"Beta 1Z" ?

Honestly Frogboy, you're just making up letters now  

It was a facetious response expressing my desire for Elemental to leave beta.

After 'Z' its 'GT'. Everyone knows that

I am excited about the next version, All bugs that I have run across have been noted/reported in the forums. As a beta tester I am in a holding pattern until the next version. Every bug fixed now is one step closer to a finished product. As in any beta test, the quicker we provide accurate feedback and error reports with detailed information. The quicker they can fix them.

Something I would like to see is the ability to play a complete single player game (start to finish)  before moving to multiplayer.

"The mouse who sits still, finds no cheese at the end of the maze"

Hmmm, I have a question. (maybe a stupid question) When we get done with the Final Beta will we have a finished game and downloading the release version will just be a formality or will there be a lot of content added between the final beta and the release version?

I would say in order for any stage of beta to move forward all the content relevant to that "stage" needs to be in game and working as intended, tested for bugs, stability, and balanced. From what I've seen in the beta's a LOT of content still needs to be added. On top of that all that content needs to be balanced. Balancing is something I'm giving more and more thought to as the beta's progress.

Back in the day when I worked on UO we had a private test server. This was back before MMO's had public "test" servers and it was only open to developers and their families. Our biggest internal debates (lets face it, they were flat out arguments) were over balancing skills, spells, and items. Every time we would introduce something new to the game it would take months of testing to find the proper balance to make sure these things didn't over-power one class against another or one play style over another. Achieving a proper balance can take MONTHS of play testing alone and in order to balance these things they ALL need to be in game. In Elemental's case this means we'll need ALL the spells that will be in the final game. We'll need all resources and things that can be made with them. Basically we need to have whole, complete, system to work with and test. A lot of what we'll need to do this properly we don't have. Hell, we've only got three types of monsters walking around on the map. All the various monsters need to be in game and every spell that is in game needs to be tested against them, their armor and health needs to be balanced, there are a million little factors that need to be adjusted.

Until all that is done I don't think I could vote "Yes" in good conscious and still call my-self a professional tester. I actually have a name in the beta testing community to uphold as from time to time I still get paid to test games and other software. I won't put the "Raven Stamp of Approval" on something that's not finished to my high standards.

How much time will we devote to Balancing out the spells and stats of all the creatures and items in game?

One last question. When Elemental plays it's "credits" will we be listed as Beta Testers? If so I'd like to know so I can send my Real Name to the person responsible for adding it to the Beta Testers List.

You can't properly test balance right now no matter what you do, going by that standard. Any spell intended to be used in tactical combat won't be in the game until tactical combat is also in the game, and that's beta 4.

When something this size is still in active development, it's not practical to wait for all the content. You're testing systems. Content will get added throughout the process, because people like artists and writers can only work so fast, AND they can work in parallel to the developers. Speaking as a software developer myself, that's the only practical way to get it done. Balance in particular is pointless in beta 1, because multiplayer will completely throw it out of whack again anyway, and AI improvements will do the same.

If you really expect all the quests and spells targetted for release to be in the game and balanced before we get out of beta 1, we'll be in beta 1 for the next five months.

(A friend of mine is a professional game tester currently working in the industry, and he goes through the same thing. There is no such thing as an early build that's content or feature complete. Content creators simply can't work that fast, but they *can* keep working on content while coders are adding multiplayer and modding support. Of course he also wouldn't call what we have a "beta", since it's more like an "alpha", but that's okay.)

For beta 2 this is easier, because the standard is if multiplayer works correctly. You can measure that. For beta 1, the standard should be things like "does the quest system work?", not "is every quest for release already in the game and balanced?"

Here's the link to the Elemental beta schedule:

https://forums.elementalgame.com/363845

I think it'll clear up a lot of questions if people take a look at it.

I look forward to seeing this Major update!

I wont say how im going to vote untill i see it, because that would be very silly wouldnt it!

LoL I think you took my reply a little too dramatically my friend. I wouldn't vote no to save face, I would vote no if I thought it wasn't ready. As for this current stage of beta I don't see a problem with moving forward. The goals that were set for this particular stage of beta I think Have been met. This beta was to get the foundations of the mechanics in, to get the outlines of how the individual systems will work, I.E. the economics, the diplomacy, the Quests system, and to make sure the game will run on as wide a range of systems as possible without errors. Those goals have been met for this stage of beta.

Most of the examples I give in my reply refer to things that will be important in the next few stages of beta. Things that can and have taken companies years to get right. I have faith in Stardock's ability to do this as I haven't found a game of theirs I didn't like, but, in a true beta testing environment when you're on the inside of a company things are a lot more involving from a testers standpoint. In many cases when I was a internal tester we would receive new beta builds on a almost daily basis. The developers had all the concepts locked down and the testers didn't have much say in changing them. The testers job was to play and look for bugs in gameplay, graphics, game performance, etc etc.

In this case Stardock has given it's customers the chance to be testers and actually have input on how some of the systems will work in the game. It's a great move on their part and I'm glad to be a part of it, but we aren't truly "beta testers" when you compare that to what a paid tester goes through. As such I'm just wondering how much say we'll have when it comes to some of the examples I give in my first reply. When you get down to the nitty gritty of the core concepts there's a lot we don't know and won't find out until the systems are fleshed out. As Brad has stated making a game, when it comes to the actual work, is 80% engine, 20% actual "game". With as fast as the schedule is going some of the upcoming steps in the build process will see loads of content added at once. Many different unit types, wandering monsters, spells, items, quests, champions, races, skills, I could go on and on. How much say will we get into these things and how they work? It's conceivable those details could be argued on forever and of course, none of us want that and I'm sure Stardock already has a set time limit on when the final word will be. It's always possible at one point that a 75% consensus won't be reached or agreed upon and that point Stardock will have to say "Well, it's been fun but we think it's ready. It's fun, it's awesome, it's done.".

Of course there's always the great modding features for those people who simply can't be agreeable. If they don't like the final say on something they'll just have to mod it in themselves. I know more then a few people who are already planning their Elves and Dwarves and Orcs.

You're quite right, Tridus. Of course we all know the things I mentioned aren't in This stage of beta. In the next few stages though those things (all the spells, items, quests) will be extremely important when it comes to balancing and gameplay.

That would be "was" a UO developer. That was quite a few years ago. One of the first jobs I got after college but I started as a player and then was a "Volunteer" staffer. Origin did a lot of groundbreaking work but sadly having non company employees working as official staff members on a MMO back fired in their faces. The Volunteer System was shut down after a man was caught using the game and his staff member abilities to stalk his ex-wife in the game. Origin got sued, more then a few people got fired, and the volunteer staff program was shut down. I was lucky enough to be kept on when program was cut as was one other person. I worked from home and logged in through a special client to answer pages, help players with housing issues (before the system was automated), get people un-stuck. As a employee though, after the fiasco that happened, all GM's and Seer's in game had to follow a preset "script" of answers. If a player asked us to do something we weren't supposed to we had to say "I'm sorry I can't help you with that. If you need further assistance or help please contact a Admin or Origin tech support..etc etc. Thank you for playing Ultima Online".

After doing that for two and a half years I went over to a free shard we used during testing called "The Forgotten Lands" which was the longest running UO free shard in the world up until it shut down recently. There I was known by my player name "Raven Xavier" and my GM name "Thanatos". I also portrayed a bunch of other "Gods and Goddesses" for RP reasons during live quests and events.

Those were good times. Probably some of the happiest of my life.

and

Stardock usually releases on thursdays

and

next thursday is April 1st

um....prepare for some fun?

lol.

We just mean significant game mechanic changes.

Thanks for chiming in Frogboy. Some people seemed to be reading way too much into this.

No, it's not, because we're not judging whether or not the complete game is good, we're judging whether or not what we have access to up to this point is good enough to move forward with.

I already ceded that this wasn't the best market sample with my first post.  "If a majority of us say yes, then they're doing their jobs perfectly, and now they have an indicator that the game will sell, at least to folks similar to those in the Beta."

I also mentioned that SD will obviously have the final say in this.  I'm starting to get the feeling you've completely misread and misunderstood what it was I was saying.  All I've been saying is that, as far as the Beta is concerned, I think SD's doing a really good thing, asking us.

And to this I say, whether or not you ask the players doesn't matter.  We've already established that SD has the final say, and we also know the testers aren't the ones rooting around in the cogs and wheels of the game and making changes.  With those two things known and in place, then asking the players has no real impact.  Either you get some good ideas out of them, or you don't.  In this particular case, either they decide the Beta is ready to move on, or it's not.  We can't hurt anything, so why not ask us?  SD's going to move forward and release the game, with or without us, and they won't let us hold them back more than is necessary, or at all if they feel like it.  While asking, or not asking, the players doesn't hurt anything, having an open dialogue with them about whether or not they feel the Beta is ready to move forward can tremendously help Stardock feel out their little sample, as well as tell them if they're doing a good job or not so far.

Also, using the WoW Forums and Development as a reference?  Bad example.  Completely different game, different company, different genre, different everything.  While the WoW forums may be slanted to the Elite and Hardcore players, I tend to doubt Blizz listens to anyone other than themselves about what to do with their games.  The most cooperation I've ever seen between Blizz and its community has been with the SC2 Beta, and even then, it's obvious Blizz isn't listening, or else they'd stop nerfing the Protoss, at least for a little while.  (Even the guys who don't play Protoss, like me, think the Protoss nerfs are getting to be too much.)

SD's obviously different.  Elemental is obviously different.  To compare Blizz/SD, WoW/E:WoM, is absurd to say the least.  SD listens to their community, they brainstorm suggestions made by their community, and if they get a good idea that works well with their game, they'll go ahead and see what they can do with it, if anything.  But comparing their business and development models is not only a faux pa(SP?), but fallacy, like comparing two different sets of ideals.  They can both be good, but to a third person entirely, they might both seem absolutely ridiculous, but in the end, that's all just opinion and speculation.  It's about what works best for them and theirs, and this is what they've decided on.

In the end, whether or not SD should use us as a tool in deciding if their game should move forward or not is purely a matter of opinion, and as I've stated, I think it's a good idea.