpected adds.

if you have 2 monitors, then i would clump all the important stuff (Like ETW windows, situational hotkeys, etc) on the right side of 1 monitor and the left side of the other. This allows you to focus on a narrow slice in the middle.

I like running 3 toons on one computer, because i can slide across monitors and click all 3 toons without having to take my hand off the mouse. I also set my primary attack keys to be the same for all 3 toons. This allows me to click..attack..click..attack for all toons without taking my hands off the keyboard. For me, "4" is my primary /attack on key, "3" is short refresh combat strikes and "5" is longer refresh combat abilities.

By the way, i am working on War/Shm/Bard right now as an alternate to Bst/Bard/Rog which i have run for a few years. I suspect that my war will be ok with 3 merc healers, so i may switch to War/Bard/Rog. I think this will give me the highest DPS for the fewest number of clicks.