Constant Disconnects While Boxing on Agnarr.

I wouldn't want it to be enforced. But, in a thread that is entirely about trying to circumvent TrueBox code, I don't think we should ignore the fact that it is against DBG's rules.

On a Monday philosophical note, I'll be the first agree that rules aren't as important as some people want you to believe they are

Which rules do YOU think they should enforce?

I still don't know if I believe it is 'Truebox' code since some get it and others don't.

Except those who "get it" ONLY get it on servers that have TrueBox code enabled.

People are looking at this like a network issue, it is not it is an issue with the TB code(obviously) and it absolutely will "investigate" a subnet, you give it permission to do so every time you "sign" the EULA.

Now there is no doubt such a plainly thrown together solution as TB can be affected by how your network is configured so "mess with it till it works and when it does, stop messing with it" is valid.

They are also having server "freeze" issues so it seems the game may reach that point soon unless they begin to solve some issues. Lately they have been piling up.

I have been boxing 2 toons since classic with 3 different PC's at 2 locations and i have never ever run into this disconnect issue you speak of. EVER. maybe you should look into what background programs you have running that may interfere with network traffic or something.

It isn't about trying to circumvent the truebox code. The aim of the truebox code is to prevent you from playing two toons on one computer, or key broadcasting from one computer to multiple clients. People who are not doing either of those things but are trying to avoid random disconnects are not trying to circumvent anything they shouldn't be.

I'm just quoting the rules, I'm not judging Want to agree that only DBG can decide whether players are doing something right or wrong?

Nope. I think reasonable players can make reasoned determinations on it based on DBG's history of enforcement. It's the only thing we can do, really, since they never clarify what is and isn't legal when we have questions and aren't sure.

And that is how you get ants.

No, but seriously...that is when rules break down: when players start assuming their interpretation of rules means anything at all.

We have no other choice. Each player has to decide whether certain things are allowed, or not. From choices about which 3rd party software is ok to use, or which tactics are ok to use, or what is acceptable conduct on contested spawns. People interpret the rules all the time. Sometimes we are wrong and get slapped down, but there are plenty of things that were once questionable and people weren't sure whether they were legal or not, that are now commonly accepted parts of every day life in Everquest.

It is absolutely TrueBox code. The only question is why some folks get it and some don't. The most egregious cases have nothing to do with key mashing. The key masher disconnects are what you might call the common case.

Not every server uses TB of course, not every one sees the TB disconnect issues of course.
But if you got it the dam thing will try and run you nuts.
I would say with little doubt TB code needs work.
Sacrifice a bucket of KFC see if that helps

Nobody is "trying to circumvent TrueBox code".

Truebox as defined by DBG is playing 1 account per computer with out the use of 3rd party software to do so. In other words, each EQ account being played at the same time needs to be played on its own seperate computer, keyboard, mouse, and monitor.

We ARE following those rules. In the case of my situation, there are 2 players (my brother and I), 2 computers, 2 mice, 2 keyboards, and 2 monitors.

That is not circumventing the TrueBox code. That is doing exactly what the TrueBox code is intended to enforce.

Also, there is no mass spamming of keys. When the issue was occuring, it was with ordinary game play. Attack mob, hit kick button, etc... bam disconnect. No spamming of keys. This has nothing to do with spamming of keys. Again. NO SPAMMING OF KEYS. Ok. Let's put that one to bed please. I see it on every thread about this kind of issue. It has nothing to do with spamming of keys. Just because some people can reproduce it by spamming keys does not mean that is the cause of THIS particular issue.

Also, it does not matter that this person or that person runs multiple accounts and never sees this issue. Good for person A and B for not having the issue. That does not mean that it does not happen to other people. I wish people would stop dismissing the issue just because it does not happen to them. Feel lucky that you are not effected.

Finally, the issue is not 1 scenario. The issue is not 1 specific thing. The issue is not the same for everybody. The issue does not happen to everybody. Until DBG starts helping, the customer base are on their own to try to figure out what will fix the issue FOR THEIR VERSION OF IT. Seriously. It happens different for different people and appears to have different factors that cause it. It's not a simple cut and dry issue with a simple solution.

Because of the lack of support on the part of DBG, we have to tin-hat this thing some unfortunately. Therefore, you will see solutions mentioned that sound completely wrong to you (such as my changing of internal IP addresses that fixed my issue). Yeah. It doesn't make sense, but it works. We are just customers paying for a product, and having to rely on one another to try to fix the game on our own to be able to play what we are paying for because the company charging us for the game is unwilling to help.

To recap, the issue has hit my family three times.

1. On the Phinigel server some time after the Luclin expansion opened, there was a patch that caused the issue to happen every single time that my brother and I were in the same group, same zone, and did anything in combat. There was no spamming of keys. There was no 3rd party software involved. We were following TrueBox rules. We did nothing wrong. It simply just started kicking us out of the game every single time. We asked for help from DBG, and the ignored us. We took videos showing we were doing nothing wrong. DBG ignored us. We tried everything we knew to do, and the issue did not go away. We left Everquest for almost a year.
2. On Agnarr server, we came back to Everquest to see if the issue had been fixed. It did not. The same issue persisted. In a last ditch effort, I turned off dynamic ip addresses on my router, and assigned IP addresses manually to the computers in our home. The issue went away immediately. IMMEDIATELY!!!!
3. Recently I was playing my druid, and I wanted to work up Forage and Tracking while playing him, so I added Forage and Tracking to hotbar 4 keys 1 and 2. I went in to the Everquest keys settings, and I made the numpad key number 8 (because I use the numpad to move around) be assigned to hotbar 4 keys 1 and 2 as well as the normally mapped "move forward" command. Later that day, we started getting kicked out of the game again just like in the past. I changed the IP addresses of the computers thinking maybe the old ones had gotten flagged by the TrueBox code incorrectly. The issue persisted. I remembered that I had setup the keys that day for foraging and tracking, and thought just maybe it was seeing that as key broadcasting, so I took the hotbar 4 keys 1 and 2 off of the numpad 8 key press in the key settings in Everquest. The issue went away IMMEDIATELY.
4. We have had no issues since then.

So, as you can see, there are more than one way to trigger this issue. I have no idea what causes it, but I can tell you with out a doubt that it ONLY happens on Phinigel and Agnarr. Let me repeat that, so you understand fully. THE ISSUE ONLY HAPPENS ON PHINIGEL AND AGNARR WHEN IT HAPPENS. This has been tested every time, and been found to be true 100% of the time. The one thing that is unique to Phinigel and Agnarr is TrueBox code. They are the only servers that implement it. So... it is VERY hard to not believe the issues are related to TrueBox code. Very Very Very hard.
Facts. Enjoy.

As part of this, did you also manually assign DNS servers?

I play 2, and for example, my cleric has bash, and my bard has kick, both on button 2, and sometimes, when autoattack is on, I'm just mashing "2" on both keyboards the whole fight. Never had a disconnect.

I think the people above who suggested the logic is applied "more strictly" to your account(s) might be onto something. My behavior should "look like" problematic behavior.

I had this happen to me at the start of phinny when I 3 boxed. Happened once everytime I was in a new zone. It got annoying so I stopped boxing for a while. I took up boxing again some months later and added a 4th box. Never had a problem again. I also switched from wireless to wired from my router to all 4 boxes somewhere down the line here as well.

I just thought of something that may be related. When I box multiple toons, and they die, some of the chat (like guild and group chat) stops working for SOME of the boxes, but not all. Usually only 1 box will display my guild and group chat. It is as if, when dead, the chat service only sees one of my boxes. It has made for some not-fun rezzes, if I don't realize it soon enough and miss what my group is saying.

Not sure if it's related or not, but the behavior leads me to believe that not all of the services are as disconnected as others. Perhaps the problem lies with the chat service, and the mashing of keys is a coincidence: perhaps it's only macros that have chat functionality ("Healing %t", for instance) that cause the problems?

I think we are all arguing the same thing but I am phrasing it in a odd manner that is causing confusion, so let me elaborate what my gut is saying on this issue..

I don't think DBG is targeting people saying 'You are flagged and now suffer these issues as some kind of punishment.'

I do think that the Truebox server has some kind of coding that is finicky, not intended by design, and local networking issues are exacerbating the finicky-ness causing these unwanted and un-desired consequences. It could be only seen on Truebox servers as it is adding some kind of check in its process.. but anything else i say in this is just more speculation...

Either way, I think the best way to get to the bottom of this is for people having the issue to open support tickets, to see if they can isolate the cause or do some packet traces etc... not sure if DBG does that though.

That was the conclusion I came to in my case.

When I petitioned about this it was clear that DBG has no interest in figuring it out or fixing it. None.

We know the disconnects are TB related because that only happens on AG and PH, and that would be the only thing we know of unique to those servers. Now of course the TB app (if you will) may load on all servers but only flag on those, we just don't know. These are similar to the disconnects from changing Wi-Fi nets while the game is running, yeah that was accidental but the similarities were striking.

The "server freezes" seem to be game wide, both are being completely ignored.