May 22

On the eighth of May I posted about my expirement with dual-boxing a set of characters with Recruit-A-Friend. As of yesterday, that experiment. With approximately 1 day and 20 hours /played, the priest and paladin are both level 60 (well, the Armory insists the pally is 59 but he’s definitely 60 .

Overall, the expirement went really well. I took the paladin along the path of retribution and just used Righteous Fury to hold aggro, while the priest went holy for improved healing and some DPS talents like Divine Fury, Searing Light, Holy Specialization and Surge of Light, along with Glyph of Smite. Mobs died quickly, and after the paladin got the replinishment effect it was difficult to run out of mana on either toon.

At level 56, while I was in the Plaguelands leveling, a guildie offered to run me through Scholomance and Stratholme. I gathered up all the quests and off we went. By the time we were done, both characters (the priest especially) had some nice blue (and a purple!) gear, and was about 30% from dinging level 61. So, now I’m taking my time leveling through Outland, with a focus on getting professions up to speed before I set foot in Northrend.

The experiement was a lot of fun, and though I considered doing the same thing with more characters (and I might in the future), for now I’m eager to get my priest to 80 and into heroics and raids, and my budday Neal and I are still doing our RAF with other characters.

Related posts:

1. Foray into Multiboxing: Introduction
2. Foray into Multiboxing: Dual-Boxing with Recruit-A-Friend
3. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 1
4. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 2
5. Levelin’ Like a Madman

May 8

It’s been a while since I posted anything in the Foray into Multiboxing category.The priest and paladin I was leveling on my old server, Shadowsong, go to about level 21 before I quit dual-boxing them. Part of the issue was that I moved servers, and let the second account die; the other part of the problem was the speed at which the character’s leveled.

In a group, the experience awarded by mobs drops due to the fact that it was easier to kill in a group. WoWWiki covers the math in detail, but in simple terms:

XP Gained = Mob’s XP / Number of Group Members * Modifier

Modifier is a constant that changes based on the number of people in the group; it’s higher in larger groups, so as to not punish people as much for running instances with full groups, etc. While playing solo, or in a two-person group, Modifier is 1.

In the end, assuming a two-person group (which is what I was running), and also assuming both characters are the same level (which they were), each character receives half the experience that a player killing the mob alone would receive. This makes the leveling experience when dual-boxing slower, and makes questing not only more efficient than grinding mobs, but practically required to make any decent headway at all.

However, Blizzard introduced once system that flipped that world upside down: Recruit-A-Friend. It was intended to get new players up to level more quickly so they could play with their high-level friends; the high-level friend would send an invitation, and for 90 days, the two accounts would be linked. For the duration, characters on both accounts receive 300% XP from everything assuming that (1) they are grouped together (2) they are relatively close to each other, and (3) they are within 3 levels of each other (if not, only the lower character gets the 300% XP).

So, the higher-level friend would create a new alt with his new WoW-playing noob buddy, and for every mob kill get 150% normal experience (the experience is split, making it 50%, and that is tripled, making 150% total), and 300% experience for every quest.

This is huge.

A friend and I have been leveling a few alts using the Recruit-A-Friend system. It is really… really fast. The 300% XP from quests is amazing–I’ve had quests give me half a level or more worth of experience.

At the same time, I’ve decided to dual-box again, this time using Recruit-A-Friend, during the times my buddy and I aren’t playing our RAF characters. 150% XP from mobs makes it much less painful to do, ie, quests where each character has to loot a certain number of items, and the 300% XP from quests makes practically every quest worth doing. Last night I started another pally/priest combo on my new server, and when I logged off they were level 10. I’m still using the same technology from my previous posts, so if you’re interested, be sure to check out the other posts in this category.

As time progresses, I’ll post some other information, tips, and tricks.

Related posts:

1. Foray into Multiboxing: RAF Experiment Done
2. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 1
3. Foray into Multiboxing: Introduction
4. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 2
5. Patch 2.3 and the Experience Curve

Feb 10

Sometimes determining afk status is not so straight forward.

Related posts:

1. Weekly WoW Bash: Yes, You Do Need Help
2. Weekly WoW Bash: Sounds Like a Raid to Me
3. Weekly WoW Bash: How to Spot a Noob
4. Weekly WoW Bash: No One Listens to That Rule
5. Weekly WoW Bash: Like Playing a Hunter

Jul 31

This installment of Foray into Multiboxing will cover the following topics:

• Resources for questions
• Getting the hardware and software you need
• Setting up your workspace and UI

Read more… »

Related posts:

1. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 1
2. Foray into Multiboxing: RAF Experiment Done
3. Foray into Multiboxing: Introduction
4. Foray into Multiboxing: Dual-Boxing with Recruit-A-Friend
5. Levelin’ Like a Madman

Jul 31

In this installment of Foray into Multiboxing, I will discuss the following topics:

• What is multiboxing?
• Why multibox?
• What immediate challenges will I face, and how do I overcome them?

Read more… »

Related posts:

1. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 2
2. Foray into Multiboxing: Dual-Boxing with Recruit-A-Friend
3. Foray into Multiboxing: Introduction
4. Foray into Multiboxing: RAF Experiment Done
5. Decisions

Jul 31

Being The Altoholic, I naturally have a lot of… well, alts. A few of them have made it to or close to the level cap, and a few of them are between 35 and 50. But, most of them are lower, many of them much lower.

Two classes I’ve always wanted to level but never really have are paladin and priest. I dearly want a pally tank, though a death knight tank could be cool as well, and I’ve always wanted to try a healer (just recently I took my druid resto, that’s my total sum of experience with healing) and maybe experience all this face melting everyone is talking about.

I’ve started a priest a few times, but never gotten one past level 10. I’ve also started a pally or five, and recently finally got one to around level 26. The pally, as many of you know, is absolutely painful to level (at least in many people’s opinion). The lack of things to do between auto attacks, especially in the lower level range, makes it a bit boring, and troublesome when fighting a lot of runners.

So this all got me to thinking: how could I make leveling these two classes less boring? I toyed with ideas back and forth, but nothing leapt out at me. Then, looking through my blue post tracker RSS feed, I saw yet another player complaining about multiboxers in PvP. Then it hit me: what if I leveled the pally and the priest at the same time?

Thus began my foray into multiboxing. Throughout this series of as-of-yet undetermined length, I will explore my experiences as a complete multiboxing noob, including tips, resources, and any thing else I personally find useful or interesting on the subject. Stay tuned!

Related posts:

1. Foray into Multiboxing: Dual-Boxing with Recruit-A-Friend
2. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 1
3. Foray into Multiboxing: Part 2
4. Foray into Multiboxing: RAF Experiment Done
5. Baby Healer Dings 80

Jul 30

The default UI in WoW is really good, and a lot of people use it (or something pretty close), but I love making my UI my own, setting it up exactly the way I want. In World of Warcraft, you do this through addons (or mods, though mods technically is not correct). The problem with addons is that first you have to find ones that work the way you want, then you have to keep them updated every patch.

I love addons. I have a lot. And, to help with one part of the problem outlined previously, I’m starting a new feature entitled “Mod Madness,” where I will bring you what you need to know about various addons.

Being The Altoholic, I naturally have a lot of alts. I thought it would be appropriate to start of the mod feature on just that addon: Altoholic.

Altoholic is all about making information about alternate characters, or your alts, available to you at any time. After the jump, we’ll take a more in-depth look at this addon.
Read more… »

Related posts:

1. Mods for 2.4 Coming Around
2. My Addon: Nice Try
3. Greetings
4. What to Do with the Banner?
5. My Favorite WotLK Change So Far

Jul 28

Digging back in the archives uncovers this awesome quote.

“What’s more worrying is that he’s a healer…”

Related posts:

1. Weekly WoW Bash: Yes, You Do Need Help
2. Weekly WoW Bash: Sounds Like a Raid to Me
3. Weekly WoW Bash: How to Spot a Noob
4. Weekly WoW Bash: No One Listens to That Rule
5. Weekly WoW Bash: Do I Gotta Explain It?

Jul 23

Why is it always so easy to identify noobs? And also liars?

Related posts:

1. Weekly WoW Bash: How to Spot a Noob
2. Weekly WoW Bash: Yes, You Do Need Help
3. Weekly WoW Bash: Sounds Like a Raid to Me
4. Weekly WoW Bash: Like Playing a Hunter
5. Weekly WoW Bash: Do I Gotta Explain It?

Jul 15

It’s not hard to spot a PvP noob. Some mature language.

Related posts:

1. Weekly WoW Bash: No One Listens to That Rule
2. Weekly WoW Bash: Yes, You Do Need Help
3. Weekly WoW Bash: Sounds Like a Raid to Me
4. Weekly WoW Bash: Like Playing a Hunter
5. Weekly WoW Bash: Do I Gotta Explain It?