account sharing - a way around it maybe?

[Gadzooks]

You will not get banned from having multiple characters play off of the same IP address.

Correct, you get banned for having multiple players making the SAME keypresses at EXACTLY the same time (i.e. clearly multiboxing) from DIFFERENT account names. Logging in from the same IP has nothing to do with anything.

If 3 people are playing from the same IP -- legitimately -- there is no problem. The trouble arises when you start playing their accounts or they start playing yours or any other combination.

This is actually an interesting one to me in a certain context.

For me when I am 5-boxing on one pc I am seeing lag between each of the accounts (Quartz shows each with a different delay during casting) so if my accounts were being watched they'd show each character not quite casting at the same time.

Let's now go to a situation where we have a few people all in the same house, grouped together and questing using the method we suggest to the haters (have one member as assist/focus and then all press attack key on 3..2..1 count), could this not appear to Blizz as the same as someone multiboxing but with not all accounts in the same name? How would one go about proving it was not a case of account sharing in this situation?

Blizzard can see more than they'll admit about what you're doing while logged in, by any number of methods - Warden, polling the client, logs, etc. Unless you know EVERY parameter of what they see and look for, your accounts are at risk of being flagged. Trust me, the guys who write programs like Glider would sell their children to get that info, of exactly what Blizzard sees - and Glider users get caught constantly - i've read in botter forums (I go to places like that to see what they're up to, mostly scams, so I can avoid them).

As an intellectual discussion, it's interesting, but beyond that, it's a bad idea, and we as a community get enough abuse, without them coming here, seeing we're talking about using accounts against the rules, and posting all over General what cheats we are.

As a final note, it's nice to know if you submit a report on another player, that you have nothing to fear. I had an asswipe in Hellfire pull some trick on me, where my mage all of a sudden was attacking his pet, even though I did NOT flag for PvP or target him or his pet. I do not PvP on either toons at all, ever. I'm not quite sure how it works, as I don't play a hunter, but he started out riding around my toons in circles. I moved off, he followed. I moved off, and a buzzard attacked me, and I started hitting keys to kill it. Next thing i know, my mage is dead, and he's sitting there emoting at me.

REPORTED

On both toons. I got two GMs at the same time, it was kind of funny. Awesome GMs, as usual, too. I rarely report players, but this guy needed to be reported.

Anyway, if I had an account not in my name, I would have been banned right there - you REALLY need the ability to interact with GMs if you MB, because of the abuse and harrassment you will get, and if you do forget and submit a ticket, and they see you're killing the same mobs from the same cpu and IP and your combat logs are identical, and they see two different names? BAN.

It's just a bad idea. Tempting? Yes. But in the long run, not worth the risk.