A true box server

[Yummydain]

There's been a lot of discussion lately on the forums about only being able to run one single client per computer, and an equal amount of backlash from the community in regards to this.

I don't think a true box server is inherently a bad idea.

Look at EverQuest 1. For the past few years they have been putting out "True Box" servers which require a $15 subscription, and you may only run one client per computer. Now, this doesn't stop everyone from multi-boxing but it does a great deal against it. The most important thing that True Box servers do for the community is allow a wide variance of classes to be played as a main character. In fact, all of my main characters on these servers are support characters. I love playing support classes. When you don't have the majority of the population multi-boxing their own support characters then the importance and need for people who enjoy playing these classes will shine. Unfortunately, this isn't the case as of now and I have to multi-box a DPS character alongside my SE to make any progress.

Now, EverQuest 1 is an incredibly niche game and mostly only popular with English speaking players (in the US). EverQuest 1 also has an in game cash shop that offers timed EXP boost items, appearance items, mana regen items, etc.These True Box servers are poppin' at peak times, and they require a queue during major updates for expansion releases.  That being said, I don't believe it would be the same situation with Lineage 2. Lineage 2 is not nearly as popular with English speaking clients as EverQuest ever was, and in the same vein Lineage 2 already has an EU based subscription server. If they were to release an NA based subscription only "True Box" server there's a chance that we would lose out on a great deal of the population. Why would they play on a subscription based NA server when they could be doing the same thing on their EU server but with better ping?

This is a decision that only the devs at NCSoft can evaluate because us players don't truly know how many connections there are from the US. However, I don't think its crazy to toss the idea around seeing how it has been a massive success with other games in the US. What if after a few months it fails? What if it survives a year and then becomes a ghost town? Merge the server into one of the F2P servers.

Give it a thought!