The sneaky better news that I’m seeing is that the new patch is closer than I thought!
Looking forward to the next major update!
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This might sound weird, I don’t really see how either of those two could be considered useful. They both say that they don’t like the system, without providing any details to work with. Sure, one is formulated more polite than the other, past the wrapping there’s zero content though. Which kind of feedback are you looking for, something that may challenge a design choice or just a like/dislike?
Is there going to be any feedback to feedback or is feedback planned to be a one-way channel that may or may not get read?
To elaborate a bit, in the past beta feedback seemed to have fallen on a lot of deaf ears, e.g. the broken weapon upgrade system that was released entirely unchanged despite receiving overwhelmingly bad feedback. Suppose there would be another upgrade system to beta test, and suppose further someone would make a detailed list of which parts are unlikely to work well and how they could be improved, would this be filed as “one player not completely happy”? Or would there be a discussion about those list items, with all parties negotiating for the best solution, possibly through several iterations?
I guess what I’m asking is how much the parts being beta tested are already set in stone, with anything past game crashing bugs being out of scope. Sorry, tech guy here, so no fancy wrapping. 
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I would assume that her first example was supposed to show it was a little more useful because of this line.
This example was negative yet gives some indication of what specifically they want the devs to focus on. The other example only amounted to “it sucks”.
Frankly, I wouldn’t try to over analyze those examples. I think she was just quickly trying to illustrate the difference between a comment that is just purely negative with zero value and a comment that is both negative and somewhat constructive.
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I do hope in a future beta troops and classes can be tested too. I’m thrilled with the increasing visibility and seemingly expanded sample size. I’m always happy for some good news.
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Constructive criticism gets lip service
Negative criticism gets spite
Console players get the result 
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On a technical level they both amount to “it sucks”. The first one is more dangerous because it allows a broad range of interpretation, e.g. “I’d like less gem rewards and more minor traitstones”.
Which is sort of my point. They should both be considered very valid feedback that should both receive the response “please specify in more detail which parts exactly you consider bad and how they could be improved”. There’s no point cherry-picking feedback based on how encouraging it looks, to improve the game experience you need to get your hands dirty (and sometimes grit your teeth, especially if you are not a tech person).
I’m still not sure what exactly is expected of beta testers, even after reading the announcement several times. The only item seems to be “willing to give us a thumbs-up”, which sounds more like participating in a survey than beta testing. Maybe it would help to provide more insights into their work environment, how the beta testers aid the devs, how the devs aid the beta testers. It would make it easier for players to decide whether they want to apply.
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Do beta testers use their existing account and if so, what kind of impact, if any, does joining have on an account? For example, can you still play the release version, do Guild Wars, etc.?
Yes, we use our real accounts for testing purposes. They are used on a different server than the live version. The beta profile isn’t as current as your live account is tho, which is understandable.
Love how the switch is ignored here too XD
Wouldn’t you consider the Switch a console? 
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I thought of that, but it was too funny regardless
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Console player here, so no Beta for me. I would think it better to hear any criticism sooner rather than later. I see the difference @saltypatra was trying to make between constructive and purely negative criticism, but again, the criticism will come regardless. At least hearing it voiced in the Beta the team can anticipate a response ahead of release.
And furthermore, the criticism might even be lessened, because certain voices if prohibited from participating in the Beta might feel excluded and incensed that they were not deemed worthy by the powers that be.
Their game, their rules. I took an 8 month break once because I didn’t like the bright green click buttons following a ui update. Some Switch players are on break following a GW update that wasn’t noticed during Beta. Good luck future testers. Have fun. I hope your voices and concerns are listened to and acted upon.
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I think from this topic it will be possible to immediately understand who the developers will choose for the beta test
@Fourdottwoone it’s true that the differences are not any, I talked about this, the only difference is how the information is presented, more gently (as the developers want it to be) and a little aggressive with criticism
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Given that this developer has a history of hiding its head in the sand and ignoring/deleting what they dislike, it would be interesting to hear from previous Beta Testers how much effect/impact has their feedback had over the years (we know from the get go that they are not allowed to test new troops, so that red flag remains flying high).
Otherwise, the Beta Program may be (like an inexplicably increasing number of Pets) purely Cosmetic.
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Yeah I’m not sure if I can be positive about that…
An example: we definitely said a lot about the epic tasks and it took until the public announcement and subsequent outrage before any changes were made. I don’t know about “changes considered prior to public announcement” but I certainly don’t recall any feedback indicative of that.
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Sure.
Editing this back in to answer the initial question - I believe that my feedback on the new Explore mode assisted in causing D12 on live to be level 150 and not 250 as it was on beta. (That said, level 250 delves wouldn’t stop Scorpius teams, but boy was it unfair to everything else as you needed a truly meta end-game stat team for a unit to survive a single hit from the opposing side.)
Personally, I believe that there is a wide-ranging misconception among what exactly beta testing is supposed to be in this game.
In what was the “current” beta program, the devs’ perspective on the matter was for beta testers to test out new features and replacement game modes in the 4.x series of updates. On the other hand, the general perception of the beta testers was that they expected to have significant influence on the actual update itself.
Beta, at least in the past, worked like this:
- The devs released an update-in-progress on beta/staging, with partial patch notes relevant to the partial update that was revealed to us.
- We were asked to verify functionality of things in the patch notes and note issues like missing assets, broken things (Cliffy errors) and give general feedback on our experiences.
- Beta testers post feedback/issues on the beta forums. Depending on the content posted by the beta tester, feedback may be given by Salty or a dev about the post.
As is well known on the public portion of the forums, beta testers don’t necessarily have complete information about the content they are testing. This could be attributable to a couple a reasons: the content in question was still internally not final and therefore not yet pushed to beta, complete knowledge would require revealing things (such as balance issues, the mechanics of the dynamic difficulty system, and so on) that the devs do not want to make public. The second issue is further compounded by the fact that beta testers are not held to a NDA or similar pact outside of an “honor pledge” not to spill the beans on beta things before they are publicly released.
Updates, when they are released, are 95% in-stone when then beta testers first gain access to them. What shows up on beta is going to happen, one way or another. Full stop. There’s literally nothing beta testers can do to make an update grind to a screeching halt, like with Epic Tasks. At best, beta testers can somewhat shape the final result of an update with directed, quality feedback. (Example: my edit about explore delve level at the top of the post)
Salty highlighted quality feedback, above.
One is a straight negative response, while the other recognizes the negative but attempts to discuss the content seeking a compromise while not dismissing the content entirely. There is surely going to be more content coming in the future that will be seen by some as negatively. Being able to be constructive in giving negative feedback is important, especially to avoid those situations on beta.
In fact, Salty said on the Wed/Thurs PQ stream that something controversial was going to be revealed by the Mon/Tue GoW stream. Maybe this might be the devs getting in front of a change for 4.8, similar to the pre-announcement of Epic Tasks for 4.7. Maybe a Screenshot Saturday, or perhaps revealed on-stream for discussion. Either way, whatever it is, the content will find its way to the forums for discussion quickly. Posts about the topic might serve as a pre-screening tool for upcoming beta applications on how players might react to controversial content presented on the beta server in the future. Just saying.
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If I may…
The TL:DR for your post: (based on my summary without quoting you directly)
The devs want feedback from the beta testers and honestly, the community itself. But that doesn’t mean they are going to listen to it all and make changes at the discretion of feedback.
The beta testers main objective is bug testing. But even that is handcuffed because though GoW is available on 6 different clients… Usually only 1 of them is actually beta tested by players. The rest of the beta testing is on 505 Games. Keeping in mind, the players beta testing is free labor and a large part will still try to support their guilds. So many have to play on at least 2 accounts during testing.
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That was you? Thanks. I wondered why the change happened.
The rest of your post rings true to my experience as a beta tester. I wonder how the new program will compare. I guess the best way to find out is to participate, at least for the first round of new-beta.
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What’s funny is the only reason I’d want to be on the beta is to advocate for the community and warn the devs about possible unforseen consequences to changes.
But even if 505 was okay now with me being on the beta (my words not theirs). I feel like I+2 is only responsibile for 10% of the changes done in the game anymore. And 90% of is at the discretion of 505 Games at least when it comes to resources.
As the years go on the developers themselves lose more and more touch with the game and the community.
So if I was on the beta (Mind you I don’t talk any other languages then the English. And as my previous sentence showed. I cans barely speak it.)
It would be me speaking Spanish to the Devs who only speak French, but are responsible for translating my Spanish to 505 who only speak English.
Even if all parties use Google Translate, a lot will still be lost in translation.
I brought the idea up to @Saltypatra years ago who informed me that it’s 505’s call (paraphrasing here not quoting)… But the idea was someone like @Ozball taking on the job of playing GoW 40 hours a week and interact with the community. Or at least help @Kafka and Salty out with the community.
GoW does an amazing job of bringing in new content in hopes of making the game more new and exciting for long time players. The job I personally feel like they fail at is the sustainment of the game modes that don’t get an update. So if the player isn’t into the new additions. And if they feel like they what they enjoyed about the game is now no longer as fun. They are quick to leave. Despite all the time or money they invested over the years.
What I do know for a fact is that publishers are more interested now a days with getting $10 a month for 3 years than $60 a year for 3 years. And since 4.7 was introduced I have literally witnessed way too many players who spent money monthly if not weekly walk out the door. Maybe the new players are replacing that income… If so… That’s great. But ideally wouldn’t it of been great if they could’ve kept both revenue streams?
TL:DR Patch previews or teases about a patch have become more like warnings of what GoW is becoming rather than exciting news about what’s to come.
The bigger GoW becomes the higher the risk of hitting a metaphorical iceberg. I hope @Sirrian will advocate to 505 to allow more time spent in game by his employees because the more complex GoW has become, the less time there’s been so far budgeted to actual knowledge of the game outside of that the code says. The community has practically begged for more developer understanding of the balance of all Faction teams. For years it’s been ignored or misinterpreted and instead all focus has been on how many gems are spent during Faction Assaults. That cannot, and will not be, sustainable…I promise you that.
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