End True Box on Phinigel

I don't think the current EQ player base is antisocial. They just don't like wasting their time and their friends' time trying to round up five players for something boring and tedious that one or two people can do by themselves with a little work and preparation (boxing).

Very rarely run into people who are uncomfortable using voice apps. Maybe a dozen in the last six or seven years, most of that in a guild that required all members to use voice chat. Most of those dozen were previous members trying to sneak back in under a new name and hide their identity. Maybe it helps that our requirements were clearly stated up front, but I just haven't experienced the issues you seem to have.

I think you're right, Machentoo.

We mainly play this game now for the game it is. We make new friends and bonds, but now it's more like a team-mate than a community friend.

Back then, it was basically a totally new world to dive into. The very fact that you could log into a 3D world and interact with thousands of players from all around the world D&D'ish style was the biggest thing ever. I remember spending 9hours of days at an Internet Café without doing anything to progress my character and still thought I had the best gaming ever. Those days are surely over - Online communities and networks are more common than real physical gatherings now hah.

Would also be in favor of ending truebox on Phinny. Would allow me to fire up a few more subs on accounts I've let lapse since I don't want to buy nor have space for more computers. My goal with this is to accomplish things on my own if I can't find others that want to join, even though I always ask if others do want to join first to replace my boxes.

I mean, if you just want to play EQ alone with your little box army.. why not spin up your own and play there using bots? Save you the effort of boxing and you'd get to play however you want in a world all by yourself. No rules, no other people to get in the way of your farming or whatever...

But thats not really fun if you like to interact with other players. I use to box way back in the day (pop-oow when I quit) so I get the desire to be able to solo group content... I do. I'd just rather see a healthier community then what amounts to a solo server with everyone running their own groups.

I'm glad DBG is not going to change one of the major rules of the server.

Edit: yes I'm well aware pugs are basically dead and a lot of players just log in to raid.. I expect TSS will change that for a while. Its more or less a result of how much content is in instances now.

I think its more getting into the market to farm stuff or be with friends. There are some that know how to exploit the system and there are others that dont. Unfair as it maybe there was the majority to play the game as intended. If they merge this or another server together for the simple fact it is in low pop then adapt a boxing army to liven up the server. Otherwise we have enough true box servers. Nothing is stopping you from having 2 or 6 accounts you just have to have 1 computer per account so that people do not exploit from others.

It doesn't make much difference to me whether Truebox is on Phinny or not but in general, I would say the idea of truebox pretty much ends at PoP/LDoN. Definitely by GoD. By GoD, many servers have lost a lot of their population. Then comes 4 level 70 expacs. The servers keep losing people in each until it culminates in PoR which was a pretty terrible expansion with only a few redeeming qualities.

Personally I won't ever play on one of these servers, not because I want to run around with box armies; I don't and never have; but because I like to be able to play the game how I want, when I want whether it's 1 toon or 2 or maybe a whole group of 6 and I'm sure as hell not going to build a bunch of computers to do it with.

I find those of you that do, just a little bit nuts

I'll have you know I got my boxes' laptops off of craigslist and I was only mildly inappropriately touched.

I don't understand the "I don't want you to box so that you are forced to play with me instead" attitude. Most boxers would prefer to play with other people if that was an option, but realistically, it's not. The ONLY time you are guaranteed to easily find a group that is appropriate for your level, in the place where you want/need to hunt, is in the first month of any server's release. After that, people's level ranges have spread too far and it is not realistic to hope for a group.

And that only leaves one other reason for the anti-box hate: contested content. And that is 100 percent DBG's choice, and has absolutely nothing to do with boxing. They could choose to allow private picks (just by lowering the /pick threshold to 1 in every zone and increases the /pick timer to an hour), and contested content would never again be an issue. But instead, DBG chooses to incite anger and contention among the players.

TrueBox has no place. The next server I would like to see would have private /pickzones.

This is a strawman. I don't think I've ever met a boxer who never wants to interact with anyone. Personally, I love the interaction and teamwork of raids. But if I need to run an instance 35 times to get a rare drop I need, I don't want to have to drag other people into that (and I definitely don't want to have to run it 105 times instead of 35 because I lost the roll on the item the first two times it dropped.) So I'd rather box stuff like that.

Even the ones that never group or raid outside of their own box crew still like the interaction of a player based economy.

Players that truly never want to interact with anyone probably are already playing games where that is the case instead of Everquest.

I say leave it as it is. Let it actually demonstrate exactly how people really feel about it. People claim all day and night how if people couldn't box then they would be able to get groups, well here is the exact server for what those people have been claiming.

The TLP Cesspool at its finest.

-cry for years for truebox
-get it
-proclaim Phinny’s superiority over and over
-cry for it to be removed when tired of it and/or past the expansion(s) where it directly benefits them

It’s the Circle of Derptitlement.

Side note: Are the folks who didn’t jump ship and actually stuck with RF/LJ smiling nice big smug smiles at the moment?

You have to isolate a single change before you can draw any significant conclusions from the results. As things stand, no one will be able to confidently say whether the groups available on Phinny came from the Truebox code or whether it was entirely due to AoC's. Since DBG has not yet released a server with one but not the other, all we can do is guess and speculate. So no one's claims are being confirmed one way or another.

People of Ragefire are full of benevolence and wisdom, we would never do that !

Truer words have never been spoken.

After about Velious, the group game is mostly dead. After pop, it's dead and gone. I would disable truebox starting with GoD on these servers. DBG seems to lose interest in these servers after Kunark, probably because the marketplace bucks and krono bucks taper off. That's also a good point to consider disabling truebox.

Machen hit the nail on the head, and this is the style of gaming many people in the Ragefire community have been enjoying for the last couple of years. They have the freedom to be more independent during non raid hours, but don't have the burden of having to box on raids. Or, if you already box, you have the freedom to play more than 1 character on a single computer. We're on our 3rd week of Omens of War, we have ~3.5 month unlocks, and faster experience than any other TLP, so getting caught up is less of a grind. The faster experience and longer unlocks is a huge appeal to people who are unable to keep pace with the demanding schedule of the 2 months Phinny/Coirnav unlocks.

And there are several guilds with a strong emphasis on people who don't box, for those who have no desire to do so. I know my guild has dozens of people who play just 1 toon, or just 1 account. Plenty of time to get caught up if anyone's interested.

You don't actually have faster exp than Phinny, Phinny has gotten more EXP boosts then RF and will be at live levels when TSS goes live. The 2 month unlocks are only for non-level cap increasing expansions and level increases are 3 months. You extra 2 weeks is hardly world changing.

RF/LJ have their perks, just stick with what is accurate.

Who me? Never

Is it ok if I ask? Since I didn't cry for any minutes, let alone years asking for Truebox? And I didn't ever claim Phinny's superiority over any other server? And I'm not currently crying for it to be removed? And it has nothing to do with directly benefiting me as I don't box at all, Truebox or non? Or am I still derptitled? See, I actually play on Phinny, unlike you. It's reasonable to at least reevaluate certain aspects of TLP servers 2+ years after their initial launch. As someone who actually plays on and enjoys Phinny immensely, all I want is whatever is best for the longterm health of the server's population. Now if they decide to stick to the original ruleset and just ride it out, that's totally fine, I'm not going to cry (no really!). But I do believe, as someone who actually plays on the server, that it would be beneficial to think about what the intention of Truebox is/was, and whether or not that intent has already been realized or not. Perhaps there is no tangible benefit to continuing Truebox in later expansions. Is this opinion ok with you? Or am I just part of the 'TLP cesspool' because I don't play EQ the exact same way you do?

LOL!

You know the thing with me is that I find my attention span just isn't what it used to be back in the day. I suck at boxing , so I tend to keep my boxing down to just 2 these days. Most of the time, I don't even bother loading the second box because I prefer to just focus on one character.

You’re welcome to play the game however you like and have all the opinions you want, sir.

The only thing I’m commenting on is the fickle nature of the TLP crowd constantly demanding things, and then changing their minds when it suits them. Whatever DBG does, it’s never enough for said “community”.

To an outsider, this seems like karmic irony at its best.