No Public Beta Testing: good bad for the game?

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

--But they still talk about the game prior to its release anyway. It's minor spoilers at best, and officially sanctioned, but it's still a spoiler, especially if you're going to say

--to the proposed random fates and random dummies.

--That's quite a leap in logic; just because they would want to test multiple things, it does not mean that they would want or have to provide access to raids or dungeons. It really depends on what it is they'd want to test, but if they're really so concerned about certain aspects of a dungeon or a story element that they would want player feedback for it, and then had no other means to test it other than by sticking someone into that part of the dungeon or story, then a more suitable approach, in order to avoid the leaks, would be to have a more closed and controlled test where applicants would have to sign an NDA (much like with the media tour).
But there's plenty of data to be gathered without having to mix any kind of story into the situation.


--Because a team of game developers cannot possibly account for what happens when their software actually collides with their end users. This holds especially true if their personal testers have a planned and conveniently well-known and pre-approved behavior or bias on how to handle certain gameplay situations.
The reason certain elements of job balance, bugs, and inconsistencies are brought up in the first place is because of what the developers expect and provide for vs. what the players put in/out, and we wouldn't be having reworks or revisions if everything were going exactly as the developers proposed and expected. They're not perfect, nor should we expect them to be; which is why there are some things they just wouldn't know is necessary until after the players end up jam-handing their pristine work.

--This confuses me.
Are you saying that the core combat gameplay, which is repeated ad nauseam from the start of play to the end of it, is a small thing?
Or are you saying that prior testing to ensure that things go well when players begin to take control of the gameplay is a small thing?
Or are you saying something else?


--I hate to break it to you, but if you think a Public Test Server is what's going to make people think that SE is getting lazy and that other players are ok with it, then you probably should take a moment to re-examine these forums for a while. There is no shortage of threads or discussion about the state of the game, and you'll easily find remarks that SE are either "getting lazy," "purposefully cutting content," and/or that they just "don't get it."

--Sure, but they can't say specifics. What they can and can't say is at the Discretion of SE

--Why do they need a PTR if all we are doing is FATES and attacking Training Dummies.
Sounds like stuff they can/should do with their own QA.

--Thats...kinda what Im getting at. If they are just gonna make us fight Dummies and do Fates...what is the point of the PTR? What are we public testing that they need the playerbase to do it for them instead of their own QA? And if its going to be Closed and Controlled...then its not a PTR. What your describing isn't the same as the Subject.

--Yes nothing is perfect, but QA is there so content is released in the best possible state it can...and then when its live, for many reasons there could still be an issue, and its brought up and usually dealt with pretty quickly. Sometimes things change when you take it out of a Closed Isolated Server, and put it on a Live Server. Unless I just haven't noticed, I haven't witnessed a trend of content releasing Broken because of a lack of QA or PTR.
So based on that, I feel good thinking that they do enough QA to release stuff in the best state they can.
But then of course there is the occasional hiccup. It happens.

--No, Im talking about having us run FATES and attack Training Dummies. That is a pretty small thing to make a Whole PTR for.
And what exactly are we doing that QA can't do?

--Im not talking about Threads on the Forums about peoples takes on the game and the Devs. Im talking about making PTRs for this game instead of them doing any QA themselves. And I remain firm on that stance, nah, keep PTRs out of FFXIV. Unless they suddenly have no manpower or resources to do their own QA, we dont need PTR.

[Baxcel]

snip

100% agree with everything you said.

Why do people assume a public/private test server should/would have actual content? The story is fine you don't need to adjust anything there.. the fates can be programmed to have raid/trial mechincs there, the dummies can be setup for hp and time testing like Stone, Sea, Sky. The game already has trial synthesis for testing crafts so those could also be tested by player for the new skills.

It seems to me people who think that for some reason the story or raids would be spoiled have no idea how a test server would be ran.

Honestly it is something the game needs, a test for players and a way for players to communicate back with the devs on what they approve of and dislike. On what breaks and what works. Of course the devs have final say but the game would feel a bit better if some dialog between the base and the devs, especially on things the player have been asking about for years! The infamous quote from YoshiP during the last fanfest over DRKs Bloodweapon skill/spell desync "No one has mentioned that before" and even then nothing was done to address it.

[Misutoraru]

So the complaint everyone is making is if there is a PTR then I will be spoiled.

But, you don't have to look up anything on the PTR, play the PTR, or look up any leaks. If you do so then you have chosen to spoil the content for yourself.

Again the PTR is a tool more for the devs than the players anyways. If they devs need it and can utilize it good, if they don't then they likely won't implement one.



MMOs cater to the loudest, as they then to be the larger group. This game has more casual content and heavily caters to casual players as they are the loudest and largest group. Which is why harder content and class design has suffered a bit over the past two expansions in this game. But the point is none of that had to do with a PTR.

It is the balance and overall direction that I am worry about
It really depend on how dev act on “feed back”.
I must say I do not have great experience when dev use public testing and players feedback on public test, especially when multiple fractions in game that involve some competition.
Always the most played job/fraction get “favourite treatment”.
Player’s feedbacks in forum only reflects a tiny portion of the whole player community and usually the most vocal one.

I am fine with public testing if it is only to find bugs and server stress test, or dev using it to collect and fine tune “numbers”. When it is use to get feedback from players, it get complicated.
Of cause it is always good to have dev taking player feedbacks into consideration, it need to handle carefully.

[Baxcel]

Always the most played job/fraction get “favourite treatment”.
Player’s feedbacks in forum only reflects a tiny portion of the whole player community and usually the most vocal one.

Sorry to say it's already like that without the test server. The Devs themselves only play DPS class an have said they don't like playing Healer and Tank.