ISBoxer - OK to send multiple keys at same time?

I'm trying a few funky things with ISBoxer that I didn't do before, and I wanted to find out if anyone knows if it's OK for ISBoxer to send multiple keys each time I press a button. By that I mean:

I press 1 and ISBoxer sents 1,2,3,4,5 to all the clients one time. Kind of like if I press 12345 all at the same time with my hand. To me, this seems perfectly legit, since it's something I can do now by just taping a popsicle stick to my keyboard, but I wondered if anyone had done this before and if so, was it an issue? I wouldn't be doing multiple actions with a keystroke - it looks like if simultaneous keys are pressed the WoW client will only parse 1 of them at a time so it wouldn't have the risk of firing off two actions with one press.

Right now I use a modified version of the 2 step DPS key, except I have 7 steps (some slots are duplicates for spells I want to give priority if they proc) - it cycles through each step when I spam it (and I spam it about 4x/second) - so sending multiple keys at once seems like it would be a bit more efficient and let me not wear out my keys.

Any insights?

A self-reply in case anyone else was interested:
Lax told me in the chat that what I want to do is perfectly OK. Woot!

This is a relatively common question based on a flawed interpretation of something a GM was trying to explain a while back about the difference between botting and not botting.

What it boils down to is that spamming more than one key at the same time is not automation and doesn't make you a bot, any more than spamming one key. The game will prevent too many things from happening at once, e.g. via the global cooldown. It's perfectly fine to do this.

On the other hand if the question was "can I press a button and have it press 1, wait a sec, then press 2, wait a sec, then press 3, wait a sec, then press 4, wait a sec, then press 5" the answer is no, this would not be allowed. This would be called auto-fire or auto-repeat, etc. Note that pretty much any programmable keyboard, including officially licensed ones, have and even promote this kind of functionality. For example... Steel Series Cataclysm keyboard! http://steelseries.com/products/game...hift-cataclysm Licensed, approved, and even sold at BlizzCon in the Steel Series booth (when BlizzCon exists). Right side of the page under Steel Series Engine... "3. Record a sequence of actions, with delays included, and map them all to a single key"

So, FYI, if you or any multiboxer gets harassed about this kind of functionality, you have every right to use it. If you don't, then neither do Steel Series and Blizzard have the right to promote it with a Blizzard-licensed Steel Series keyboard.

Most of the extremely popular 4x Death Knight + 1x Something teams, are based off of Mosg2's priority system.
Teams using that system definitely mash numerous keys at once...
They have been around, for close to two full expansions of play.

I cannot really count the number of teams across all of the servers.
But am sure the number is large.

I play my team, almost exclusively in battlegrounds and for many hours a day; I'm pretty sure I get reported for cheating several times a day.
Blizzard can see exactly what I, and others, do.
And they don't have an issue with it.




Anything off of the Global Cooldown (GCD), can be freely used in conjunction with other stuff that is on the GCD.
So my Mind Freeze, is included in my basic spam.
As is the IWT keybind, which is sent to each melee member of the team, see: http://www.dual-boxing.com/threads/3...469#post312469

There are numerous abilities, each on the GCD, so limited in which can fire at a given time.
In my setup, see: http://www.dual-boxing.com/threads/3...n-DK-Manifesto ... a main ability is sent on Step 1.
And several secondary abilities on Step 2.

The idea being, the main ability gets used at every opportunity.
And randomly, one of the secondary abilities gets used as well, although you can stack 3x Frost Strike (keybinds) with 1x The Others, increasing the odds.
With sufficiently quick spam of the DPS key, to account for on-cooldown abilities being clicked often, you eventually click something not on cooldown.
I personally spam at 3.5 clicks a second, which keeps all my runes on cooldown and depletes the runic power at a decent rate.

Anyway, on one press and release cycle, I:
(Press)
-- Howling Blast macro
---- Howling Blast
---- Start Attack
---- Anti-Magic Shell
-- Interact With Target (to the Melee)
-- Mind Freeze rotation (to the DKs)
-- Pally Macro 1
---- Flash of Lights, with Holy Shock fall-through.
(Release)
-- Howling Blast macro
-- Frost Strike ability
-- Frost Strike ability
-- Necrotic Strike or Plague Strike ability
-- Death Coil ability
-- Pally Macro 2
---- Holy Shock x3, and Word of Glory.

That's quite a few actions (simultaneous keystrokes) off of my "1" key.




That would only be considered "botting", if I were to press the key once.
Stop pressing the key.
And continue to have the system execute things.

Even though I push several keys at once, only things that are allowed to fire off (everything off of the GCD, plus one thing that triggers a GCD) can fire off at the time the input is given to the game.
Everything that occurs, is a result of an input done at the time the ability fires off.
Nothing is executed/pressed/activated, after I stop giving the game inputs.

You cannot bot with IS Boxer.
There are no functions for that.

Thank you for the in-depth responses to this, and hopefully those answers will help other people.

A couple of things I noted: I can't send [, shift+[, ctrl+[ and alt+[ at the same time - the same key but with different modifiers. I can send [\.+ however, and it works fine. Additionally, I notice if I send more than 3 keys the client tends to omit many of them or behave erratically. So, the way I handled this is I just added another 2 steps - step 1 just sends "assist me" and the actual key pressed, step 2 sends 3 keys, step 3 sends those keys with shift, and so on, as needed. Everything fires off just fine now, and it's easy to manage.

The only question I have is about press/release - are we sure that's legit? For some reason, I vaguely recall someone somewhere (helpful, right?) saying that up/down having different actions was verboten, but I can't honestly remember where. But, since I'm a total spazz and don't mind mashing keys, I just made each step for my set-up fire on release. I'm sure it is totally cool, but it never hurts to get maximum clarity.

For what it's worth, I have this set up on my system now and it is glorious. It's really going to open up the door now for me to really enjoy mixed class teams that previously were very frustrating for me.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lax

So, FYI, if you or any multiboxer gets harassed about this kind of functionality, you have every right to use it. If you don't, then neither do Steel Series and Blizzard have the right to promote it with a Blizzard-licensed Steel Series keyboard.

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That logic is kinda flawed: none buys a keyboard just for the single purpose of playing wow. The fact that it offers extra features that can be used for other things besides WoW, doesn't legitimate the use of those features within wow - provided they are illegal. What you are basically implying is that Steelseries should make a keyboard which can't be used outside of wow, shipping with software that has limited functionality, and thus sell a keyboard that is subpar compared to the functionality competitors offer.

Or to use an absurd example: my local government provides cheap pruning shears (hand pruners in US I believe) for fuck knows what reason. The fact that you can cut off ones dick with it doesn't make it legal to do so.

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Originally Posted by zenga

That logic is kinda flawed: none buys a keyboard just for the single purpose of playing wow. The fact that it offers extra features that can be used for other things besides WoW, doesn't legitimate the use of those features within wow - provided they are illegal. What you are basically implying is that Steelseries should make a keyboard which can't be used outside of wow, shipping with software that has limited functionality, and thus sell a keyboard that is subpar compared to the functionality competitors offer.

Or to use an absurd example: my local government provides cheap pruning shears (hand pruners in US I believe) for fuck knows what reason. The fact that you can cut off ones dick with it doesn't make it legal to do so.

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I think what Lax was getting at was that Blizzard is explicitly promoting this keyboard for use with WoW, a key feature of which is the ability to do these kinds of things. Why would they advertise a device and specifically cite certain features as reasons to buy it, but then punish people who actually use those features?

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Originally Posted by kate

A couple of things I noted: I can't send [, shift+[, ctrl+[ and alt+[ at the same time - the same key but with different modifiers.

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If you hold down CTRL, ALT, SHIFT, and [ at the same time... how do think the game sees it?

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Originally Posted by MiRai

If you hold down CTRL, ALT, SHIFT, and [ at the same time... how do think the game sees it?

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I hadn't realized until that point that ISBoxer was sending exactly the same information and in exactly the same way and at exactly the same time as my keyboard if I were to have it send multiple keys in one step - for some reason I imagined it might be sending a stream of keystrokes, so it might have been as if someone were very quickly changing the modifier keys they were holding down while spamming [ or something like that. Possibly silly, but I try not to take things like that for granted. Better to ask and learn something than just assume and remain in ignorance, I say.

Edited for clarity.

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Originally Posted by zenga

That logic is kinda flawed: none buys a keyboard just for the single purpose of playing wow. The fact that it offers extra features that can be used for other things besides WoW, doesn't legitimate the use of those features within wow - provided they are illegal. What you are basically implying is that Steelseries should make a keyboard which can't be used outside of wow, shipping with software that has limited functionality, and thus sell a keyboard that is subpar compared to the functionality competitors offer.

Or to use an absurd example: my local government provides cheap pruning shears (hand pruners in US I believe) for fuck knows what reason. The fact that you can cut off ones dick with it doesn't make it legal to do so.

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No.. what I am saying is that keyboard is specifically licensed for use with WoW, promoted for use with WoW, Blizzard will even help sell it to you, and this is one of the features prominently advertised without even a hint that it could possibly get you in any trouble. In fact, by looking at the advertisement (e.g. the linked page), any normal person would be absolutely convinced that this feature is both designed for, and okay with, World of Warcraft. (I'd wager, in fact, that more people use those keyboards and those features than people around here realize...) The same goes for other games as well.

Your analogy is flawed because the pruning shears are not being sold with a label that says "chop off your dick with our dick chopper offer". It's sold as pruning shears. The keyboard is promoted as a tool specifically to gain advantages in the game, and that's exactly why Joe Shmoe would buy this keyboard.

They can not legally promote the use of this tool in the game while simultaneously banning you for using it as advertised, and they also have to its treat competitors fairly.

The feature set isn't available in ISBoxer (or planned) anyway.

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I hadn't realized until that point that ISBoxer was sending exactly the same information and in exactly the same way and at exactly the same time as my keyboard if I were to have it send multiple keys in one step - for some reason I imagined it might be sending a stream of keystrokes, so it might have been as if someone were very quickly changing the modifier keys they were holding down while spamming [ or something like that. Possibly silly, but I try not to take things like that for granted. Better to ask and learn something than just assume and remain in ignorance, I say.

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HOWTO Configure ISBoxer like a Pro: DPS Rotation has some tips on different ways to split that up :)

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Originally Posted by kate

Thank you for the in-depth responses to this, and hopefully those answers will help other people.

A couple of things I noted: I can't send [, shift+[, ctrl+[ and alt+[ at the same time - the same key but with different modifiers. I can send [\.+ however, and it works fine. Additionally, I notice if I send more than 3 keys the client tends to omit many of them or behave erratically. So, the way I handled this is I just added another 2 steps - step 1 just sends "assist me" and the actual key pressed, step 2 sends 3 keys, step 3 sends those keys with shift, and so on, as needed. Everything fires off just fine now, and it's easy to manage.

The only question I have is about press/release - are we sure that's legit? For some reason, I vaguely recall someone somewhere (helpful, right?) saying that up/down having different actions was verboten, but I can't honestly remember where. But, since I'm a total spazz and don't mind mashing keys, I just made each step for my set-up fire on release. I'm sure it is totally cool, but it never hurts to get maximum clarity.

For what it's worth, I have this set up on my system now and it is glorious. It's really going to open up the door now for me to really enjoy mixed class teams that previously were very frustrating for me.

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I would generally make a mapped key.
It will output whatever you want, to whatever targets.

My approach is something like this:

Mapped Key A
No Hotkey
Sends this keybind to WoW
Target: Current Window

Another mapped key
Has a Hotkey
Do Mapped Key Action > Mapped Key A > In Whatever Keymap > Target: (An ATG with three toons in it)
Do Mapped Key Action > Mapped Key B > In Whatever Keymap > Target: (An ATG with three toons in it)
Etc...





Blizzard has not explicitly allowed actions on press and release.
However, the functionality exists for addons to use, because Blizzard has included that ability in their Keyboard API.

The option to use that feature is only there because Blizzard put it there.
If they decide against it in the future, they can remove it from the Keyboard API.

Numerous (not sure how many, but would guess thousands) of players use addons and/or software that does things on press and/or on release.
Blizzard has had zero issues with any of that.

With regards to mapped keys, I would have to create the mapped keys for each of the sub keys, right? Like right now I do not have [ mapped in ISBoxer to broadcast, individually, I only broadcast them as part of my mapped key for my DPS spamming buttons. Basically, They key press for 1 is a 3-step key map that happens to send several keys that are not themselves mapped.

What you seem to be suggesting is that I should add the individual sub-keys that currently aren't mapped. Is there a benefit to doing this that I'm not aware of? I mean, other than being able to have a more fine-grained bility to send the abilities that are on the slots bound to hose individual keys?

I have my action bars in game set up in a standardized way and with more or less equivalent functionality on each spot for all classes (ex: f is my taunt/feint/feign death/fade spot depending on the class and role since its intended to give the tank aggro/reduce aggro on non-tanks), which I would have to do anyway for either my method or yours where I have more mapped keys. Ideally I don't want to put in too much extra stuff I won't use (I never hit the [ key because my right hand is on my mouse, and that's actually part of why I use it in the priority spammer setup I have now) so I'm just making sure I am not missing something obvious with your system, especially since you usually have really brilliant stuff!

There are several methods you can use.

I like to have a mapped key.
No hotkey.
Target is Current Window.
And it does whatever:
a) Keystroke Action (macro, in Warcraft); or
b) Named Warcraft Macro Action (macro, stored in IS Boxer)


As an example...
Mapped Key: Melee IWT
Action: Keystroke Action > My WoW IWT Keybind
Target: Current Window




Then you have a mapped key you will activate via a hotkey.
Or another mapped key.

Decide which toons want to use a given mapped key.
Decide by Slot number.
Or by Character Name.
Or by putting toons into logical groups, such as all your Melee into an Action Target Group (ATG) named Melee.

So this mapped key calls the previously made key.
Do Mapped Key Action > Melee IWT > Target: Group (all of) Melee [The ATG with Melee in it].

The mapped key that is calling the others, determines the target or targets.
The called mapped key, is current window only.
The calling mapped key, calls the mapped key for every target you would like it to execute for.

Hope that makes it clearer.