Regarding Third Party Cheat Programs

If the programs are mentioned on page 1 of a google search for everquest cheat programs, I would say you are being way too cautious about not naming them.

Tbh, I agree with you there.
I don't see the harm in drawing attention to the programs at all, if their detection is as good as they claim.

It's not like people are stupid enough to think that, "we can 100% detect the use of xxx and we will perma ban you immediately", actually means; "woot! a new cheat program, better try it out!"(and if people are that stupid, they deserve that ban... ).

In real life we have laws prohibiting a lot of stuff, that are accurately named and specified. Lawmakers don't go: "we better not mention that stealing is illegal, people might discover the concept of stealing..."(no, Im not comparing stealing IRL and cheating in online games, Im just pointing out that being overly vague is silly)

This thread has been very enlightening. I had no idea so many cheats were being used in EQ. Are they being used in EQ2 also? And here I thought these people were just really good players. No wonder I feel so far behind when I don't use these cheats. I just pay my yearly subscription on 2 accounts (used to be 3 accounts but I really can't keep up with 3) and try to have fun. I feel like I have really been taken advantage of. It reminds me of how Diablo II was ruined by that power cheat that allowed you to create a super strong character and that took all the fun out of the game. It sounds like some players here are really getting an unfair advantage over others.

Tbh, I don't think cheating is that widespread. But the few people who are cheating, does it very openly and they justify it to themselves, by claiming on the forums that everyone does it...

If DBG's detection is good, they should have the real numbers...

That really depends on what people consider cheating. Personally, though others disagree, I do not find parsing programs to be cheating. I DO find buying anything that has any sort of in-game utility at all from the Marketplace (such as buying a house there to put trophies into so you can use them, or buying a bag, or buying an item for a proc or effect, such as a better stat mount) to be a level of “pay to win” which is itself a form of cheating, though ..

Personally, though I suspect the number of people using Innocent third party software is high - VoIP, parsers, utility things like that which do not directly affect the game itself - I suspect the number of people using cheating programs to be very LOW. The people saying that banning every user of them would cause DBG to fail are trying to Chicken Little their way to keeping the cheats usable.

Ban cheaters. Ban them HARD. The majority (99%+) of us will still be here.

If you find the game too tough to play without the use of some hacks ... then EQ isn’t the game you you anyway.

Yup they were better than you so they must have been cheating...
Paying 250 DBC for a house to put Trophies you earned in game is also cheating...

These forums are sad.

Making up stats much? I’m sure dbg has better knowledge about this, but there are 2318 unique downloads (stat from main site downloads text and the “red” sites memberdb) of the program code named “game genie” for the month of June this year... since game genie is used for boxing mostly I would guess all those people have more than one account...
You want all of them banned? Many have used it for years, are strong members of the community and love Everquest, they don’t warp, they don’t hack or monopolize content. They simply play a full group by themself...

This thread is ridiculous, bottom line is dbg run a business, don’t rock the boat. No matter how u spin it, multiboxers pay the bills...

And how many updates (test plus live) were done where they had to redownload the program? So much less than 2000.

Actually, using that software makes one a botter, not a multiboxer. Multiboxing requires multiple boxes, not one box to run them all

And if you think that “having used it for years” makes it acceptable .. try telling that to a policeman who pulled you over for speeding. “But officer, I’ve been speeding for years!!!” Point being - doing a wrong for a long time does not make it something right.

Stopping cheating is the right thing to do. As I said, if playing Everquest is too hard without cheating, then perhaps Everquest isn’t the game for you.

There is one patch a month where a download is required so usually just once a month. Lets say we give you half, so 1k members. And on average each member has 3 accounts (some have more, some only play 1). That's $45k a month in revenue for DBG and half a million a year. Not insignificant and I'm being on the more conservative side. Who cares if it's kronos or subscriptions. Someone has to buy those krono for boxers to use.

The thing is that even though some of these applications may make boxing easier it still doesn't fully automate them. It might do multi-string inputs to multiple windows so they can hit one button and activate auto attack or something but even I don't think that's fundamentally bad. It's one of the reasons why I only play three accounts. I don't feel like I'm proficient enough to play six at a time and be effective, I also do it manually though with no third-party software. I am sure after I get to a certain level the Mercs will be useless and I will wish I had a full group of real toons but at the moment the mercs generally outperform me just by the fact that their stat growth and "gear" scaling is busted. They do sooo much damage and having multiple heavy action classes is difficult to manage by myself.

I don't want to play even three classes, let alone six but grouping on a live server while trying to level is basically impossible and since I haven't been playing non-stop for the last 10 years I'm a bit behind on pp to pay for things like power leveling etc and I refuse to buy Krono, it just perpetuates the RMT problems I personally believe that EQ has. It's the happy medium I have found to get some leveling done. I wish I didn't have to, I would like to just pick out five mercs and be able to go and level my one class I want to play at a time, but it just isn't done that way and honestly if DBG came out and said, "You can use this program that will control five characters and that's totally fine" I would totally do that so I could stop triple boxing with mercs and be able to get my characters/classes I actually like to max level fairly simply. That also being said, if I could just auto-fill a group with Mercs I would also do that if it was an option because I really just want to enjoy one character at a time not like what I am doing now which is like, ok get this one in position, then switch windows and get this one in position and auto attack and then this one I need to do this on and oh crap, pulled aggro, need to flip back to window one and taunt, and then I need do cast this stuff here, and then switch windows and do this and cast these and then flip back to window two and blah blah blah blahadnsakndaskndakmwda it's super annoying which is why I end up boxing a chanter and bard and they just sit there afk 90% of the time just so I have more mercs that actually do something without me having to wish I had four extra arms and two extra heads.

Some months there are a bunch of little updates. Wasn't June one of those?

The majority of the little updates don't require a redownload, just the monthly big one. This isn't true 100% of the time, but generally once a month, maybe twice. You're also looking at the data from one wesbite, which isn't the only one. Google will show you the two/three.

Despite what you might think from my posts I am on your side insofar as it relates to active hacking (warping) and afk play. For truebox servers I think they should be left alone. I don't have a problem with a guy who really plays on 6 computers, but it does defeat some of the spirit of it. Maybe limit it to 2-3 as that's what actually happened back in the day (I two boxed on two computers). I don't play in the most recent content, and even when I do I try to include others if they wish to join. I stopped playing in POP/GoD era so there is a lot I never did. I enjoy being able to explore those areas at an appropriate level for some type of challenge. I can go in with a 105 and destroy it, but I don't find that very fun.

Some of you really need to stop trying to blur the line between automated bots and people playing multiple characters. Night and day difference and you know it. Just because you don't like people playing multiple characters, doesn't mean it shouldn't be happening.

If you think making all of the servers like the TLP TrueBox servers is going to make people like myself go OH! Hell, I guess I'll just play one char now and group with you all the time... you're dead wrong. It will instantly result in a loss of all of my accounts being paid for with Daybreak. I play like I do for a reason. I really don't give a damn that you don't like it. I don't automate any of my characters, I push buttons to make things happen on all of them which has always been the way things are supposed to be. My game play does NOT affect you in any way. I'm not available most of the time to group with you anyway. When I am, I *WILL* group with people.

Some of these posts are absolutely absurd. Buying a house for trophies that increase your stats is "cheating"? LOL...

this thread is approaching epic proportions ....lol

Your time, give it to me

Bwhahahaha!!!

Seriously. I haven't seen a fun thread like this since the PoP era!!

Its funny , they fixed the AE's on zek, after all the guilds felll (it greatly affected the damage guilds could do, on an allready hurt (population wise) server.....

Now they are going after cheaters, now that there are 0 guilds on zek.

I do appreciate you guys doing this, but where were you all those years we were petitioning, and posting on the forms?

Since there are people who regard using actual class abilities the way the class was set up as cheating and some of the most vocal anti-boxers coming from what for years was a totally illegal emulation server I find most all of the "ban the cheater" arguments to be without merit.

Daybreak owns the game and it's their decision what is or is not allowed