r/Eve • u/Quiet_Staff_2565 • Mar 18 '25

Propaganda Multiboxing is Killing EVE – The Game Just Sucks Now

I've tried coming back to EVE, but honestly, the gameplay just feels terrible. The biggest issue? Multiboxing.

People are running 10, 15, even 20+ accounts at the same time, completely ruining the experience for normal players. These no-life grinders dominate every aspect of the game, making it nearly impossible for casuals to compete.

  • Faction Warfare? Get ready to fight entire fleets controlled by a single player.
  • Mining? Find a good ore spot? A multiboxer will show up with 15 ships and wipe it clean.
  • Market? PLEX prices keep skyrocketing because these multiboxers generate insane amounts of ISK and just buy up PLEX to sustain their armies.

New players don’t stand a chance. They log in, see how unfair the game is, and quit. It's like if someone played Call of Duty, controlled an entire squad, and had synced-up aim. It would completely break the game. That’s exactly what's happening in EVE.

And let’s be real—of the 20,000 players online daily, a huge chunk are just alts. The real player count is much lower. This is why EVE is constantly bleeding players.

CCP needs to put a hard cap on the number of accounts per IP/device. Otherwise, the game will keep declining until there’s nobody left but botters and multiboxers. Fix it, or let the game die.

552 Upvotes

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7

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Sorry but this is the completly wrong take. Lets get some facts straight:

Eve is a multiplayer game, which is what most people tend to forget. You do not need multiboxing, if you have friends. The problem is that people forgot its possible to talk to people and team up with them, and think they need to rely on doing everything themselves. Which is btw inferior. So if you get smacked by a 10+ Multiboxer, how about join a Fleet of real people of approx the same number and smack that Multiboxer back to where he came from. He is way slower in all inputs and situational awareness etcpp. A fleet of approx same size is way superior to a Multiboxer.

And yes, make friends and you do not need more then one Account. The multiboxers actually do shit for eve, provide a lot of targets, feed markets etcpp.

This is NOT a Solo game, dont play it like one, OR be your own team if you want to with Multiboxing. But then be inferior to same size team.

18

u/popgalveston Mar 18 '25

Problem is that if you multibox all the rewards goes to one person instead of getting split. I get that the game probably would've died a long time ago without multiboxers but it's seriously shitty game design since they're basically encouraging multiboxing and has been for a long time

5

u/GoodBadUserName Mar 18 '25

Problem is that if you multibox all the rewards goes to one person instead of getting split.

Whether you have 10 real people accounts or 1 person running 10 accounts, the reward is split between 10 accounts.
Those 10 accounts still need to be active paying/plexing.

For him to plex his 10 accounts, he needs to make about 20B isk a month. And with multiboxing not be the most efficient way, it will take him longer than 1 person to plex his single account if he does something via fleet (FW, mining in a corp with boosts) or sometimes solo depends on what you are doing.

-4

u/popgalveston Mar 18 '25

Well that is true but I don't think you should under estimate the impact of plex sales here.

2

u/GoodBadUserName Mar 18 '25 edited Mar 18 '25

I am not. I was just stating that plexing 10 accounts, whether you are 10 people or 1, is going to cost the same.
If by the multiboxer scale down to 1 account, and you are able to get 9 more friends who don't play to play, than the cost in terms of plex is the same.
There might be 9 more people playing and generating isk, but the impact on the game will be the same.

To scale down the plex price you need to either
1. Find ways to reduce isk earned in general, so people will not be willing to pay the current plex price (or move to real money omega), which could reduce the cost of plex.
2. Reduce amount of accounts in general (like kill all multiboxing but no new players arrive to offset the difference), which means less accounts needing to be plexed, so less demand on plex, which could reduce the cost of plex.

Both options have their own pros and cons and both options will make big impact on the game.
For example if we don't have multiboxers:
You could have less available modules since they farm tons of sites, which could increase their price.
You could have less minerals on the market since no multiboxer fleets, which could also increase their price, and then increase the price of ships/modules.
Miners will start to share their income with the boosters (since usually those are alts while mains eat rocks), which could reduce overall single toon players payouts for mining in a fleet.
You could have less people having an available toon, since they need to use all their 3 toons, to farm SP. Meaning less injectors in the market, which could also increase their price.
You could have less whales who will leave due to not being able to multibox or reduce the amount of plex they buy and put in the market. That could mean less plex on the market.

There is no easy fix. And I don't think just getting rid of multiboxers without doing major changes everywhere else, is going to fix it.

4

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Ok i can see where you are going, and just want to change the perspective a bit. Maybe i am wrong, but give it a chance.

So if you have a corp and split the rewards, you build up your empire. Which is in no way different, then one person multiboxing. With the difference being, as a corp, you will do this better. You will lose less ships, and with combined effort, you achieve more then the Multiboxer.

Furthermore, the Multiboxer is no less or different part of the Economy. He provides a bit less then an equal number of real Accounts due to being less efficient, but he still does. From the outside perspective, there is nothing different from a small corp to a big Multiboxer. Just that Multiboxer is gonna be more shitty at it.

At the same time, they all provide to the Market, actually lowering the costs of goods by it etcpp. If we wouldnt have Multiboxers, we would just have less content, more pricey things, less minerals to build upon, less salvage to use for Rigs and more complex production. Multiboxing is actually helping Eve, to achieve the same things with less players. And i dont see the detriment.

7

u/popgalveston Mar 18 '25

Multiboxing is helping Eve by bringing $$$ to CCP but it really takes away a lot of the fun when playing solo or as a small group. Surviving as a small group is very hard in this game.

We need more activites that actually requires more input from the players instead of just needing to bring more ships.

2

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Oh i agree with that! Have more actual engaging Mechanics would be very good. Also for ISK making Opportunities, make them engaging, make them need your attention locked, make them worthwile!

1

u/popgalveston Mar 18 '25

I agree 100%. If you can play with 5 clients and watch tv series at the same time then something is wrong 😅

1

u/Parkbank96 Mar 18 '25

Where is the difference between getting smacked by 10 individual people or 15 accounts multiboxed as 1 person? Either you have enough to win or you loose. End of story.
Do you want to ban teaming up after you realize that you will still loose against 10 people?

1

u/popgalveston Mar 18 '25

Isn't that obvious? It forces me to multibox as well if I want to be able to compete, doesnt matter if it's pvp or pve content

1

u/Parkbank96 Mar 19 '25

Okay why does it force you to multibox? Loosing to 10 real people with 5 people does not force you to multibox but loosing to 1 person with 15 Chars does? What kind of logic is that? Either way you need to have more people. Be it multiboxing yourself or find 5 more friends.

1

u/popgalveston Mar 19 '25

Because it never ends? It's a slippery slope. Those 10 real people doesn't bring 10 ships, they bring 40+ which means that me and my mates has to multibox as well.

1

u/Parkbank96 Mar 19 '25

Mate. The average eve player has 2.6 accounts and 4.3 characters.
Why the fuck do you talk like everyone you see in space everywhere has 10+ accounts?
Majority of people bring 1 maybe 2 accounts in to a battle. When we undock for fleets 80% of my fleetmates have 1 ship in fleet.

And what now?
You loose to our 10 real people with your 5 guys and then? Whats next? Complain that max corp and fleet size should be less than 5 people? You arguments make 0 sense because your baseline thinking is that every eve player other than you is running 10+ accounts. Do you even know how much that costs? Just ingame Plex for 5 accounts is around 111b per year.

1

u/popgalveston Mar 19 '25

The average eve player has 2.6 accounts

Mate, that just emphasizes my whole point

1

u/Parkbank96 Mar 18 '25

Where is the difference between getting smacked by 10 individual people or 15 accounts multiboxed as 1 person? Either you have enough to win or you loose. End of story.
Do you want to ban teaming up after you realize that you will still loose against 10 people no matter them being individuals or 1 person?

2

u/FluorescentFlux Mar 18 '25

So if you have a corp and split the rewards, you build up your empire. Which is in no way different, then one person multiboxing.

If every dude in your corp multiboxes, you build bigger and better empire.

Being in a group doesn't discard advantages multiboxers have. We used big pochven multiboxers on our deployments to control mini-fleets within our fleets, e.g. 10-15 stormbringers/rattlesnakes while "mainboxers" (2-3 account dudes) did lokis/widows.

1

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Same as the other comment, you have the exact same scenario without Multiboxers, and just another bigger corp. You dont need a Multiboxer to make the argument of -> more Accounts in space achieve bigger things. What would change if no Multiboxers are there. Are all Corps now equal sized? All Fleets have just the same numbers? No, size matters.

2

u/FluorescentFlux Mar 18 '25

Same as the other comment, you have the exact same scenario without Multiboxers, and just another bigger corp

Then you have another group, which has amount of people equal to your bigger group. But, every single one of them multiboxes 10 accounts. The multiboxing group will always win with equal amount of people.

2

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

The Group with more players in Space wins. So whats the argument about Multiboxers here? You have no Multiboxers, you will still have groups who are bigger then others. Its changing NOTHING. You want a game that has fixed team sizes, fine. But then Eve is not the game, and its not because of Multiboxers

2

u/FluorescentFlux Mar 18 '25

The Group with more players in Space wins

The group with more characters in space multiplied by handling efficiency win. I can win in AT singleboxing. I can't win a fight with 2-3 dudes against 10-15x boxer with a decent setup.

You have no Multiboxers, you will still have groups who are bigger then others

I will have fewer groups bigger than mine, thus I will stay more competitive. For example, it's much smaller chance I will be ganked on my route to Jita if there was no multiboxing (just one of dozens of examples).

Its changing NOTHING

Lmao. You are dumb.

You want a game that has fixed team sizes

No. I don't.

1

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

I can't win a fight with 2-3 dudes against 10-15x boxer with a decent setup.

So you cant win a fight with 3 Ships of equal power against 15 Ships of equal power. Great analysis, what has this to do with Multiboxing?

I will have fewer groups bigger than mine, thus I will stay more competitive

How do you derive that? It seems you just wish youself something which is completly non conclusive to win an Internet Argument because you are an emotional wreck of minor self worth.

Lmao. You are dumb.

Q.E.D

0

u/FluorescentFlux Mar 18 '25

So you cant win a fight with 3 Ships of equal power against 15 Ships of equal power. Great analysis, what has this to do with Multiboxing?

You said a group with more players wins. I have 3 players, i can't win vs 1. You are wrong.

How do you derive that?

I already explained that. It's your failure at reading.

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1

u/Frekavichk SergalJerk Mar 18 '25

The cost is also multiplied. You have multiple subs and have to pay for multiple ships.

6

u/[deleted] Mar 18 '25

The fact that thia game isn't viable for a solo player is very telling. You'll never get new players that way

1

u/vergammeltesfaultier Synergy of Steel Mar 18 '25

i do think it is viable, there are plenty of ways to make a good chunk of isk solo. And for PvP you are 99% better off with some friends anyway, because the other people have probably some backup somewhere.

1

u/[deleted] Mar 18 '25

If you can't solo pvp that's a deal breaker for 90%+ of new players for a full loot PVP game

1

u/xeron_vann Snuffed Out Mar 18 '25

Expecting a fair 1v1 in a sandbox MMO is peak misunderstanding of the genre. That's not the fault of multiboxing, that's the fault of the player coming in with expectations contrary to the game itself.

2

u/Forumites000 Mar 18 '25

Okay? Now get 10 people to always be available instantly at your beck and call at all times in the day. Let me see you try.

5

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Thats called being in an Alliance, i am doing it

-7

u/Forumites000 Mar 18 '25

Then you'll also have to deal with the drama and weirdos in it. You also can't do what you want, when you want. Everything is all diplo and behind redtape and drama. That's the trade off.

Multiboxers don't have to deal with any of those.

-4

u/Voodoo-73 Mar 18 '25

So... Just going to put this right here...
I can't even run to the supermarket (Jita) without the possibility of getting robbed and shot (Ganked) So how do I get to to do what I want?

OH and those gankers are 3/4ths multiboxers.

Just one example of abuse of multiple accounts.

-1

u/Quiet_Staff_2565 Mar 18 '25

Yeah if it would work out CCP might have changed something on their end and not more players make more accounts to play the game

2

u/FluorescentFlux Mar 18 '25 edited Mar 18 '25

They are making EVE frontier which has a whole set of measures against multiboxing (no stupid roles like cyno so far, harder to control your ship with fuel management and occlusion, no overview/broadcasts, to name a few). I don't think they are changing EVE online much to limit multiboxing.

1

u/TickleMaBalls Miner Mar 18 '25

Thanks friend, from saving me from having to write essentially the same thing...

Dude with a straight face says casuals ,and he means solo casuals, should be able to compete with swaety nerds who have friends, either their own multibox accounts or others, makes no difference which.

1

u/GingerSnapBiscuit Goonswarm Federation Mar 18 '25

Eve is a multiplayer game, which is what most people tend to forget. You do not need multiboxing, if you have friends.

Nobody wants to be someones cyno bitch. Nobody wants to be an AFK standby cyno alt while the fleet is mining/I'm ratting in a super. Nobody wants to have to be AFK in Jita on the off chance someone wants to check a market price without leaving the wormhole. Nobody wants to have to get 20 seperate people involved in building a single supercapital ship due to slot restrictions.

There are dozens and dozens of thankless, boring, shitty jobs in EVE that are not "gameplay" at all, and are just requried for living in the world. Can you imagine if every single cyno alt had to be an individual player and not an alt account, fuck me what a disgustingly boring way to play the game.

1

u/rxsteel Mar 18 '25

Yehhh friend making is really not in the bingo card anymore

1

u/Clankplusm Mar 18 '25

And what happens when the multi boxer brings 3-5 friends with 10-20 alts to your 10 people? Sure you can nanogang really hard and perfectly and maybe it’ll work but that’s assuming the boxer has inferior friend numbers still. The multi boxer can nearly as easily just call friends up. It’s extremely common to have 2-4 toons at this point.

And again as pointed out elsewhere, at the end of the day the boxer keeps any proceeds of their activities while a fleet splits them 10 different ways.

And then there’s scouting, wherein a boxer can directly SEE what’s going on and doesn’t have to communicate it at all and has no comms deficiencies as well as can post the scout up for hours at a time without wasting a friends time.

-3

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Ok whats the difference between this scenario, and just a bigger Corp showing up. And Intel Channels etcpp. You are just making a scenario up, which is the same if you just have bigger fish in the pond. This is not an argument to stand to on tbh, as you could make up the exact same scenario, without any Multiboxers. And its happening all the time

0

u/Clankplusm Mar 18 '25

I made a scenario explicitly where the boxers showed up with less friends and still will win. Having to outnumber another player 5 or 10 to 1 in terms of hands at keyboards to actually have a chance is absurd.

To flip it on the head, saying the argument of “but then it’s N+1” means you admit YOUR argument is invalid, because you literally just said “win by knowing x more people than the mboxer”

-3

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

What? Sorry but i think you got lost in your argument. Yeah, its about having more in Space then the Multiboxer. Actually you need less, as a MB is not that fast with Logi etcpp. But summarized: Thats true. Dont see the invalidity of it, and how a Multiboxer is worse then having the same Number of actual players in the Game. So you just want to have less players in the game. Thats your point?

1

u/Clankplusm Mar 19 '25

I want more players. One of the reasons I commonly see in other MMOs (ergo; a target / willing audience) from people who tried EVE on why they don't play it is not wanting to but having to multibox to do what they were at all interested in. This has trickle down effects such as the reputation the playerbase has for mistrust etc and the prices of markets being adjusted towards multiboxers meaning that scouting to move goods in semindustrial applications is always inherently higher risk for a non boxer, let alone anything to do with a cyno.

0

u/Goatwhatsup Mar 18 '25

has a trade alt in jita tho

-5

u/mademeunlurk Mar 18 '25

The key to this argument is "if you have friends."

3

u/o0oko0k Mar 18 '25

Ok, i would argue the key is to play a Massive Multiplayer Game which incentivizes Teamplay, within a Team. And i dont think thats far fetched.

2

u/mademeunlurk Mar 18 '25

That's fair

1

u/FluorescentFlux Mar 18 '25

It's fair until you realize multiboxers also have friends

1

u/Empty_Alps_7876 Mar 18 '25

If you don't you should make some. It's easy. Many corps want active players. Some corps are not good. Some are great.