Question - Boxing 12 toons

[AnotherJohn]

I just leveled up a second group on a TLP server (all level 75) and thought I would try to use them together, mini raid style. I started searching for Guides or other posts that might give me some hints or tips on how to do this. I maybe searching using the wrong terms but I could find nothing helpful on 2 group setups. I thought maybe someone would know of a thread I could not find in my searching that would give me some beginner tips on what I need to account for and do different than a one group setup. Right off the bat, is there an easier way to get the toons into a raid other than doing it manually? MQ2autogroup only shows how to group with 6 toons and appears not to use Dannet yet. This is the type of thing I am running into just starting I am sure there are more things I will run across as I really get going, like do I need to play with my ini's to get things to run better? Is running them in a raid format the best way to go? So any tips, suggestions, strategies or especially links to guides or resources on this subject would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, AnotherJohn

 

[freeferli]

Is your question regarding group composition or how you should setup the 2 groups into a raid.

I assume it is about the raid.
You can form a raid, but then you take a huge hit on the EXP
If you do not form a raid, you can co-locate the groups, but I do not think there is a way to assign an incoming mob to a specific group.
So the higher DPS group is going to steal the kill from the lower DPS group.

For the mechanics of setting up the raid, I use autogroup to set the groups, and then I have a macro with something like this (I may have the command wrong because I am not at my gaming computer)
/raidinvite XXX
/dgexecute XXX /yes

 

[AnotherJohn]

Thanks, I think I need to wait until autogroup supports Dannet but a resource on how to write, or a macro someone has written to group toons in a raid format would be nice. Every time I play I come across things. Right now I am using Isboxer and have it set up to use fxvidio windows that allow me to see and click all my hotkeys on every toon from my main toons window. I also can see the cast bar so I know the spell/song is casting. I can also see each toon's health and mana and know if I need to take action. This worked great with six toons but is unworkable with 12 (just takes up too much window space). Also, since I am needing to click background toons hotkeys I need the fps on all toons to be at least 30. With 12 toons now this is starting to cause lag. There has to be a better way to know what background toons are doing. Maybe a HUD or window with general overall info. Maybe I need better ini's/macros so toons are a bit more automated and I dont need to keep such a close eye on them. Again, I am guess peeps have solved all these problems I am running into and all the ones I have yet to even get to yet. So looking for any information in this area and since I am just starting to work on this, nothing will be to trivial since I am starting from ground zero and making everything up as I go. Thanks all, AnotherJohn

 

[surfdog21]

I just throw the two groups together. At a camp. I have an assist key on the main tank on the second group to assist the main tank in the main group. I usually will do this if I need to kill namers that can be a pita for 1 group...for instance camping named for Muhbis. Have to be at the helm to hit assist button is all. Problem here is that one group usually will have more dps and it will obviously get all of the experience, and there can be a looting issue. 15 min ish lock out for looter in non kill credit group is all.

If I were to do it afk style, I would ad the second group to raid format, and the second group will auto assist. Its pretty easy peasy. The problem though is that its raid experience. In raid mode I find the cleric from the other group will heal the other tank yada yada and stuff, though that could be coincidence depending on the ini...sometimes MQ2 is magic like that !~

I like to keep things simple and dont use Dannet. It works well for me shrug. Manually setting up a raid is as simple as raidinvite groupleader from group two. Going to options in raid window and setting looter to all. Thats it. Then turn on John5 "Crank It" and sit back and watch your symphony of destruction!

EDIT: I just noticed you said lvl 75s- My reply is for all lvl 110's so. The principles are the same though. Enjoy! Its so much fun!

 

[AnotherJohn]

I think maybe I am over thinking this. It just may be that each persons stuff is going to be setup way different than everyone else's. I guess I was thinking there would be a "one size fits all" road map for this. In my case I switched to Dannet since I use Ihc385's Enchanter and Wizard macros. Since my setup is a mix and match of KA and Ihc385 it is not going to be like anyone else's and I just need to ask when I run into a problem I can't solve. This is probably why I could not find what I was looking for in the forums. I was trying to solve all the problems before I encountered them. So I am going to soldier on and get this monster up and running and just post a question when I need a specific answer to a specific problem. Thanks for the feedback and if anyone reading this has any tips or suggestions I am sure it is something I don't know since I seem to know very little in this area. AnotherJohn

 

[eqtrader74]

I haven't tried any of the auto-group setups for raid. I manually invite the group leaders and accept, since it's just a quick click on each guy. Then I have the raid window open to set the MT and master looter anyways.

Loot - I would suggest making sure you set your raid master looter to one of the group's master looters. I've had the auto-looting things stop working when I go raid-mode sometimes and I'm not always able to figure out why.

Healing outside group - I'd setup your healer to cross heal the other group's tank. KA has extended target healing built in and it is easy to setup.

Pulling - Not much point in running more than one puller. KA's pull routine will stop a puller mid-pull if it sees more mobs appear on the xtarget window. You can run chain pull mode, which will go for more mobs once there is only one mob alive. I've also run two pullers, each set to opposite 180 degree arcs (via [Pull] settings) so one guy ran east and the other ran west. Whichever found a mob first won, so it was a tiny bit faster.

MGB buffs - You can add "|mgb" to some group buffs if you have the tranquil blessings AA. KA will mgb them if you're out of combat long enough and the buffer has lost the buff themselves. The "out-of-combat" part is the tricky one, it's quite a long wait at like 30 secs. I set a longer pause in my puller's Pull section so they'll check every 30 mins. I've gone back and forth on the usefulness of using MGB. It's great to have fully buffed raid, but I don't like editing my ini every time I go from raid to group setups. Maybe a raid-version ini would be a better way.

Tank target selection - I ran all tanks in Tank mode. They'll choose their own targets, so sometimes they'll be on the same mob but usually they'll select their own. Once in awhile, it seems like one tank would decide the other tank "had the mob first" so KA's anti-KillSteal code would stop the tank from attacking. Doesn't happen a lot, but I did notice it.

How to assist - Mainly I just let both groups assist their own tank and let the tanks sort out who they want to kill. If named shows up, all tanks will attack it assuming you have them with Burn turned on. At some tough camps, I did have a few other-group DPS set to assist my stronger tank. I figured that tank was most likely to survive a bad pull and wanted any DPS focused on his targets first.

Mezzers - You could run just one and have the other groups mezzer run a pure DPS ini. I usually let all mezzers just mez, it didn't seem to cause any issues.

 

[AnotherJohn]

eqtrader,

MGB buffs - You can add "|mgb" to some group buffs if you have the tranquil blessings AA. KA will mgb them if you're out of combat long enough and the buffer has lost the buff themselves. The "out-of-combat" part is the tricky one, it's quite a long wait at like 30 secs. I set a longer pause in my puller's Pull section so they'll check every 30 mins. I've gone back and forth on the usefulness of using MGB. It's great to have fully buffed raid, but I don't like editing my ini every time I go from raid to group setups. Maybe a raid-version ini would be a better way.

I will have to give this a try. At level 75 I cant think of any MGB AA buffs my toons have but some can MGB a group buff now and then. Will play with it and see how it goes.

Tank target selection - I ran all tanks in Tank mode. They'll choose their own targets, so sometimes they'll be on the same mob but usually they'll select their own. Once in awhile, it seems like one tank would decide the other tank "had the mob first" so KA's anti-KillSteal code would stop the tank from attacking. Doesn't happen a lot, but I did notice it.

Both groups do have tanks. One is Warrior and the other Pally. Once my Pally gets some decent gear I will give this a try also. Right now my warrior is much better geared so have all toons assisting him but I can see the advantage to setting it up your way. For instance if the warrior goes down the Pally will have agro and the second group could keep him up until the Warrior gets battle rezzed.

Healing outside group - I'd setup your healer to cross heal the other group's tank. KA has extended target healing built in and it is easy to setup.

I changed to try this immediately. I was wondering why my second group healer (Druid) was not prioritizing the MA/main tank in group one. I followed your link and set up the Druid's xtarget like you suggested. This could make the difference on my tougher fights.

Going to bookmark this. I am sure I will be looking back at it as I go. Thanks so much for the suggestions, AnotherJohn