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As a Legendard Founder, closed beta tester and now an open beta tester, I really think it is a bad decision to stop wiping the game. Yes you went to 'Open Beta', but it's in name only. Without resets you've essential launched the game. The problem I see with this is that a lot of
functionality has yet to be implemented and a lot of tweaks still have to be made.
I appreciate the initial non-reset mentality, especially in order to test out how free-to-play will react with the trial mech mechanics and economy. It's very useful data to be had and needs to be done. But why not just disable Founder's mechs for a week or two and have *everyone* go through the trial phase. It would also give a better indication of the whole PUG vs. Premade griping that is going on the forums when everyone is relegated to the same trial mechs. Consider it a 'control group' if you're aware of how the research and development process goes.
Another case in point would be the proposed new double heat sink functionality with 0.14 heat per second as opposed to 0.20 heat per second. I would very much like to test this out as my initial calculations for my mechs and a even some of the PPC and Large Laser builds (Awesomes, K2 Catapult, Large Laser Atlas or Centurion) show that they either make heat dissipation worse so single heat sinks are better or that the gain is so marginal it isn't worth the C-Bill investment for upgrading, paying for extra sinks, and the associated repair costs. In either case, my conclusion is that the 0.14 heat sinks are not worth buying for *any* mech.
HOWEVER! I want to test this out.
But without resets to the game and to the amount of MC (and without injecting MC for the free testers) I really don't want to spend any actual money and C-Bills just to test something out. I would assume that most others (especially free players) feel the exact same way. Because of this you will probably get very biased and skewed data!
I really, really want to be able to test my math and hypothesis out(essentially a simulation) in-game (data for verification/validation), but have no incentive to do so. The current way the game runs actually discourages proper game testing.
The DHS example above is just one trade-study on the phase of the 'beta' we're in (it's not a true beta at all, you've essential launched that game by removing resets). Any ther new maps, additional features, and modifications to the mechanics, etc won't be properly tested with accurate and valid data to back up the research and balancing process unless wipes (and MC injections) still occur. I really hope that everyone at PGI takes this in stride and realizes that
essentially releasing the game only hurts the development process of this game. I would very much like to see MWO to survive, but in order to do that, we (as testers) need to actually be able to test the game and be able to give the developers at PGI useful (and unbiased) data and opinions.
We can't do this with how the game currently functions. I urge the developers at PGI to realize that the way they released to 'open beta' was a very, very big mistake. Make an announcement to admit this mistake; and let us actually get back to a productive testing environment.
As an example to my above DHS anecdote, here is what I've tested on my current mechs. It's a limited pool of chassis (but are some very common ones) and I would like to test out the PPC Catapult-K2 (rather than guass builds) as well as various PPC and Large Laser Awesome builds. But I have no reason or incentive to do so....in fact I am completely discouraged because in order to test I would have to spend a large amount of my personal money (which I already have done) or spend *a lot* of hours playing the game to earn the C-Bills in order to test the effect of 0.14 heat sinks vs. 0.20 heat sinks.
I will reiterate:
*This is not a good testing environment*
Please, please, please return the game to a proper and useful testing environment! It helps you and it helps us.
Edited by nungunz, 03 November 2012 - 10:29 AM.
