79 replies to this topic

[Bishop Steiner]

This isn't a recruitment poster like Mischief's post. Nor an indictment of those not "testing for the greater good".

I just thought it would be nice to correlate the reasons people have personally chosen not to, in one place, sort of as a "Food For Thought" Buffet for PGI to digest.

-Is it because you get nothing tangible for your time, like keeping the cbills and xp?
-Don't think it matter because PGI will do whatever PGI will do, regardless?
-Find it to be a hassle, having to download another client, update it, then because nothing is stored from session to session, grind through the Mechlab and Modules and stuff to test anything new? (My personal pet peeve)
-Fill in thought here....... (aka could be dozens of more reasons)

And what...if anything, could PGI do to incentivize you to use the Test Server?

For me, one thing I think, since it is reset every session, is just to assign us "Clean Slate" accounts, with everything already maxxed out. Thus all we have to do, is hit the mechlab, and go. I don't care much about my accounts saved builds, TBH, because it takes like...60 seconds to slap together if I really need to, but because usually we are testing NEW stuff... so for instance, here, I need Clan tech, to test the clan laser nerf ideas. So having my HBK build on hand is rather pointless.

At the very least, if not a true cleanslate, then just unlock all the skill trees on every chassis, and all the modules, so they are literally grab and go.

Spending An hour just unlocking a set of mechs to use, just feels wasteful...that's time I could be actually testing.

What about you?

And please.... don't crap on other people's reasons or opinions. I'm not asking for a debate about why we should or shouldn't, etc.... just for why you, the individual don't.

Thank you.

***EDIT: Making it a weekend event on the Test Server with rewards actually staying with your account would also be brilliant, yes.

***Edit pt2: PGI should allow testers to pause any active Premium Time so it's not being wasted while in PTS. Or if that is too hard, reimburse us for our active premium time.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 16 October 2015 - 03:30 PM.

[CptGier]

Yeah, part of it would be the pointlessness of playing it, other then to test stuff...

[TyphonCh]

I... Actually have been enjoying the PTS server more than regular games. The change to lasers required people to use more mixed loadouts. Or so it seems until everyone settles in. Not near as much 600m+ armor obliteration. Playing without quirks is really refreshing
I'd spend more time if there wasn't so much of a wait for games. I swear yesterday afternoon (About this time Mountain time) there was less than 48 people playing.
They could easily incentivize it with an event. Something simple like every 10 games we get rewards (C-bills, MC, etc) up to 50 games for the top reward

Edited by Team Chevy86, 16 October 2015 - 03:21 PM.

[Adamski]

Because PGI will do whatever they want regardless.

People have been yelling at them to fix ECM for almost 4 years now, so it wasn't a godmode jesus box.
And yes, ECM is godmode jesus box, no other 1 ton piece of equipment negates sensors, and high res graphics settings, and 2 entire lines of weapons (SSRM & LRM).

People had to yell at them forever about how unbalanced some weapons were, and it wasn't until PGI ran their own 12 man and got curb stomped with their remains desecrated did they call back their balance dev from his 6 month vacation to edit the XML file.

Edited by Adamski, 16 October 2015 - 03:24 PM.

[Mazzyplz]

Bishop Steiner, on 16 October 2015 - 03:07 PM, said:

This isn't a recruitment poster like Mischief's post. Nor an indictment of those not "testing for the greater good".

I just thought it would be nice to correlate the reasons people have personally chosen not to, in one place, sort of as a "Food For Thought" Buffet for PGI to digest.

-Is it because you get nothing tangible for your time, like keeping the cbills and xp?
-Don't think it matter because PGI will do whatever PGI will do, regardless?
-Find it to be a hassle, having to download another client, update it, then because nothing is stored from session to session, grind through the Mechlab and Modules and stuff to test anything new? (My personal pet peeve)
-Fill in thought here....... (aka could be dozens of more reasons)

And what...if anything, could PGI do to incentivize you to use the Test Server?

For me, one thing I think, since it is reset every session, is just to assign us "Clean Slate" accounts, with everything already maxxed out. Thus all we have to do, is hit the mechlab, and go. I don't care much about my accounts saved builds, TBH, because it takes like...60 seconds to slap together if I really need to, but because usually we are testing NEW stuff... so for instance, here, I need Clan tech, to test the clan laser nerf ideas. So having my HBK build on hand is rather pointless.

At the very least, if not a true cleanslate, then just unlock all the skill trees on every chassis, and all the modules, so they are literally grab and go.

Spending An hour just unlocking a set of mechs to use, just feels wasteful...that's time I could be actually testing.

What about you?

And please.... don't crap on other people's reasons or opinions. I'm not asking for a debate about why we should or shouldn't, etc.... just for why you, the individual don't.

Thank you.

wait, don't they give you like 2 Million mc and 2 million GXP in pts? why can't you buy the efficiencies?
you also get 2 billion cbills

does it really take an hour to buy efficiencies for 3 variants?

Edited by Mazzyplz, 16 October 2015 - 03:25 PM.

[Adamski]

Team Chevy86, on 16 October 2015 - 03:20 PM, said:

I... Actually have been enjoying the PTS server more than regular games. The change to lasers required people to use more mixed loadouts. Or so it seems until everyone settles in. Not near as much 600m+ armor obliteration. Playing without quirks is really refreshing
I'd spend more time if there wasn't so much of a wait for games. I swear yesterday afternoon (About this time Mountain time) there was less than 48 people playing.
They could easily incentivize it with an event. Something simple like every 10 games we get rewards (C-bills, MC, etc) up to 50 games for the top reward

If PGI wants players to do a testers job for them, the LEAST they could do would be to pay them with MC.

PGI is the two worst things a development company can be, cheap and lazy.

Edited by Adamski, 16 October 2015 - 03:28 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Mazzyplz, on 16 October 2015 - 03:21 PM, said:

wait, don't they give you like 2 billion mc in pts? why can't you buy the efficiencies?

You can buy Them.

The point, is let's say....Oh, I don't own an Executioner the last time they snapshotted my acct for the PTS. And the changes involve....lets say...clan lasers.

Now...before I even drop 1 time, I have to:
1) Buy 3-4 Executioners (or any clan mech since my acct has none)
2) Go through and unlock all the Skill trees, 121 clicks and 39 refreshes (for 3, let alone all 4)
3) Unlock and then purchase any relevant modules
4) Finally get to mechlab to outfit said mech

Because to get a "real world test" we need the mechs ready to go like the ones we use day to day, no unbasic'd, unmoduled clunkers.

and an hour later...maybe more, I might finally be ready to drop.

Seems awfully wasteful of time that could have been used actually testing, or just playing normal MWO Server and getting my usual 1-1.5 million cbills per hour. Especially is I have Premium Time open on my acct. Doubly so, since unless I buy said mechs for my acct before the next server updates, I get to do it ALL over again.

None of which is actually terribly relevant to this thread, actually.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 16 October 2015 - 03:33 PM.

[Gas Guzzler]

I plan on playing it tonight again, but what will probably drive me away after a while is:

Long wait times
Mech's I like (Black Knight) are in a worse state
No C-Bill Gains

[TyphonCh]

Bishop Steiner, on 16 October 2015 - 03:26 PM, said:

You can buy Them.

The point, is let's say....Oh, I don't own an Executioner the last time they snapshotted my acct for the PTS. And the changes involve....lets say...clan lasers.

Some mechs, for whatever reason, didn't have their weapon groups saved either. You can imagine how dropping in my 12 erml Nova went the first time with all of them in group 1...

[Bishop Steiner]

Team Chevy86, on 16 October 2015 - 03:31 PM, said:

Some mechs, for whatever reason, didn't have their weapon groups saved either. You can imagine how dropping in my 12 erml Nova went the first time with all of them in group 1...

yeah at least half my mechs had unassigned or wrongly assigned weapon groups.

I also figure it would be less data migration for them, if we just played on blank slate "Dev Special" accts.

[AEgg]

Mostly because I have to redownload it. MWO is like 10 gigs, that takes like three hours on my internet connection.

[TyphonCh]

AEgg, on 16 October 2015 - 03:40 PM, said:

Mostly because I have to redownload it. MWO is like 10 gigs, that takes like three hours on my internet connection.

That never stopped me. I grew up on a dial up internet connection. If I wanted to download that new album, I'd put it on before I went to bed and hopefully it was done in the morning
The internet still works while you sleep

[Bishop Steiner]

Gas Guzzler, on 16 October 2015 - 03:26 PM, said:

I plan on playing it tonight again, but what will probably drive me away after a while is:

Long wait times
Mech's I like (Black Knight) are in a worse state
No C-Bill Gains

Legit. Catch 22 also....because people get sick of waiting, nobody is on...because nobody is on, wait times suck.

Because of this, PGI throws up hands and says "nobody care to test, why bother".

Perhaps if PGI incentivized testing, people would try it, thus people would be on, and wait times wouldn't suck.

I clicked launch like ......10 minutes ago......which makes the hour spent buying and prepping mechs even more worth it.

Team Chevy86, on 16 October 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

That never stopped me. I grew up on a dial up internet connection. If I wanted to download that new album, I'd put it on before I went to bed and hopefully it was done in the morning
The internet still works while you sleep

Yeah...but what if you want to download that new album, a movie AND the PTS? Interwebz companies are bandwidthnazis these days.

Out of the 3, PTS would be low man out, for me, just saying.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 16 October 2015 - 04:06 PM.

[OznerpaG]

because i'm 99% of the way to tier 2, and it ain't gonna go up playing on the PTS server lol

[Percimes]

When I tried to patch the pts client the server was down, if I try it now it will take forever to patch meaning I won't be able to play much tonight.

[Mad Strike]

Hard drive partition space , should be like Elite: Dangerous where they have PTS and Live servers on the same game files.

Edited by strikebrch, 16 October 2015 - 04:03 PM.

[Wintersdark]

Team Chevy86, on 16 October 2015 - 03:20 PM, said:

I... Actually have been enjoying the PTS server more than regular games. The change to lasers required people to use more mixed loadouts. Or so it seems until everyone settles in. Not near as much 600m+ armor obliteration. Playing without quirks is really refreshing
I'd spend more time if there wasn't so much of a wait for games. I swear yesterday afternoon (About this time Mountain time) there was less than 48 people playing.
They could easily incentivize it with an event. Something simple like every 10 games we get rewards (C-bills, MC, etc) up to 50 games for the top reward

This, for me. I get into every PTS I can - I work during a lot of them, so it's just "when I can".

This particular PTS has had really enjoyable games. As much as I don't like the damage falloff mechanic, I can't argue that the whole package lead to (from my perspective at least) very interesting gameplay. Not just "look we've changed weapon balance" but fundamental changes to how people approached strategy in gameplay.

And that's the reason I enjoy playing on the PTS: It's different. You're generally testing something, so gameplay for that little window is different, not stale and more of the same. Even if I strongly disagree with the changes in a PTS I still enjoy playing in it just for the breath of fresh air.

So... I head to the PTS whenever possible regardless.

With that said, I'd probably make more of an effort and spend more time there if there was some incentive, because tangible goals and rewards make everything a bit more entertaining. Even if it was just some sort of staged acheivement thing:

1) 10 matches on the PTS.
2) 10 matches in each of two different PTS versions
3) 10 matches in each of three different PTS versions
and so forth, to encourage players to stop in on every PTS build, but not build/version specific acheivements as if you miss one for whatever reason that would ruin the set and make it impossible to complete. Gamify that beeyotch.

While it doesn't matter for me (I have practically everything anyways) they should just give all PTS accounts every pilot skill/mech/etc. I'm sure just copying your account and issuing a buttload of CB/MC is easier, but it does add a level of "grind" to the mechlab when you first log in, buying up everything you want to test etc.

Or, at least, so I assume for people who do that.

At the very least, they should push cbills earned on the PTS * 2 to your regular account, or something like that. Some sort of direct reward, so people are motivated to at least cbill grind matches on the PTS to generate traffic there.

[Wintersdark]

Team Chevy86, on 16 October 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

That never stopped me. I grew up on a dial up internet connection. If I wanted to download that new album, I'd put it on before I went to bed and hopefully it was done in the morning
The internet still works while you sleep

That wasn't an option this time, if you wanted to play on release. I needed to redownload mine this time around, and while I have a moderately usable 25mb down connection (so it only takes ~15 minutes) I wasn't able to start the download until the PTS started. Kinda dumb to not let people pre-download.

[TELEFORCE]

I was thinking about trying the PTS but I have premium time I don't want to waste. If they were to somehow compensate for that, though, then I'd be on board.

[3xnihilo]

Free time...I can't find any of it anywhere! I managed to patch in the PTS client this morning. I might find an hou or so tomorrow AM but probably when no one is on I like trying new stuff so I like the tests...please if anyone sees my free time anywhere let me know!