TWO Training Rooms?

If it's a fact that open betas don't provide any useful feedback or testing, why not just go straight to live and skip open entirely?

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

If that's what I had said, you might have had a point. Only, you don't. This is what I said.

I underlined the important bit. The fact is, by the time a game is ready for an Open Beta, what the developers need is a stress test and more raw data. The example I have used before is Planetside. Sure, the developers, in house, could test a 32 person fight very easily... but could they actually test 600 people, 200 per each side, each with different connection speeds, each doing something different in the game? No. Could they get that sort of raw data with a closed beta? Probably. An open beta, however, will get a massive influx of players in.

What I've been over before though is that the perception of beta's has changed in the eyes of many gamers. Many users approach an open-beta as though the software was feature-complete, and do not take the time, or make an effort, to actually test the software existing software, instead focusing on the new hotness feature that's been tested to death. In the case of City of Heroes, massive bugs, such as the towers at the end of the Statesman's Task Force, and the Archvillains using Reichsman values instead of AV values, have slipped through because nobody in an Open Beta wanted to test the existing content.

The fact is, Open Beta's generally don't provide useful feedback from the playerbase. They do, however, provide useful data feedback to developers tracking the numbers as those numbers are created.

There is also the matter, and I believe this has been directly stated by the Paragon Studios staff, that players who actually participate in beta testing, meaning they file bug reports, go looking for issues, ask what to test, get involved with making documented reports on the forums... these are the players who accounts will be flagged for inclusion in future beta events.

Players who simply join open beta, log a bunch of time in the game playing, but don't actually make any kind of bug report or effort to communicate what they experienced, won't get noticed for inclusion in future beta events.

The squeakiest wheel gets the grease. And yes, I know that saying doesn't completely apply here, but I like to use a tired cliche at least once a day.

I wasn't talking to you, I was talking to Bill, in response to Storm.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

Man, if I had a dollar for everytime this came up... >.>

No, that does NOT grant access to any Closed Beta other than the Going Rogue Closed Beta.

I thought I heard a piano when I started test!

Looks like Issue 17 will be incompatible with Linux: the game hangs at "Loading message stores...done." Could one of the other Linux users confirm this?

...Paragon studios has never revealed what gets a person into closed beta, ever. That's a nice idea towards what they might do, but they've never come out and said 'People who break out game and tell us what's wrong get into the next beta.'

The flawed logic there is, it'd create a group of people that always got into the beta because they're simply faster at noticing things and can type in detail. While it's nice to entertain this for several seconds. I'd assume that to be fair... The inclusion in Beta testing is a little more random.

The idea that 'Haha, you didn't find anything.' or 'People got to the bug faster than you.' making you inelligible for further betas is plainly... Stupid and mean. Just because you couldn't find anything wrong, even though you may have looked hard for any little bug... Suddenly discards you from being included in Closed betas in the future?

...Paragon Studios isn't stupid, nor are they nasty like that.

I would hope this isn't true. I was in Dual Pistols closed beta and didn't find a single bug while testing a variety of defender builds. I was actually amazed at the quality of the animations and performance. I saw nothing that jumped out at me as a bug. If there was it was something small and easily missed.

As for forum posts, the most I could have done was express opinions. I wasn't all that excited about the animations, but most players were. That's simply a matter of personal taste. I thought the damage on defenders was light, but then saw they use the same formula for every archtype and defenders have always had weak damage. Look at the forums, see some think it's too low, others say it fits the formula. Fine, someone addressed it, don't add clutter.

My first closed beta was Issue 14. Spent a month there. Find bugs, go to the forums, find they've been addressed, go back to testing. If you aren't aware of how the bug data is handled and see it being addressed, and see no reason to add to what has already been told, then you could be cutting your throat and not even realize it.

So I would hope that isn't true. You learn by doing and it isn't always clear what you are supposed to do. If they want to use the players who are known to be efficient bug hunters, great. Makes good sense. But just tossing others aside when they may have actually been trying to find bugs and actively built a variety of missions to test should account for something.

I know right? I'd be rich if every time that was asked I got some money lol! Get it through your heads people!

...

This would be great if it were true. But it's not. I know three people, whose situations are:

1) Have been in every single closed beta from the beginning. Except they don't do a single bit of testing or file even one report or post any tidbit of feedback. In fact, sometimes they don't even log onto the test server. But get invited every single closed beta, including this one.

2) Was in numerous closed betas for a while, and gave lots of nice feedback and reported bugs and posted on the forum for each one. Then, suddenly, stopped getting closed beta invites somewhere around i13 and hasn't gotten once since.

3) Has never been in a closed beta except for the AE one and the DP one. Gave TONS of useful information, feedback, and some very big bug reports. During the AE beta did a lot of useful work and found some big issues. And has participated in numerous open betas and helped there too. Still has yet to get into any closed betas.

So I know people who don't log on at all who still get included every time, and people who work their fingers to the bone giving feedback and bug reports who don't get invited at all.

Originally Posted by PRAF68_EU Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.

What exactly is this suppose to mean? Kheldarn and I have both seen a lot of people asking the same crap instead of searching threads. The only reason her comment was funny to me. What is your problem with that?

No one knows how the Devs choose Closed Beta testers. Personally I feel it's nothing more than a lottery.

I turn in hundreds of bug reports...after i'm done with them.

I have a HUGE problem with that.

Well until you state what it is you might as well be talking to yourself. So until you bring a valid reason to the table how this is a problem for you just deal with it!

If it says nothing, then fail?

No, Fail was the first patch today, that made the Launcher/Patcher/Client a version ahead of the servers. Was funny fail.

I...don't quite believe the code to detect your card is working as intended. I'm pretty darn sure my old vid card would spit out smoke and burn out if I tried to run Ultra Mode with it (after all, it was a cheap replacement when WoW managed to kill my older card and I needed something to drop in quick), but apparently it detects it and says I can turn on Ultra Mode. It isn't as powerful as the minimum req cards Positron pointed out. But maybe his info from december is WAY outdated now. Or maybe nvidia was just fleecing the customers so much my older card is roughly equivalent to one of their newer cards, I dunno how these things work.

Guess I won't know until it goes to open beta, though.

Well, I get no pop up or compatability message at all.