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What happened in WAR beta?
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Member Posts: 252
I've got some theories, but I'd really like to hear from people who were in WAR's beta.
How was it run?
How did they organise testing?
How well did Mythic listen to feedback?
What changed between beta and release (ignoring the dropped classes and cities, of course)?
I've got some theories, but want to hear from those involved about how it went - what worked, what didn't - before posting them.
Comments
The biggest problem with Warhammer right now is Scenerios > RvR
The reason this wasn't detected in the beta is because players weren't really worried about grinding RP on a throw-away character, so they didn't realize that it was so much better in scenerios. I just tried each of the scenarios a few times to see what they were like.
Also, RvR was HUGE in beta, so even if people had tried to grind scenarios, they wouldn't have kept up with people in RvR. This is still the case though.. if you have the critical mass of players in RvR.. it is more rewarding (rp and exp)... but on most servers, that critical mass isn't met.. and the less people doing RvR, the more efficient it is to just grind scenarios. It's also a self-fullfilling prophecy.. as more people come to believe that scenarios are the best way to gain exp/rp.. then it will make it less likely people will be in RvR.
Very true. Open RvR was huge in beta and a ton of fun. You could play all day and feel great. Wasn't a grind at all.
Sent me an email if you want me to mail you some pizza rolls.
There you go
There you go
Omg, I've seen people on this forum boasting about how Mythic let them them test the whole game and how they were not hiding anything compared to Funcom. It shows how much BS people talk.
The people who made such claims should be ashamed of themselves.
There you go
Omg, I've seen people on this forum boasting about how Mythic let them them test the whole game and how they were not hiding anything compared to Funcom. It shows how much BS people talk.
The people who made such claims should be ashamed of themselves.
they did let people test the whole game (For the most part) they just split it up into sections.
There you go
Omg, I've seen people on this forum boasting about how Mythic let them them test the whole game and how they were not hiding anything compared to Funcom. It shows how much BS people talk.
The people who made such claims should be ashamed of themselves.
Problem with beta is too many people get in the game to get a headstart or an advantage and not to test the game.
Too many testers don't know how to test a game. they provide feedback but it is not useful. This game is awesome or this game sucks is not constructive.
Some games just want bug feedback and not actual feedback on game play. Not sure if WAR was like this, as its the only major game I neve rmanaged to get a closed beta invite!!!!!
Actaully that must be why it failed
Most of the type of 'closed beta' testers you listed were removed from WAR's beta. The WAR devs did not play nice. If you exploited, broke rules, repeatedly posted about the same topic despite the issue being closed or its already in discussion elsewhere, if you did nothing but offer crap commentary in a negative light without being constructive at all you were banned from the Beta.
WAR broke up its beta into phases and narrowed the testing scope so that the bug reports, feedback etc were on the subject at hand and not someone crying because no one was playing lvl 1 toons. Infact one can contribute their rather nice launch to the narrowed scope focus it allowed them to concentrate on bugs in one or two areas at a time instead of all over the board.
Some phases you only tested 1 Tier from all races, some phases you tested only certain races at certain tiers in certain realms and in some phases you could play from lvl 1 to 40 from anywhere you wanted using any class you wanted. Sometimes some content or classes were turned off because they were being tweaked.
To be honest from a design & development stand point this is a far better approach especially for time managment than letting everyone do anything they want in a willy nilly fashion. It allows the devs and the worker bees to look very close and frequently at the same areas with a decent amount of time to repair, change, or tweak. Having to concentrate on 10 different things at once highly contributes to the major bug & exploit factor...while nothing 100 percent wise gets rid of these it certaintly helps in lowering the chances.
Most of the type of 'closed beta' testers you listed were removed from WAR's beta. The WAR devs did not play nice. If you exploited, broke rules, repeatedly posted about the same topic despite the issue being closed or its already in discussion elsewhere, if you did nothing but offer crap commentary in a negative light without being constructive at all you were banned from the Beta.
WAR broke up its beta into phases and narrowed the testing scope so that the bug reports, feedback etc were on the subject at hand and not someone crying because no one was playing lvl 1 toons. Infact one can contribute their rather nice launch to the narrowed scope focus it allowed them to concentrate on bugs in one or two areas at a time instead of all over the board.
Some phases you only tested 1 Tier from all races, some phases you tested only certain races at certain tiers in certain realms and in some phases you could play from lvl 1 to 40 from anywhere you wanted using any class you wanted. Sometimes some content or classes were turned off because they were being tweaked.
To be honest from a design & development stand point this is a far better approach especially for time managment than letting everyone do anything they want in a willy nilly fashion. It allows the devs and the worker bees to look very close and frequently at the same areas with a decent amount of time to repair, change, or tweak. Having to concentrate on 10 different things at once highly contributes to the major bug & exploit factor...while nothing 100 percent wise gets rid of these it certaintly helps in lowering the chances.
Breaking it into pieces works well for testing out pieces. However it doesn't do any good for testing out the whole of the game, which is what is broke in Warhammer.
There you go
Omg, I've seen people on this forum boasting about how Mythic let them them test the whole game and how they were not hiding anything compared to Funcom. It shows how much BS people talk.
The people who made such claims should be ashamed of themselves.
Probably those people were from the open Beta.
But in the closet Beta things were as I described them in my post.
The very first leg of closed beta had no restriction, but people were complaining that the game was boring and that they didn't see the point of it.
So they decided to break up the testing in sections, so we could give feedbacks only on that section.
They also changed policy in the forum where you no longer could start a thread so to avoid whining threads (which by the time they were getting increasingly more critical), the threads were started by Mythic staff asking for feedbacks on particular subjects.
The only place where you could start threads was in Tavern section, where you were not allowed to give any kind of feedback on the game.
So, no they weren't completely transparent, they've been in denial for the all duration of the closed beta, and pretended not to see/hear anything by effectively censoring too negative feedbacks in the forum and breaking up beta in sections.
Easy Answer..... I got bored.... and the game never got any better... Not even after release... Oh and the graphics never changed for the better either... Leaving me even more disconnected... It's sad I know... I kinda feel like they should stop making major IP's into MMO's.... They only stand to dissapoint.. But thats only my opinion... I know others like it just fine...
There you go
Excellent write up.Yes I was in the beta. My two cents.Many players especially ranged attackers(mages and archers) were extremely frustrated with their low damage dealing and lack of Crowd Control to give them some defense.Some classes just didn't work well were reported and never fixed(engineer comes to mind).I am a long term DAOC player and expected the next generation of RVR. I was stunned to find rvr was an afterthought.Classes poorly done..seige warfare minimal and poorly done.ZERGING was what passed for rvr.I said to myself...wait till players get to the higher levels and see whats NOT in the game.I stopped beta testing because the game didn't improve....and it was boring.
Thanks all - this corresponds to what I heard about WAR's beta. I just wanted to hear it from some other people to make sure.
Beta Warhammer was more fun then the Final Warhammer, why you ask? because they capped your progress at Tier 2, so everyone was bunched up together, this made for very active Open RvR and PQ's... Now with people spread out from Tier 1 to Tier 4, the game feels empty..
I was in Beta and you focus on specific bugs in game not the general. I think though this game needs population to make it fun. They just released too many servers.
Waiting for the next thing
Why didnt' you guys complain about the Broken classes like the SH and SW, or the MAGUS and ENG, or where you guys too busy playing ZERGFEST after ZERGFEST
We complained. A lot.
You should've seen (at least the Engineer and the Magus) when the Magus was first introduced. They were so much worse than they are now.
So stop bit**ing. Mythic did listen. They improved a ton of stuff across the board. However, me and most of my friends who were also in the CB all agree on one thing: beta should've been extended a good 3 months. Classes could've been perfected, the XP issues could've been smoothed out, ect.
We complained. A lot.
You should've seen (at least the Engineer and the Magus) when the Magus was first introduced. They were so much worse than they are now.
Yah well you see where it got the community now....the most OP ability in the game now belong in the hands of a disgruntled MAGE and ENG who are using the rift to Pull players through Keep Doors and into the LAVA at Tor anroc...disgusting, not surprised that your playing on Destro side either.....
We complained. A lot.
You should've seen (at least the Engineer and the Magus) when the Magus was first introduced. They were so much worse than they are now.
Yah well you see where it got the community now....the most OP ability in the game now belong in the hands of a disgruntled MAGE and ENG who are using the rift to Pull players through Keep Doors and into the LAVA at Tor anroc...disgusting, not surprised that your playing on Destro side either.....
IIRC, both Electromagnet and Chaotic Rift were both added about 2 weeks before launch. See how I amended my previous post? Mythic did make a mistake not extending beta. But most issues are still pretty minor (the CR/EM being the largest ones, and they're slowly getting fixed). So again, effing stop with the whining. The game isn't perfect, it definitely launched a few months early, but stuff is getting fixed (fairly fast too) and everything should be where it should've been at launch.
It's okay that you're not subbed - you're the consumer and with your dollar, you're showing Mythic how you feel about their product - but stop the goddamned whining. It's annoying, immature, and does nothing to help either you, the game or the community.
Simply put, they focused so tightly on testing that they didn't run the biggest test of all - how the game plays as a whole. Did they run out of time, or were they overconfident and ignored that test? That's a good question.
The open test was capped too low and run too quickly for the grind choices to set in. The closed tests were mission orders - "we'll load X zones, we want you to test Y" like open RvR, a zone's quests, or a city siege. Running off and doing full-time scenarios was a ticket off the bus, so it didn't happen. Leave it to the players to end up deciding what THEY want to do - the test that wasn't run until after launch. Surprise.
Avatars are people too
While I agree that Rift and Electromagnet are both OP and should be looked at (increase the cooldown, decrease the range slightly), those skills are in the TOP of the worst mastery line for those classes which makes them pretty useless except those abilities.
I am not surprised that most of the beta testers rolled a Bright Wizard as their main though... Horrible decision not to balance that class. Fail.
What Mythic should have done:
1. Give more appealing classes to Order, make them more exicitng and better looking.
2. Balance Bright Wizards and Ironbreakers to their counter parts.
3. Make resistances work as intended
4. Encourage RvR by giving good renown, XP, loot.
They are still working on the stupid quests and worthless content. So I doubt they can solve these within a few months.
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Ted Treffon: I don't represent Hardbodies.
Osbourne Cox: I know very well what you represent. You represent the idiocy of today.
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hmm, sounds like they made the whole DAOC Task Dungeon mistake all over again. They will fix this eventually by making RVR uber phat w/ lootz like they did in DAOC. They try to cater to the casual 30 minute player who wants to get something done, but don't realize that MMORPG players are insane enough to do nothing but mindless grinding if that will get to endgame.
Extremism in the defense of Liberty is no vice.