Private Testing Feedback Needs to Stop

That thought omits that the final boss room of CTe is small. Many opted to do that final elite boss fight with only 6 or 7 players in the room. Did Charon and company truly design an elite idea to bench a couple of players? That’s the idea the community received.

Difficulty is subjective, and what’s often forgotten is the mid-range player. Before the clamp, the mid-range player could keep trying at each gear upgrade until they could accomplish the raid and the feats. No spoon feeding. They were trying. But under the stat clamp model, there is no mid-range on elite. There is either you can do it or you can’t. It doesn’t matter how much money you spend or how much time you put in. You’re just where you are. From now till the end.

I would ask the devs to consider the mid-range in elite. Not for today’s content, but for old EEG content that’s two or three years old. For some reason, that idea is incredibly offensive to a scattering of people (I think even Charon); but if the idea is “git gud” or don’t bother? Well, eventually players are going to choose “don’t bother”. I don’t think we’re there yet, but it’s coming.

What about testing feedback is so valuable? When we don't know final version. What's stopping you from testing it and posting results yourself? I'm sure the A-Team is not the only game in town on the test server. Sounds like you have a personal vendetta and using this as an avenue. If the A-Team gives the devs peak performance in developing the content, then their work deserves something, no? I can see if they won the Test Server Group award that offered cool stuff but you can do the same as them.

I get it, I used to test things hardcore, almost to the degree that penryn does, then AF2 happened and they revamped the entire raid @ the last minute and pushed it live before any testing was done, making the work I did completely useless and a waste of time.


This is why we should have a DLC be on test for more than 2 weeks, more work needs to be done before a DLC is pushed live because half the time a DLC is broke af when it goes live and more than half he time, specific feats are impossible to do, raids have to be disabled, constant crashing happens when entering the content,etc.

I agree that testing is a complete sh** show and needs to be revamped (especially internally), Private feedback needs to be moved into the public sphere, incentives for testing say like some extra replays or somethikng. But I agree that incentives should on the table for people that do test. I mean that or the ideal solution would be a 3rd party tester, the only issue their is Daybreak sticking a crowbar in their wallet and forking that money for a 3rd party tester.

I'd say even for exploits on test server content only, should be open too, but then the devs actually have to fix the stuff. Live server where someone can actually benefit from something, that should ofc be kept to to the exploit thread wherein you can only see the posts you've made and not anyone else's posts.

I think you're missing the point, I don't have a problem with anyone posting feedback. I'll say it again, I have an issue with anyone who back channels with the devs to get the DLC made in their view, especially when the feedback that is taken into account is increasingly only coming through PMs. If their was nothing wrong with the feedback then they wouldn't feel the need to back channel on a constant basis.

I get your point. You're displeased with feedback not being public and devs favoring long-time testers. You didn't answer my questions. Why is it so important? Did you ever think devs want to keep encounters as much as a mystery as possible? You jumped straight to conspiracy from a forum disagreement. Can you give solid factual examples of devs favoring them?

Some games do bring players to work for them. I know Niantic requires players to have a certain ELO rank to work for them, so they can improve their game development, but that's a different kind of game to DCUO.

In any case, the problem you have is the same one I do. I don't think there is anything wrong with a private message on feedback, but there is a problem with feedback that is only accepted because it shows favoritism.

This is all very tinfoil-hatty.

So have everyone post feedback on the testing forums so that you may go through that feedback and determine what is viable or not based on your zero experience actually testing what the feedback is being posted about?

Both sides are right in this thread imo. Its fine that some players want to give their feedback privately. The problem is, that its not being communicated with the public sometimes.

If there is a major change likely to come in an upcoming test server hotfix wich was requested as a pm, it should be posted by the dev that got it or by mepps anonymously. That way its actually preventable to have changes that are not the best in hindsight, wich couldve been avoided by a discussion beforehand.


To the point that anyone can test, yes its true. Kinda.
I like to test stuff but its painful to play on test if youre not living close to the US. The ping is awful. If i wanted to clip 2 abilites i'd have to wait 0,5sec until i hit the 2nd ability becuase it woukdnt register otherwise.
Since im a PS player im using a controller wich still or again makes the game lag massivley after some time. Then i have to replug it to reset the lag but then my audio cuts off unless i restart the game... overall, yes anyone can test but for me its far from enjoyable. Its actually more like torture at times. (Fun fact, if i use the PS5 controller wireless, the game lags massively or runs at 5fps. Cant tell wich is the case.)
Since i like to mainly play elite content its rather frustrating that i cant even contribute to feedback properly because the game performance doesnt even come close to live servers - and for elite it makes a massive difference.

This isn’t entirely true. Yes you can care about those listed issue and give feedback. However the feedback given should be unbiased. When one says “X is to hard” you should be more clear. Is it hard because there is an issue with the mechanics? Or is it hard because you can’t personally do the mechanics?

Yes the game appeals to all types of people. Casual and elitist are all part of the game. The game is designed for everyone. So not. It’s not designed for the elitist. It’s also not designed for the average player. It’s designed for everyone. Regular raids should be able to be completed by pretty much everyone. If someone is a cosplayer toon and is having trouble with the regular stuff should the game be lowered so they can beat it? No. They are choosing to limit what abilities they can do to pull of a cosplay. They are intentionally limiting their toons potential. So regular raids are meant for almost everyone while event should be made by pretty much anyone in the entire game. Then you have elite raids. They are designed to be harder than regular with tougher mechanics. So yes they should be hard. I’m not saying they should only be beat by the top 5-10% of the players. Anyone should be able to beat them by following mechanics and actually trying to optimize. If you aren’t willing to learn mechanics and just want to face roll elite than sorry but it shouldn’t be designed to let you beat it. It should be harder and you should try to get better to beat it. This is why I don’t like cheap mind control or similar mechanics. Because they are cheap ways to simulate hard content.

If the game was only designed for the average player than elite wouldn’t exist. If these top players leave the game than it’s only a matter of time before the content because even easier and the average players become the top players. So what than? Should the new base line be the lower players?

What proof do you have that they ONLY listen to feedback by PM? If that’s the case they wouldn’t have a feedback thread for each thing up on test? If you look over the feedback you’ll see devs actively interacting with people in the feedback thread. So what’s wrong if someone chooses to only give feedback by PM? Believe it or not, the devs actually listen to feedback. I’ve personally talked with a dev privately. But I’m open with feedback too.

You keep using the word integrity, you or anyone in this thread or the entire game is completely welcome to try and debate how the feedback I provide and the DCUO resume I have to present to back up that feedback is somehow lacking integrity. What am I providing feedback on? hmm lets see Artifacts, Allies, Elite Content and what have I focused on for the past 10+ years of playing DCUO hmm...

I also don't understand your complete lack of respect for the developers, because that is really what you are doing by creating this thread. You don't believe that feedback the developers read on the forums or PMs or emails or postage letters aren't weighted equally to them and you assume they just completely disregard feedback from players because it didn't come from ______ player. Not sure how else to describe that besides a complete lack of respect for their abilities to do their job.

The only point worth mentioning out of all of this is that we need more testers

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I don't quite agree with this part of the statement, but everything else, sure. And I suppose I don't agree with with part of the statement because no other part of the community support system is benefitting in a direct manner from anything that they're doing to benefit this community.

I don't do pre-live content testing, no - I like this game but my home PC is set up for word processing, not gaming. Pretty sure my boss'd frown on me using work resources for that, so scratch my work PC. That aside, I do donate quite a lot of time to the task of video verification of (nurmerous) in-game bugs, and quite a few of us engage in the (absolutely) thankless task of community education efforts via means of FAQ creation, streaming, blogs and social media presence, et cetera. Try getting a solo shot at Doomsday for a straight month. It'll make you hate people. But I'm still here, too.

I think treats or other overt displays of tester favoritism would muddy the waters further; and honestly - quite probably - third party testing is the way to go. But since that ship has sailed and no one's got both a plasma cutter and the Daybreak CFO's home address, that wallet is likely to stay closed. Plus, for better or for worse, all the people that actually know the game are already here on this forum somewhere, and likely somewhere in this thread.

Since that's the case, formalized tester solicitation and more transparency is probably the most functionally applicable way to improve the current circumstances. Or Daybreak can draw names out of a hat and start sending people laptops; that would probably accomplish about the same thing for diversifying tester results.

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