I am (almost) back!

[Kaynin]

I've been gone a long time form multiboxing, but I've been itching to get back the past few weeks, played WoW solo a while and although I definatly see a lot more challenges for PvE, I figure PvP (arena) multiboxing is probably pretty much dead nowadays, and battleground farming is boring to me.. So PvE it is!

Anyway, I'm thinking of doing a quad box for PvE, 4 manning heroics, like I used to, so I can always bring along a friend too. Definatly a multiclass set up this time, when I boxed in burning crusade, shamans were all the rage, but I guess that's pretty much over.

Still not sure which 4 classes I want to go with. Probably a warrior or druid tank, a shaman healer, a priest dps and a hunter dps. I figure that would be a nice set up. Already got a druid and a shaman at 85 anyway, so would save me some trouble leveling toons. :>

Anyway, I got some new learning to do, see what's been changed. Is keyclone still supported? I'll guess I'll browse and find out. Well, to all who remember me, hi again! And to those who don't, nice to meet ya. :D

[thefunk]

Welcome back!

DK's are strong at the moment, so are mages but you know how it goes...every class will have its time!

Keyclone is still working but not actively supported like back in the day. Check innerspace/isboxer, next gen software.

[valkry]

Yea keyclone still works, it's what I use. Personally I LOVE the pally tank, just so easy :P

You will enjoy the LFR, i basically just made raiding viable for multiboxers :P

[Kaynin]

Raiding was always viable for multiboxers. I did fine in wotlk at least. :p

I decided on my team, since I already have a feral druid and a resto shaman at 85, I am going to use them, and I started leveling two hunters as dps for my 4man pve team, im also leveling my other 3 shammies to maybe do a bit of quad shammy pvp in the future, but focusing on my pve team first. :D

I checked out and bought ISboxer, and although its definately what I would use if I didn't already know how to set up ftl in keyclone, I think im sticking to keyclone for now while im leveling my hunters. I'm currently using fullscreen instance on my lcd tv with alt tabbing, and since im leveling with just two for now, setting up ftl keymaps and macro's was easy. Eventually I'll use a multiscreen set up when I've leveled them all up though, ISboxer does seem much stronger in that regard. (switching screens that is. But other then that I see no advantage of using ISboxer over keyclone as far as I could tell from trying out ISboxer.)

Just got to level 5 dualboxing two hunters and I'm already addicted all over, hehe. :D

[Ualaa]

A few things to consider...
Not bashing KC at all, I loved the product and it got me into boxing.
But IS Boxer is the program to use for boxing, its exponentially better than everything else (HKN is probably the closest, lacking a few features and the graphical configuration interface).

Keyclone has broadcasting, where you push a key and everyone gets that key.
You can blacklist keys so when you push it, it is not broadcast.
Or you can whitelist a key, so only those are broadcast.
You can also have something on a given keybind for one toon but not for the others.

With IS Boxer, there are essentially two methods of broadcasting.
There is Repeater (which by default is both Keyboard and Mouse, but can be split into separate toggles), which is exactly like Broadcasting with Keyclone; and you can blacklist/whitelist keys to go with it...
But there are also Keymaps (which are groups of mapped keys).

Mapped Keys can have a variety of options, such as Window: Current, Window: Others without Current, Window: All, a pre-defined group (Action Target Group), specific character slot numbers, etc.
A major advantage of this, is having everyone with all spells and keybindings set the same, so you can one-box any of them with the same keys you already know.
But then use mapped keys, for your team... which will round-robin say your "6" key, when you launch as a team.
And which will send "4" to your current window only, without needing to have something on that key for your lead but not on that key for your slaves.

A repeater region is a phenomenal feature for healing.
It is a region, where broadcasting is enabled and sent to the client (slot) or group (Action Target Group) of your choice, but only while the mouse is in the region.
Combine this with Healbot, Vuhdo or Grid + GridCustom Layouts + Clique, and you have mouse based (click based) heals/buffs/cleanse/etc from any window to your healer without macros or keybinds.
I have a repeater region over the Jamba item bar, so when I click on the alchemist flask, they all click on it together.

My Death Knights have two "Send Next Click" mapped keys for Death and Decay.
In Warcraft they all have D&D on keybind Shift + A (so I could one-box any of them, and use the same keybind I'm used to while boxing).
Alt + A, does:
- Sends Shift A, to my Action Target Group of the DK's (four DK's in the group), but round-robin'd in the order they were invited to that group... so press 1 = DK 1, press 2 = DK 2.
- Sends Next Click to my DK ATG, which being the same group will be the same ordering.
A "Send Next Click", activates the mouse in the slave window, complete with a targeting circle that moves in real time, without any delay... and as soon as you click in the master window, the target (and only that window) receives the appropriate click, and then broadcasting is disabled.
Shift + A, does almost the same thing.
- All of the DK's receive the Next Click action at once, so the D&D is stacked in the same place (or very similar, subject to camera angle differences... which could be sync'd with a /setview type action), and the Paladin does Consecrate too.
The mouse broadcasting was the original main selling point, on what motivated me to switch to IS Boxer.

The instant swap from one window to another was another selling point.
At the time, there was basically one type of layout, whether across one screen (monitor) or several.
You had a main region and slave regions (picture in picture) or each with their own portion of the screen/screens.
Now there are layered options too, which can be stacked on top of eachother... so each is full screen all the time, and you choose which one is visible at any given point.
You can also now have "blank" windows with nothing shown... and use "video feeds" to see select portions of the other windows that are behind the current window.
Instant Swap is a major feature that I would be extremely unhappy losing, if I went back to KC.

The power of the mapped keys...
While I didn't switch to IS Boxer for them...
They're the strongest feature, in my opinion.
For example, when I switch from one toon to another it runs a mapped key that does several things.
One is that the current window gets a "High Settings" mapped key run, while the other windows (Target: Windows Other Without Current) run a "Low Settings" mapped key... essentially every active/main window plays with all the eye candy, while the other windows have minimal options for smoother play.

The auto FTL is extremely nice too.
Run a wizard, and instantly have several FTL Keys which can be configured quite easily.
You can adapt this too.
FTL is based off of three FTL keys, which are referenced via a "Do Mapped Key" action.
These are: FTL Target Me, FTL Assist Me, and FTL Follow Me.
The target is usually the Other Windows.
But I've copied the mapped key, and then changed the target to a specific character.
For example, on my mixed team the key is "Priest Target Me", which then allows me to round-robin: Power Word: Shield or Renew via spamming a key a little.
I could accomplish the same, via Clique/Grid and the Repeater Region.

I've not looked at ClickBars all that carefully, since I'm used to what I have and prefer to use the Keyboard as much as possible.
However, you can set a region of the screen to respond to mouse clicks.
Where a click runs a mapped key, rather than a keybind running that mapped key.
And you can choose which graphic to show.
So if you want to have an icon to click, instead of a key to push... that is an option too.

Virtual Files are nice too.
The equivalent of Config.wtf exists for each of your toons.
So you can have whatever sound/video options you want on a per toon basis.
And you can virtualize any file you want, so you could in theory have addons virtualized such that boxing you have one set of unit frames, but when solo and not using IS Boxer and its virtualized files you would then have a totally different unit frame positioning for the same character.

[Kaynin]

Hmm, I'm having trouble setting up my keymaps in ISboxer to be honest. I tried to run my keyclone ftl maps with ISboxer for the regions/swapping part. But running them both will make my windows swap just by moving my mouse around. Which I dont think I even have broadcasted. Hmm.

I'm not a clicker myself, I'll be boxing solely with keybinds and I'll be maining my healer so no problem there either.

All I want is to get this FTL to work in ISboxer, but the GUI is a pain, every time I try to set it up, it auto adds a ton of mappings that I dont want. I do better with notepad. :<

Well, I'll try to get ISboxer to work as well as keyclone. Let ya know if I've managed. :p

[thefunk]

I'd be interested to see what you're struggling with but Lax is a better person to explain (it's his software after all).

FTL is automatically created when you use the wizard for keybinds 1-9 (and 0,-,=). You can always add more as you wish by copying an existing mapped key. It kinda takes all the pain out of setting up new teams.

[Kaynin]

I deleted all standard mappings since I wont use any of those. I figured out how to drag stuff from the 'main' tree to the 'other' tree or whatever that means and found out how to map keys, so think I'll be fine now. Altho my first test in running IS, it didn't broadcast any of the keys I had mapped. But I'll figure it out eventually.

[Kaynin]

I do have one question tho, why is actiosn on key releases default, is that better then actions on key presses?

[Ualaa]

The Warcraft default was originally on key release.
A few years ago, they added the Keyboard API functions which let us use: on press or on release as separate events.

When you make a change within the Toolkit, you need to export to Inner Space (File Menu), before the changes take effect.
If you're in game, a lot of the time you'll also need to /console Reloadui, for the changes to take effect.
Other than that, you'll need to ensure the IS Boxer (addon) is enabled, which it sounds like it is, otherwise nothing would be working.





Understanding FTL within IS Boxer...
There are three FTL Keys, which are frequently referenced and allow other keys to benefit from FTL.
There are: FTL Follow Me, FTL Assist Me, and FTL Target Me.
The DPS 1 (mapped key), in the FTL Keymap does this.
- Do Mapped Key Action (Target: Current Window) > FTL Assist Me.
- Keystroke Action (Target: All Windows) > Sends warcraft the "1" key.

The FTL Assist Me mapped key, is run from the current window.
So that is the window where the command originates.
The actual mapped key that is called, has (from the target window's point of view) the other windows assist them.

The wizard auto generates the FTL modifiers to use for each slot/character, when it is run.
You can change which modifiers you'd like used, but as long as each toon has a unique set, it doesn't matter which modifiers each uses.
The only time these modifiers come into play are when one of the three FTL mapped keys are used.
So, having Alt set for a toon does not impact in any way your ability to use Alt as a hotkey (Alt + A, for example).





I like to have somewhat differing configurations for my assorted teams.

As in, pressing "5" might be a "Send Next Click" action for my Druids (Force of Nature).
But it might be the default FTL Assist Me > Send "5" to all windows, for most of my other teams.
And for another team, it could be a round-robin effect.

If I were to change the default FTL DPS mapped key, the software wouldn't know which application I want.

However, if you click on your Character Set name, under Character Sets (top left window, in the Toolkit), then reference the bottom left window.
Notice Key Maps, which by default shows Control, General and FTL DPS keymaps.

I've taken the wizard generated FTL DPS Keys (Keymap) and copied it for each of my teams.
Then renamed that copied Key Map, after the name of the character set.
Going back to the lower left pane, under Key Maps...
Drag your newly created Key Map (from the top left pane) onto the word: Key Maps (bottom left pane).
Now you should see four Key Maps that apply to this team.
Right click (bottom left pane) on the FTL DPS Keys (Key Map) and delete it from this team; that way you don't have conflicts where the hotkey "1" tries to do two things, once for each Key Map.

If you left click on Key Maps, again in the bottom left pane, on the bottom right pane it shows a list of all your Key Maps.
I really like the "White List" option, and then check (so its highlighted in Blue) only Control + General + The_Team_Specific_Keymap.
That tells IS Boxer, no other Key Maps will ever apply to this team.
Which is important, for our last step.

In the Control Keymap (left click on Control, in the top left pane), you can see the various mapped keys in the bottom left pane.
One is called Activate Maps.
Clicking the "plus" sign expands the mapped key.
We see that there are two steps.
(Steps are subsequent different things that happen, on iterative presses of the same key).
Clicking the first step (bottom left pane), we see that several Key Maps are enabled for (Target: All).
I like to add, Actions (Right Click) > Key Map Actions > Key Map State Action > (Target: The desired character set) Their_Key_Map to "On".
And on step two, to do the reverse.
Once you have an action there (on or off), its often easier to copy/paste and then edit the mapped key for the desired effect.

The Control Key Map, is always on and never gets turned off.
Only put things here, that you always want access to (generally nothing with a hotkey, as a hotkey here cannot be disabled -- so it might interfere with chatting or entering your log in password).
Unless you add the team specific Key Map (in the above paragraph) to the Key Map toggle, it will remain on always.





In my signature is a guide to IS Boxer.
I recommend taking a look at the Key Map section.

A lot of the mapped keys are now generated by the wizard, so are unnecessary to add to your configuration.

Still, the first example assumes you know next to nothing.
And they slowly build on what the previous stuff has shown.
Even if you don't implement much of those Mapped Keys into your personal set up...
The process of interacting with the Toolkit, will build a "working knowledge" on how the Toolkit works.

[Kaynin]

Great info, helped me lots in understanding how ISboxer works as opposed to keyclone.

I've started running and trying out a few boxes, still not sure which classes I eventually want to go with, but I'll figure something out. :P

Thanks for the help, much appreciated.

[Kaynin]

I have decided on a DK tank and 4x elemental shaman team. With decent enough gear (at least on the DK) I reckon I can easily do any 5 man. I've played around as a resto shaman healer on 85, and have found some DK tanks to be super uber and least stressfu for a healer to heal. Sometimes my earth shield is enough on them, haha. And now that I am leveling my DK, I have to agree that DK's are very easy to tank with as well, I still dont have all skills, but right now, DnD/DG start and Deathstrike/Heartstrike/runestrike spam is enough to keep aggro on most mobs, tabbing a few times to be sure, and does a lot of dps too. And since ele shammies do most DPS on mob packs with chainlightning, I won't really have to worry much about targeting on them either. :D

DK's require very little micromanagement and ele dps is still easy to macro as well, and I'm also positive I can play all of them as a secundary char. So I'm free to choose my main as my wish per encounter.


Woo, I'm so excited already, it wil take a while when all my chars are the same level though, so still not much boxing going on right now. :P

[Ashley]

http://img380.imageshack.us/img380/8015/raidresizedpo7.jpg

Welcome back Kaynin <3

Get yourself to Outland Alliance and play with me like old times :3 I'm currently doing 10 shamans at 85 and just geared a prot warrior and holy pala for pve :>

[Kaynin]

Hahaha, that picture is so old. :D I must have still been leveling them up to 70, judging from their gear around 65ish. :D You never went very active on Sporeggar though, did you? :P


Anyhow, I'm not joining you on Outlands :( , even though I've also boxed with those four shammies there, on horde that is. :P

But I just migrated to Grim Batol and joined Gimp myself. And it is much to my liking. :)

[Ashley]

whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat! You was on Outland? When? As Who? I've been here for two years!

Yeah I can't remember what happened, used to box on a laptop, got bored perhaps, did a stint on Jaedenar PVP too with 1 pala 4 shamans. Took another break and then came back with 5 shamans on Outland and now I'm 10 boxing :>

We've a level 25 multiboxing guild on Outland too, same sort of set up as Gimp, but our realm is one of the highest pops so we get to queue :(

[Kaynin]

During Wotlk, I was playing them as four female tauren shammies on horde called Caniika, canilka, canlika and canllka. Did mostly PvE though, not PvP like I did in tbc.

I think I was the first boxer with undying titles and among the few first that did kara 10 and such. Was active back then on DB as well. Anyhow, I quit wow and only just came back to wow, my dk is level 80 now and so are 3 of my shammies, and one shammy is 85, but since I leveled that one on alliance, all quests are reset to, so going to level them all up now in cata. Dont expect to do too much at 85 tho, just need them ready for mists. :>

I've been working a lot the past few days so a bit inacive, and now I'm trying to make my own wow addon, so thats keeping me a bit busy, but I'll be 85 soon enough I expect. :>