How is boxing a grp of toons, a game design flaw?

The characters I box were created by my kids. They grew up, had families, ran out of time to play the game. I'm not boxing characters, I'm keeping memories alive. Who knows? Someday they'll want their characters back! When they do they'll find them current and well-equipped.

That is just one of the reason that people box or group with a small set of friends. You need to stop cherry picking things out of posts to try and make your anti box crusade look better.

Where did I say that? Oh, I didn't.

This was heartwarming. Thanks for sharing, honestly.

Right. As a long time solo player, that is one of the biggest issues I had with some boxers/clique groups. Those groups never gave a chance to anyone.

And I am not saying they are wrong, per se. I know people who run six toons at once. They are not obligated to invite me to their group. I get that. But it doesn't take away the fact that if the server I am on is just me and the six boxer, and they choose to never invite me into anything... as a solo player, I am going to get frustrated. I have been there, and as someone who now is able to do everything in group game outside of missions, I see both sides.

The anti-box arguments are including way too many straw-mans or taking facts out of context now.

Did I say you said that? Oh, I didn't.

Ok, let's assume you somehow ran into a person who trained, a guy who can't find the zone, and another one who never wants to buff.

Isn't this part of EQ. Since when is there some threshold everyone needs to reach, to group with?

Who here hasn't done some really stupid stuff in EQ? These are often some of the most memorable moments in EQ for me, where you meet someone who helps you.

Everyone started out as an idiot in EQ who had trouble finding his or her way around, everyone.

This is what EQ design has lead to? I only play with X, Y, Z, and I rather not interact with anyone if it affects my ability to get item X, Y, Z within a certain timespan?

Why are some of you playing EQ at that point? Why play a multiplayer game? Because bad grouping experiences happen in every single multiplayer game.

When you have bad experiences with random groups it tends to change how you make your groups. People play this game to enjoy themselves not to group with random people who also play the game. There is no way you can force people to group with random people who are looking for a group and trying to do so will not have the desired results.

Just because someone doesn't want to group with random people doesn't mean they are not grouping with others.

MMOs have thousands of hours of content when they get this old. Single player games don't, as a simple answer. But more importantly, who cares? People all have their own reasons for playing games the way they want or why they chose to play it in the first place. They're the ones making the choice and no one needs to justify why they're playing a certain game to anyone. Boxers aren't coming on the forums complaining about single players. This argument is a very one sided one. People are going to play the way they want to play because it's what they want to do.

It's not about being better than anyone else, though in some cases......

Forming a group to do something and immediately haivng someone say "lets go do X" which wasn't what the group was formed for, is a major turn off joining a PUG. On top of that you have the fools who think it is great to wander of where there are see invis or ninja AFK and leech exp half the night. There are also the ones who lack communication skills who cannot tell you if they have a quest open or even which step they are on. We are by far than perfect and make mistakes at times but there are an aweful lot of players that just cannot do the basics.

I am fortunate I have a regluar group to get things done, I also have the ability to box, molo and solo when I feel grouping with others will make me want to punch them.... my regular group does add people from general chat (guild does have priority) sometimes if we have a space, but we now have an ever growing list of "Do not group with again" for the reasons mentioned above. People don't make the effort any more to leave a good impression when joining a PUG.

My other half doesn't box, and I think at this stage creating a live truebox server wouldn't work. There are just too many people with friends who box that wouldn't want to leave them behind. There are also a lot of players on live who would not want to start over on a truebox server.

If you really don't want to be on a server where people box your only real option is to join a TLP truebox server. Although there has been a lot of calls lately to allow boxing on older TLP servers and unlock mercs earlier.

EQ is a victim of its own success with so much to do the player base gets spread out and with instances you don't see that many players anymore. Though with instances you don't have to deal with trains and people trying to take your named. Good and bad in everything.

Well, I'm a different player than you then. Meeting random people in a game is the best things for me about an MMO.

That random stranger that taught me how to recover my corpse is still on my friends list.

Again, why play a multiplayer game if you are so afraid to have a bad experience that you isolate yourself. Not every person you meet in real life will be to your liking, it's no different in games.

What's the point of isolating yourself from "random people" in a multiplayer game?

Protip: If you talk about Biden or Trump in General Chat, you will meet many people.

It being the best thing for you might be the complete opposite for others. You can coexist in the same game space and same environment. You just need to be more open to the fact that everyone enjoys this game for their own reasons and they may not align with what you think an MMO "should be" or the intent of what you think is required in a multiplayer game.

I have never understood the desire of EQ developers to keep making zone after zone, and to make them inaccessible at times.

As a TLP server progresses, not only do power gaps between players create a barrier to grouping, so does the fact many returning players can simply not locate the zone or the group within the zone.

I don't doubt it.

6 - 8 zones a year isn't much to add to a game to keep the players interested. We all need new places to die!

They need to keep giving the players char progression and things to do or the game will just die.

And it is great that you enjoy the game in that manner but you shouldn't try and force your views on others. Let people who want to box continue to box, people that want to play with groups of friends do that and those who want to from groups with anyone who is lfg do that as well. That way everyone is free to enjoy the game in the way they choose without forcing their views on others.

For many people the live servers is about raiding.

I know several of our guild hate the XP, AA, augs grind. Its just something they don't really want to waste time on.

Boxing continues to signal a false flag for the development team. Running a box crew turns EQ into a solo game, and we all agree boxing is a necessity because EQ is designed as a group based game with no grouping.

Why continue to develop group based content, when nobody wants to group? The tools don’t exist to facilitate easy grouping, adding additional people while hunting augs can be a negative, etc.

How can they promote EQ, as the “Definitive MMO Experience,” when nobody wants to play with each other?

I’ll repeat it again, boxing doesn’t need to restricted but the necessity to box needs to be addressed. In my opinion, it just makes the game healthier. Boxing, without a doubt keeps EQ running. I just would like to see less pressure to box either through easier open-world content, better mercs, multiple mercs, a functional LFG system.

If, I really had my wish though I’d like to see them build an Heroic Adventure type mission structure with NPCs being used to fill out the group, if you’re not a full group. For example, you have a Bard and Wiz and can’t get anyone else, so you select the NPCs for the 4 slots Tank, Healer, DPS, DPS. You can upgrade the NPCs or unlock new ones through progression/achievements. For monetization, make additional NPCs to be sold in the Marketplace or equipment/cosmetic purchases. Essentially, this is what the Overseer system should’ve been instead a knock-off WoW mission table.