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Author: Nogame
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20 Comments
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While some say that dual logging may include logging in 2 accounts at the same time to mule goods, using a second account to check the auction house or maybe even power leveling a dormant character. However, what I am referring to is actually is playing 2 characters to fight, level, quest or even pvp at the same time. This means that both characters are using skills and spells during each fight while you control them from one or two consoles.
I’ve always loved the challenge dual logging brings to any MMORPG. At times I’ve tripled logged (using 2 computers) to accomplish specific goals that weren’t possible to do alone. I even know a guy who plays 6 characters at the same time (don’t ask me how he does it) in Final Fantasy XI. Though this concept may seem like insanity to some people and others simply don’t believe its possible, it’s a lot of fun and really heightens the challenge of playing any MMORPG especially World of Warcraft.
Common Misconceptions
There are a few common misconceptions to dual logging. The first and foremost, you cannot use a single account to dual log. You will have to have 2 accounts to dual log, which means you will have to purchase and pay for 2 World of Warcraft accounts on a monthly basis. Geeky? Hell yes it is, but you’ll be the envy of your friends and family once you tell them “I played through Scarlet Monastery on 2 characters at the same time!” To dual log you gotta pay the cash and grab 2 copies of the game from your nearest crack rock dealer… er, Gamestop.
You do not have to have a godly computer to dual log. I have an Intel Pentium 2.4 processor with a Radeon 9800 pro and a gig of ram. I dual logged my first few characters with 512 megs of ram but that extra stick really made a huge difference. The trick is disabling your sound on both accounts and lowering your texture quality. The sound will eliminate a lot of the hardware lag you’ll be having when dual log and depending on your computer you may or may not have to lower your texture quality. Just remember, WoW is more intensive on your ram then your video card.
Why Dual Log?
I’m one of those players who gets more enjoyment by improving myself as a player then actually adventuring through the game. Leveling my first 60 was a lot of fun but the next logical challenge is to do it with 2 toons at the same time. I’m sure playing 3 toons to 60 won’t be too far behind once I’ve achieved my current goal. I just like the challenge and the feeling of accomplishment I get from doing some things that otherwise wouldn’t be possible for a single person to do.
It’s also just nice to always be in control of your situation. You don’t ever have to find a group (outside of instances) you can just do that really hard quest alone. You’d be surprised at what you can tackle with 2 characters when you play them seamlessly. Elite quests will no longer require pick up groups, you’ve already got all the group you’ll need. Sure it may be a little tougher to do the quest, but you’ll get a great feeling of accomplishment when it’s completed.
Why level one character when you can level two characters at the same time? If you’re going to level a character, you might as well level two if you can handle it. At least you’ll be challenging yourself with new goals.
My Setup
While some people use multiple computers to dual log, I prefer using just one. The monitor in which I play WoW on is 19 inches so I log both accounts on and leave them in windowed mode. I move one window to the upper left hand side of the screen and one window to the lower right hand side of the screen. Though they slightly overlap, I see what is important at all times.
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I use one character to navigate the world and the second character has a hotkey for “follow” that allows him to quickly follow the leader. Which character leads the group depends on your preference but it is important to remember the leader will always get agro first (if your toons are of similar level) so it may be a good idea to have a mail or plate wearer for the leader role. I generally choose my lead based upon who will attack first but that’s just me and you should choose whatever you’re more comfortable with.
I use alt-tabbing to move between both accounts quickly. Alt-Tab is the windows hotkey to change your active window to whatever your most recent window was. This allows you to hit Alt-Tab to move back and forth between applications (in this case, 2 copies of World of Wacraft). So for example, if my mage’s fireball was on hotkey slot 2, and his Fire Blast was on slot 4 while my paladins attack hotkey is 1, heal key is 3 and his follow key is on 4, a scenario like this commonly arises:
-mage active-
Press 2
[Alt tab]
Press 1
[Alt tab]
Press 4
Press 2
[Alt tab]
-click on mage-
Press 3
[Alt tab]
Press 4
[Alt tab]
Press 4 (for follow mage)
[Alt Tab]
Loot and move on
Though I don’t usually heal during every fight this sequence is pretty common. As I switched between my characters (5 times in this example) you can see how the fight goes down if you were paying attention to the hot keys.
My WoW Dual Logged Toons
I’ve tried many combinations of races/classes for dual logging purposes however I always stick with the healer / damage dealer or tank formula. I enjoy having no down time and being able to resurrect myself if I pick a fight I don’t win a fight.
So far my favorite combination has been a Rogue and a Shaman. Quick kills, versatile skill sets and a lot of options really makes this combo a fun one. The rogue and shaman both wear leather (until lvl 40) which allows for a decent amount of tankability from each character. Rogues do very fast damage and when fighting 3 or 4 mobs at a time you can always drop a totem to give you that extra defensive/offensive power. It also wasn’t necessary to drop totems on every fight, single mobs die so fast you’ll just be wasting mana. Truly a fun combination and I great for pvp as you can use your 2nd account for bait as your rogue stealths next to him.
I’ve also really enjoyed my Paladin and Mage combination. The mage can really dish out the damage while the Paladin can really take it. The plated Paladin has no problem getting away if the mage dies so resurrection is always an option if the worst should happen. The only annoyance is the mage’s down time on mana and the paladin’s tauntability. Since the mage does so much damage its often hard for the paladin to hold agro, however Paladin heals generate small amounts of agro that add up over time. Remember, you don’t have to attack each mob to gain agro, just heal yourself when the fight starts.
I’ve also tried my hand with the Warrior / Priest combination though it was a little slow for my tastes. Having to keep a close proximity between the battle-frenzy warrior and the fragile priest is often very stressful. Spec’ing to Shadow while maintaining healing may have been a stronger approach but I’d have to gauge that on the down time with the priest’s mana depreciation.
I always wanted to try a Rogue and a Paladin but had no need for another of each class. The tankability of the paladin would be there and the rogue’s fast damage output could make the combination very lethal. Combine the rogue with Blessings and Seals and you’ve got very fast kills with little to no down time (I love the fact that paladins do damage without having to rely heavily on mana).
Fighting
The biggest tip I can give is that you can’t play a dual logged character as if you were 2 people. By trying to simulate a 2 player fight you can end up getting more stressed then its worth and ultimately play very sloppy. Example would be that if you were a mage grouped with a paladin, the mage would commonly stay far behind the paladin to do ranged damage. When 2 people are playing this setup works fine because the paladin can run after the mob if the mob aggros the mage. But in our little dual logged world it creates stress. The less brainpower you have to spend navigating your characters mid-fight, the better. Hitting hot keys for skills and spells is a lot less mentally exhausting without having the challenge of moving at the same time. It may sound trivial but you’ll know what I mean when you test it out.
Aggro is always a big concern but since you should have at least one healing character in your combo, you have a little leniency. I’ll let my mage tank the some fights and just heal with my paladin because I’m comfortable with the situation. Depending on your characters you’ll want to assess how much agro is tolerable based on the situation at hand.
Adds are by far the worst and the best thing to occur when dual logged. When adds are introduced to the mix, you’ll really start to test your dual logging ability as you have to maintain health of both characters as well as agro while doing damage to multiple targets. With each add that comes into the fight, the situation becomes much more complex. Practice will make perfect with this but just calm down and take them as they come. Most likely you wont survive your first 6 vs 2 add situation but with practice it’ll come with ease. The reason why they are the “best” thing to occur when dual logged is because having multiple adds and a long fight REALLY gets the adrenaline pumping. When you can consistently take out 6 mobs your level while dual logged, you’ll feel pretty damn good about yourself after a while.
Leveling
If there’s one that dual logging does, its give you options. Quest or grind you’ll be more capable then any single player out there. Elite quests… no problem, you’re a one man wrecking crew with a healer and a damage dealer. Grinding is obviously a lot less stressful but still eventful. Don’t worry though, since your playing 2 characters at once, grinding sure won’t be boring, there’s always a challenge that will present itself if you let it.
I choose to grind in the areas my quests take me for long periods of time. That’s just my strategy on it and if you get into the solo mentality of dual logging, you may find it hard to ask guild mates to help you out on an instance run since you’re so used to controlling your own progression.
When doing quests it’s important to pay attention to both characters. There’s nothing like getting 5 quests, walking a zone away then realizing one of your character’s quest logs were full on a quest that is not sharable. Or perhaps doing an escort quest while not noticing to ‘accept this quest’ box when it starts. When fighting or talking to other players, these things are quickly overlooked as you multi-task both characters.
Professions
Since you’re playing 2 characters at once you can have every gathering profession accounted for. Or you can tailor (no pun intended) your professions to a suitable fit for both of your characters. On a new server I like to choose skinning and mining on one character and tailoring and herbalism on the other. This way I can collect all the resources necessary to eventually level up any profession in the future. It takes some time getting used to 2 mini-maps with different resource locations on each but you’ll get used to it in time.
Patience
It takes time to get it right. After dual logging 2 toons up to 30 I still didn’t have all the basics down. After leveling a few more characters and critiquing my own gameplay I could dual log any quest and maintain in-game conversion with friends while watching old school Kung Fu movies on DVD. It just takes some time and patience with the complexity of dual logging, don’t give up, just keep at it.
If you keep getting groups of adds and wiping, the best advice I can give you is to take a step back from things for a moment. Think about the situation before it arises and critique what you would do to win the fight. When dual logging you don’t get a lot of time to think creatively while fighting, you’ll have to have the solution at your disposal before the fight begins. Becoming mentally prepared for an ugly pull and knowing what to do if the situation arises is by far your best offense. When fighting 4 or 5 mobs at once and your cloth wearing priest has 20% of his hit points while your warrior needs to kill an aoe totem as 4 trolls mug you, your brain won’t necessarily have the capacity to find a solution to kill the extra adds while dealing with the other problems at hand.
Conclusion
Dual logging presents an awesome complex style of gameplay and really intensifies the challenge of playing World of Warcraft. It does not require a super computer to dual log properly however you will need to have multi-tasking skills to get the job done. There are many benefits including increased challenge, faster quest progression, full independence of groups outside of instances.
As for the ultimate irony, the most mentally exhausting part of dual logging isn’t the quests or the instances it’s going into town and trying to choose which items to vendor on two characters at the same time. Now talk about confusion and stress.
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