recoil101
06-09-2011, 01:35 PM
Hey folks,
I'm a two boxer who doesn't use any keyclone type software. I like to control a tank/dps and healer/dps mainly for the slightly different challenge of doing things with a pair rather than solo. Obviously I have an advantage in that my pair are more powerful than a solo char but I've got a lot more buttons to press in combat!
I've read the posts here with great interest and picked up some wonderful tips so i thought I'd share the things I've learnt so that it might just help someone else who's trying to do a similar setup. The more experienced amongst you will, I'm sure, forgive me if I sound a little patronising, but I'll explain it from the beginning in case there's anyone reading this with no knowledge of two boxing. If anyone has any criticism or things to add then please do... I'm always to looking to learn new things and make my setup better :).
First off, my hardware and software. I use two pcs, my main pc runs the tank/ dps and a second old machine with a second account runs the healer/dps. I use Input Director (http://www.inputdirector.com/) which is a free piece of net control software. It allows me to use one mouse & keyboard connected to the main pc and 'flick' the mouse pointer across to the second monitor to easily control the secondary machine. Next up is my keyboard setup - I use a Logitech G15 keyboard, and a Logitech G13 Keypad (not cheap but a beautiful piece of kit) connected to the second machine. With the help of a USB extension cable I've been able to position the keypad just to the left of the keyboard. As a right handed person, this allows me to control the second machine, mainly during combat, with my left hand.
Right, LOTRO is up and running on each computer, the UI interface has been positioned how I want it, so the first question anyone attempting this usually asks is "How do I get my secondary char to follow the primary?". There are two stages to the way that I set this up, firstly the I need to set up a 'follow shortcut' on the secondary machine. Thanks, to previous posters (especially Eatcarbs) in this forum for giving me this info!
Type into the chat window :
/shortcut 49 /follow
In this example, the number 49 corresponds to the 49th button on your quickslots. If you do not have the full allocation of quickslots displayed then you should choose a lower number - just make sure that you don't pick one that you're already using. Once you've created the shortcut, feel free to drag it to any button that you like. I then go into the key mapping section of the options and map this button to G. Why G? why not....
So now if I press F2 (to target group member 1) followed by G on the secondary machine, I'll follow the char on the primary machine. Now the second part of of this setup is to map those key presses to a button on my G13 keypad. As it's a button that I'll be pressing a lot, I want to map it to my big accessible G22 button on the keypad. So I use the Logitech mapping software to record the pressing of F2 followed by the pressing of G. Great, now all I have to do is press one button on the keypad and my secondary character will start following the primary char like an obedient puppy (hopefully without the trail of puddles). Hang on, isn't this botting?? Well, strictly speaking I suppose it is in that we've mapped multiple key presses to one button, but this is NOT what MMO developers intended the 'no external macroing' rule to cover. They want to outlaw the use of afk botting, and I won't be afk... I'll be sitting there pressing the button. This is just simplifying the tedious part of non combat character control. I've never had any hassle from any GM in any game about this sort of thing, quite the opposite in fact. Many GMs are happy to discuss multiboxing methods and use of Logitech software. As long as we're not logging in, pressing a GO button and then leaving the pc while it kills 1,000s of mobs and earns 100s of gold, then most MMOs turn a blind eye to the odd bit of button reduction.
Anyway I digress. Back to the point. The next two buttons on the G13 that I want to setup are going to go a step further than my follow button. They are 'interact' buttons for the secondary char. The first is a 'Loot corpse' button. Thanks go to Visman amongst others on the forum for pointing me in the direction of this useful key combination. Example - i've been given a quest to collect some pieces of boar meat. No problem, I find a boar, beat it to death with a large metallic object, and my main character loots the spoils of war. Unfortunately my secondary character must also collect a piece of boar meat off the body and if I have to move my mouse across to the secondary machine, click the corpse to auto loot, and then press the G22 'follow' button every single time then I'll soon get a repetitive strain injury. So instead I kill it, loot it, press the G20 key on the keypad and immediately head my main off to the next target. The G20 key is set to do the following - (1) Press Shift F2 to assist the main who already has the corpse targeted because he has just looted his own quest item. (2) Press the G key which you'll remember I earlier linked to the /follow shortcut. This causes the secondary char ro run up to the corpse and ensures that we are in looting range. (3) Press the U key which by default is mapped to 'Use Selection' and in this case causes the char to loot. (4) press the F2 key to target the primary character and finally (5) Hit G to /follow the primary char again. This key is also useful for getting into range and interacting with a quest giver, opening a vendor etc and then following the primary again while you flick the mouse across to accept a quest or sell loot etc.
To sum that up :
Shift F2 - Assist Fellow 2
G - Shortcut to /follow
U - Use Selection
F2 - Select fellow 1
G - Shortcut to /follow
The next hotkey, G21 is the same idea but is called 'Use Object'. This has two main purposes, to gather quest items like piles of rock or flowers, and to harvest (if you are using this with a logitech keyboard or keypad then you'll need to fiddle with the delays a little to allow enough time to complete an action). This is basically the same as 'Loot Corpse' except that it uses 'Select Nearest Item' instead of 'Assist fellow 2'. The keys in order are :
DEL - Select Nearest Item
G - Shortcut to /follow
U - Use Selection
F2 - Select fellow 1
G - Shortcut to /follow
One other area you'll need to setup for the secondary character is the combat options in the options section. I'm not 100% sure that I've got these setup for the best results so the best advice is to take a look, and try things out.
A couple for special note are :
'Enable skill target forwarding' - This enables you to keep the primary char targeted so that you can heal but if you want to throw in some assist DPS then you can do this without having to swap targets. It'll pass the attacking spells straight through on to the primary's target. Nice.
'Enable movement assistance in combat' - Not really sure this is too useful for my setup as the secondary is not meleeing, but I have it ticked anyway.
Finally, it's not really a multibox tip but it's useful so here it is. Saving UI layout. If you use more than one monitor and have different resolutions then you'll notice that LOTRO saves it's UI layout server side. In other words, you spend ages setting everything up just right on the main machine, then you load that character ont he second machine and it b^$%£rs it all up! Well, the good news is that like Everquest 2, you can save/load an xml file containing your settings.
My characters UIs are basically the same layout so I get it all how I want it on one char then I use /ui layout save main_char. I can then use /ui layout load main_char on any alt to use this layout. I have another layout for the secondary machine with it's resolution. For more info see http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki//UI_Command.
Obviously I haven't even mentioned how I deal with combat, healing etc but hopefully this has consolidated a few bits of info together. Thanks again to previous posters in the forum for your helpful replys that have saved me weeks of trying to work things out for myself!!
Happy multiboxing! :D
Recoil
I'm a two boxer who doesn't use any keyclone type software. I like to control a tank/dps and healer/dps mainly for the slightly different challenge of doing things with a pair rather than solo. Obviously I have an advantage in that my pair are more powerful than a solo char but I've got a lot more buttons to press in combat!
I've read the posts here with great interest and picked up some wonderful tips so i thought I'd share the things I've learnt so that it might just help someone else who's trying to do a similar setup. The more experienced amongst you will, I'm sure, forgive me if I sound a little patronising, but I'll explain it from the beginning in case there's anyone reading this with no knowledge of two boxing. If anyone has any criticism or things to add then please do... I'm always to looking to learn new things and make my setup better :).
First off, my hardware and software. I use two pcs, my main pc runs the tank/ dps and a second old machine with a second account runs the healer/dps. I use Input Director (http://www.inputdirector.com/) which is a free piece of net control software. It allows me to use one mouse & keyboard connected to the main pc and 'flick' the mouse pointer across to the second monitor to easily control the secondary machine. Next up is my keyboard setup - I use a Logitech G15 keyboard, and a Logitech G13 Keypad (not cheap but a beautiful piece of kit) connected to the second machine. With the help of a USB extension cable I've been able to position the keypad just to the left of the keyboard. As a right handed person, this allows me to control the second machine, mainly during combat, with my left hand.
Right, LOTRO is up and running on each computer, the UI interface has been positioned how I want it, so the first question anyone attempting this usually asks is "How do I get my secondary char to follow the primary?". There are two stages to the way that I set this up, firstly the I need to set up a 'follow shortcut' on the secondary machine. Thanks, to previous posters (especially Eatcarbs) in this forum for giving me this info!
Type into the chat window :
/shortcut 49 /follow
In this example, the number 49 corresponds to the 49th button on your quickslots. If you do not have the full allocation of quickslots displayed then you should choose a lower number - just make sure that you don't pick one that you're already using. Once you've created the shortcut, feel free to drag it to any button that you like. I then go into the key mapping section of the options and map this button to G. Why G? why not....
So now if I press F2 (to target group member 1) followed by G on the secondary machine, I'll follow the char on the primary machine. Now the second part of of this setup is to map those key presses to a button on my G13 keypad. As it's a button that I'll be pressing a lot, I want to map it to my big accessible G22 button on the keypad. So I use the Logitech mapping software to record the pressing of F2 followed by the pressing of G. Great, now all I have to do is press one button on the keypad and my secondary character will start following the primary char like an obedient puppy (hopefully without the trail of puddles). Hang on, isn't this botting?? Well, strictly speaking I suppose it is in that we've mapped multiple key presses to one button, but this is NOT what MMO developers intended the 'no external macroing' rule to cover. They want to outlaw the use of afk botting, and I won't be afk... I'll be sitting there pressing the button. This is just simplifying the tedious part of non combat character control. I've never had any hassle from any GM in any game about this sort of thing, quite the opposite in fact. Many GMs are happy to discuss multiboxing methods and use of Logitech software. As long as we're not logging in, pressing a GO button and then leaving the pc while it kills 1,000s of mobs and earns 100s of gold, then most MMOs turn a blind eye to the odd bit of button reduction.
Anyway I digress. Back to the point. The next two buttons on the G13 that I want to setup are going to go a step further than my follow button. They are 'interact' buttons for the secondary char. The first is a 'Loot corpse' button. Thanks go to Visman amongst others on the forum for pointing me in the direction of this useful key combination. Example - i've been given a quest to collect some pieces of boar meat. No problem, I find a boar, beat it to death with a large metallic object, and my main character loots the spoils of war. Unfortunately my secondary character must also collect a piece of boar meat off the body and if I have to move my mouse across to the secondary machine, click the corpse to auto loot, and then press the G22 'follow' button every single time then I'll soon get a repetitive strain injury. So instead I kill it, loot it, press the G20 key on the keypad and immediately head my main off to the next target. The G20 key is set to do the following - (1) Press Shift F2 to assist the main who already has the corpse targeted because he has just looted his own quest item. (2) Press the G key which you'll remember I earlier linked to the /follow shortcut. This causes the secondary char ro run up to the corpse and ensures that we are in looting range. (3) Press the U key which by default is mapped to 'Use Selection' and in this case causes the char to loot. (4) press the F2 key to target the primary character and finally (5) Hit G to /follow the primary char again. This key is also useful for getting into range and interacting with a quest giver, opening a vendor etc and then following the primary again while you flick the mouse across to accept a quest or sell loot etc.
To sum that up :
Shift F2 - Assist Fellow 2
G - Shortcut to /follow
U - Use Selection
F2 - Select fellow 1
G - Shortcut to /follow
The next hotkey, G21 is the same idea but is called 'Use Object'. This has two main purposes, to gather quest items like piles of rock or flowers, and to harvest (if you are using this with a logitech keyboard or keypad then you'll need to fiddle with the delays a little to allow enough time to complete an action). This is basically the same as 'Loot Corpse' except that it uses 'Select Nearest Item' instead of 'Assist fellow 2'. The keys in order are :
DEL - Select Nearest Item
G - Shortcut to /follow
U - Use Selection
F2 - Select fellow 1
G - Shortcut to /follow
One other area you'll need to setup for the secondary character is the combat options in the options section. I'm not 100% sure that I've got these setup for the best results so the best advice is to take a look, and try things out.
A couple for special note are :
'Enable skill target forwarding' - This enables you to keep the primary char targeted so that you can heal but if you want to throw in some assist DPS then you can do this without having to swap targets. It'll pass the attacking spells straight through on to the primary's target. Nice.
'Enable movement assistance in combat' - Not really sure this is too useful for my setup as the secondary is not meleeing, but I have it ticked anyway.
Finally, it's not really a multibox tip but it's useful so here it is. Saving UI layout. If you use more than one monitor and have different resolutions then you'll notice that LOTRO saves it's UI layout server side. In other words, you spend ages setting everything up just right on the main machine, then you load that character ont he second machine and it b^$%£rs it all up! Well, the good news is that like Everquest 2, you can save/load an xml file containing your settings.
My characters UIs are basically the same layout so I get it all how I want it on one char then I use /ui layout save main_char. I can then use /ui layout load main_char on any alt to use this layout. I have another layout for the secondary machine with it's resolution. For more info see http://lorebook.lotro.com/wiki//UI_Command.
Obviously I haven't even mentioned how I deal with combat, healing etc but hopefully this has consolidated a few bits of info together. Thanks again to previous posters in the forum for your helpful replys that have saved me weeks of trying to work things out for myself!!
Happy multiboxing! :D
Recoil