I know the duo/2-box issues has been covered a lot on this board, but I haven't seen much on 3-boxing, which can be a very different experience.

Right now, I 2-box on occasion (with 2 desktop systems) but recently installed EQ onto my not-so-hot laptop to see if it would run. Well, it's lag city even with all clip plane/animations off, but I can actually do macros ok so I got to thinking I might try 3-boxing for a change, taking those limitations into account.

Anyway, my question is twofold:

<strong>1. What would your "ideal" 3-box group look like (assuming at least one would be a macro bot and one would be a Druid)?</strong>

<strong>2. What tactics would you use with that combination (e.g. fear kiting, traditional grouping, agro kiting, etc.)?</strong>

y hope is to one day get the trio PoP-capable but the reality is that they may not ever be flagged past Tier 2, just FYI.

Tks in advance.

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pre-pop you had alot of options, I enjoyed monk-rogue-druid. It was alot of fun and fast paced.

With pop, using any melee besides ranger I'd have to say you need to follow the traditional tank/healer/slow&haster mold.


I've heard lots of sucess w/ multiple charm classes, with maybe a cleric or ranger.

Clr/dru/pal - Typical tank, nuke, heal. Don't have to have slower if you're quick with the stuns.
Clr/dru/shm - Cleric tanks, others DoT and use pets.
Dru/shm/mag - agro kite or root dot and pet tank.
ag/dru/enc - agro kite or root and pet tank.. This one is harder if enc, dru or both don't have DC
Dru/mag/rng - druid agro kite, mage pet and nuke, ranger bow/arrow.. hotkeys are easy enough to set up, but, have to watch for wanderers going in path of arrow.. made that mistake a few times in PoStorms. :mad:
Dru/dru/dru - well.. you know the spells already. ;) All were level 62/63.

These are just ones that I've done and found to be the most fun, and hotkeys were easy to set up for all of them. Using charmed pets make it quite interesting, though stressful at times.. but certainly alot of fun. All were my characters except the other 2 druids and the ranger and enchanter, but in situations like I was using the ranger and enc, I didn't really need to know much about the character anyways. I'd like to do a dru/nec/shm combo sometime.. necro's are alot of fun to play.. but mine is still only level 38.

I'd suggest a enchanter/druid/(plate tank) combo. You can substitute the plate tank for a ranger, but unless that ranger gets pretty well equipped in PoP it won't really be able to tank. With your standard plate tank, with cultural, you can get a pretty decent HP plate tank.


Druid: Snare, evac, heals
Enchanter: Slow, tash, mana regen, speed, mez, indoor harmony

When it comes to the plate tank though, it really depends on what you want to deal with, though Paladin is probably the best of the three.

Warrior: High HP, low taunt ability without decent weapons, highly gear dependent.

Paladin: LoH, stuns (helps with taunt), root, group heals, access to good ratio 2hs/2hb weapons

Shadowknights: Lifetaps to help with aggro, access to good ratio 2hs/2hb weapons, FD (though not very reliable) to help with splits.

Tribotting in general:
As far as general tactics, I wouldn't really reccomend grouping with others, unless they happen to be friends. Friends will know your limits and give you some leeway in mistakes.

With the above combo with a TR/KR enabled druid, you can tank most mobs provided slow is done quickly.

For best performance, you'd probably want to macro the druid. The druid would have the most mana expenditure and really only would be casting heals or snares, so wouldn't be moving a lot. Leaving you free to have more mobility with the enchanter and the faster computer for mez, and kiting.

Fear Kiting in PoP isn't an option, most mobs above level 55 are fear immune.

Aggro Kiting in PoP is a 50/50 option with a combination of mobs unsnareable or summon.

My husband and I will often 3-box each other's characters, which are a 63 Druid, 65 Beastlord and 48 Shadowknight.

As it is right now, there's not much we can't do. Once the SK is nearer to 65, I expect we'll never really need anyone else aside from raid-type situations.

Our SK is an Ogre (which have awesome cultural armor, btw, if you consider an SK).

His Beastlord does most of the tanking now (he's maybe the 2nd or 3rd best equipped BST on the server though, so his HP isn't typical), but he really stands out with his damage dealing capabilities - coupled with some really awesome spells (Spiritual Dominion, Spiritual Vigor, Haste, Slow, etc) and we're an extremely self sufficient group.

The only thing we really lack is res.

Anyway, just some input from a non-typical 3-box combo. :)

-Laure

Make some friends and party with them :(

I'd recommend a Paladin and Enchanter to go with the druid.

The paladin has group heals and res and the ability to grab aggro and hold it, which is critical.

The enchanter can do crowd control, slow mobs, speed up the paladin, and give mana regen to the druid. For big mobs, just charm a PoP mob and go to town.

The druid will be the primary healer here, along with regens, dotting, nuking, buffing, and debuffing. Spike the paladin, and combine your Nines with the Paladin's symbol (or the paladin can just buy a shot of virtue from some cleric). If you run into trouble, root mobs off for the enchanter to mez, or use your quick evac.

My 3 boxing trio consists of Enchanter/Necro/Cleric and works really well, you could substitute the cleric with a druid.

IMHO when 3 boxing you really need 2 low maintenance characters that can be operated on one or two keypresses per fight allowing you to concentrate (mostly) on one, in my case the enchanter who charms/pulls/slows/hastes/deals with recharms and any adds etc.

I have the necro hotkeyed so that one keypress sends pet in, applies 2 dots and snares and cleric hotkeyed to heal when needed, which isnt very often! If things get too hot I simply fd the necro untill I get the situation under control and if I don't the nec rez's the cleric back and we are up and running again with the minimum of downtime.

Another advantage is the insane mana regen we have with c5 and necro mana taps on casting mobs allowing the cleric (or druid) to chain nuke for the most part if I am not feeling too lazy.

Great info thus far.

Rastus, could you give me an example of the Necro hotkey you mentioned? I've searched all over creation looking for a way to do more than 5 commands within a single hotkey and am just too dense to find one evidently ;)

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/pet attack,
dot 1
dot 2
snare

That looks like under 5 commands to me =/

Pauses can be put on the same line as another command, if that's what you were thinking of, so it'd be like:

/pet attack
/cast 1,
/cast 2, /pause xxx
/cast 3, /pause yyy

Pauses after a command actually take place before the command iirc. And you'd have to change the pause depending on cast time of the spells.

My actual hotkey setup is :

/pause 5,/assist <ench name>
/pause 5,/pet attack
/pause 70,/cast 6
/pause 70,/cast 7
/cast 4

You can play about with the pause timings a bit to suit the spell casting times you have memmed and I use the pauses in lines one and two otherwise you will sometimes do pet attack on a group member u have previously had targetted.

I'd have to vote for druid, necro, enchanter....now that would be a very powerful combination at 65. :)

Ahh, excellent. Yes the pause thing had me flummoxed. That was what I was referring to with the >5 lines comment. I will re-do my macros tonight :)

Primero Aventurero
63 Druid

btw, nobody mentions monks as multi-boxing tanks.

how come? They can't taunt enought? Or can't take enough hits?

Seems like FD would be nice for multiboxing

I had been debating a Monk before the nerf bat took a huge chunk out of their tanking ability. I'm not an expert on the class, but my guess is that they might have trouble holding aggro without some type of special proc, especially after the nerf to TR/KR.

Leaning towards a Pally/Chanter/Druid right now, btw.

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The monk nerf with pop, has even made rangers, that lived threw Kunark, grimace.

Best 3-box right now, is 2 enchaters, and a druid.

question for you all. As I've only played a pet class to lvl 20...

Wouldn't a pet class kinda suck in mult-boxing? They seem so hard to keep taunt. It seems like you wouldn't be able to keep them as a true tank most of the time. So that in the end, they would just get in the way.

Also, how come nobody seems to talk about a monk in multi-boxing?

the other day i dual boxed a shaman/druid and grouped with my warrior friend in valor. the exp was actualy better than most groups. with voq the shaman was able to keep dots on constantly and did most of hte healing while i blasted. Wasnt hard really either, beside charming this is a good combo :)

Best three box right now is the cleric, necro, enchanter.

y guildmate does it with 3 65's and the power is insane.

First the cleric is crucial for the quik heals and awsome buffs, you could use a druid but its easier with a cleric.

Chanter is the key since all the killing is done with charm since charmed pets fight like full groups.

Necro is the scout, dps, emergency resser.

This combination does things i would have never dreamed possible.

Pet classes rock in multi-boxing and charmed pets way out taunt any PC, or at least they do until you give them a PC to hit, then of course the mob will hit the PC over the NPC pet, however the PC tank will hold agro far better with a NPC pet assisting him. And taunt aside pet classes are far easier to multi, simply because you do not have to be constantly readjusting your position to keep the mobs within striking distance and in sight.

If you are only using summoned pets then yes you need to be a little more careful with your agro but it is still workable, one big advantage is that the healer can heal a pet all day long and draw no agro.

I've done Druid/enchanter/mage as well as Druid/enchanter/warrior. I'd take the mage any day. I imagine a necro would also be good.

First, the mage pet can follow the mob around on its own. With a melee character, you have to be constantly watching that screen and moving forward as the mob gets pushed backwards. All too often I look over at the warrior's screen and find that he hasn't been hitting the target for some time.

Second, the warrior is hugely dependant on gear upgrades that I don't have the time or plat to invest in. A naked mage can be effective in reality.

In a typical fight:

The druid (63):

- Heals
- Roots
- Snares
- Pulls
- Keeps a charmed pet

The enchanter (59):

- Tashes
- Slows
- Handles adds when they couldn't be parked by the druid
- Buffs (mmmm - 3 yellow to KEI :) )
- Uses ranged stun on the druid pet when charm breaks. One hit of "Whirl til you Hurl" stuns the former pet for 10 seconds. Plenty of time to retash, resnare, and recharm without taking a single hit.

The mage (51):

- Nukes
- Since he is lower level, tries to send pet in behind and after the druid pet is engaged. Charmed pet has far more hps and can tank better.
- Mage pet keeps mob occupied on charm breaks

how good is War/Shm/Rog @ 65?

how workable is that? is the Shm alone enough to keep the warrior alive? ;)