New guy non sticky questions.

[Brennomisue]

1) do you recommend a full working knowledge of macros before attempting to box or can I just copy everything I need?
I'm still fairly new and am just looking into macros myself, I can clear anything (except those damned scarlet instances) at the currently level with little issue without. Simply putting your Single Target spell, your Instant spell, and an AoE spell on matching button seems to work well enough till heroic content IMO.

2) easiest and common pitfall to boxing?
I'm not really sure If I can think of anything that someone hasn't already mentioned!

3) if I can box two can I box five or is there a different learning curve?
I'd say it is a little different. First the more toons you box, the more chances there are for something to get messed up, like a toon getting caught on a wall, or one not turning in a quest. Usually not a big deal once you get used to it, the only other thing that I think makes a big difference is using a non-passive healer is quite different. But if you can manage to two box you should(tm) manage to 5 box.

4) what do you hate and groan about this hobby?
Two things. Getting ganked sucks, I wouldn't say its five times as painful, but its a bit more annoying; with cross-realm zones camping is even more common at high populated areas, such as HFP and Mount Hyjal were I try to go to do the first 20 or so quests to catch up in some slots of gear. The other thing is the reworked dungeons are a pain in the pooper! Scarlet Halls? FORGET IT! Dark Master in Scholo? On a new account with no BoAs and not the best team comp/dps is a pain!

5) what do you love about it?
Everything else. I love the feeling of it and how I can *solo* most things. Even though Dark Master took me an hour to kill, I killed him, its almost like raid progression. That feeling is always a rush! The unique challenge it brings to games is just so amazing.

6) what do you box class- wise and why would you recommend it?
Currently with the new set of accounts (no BoAs) I wanted something that could pull decent dps and not have to worry about healing. So I went 1 Prot Pally and 4 Disc Priests. They have some sick burst and you rarely die once you hit 37(I think) and get atonement. The biggest flaw in this team is no AoE till 76, and it isn't very powerful even when you do get it. Its a slow but safe group comp.
The group comp that I would recommend for your first team is 1 pally 3 sham and any healer (a different armor type would be nice). They abilities of the pally and shams (ele) has such good synergy you don't need ANY macros till level cap. Put Chain lightning on the same button as Hammer of the Righteous, Lighting Bolt on Crusader Strike, Earth/fire/frost shock on Judgment, and Lava Lash on Avenger's Shield and you have yourself and very strong as well working team!

[zenga]

Scarlet Halls? FORGET IT!

Comon man, can't sell that as fact to aspiring boxers. That instance is very doable on heroic without outgearing it completely. Not sure what you have trouble with, but might want to create a thread for help if you have trouble.

At the same time this is a good example of the life of a multiboxer: what seems to be like a giant brick wall for one can become a non fact the next day after another boxer shared his strategy with you. A good memory remains the ICC dungeons. The first boss in the pit of saron was 'incredibly hard', until a multiboxer shared the tip to put your team at the bottom of the stairs and just move left/right, after which it became a piece of cake.

[MiRai]

I'm going to say that this totally depends on your understanding of the respective specs/classes. My major objection is that having fun while multiboxing pve is more important than anything: if you went for 3x the same classes and don't find it interesting at say level 74, it might be quite a task to throw all that work out of the window and start over from scratch. Whereas if you go for e.g. 3 different casters you can macro the very basic spells first as you progress through the dungeons and work from there to further optimise your setup.

If you have no clue about how most classes work, you might want to stick with a more uniform setup. If you do have some experience (read: if you are not complete garbage at the game in single player mode) there is for starters little difference between running tripple ele shamans or an ele/arcane mage/hunter as your dps.

I would say the amount of people that are able to start multiboxing a tank/dps/healer comp for their first team (w/o any real headaches) on day one are < 10%.

When I say "basics" I mean multiboxing basics, not class basics. Follow, assist, interact with target, etc -- This doesn't take 74 levels to get used to. Once someone is comfortable with those basics, then they can move on to bigger and better things like mixed teams and what not; but I always recommend that new multiboxers create at least one throwaway team that they can just mess around on and learn how to fix things when they screw them up.

The other thing is the reworked dungeons are a pain in the pooper! Scarlet Halls? FORGET IT! Dark Master in Scholo? On a new account with no BoAs and not the best team comp/dps is a pain!

I have to agree with zenga here and say that those new dungeons are easily do-able w/o heirlooms. Here's a fairly old test video I did in Scarlet Halls back in March while leveling an old abandoned set of RaF. I don't do a straight up gear-check for the camera, but when I loot the Houndmaster and swap to my Holy Paladin, you can see that he has no heirlooms on. This is also true for the rest of the team.

I have a video recorded (but not uploaded) of Scholomance as well, but it's much more recent and I was wearing heirlooms; but my stance doesn't change for that instance either. If you have a good setup where you can easily utilize your team's potential, then I'm going to be bold and say that there is no 5-man instance that cannot be done while leveling, or otherwise.

[rfarris]

WRT MiRai's comment about multiboxing basics: amen. I ran a 2-man group 1-80 (RaF) to work out those issues. Then I went to the 5-man teams.

WRT #3, i.e. the biggest difference between 2-man teams and 5-man teams; do not forget the hardware requirements. 5 instances of WoW require considerably more GPU and CPU than 2 instances.

[HPAVC]

The biggest qq for me is fundamental class changes, learn to cope with having some mechanic you have been depending disappear. That's just how it is, adapt and move on.

The main issue I see for people starting is getting over leveling, forget about leveling and just do it. Take that time to hone your macros and learn isboxer or whatever. Get used to the follow and iwt stuff, group movement, fear bomb recoveries and such. Just like single boxing, the game doesnt start at level 1, it starts when you are dipping your toes into heroics ilevel.

You need to get over the lazy macro level to really 'succeed' and get some return on the effort needed to box.

Add people to your bnet friends list and get some socialization time in during the game.

[Brennomisue]

Comon man, can't sell that as fact to aspiring boxers. That instance is very doable on heroic without outgearing it completely. Not sure what you have trouble with, but might want to create a thread for help if you have trouble.

You bring up a good point, I shouldn't of said "Forget it" because that is differently not the spirit of multi-boxing! I would say that more often than not, for me, that the newer revamped dungeons do provide a larger difficulty curve. I on normal with a no AoE team so I couldn't strong arm it and was getting owned too fast, which was annoying. But far from impossible.

With good use of resources however, like this website, and some good spirit, very few things should be impossible!

[Rhalo]

I have my accounts and just leveling in the non-pandaria areas, I am using hotkey and the scripting concepts are easy and easily understood, i'm pretty happy with this so far.
Not sure what to start with first though - haha.
I've been playing since the release of the game and I have a pretty fond love of all the classes as they are now, though I will admit to love theorycrafting weird talent tree setups.

Thank you all for the replies.

[Ualaa]

Ranged is easier than melee.

Not saying don't go melee, but start with ranged if you're starting.
5x Elemental shaman is a good start.
But you might want a tank capable toon, if you want to run instances.
That could easily be 1x Druid (or Paladin) and 4x Shaman.
I like the Druid more, because they can play ranged just like the Shaman... but can queue as tank all the same.

Ranged generally has 5x really quick nukes (things like Lightning Bolt of Wrath) which might require two volleys to kill things.
Or 5x slower nukes (like Starfire) which will drop things in one volley.

Melee is relatively easy...
With Click to Move.
And Interact With Target.
But that is one stage more complex, than straight ranged characters.

I'd probably start with 5x Elemental Shaman.
My top PvE team was 1x Protection Paladin, 3x Elemental Shaman (one was dual-spec'd to Resto) and 1x Destruction Warlock.

My favorite team, and a decent starting team...
Was 5x Druids.
Druids aren't a great team for instances, at least initially... because the tanking 'Guardian' form is harder at lower levels... with less of the essential tanking tools.
Still you can level as 5x Balance (Moonkins) quite well.
And Feral (melee DPS) is quite strong too.



Start up with RAF (Recruit a Friend), and level several compositions (as many as you can stand)...