To the people testing the Alpha build for free

[Pakheth]

Most QA technicians and engineers are paid to test things that the average player would not (e.g. exhaustive or repetitive tasks, using tools the player can't access, etc.) There's a distinct divide between in-house QA and player-driven testing, and it behooves Blizzard, or any developer/publisher really, to maximize their data-set so that the product can be optimized across all fronts. There's also a fundamental difference between QA tech and player mindset, as most QA techs aren't really engaging with the game systems to scope out metrics in "fun," but rather whether the code designed by the developers functions within correct parameters. Ephemeral metrics like quality, fun-value, and interest are better served by making Alpha and Beta builds available to the actual player base to experience and provide feedback on (both direct and indirect).

Great summary.

QA testing can be extremely repetitive and monotone and not something most players checking out the alpha/beta will do.
Regular players on the other hand has a tendency to find smaller things that break other parts of the game, like lore believe it or not.

I was in the early MoP beta and most of my time was used giving feedback on how mob placement/names/behaviours affected my playing and giving general bug reports. Apart from that I explored the early game and found it fascinating to see how the game changed from a beta state to finished game. For example the Horde intro in Jade Forest was changed completely. You were originally supposed to go down with the airship and crash.

In short I joined the beta because I A) Wanted to have a look at the early game. B) Wanted to affect the game to make it better by coming with suggestions.
A QA tester often cannot give or aren't asked for suggestions, they are often just there to check if the game works. An alpha/beta with players however can give the developers different type of insight into how the game feels. Problem is that with hiring players to test you are not guaranteed to get players who are actually interested in playing and not just people who are in it for the money and don't give a rats ass about the actual gameplay and will just say whatever to get their cheque.

It's an exchange. Blizz gets testing and the players get to see and affect the early game.

[Twelveplay]

Old burner account with shit thread. How quaint.

Because people want to try out new stuff and give feedback, you sour lemon.

1. It's just my main account . I barely write on this. I'm just bored and was actually curious.
2. My point was that people who do it ( how passionate and well intended they may be ) are putting Blizzard in the position where they don't have to hire a decent QA team to test stuff ( my opinion tho ) , because people do it for free anyway.

- - - Updated - - -

You are retarded

xD NA reply

[Tyron]

"Honey, could you set the table?"

"No, it's disrespectful for waiters."

[M1r4g3]

1. It's just my main account . I barely write on this. I'm just bored and was actually curious.
2. My point was that people who do it ( how passionate and well intended they may be ) are putting Blizzard in the position where they don't have to hire a decent QA team to test stuff ( my opinion tho ) , because people do it for free anyway.

- - - Updated - - -



xD NA reply

Can you give me a single example in the entire history of our species where a massive group of tens of thousands of people collectively decided to do something very irrelevant against their will(without being forced/nudged to by a leader or something)? If not, you guess whos fault it is.
This is just beyond stupid, no one except blizzard has the power to hire or not hire QA testers for their own games.

[MrLachyG]

1. It's just my main account . I barely write on this. I'm just bored and was actually curious.
2. My point was that people who do it ( how passionate and well intended they may be ) are putting Blizzard in the position where they don't have to hire a decent QA team to test stuff ( my opinion tho ) , because people do it for free anyway.

people have explained why over and over and over again and yet here you are, stubborn as anything, and still think you're right. well, you're not.

[DookuDookuTree]

All game companies have QA/Quality Assurance teams & test versions of WoW has 3 stages, alphas, betas & "friends & families".

The tone here stinks, personal attacks & whine in 100% of the threads, grow the fuck up.

[Arkura]

Its the same for almost all games out there wtf...

[Low Hanging Fruit]

Lets be honest the people in alpha.. most of them.. aren't actually doing it for free. They have a stream or have videos saying **DRAGON FLIGHT ALPHA**.

[Donald Hellscream]

Honestly, because I am impatient, so if I get the opportunity to test out new stuff before it is released I will take it.

And strangely enough knowing all the story beats prior to the game coming out doesn't bother me in the slightest, I will still enjoy the story if it is well told even if I know whats going to happen in advance.

[TheRealCincaid]

Why do you do it?
Activision or blizzard or whatever has been doing this for 3-4 expansions now, making people test their game for free when QA is a highly paid job around the world ( well maybe not that much but it's still paid ) . Why are you people doing it for free instead of just letting them hire an actual QA team and stop releasing bullshit untested games ?
Is it that fun to play a bugged game just to see a new spell or class or whatever?
Also doesnt it ruin the new experience for you when it actually launches?

Spoken by someone who have no idea how QA works. Of course Blizzard have their own QA, but if you think they can test their systems and server capacities in a non-open Alpha/Beta with real people you’re delusional.

[Alcsaar]

Why do you do it?
Activision or blizzard or whatever has been doing this for 3-4 expansions now, making people test their game for free when QA is a highly paid job around the world ( well maybe not that much but it's still paid ) . Why are you people doing it for free instead of just letting them hire an actual QA team and stop releasing bullshit untested games ?
Is it that fun to play a bugged game just to see a new spell or class or whatever?
Also doesnt it ruin the new experience for you when it actually launches?

They DO utilize a QA team. But people hired to test the game aren't going to put nearly as much effort into it as some one who *wants* the game to succeed and wants it to be fun for them. These are two different kinds of testers, ones who test for game breaking bugs or other concerns, and ones with a much deeper knowledge of the game who test it because its their baby.

[munkeyinorbit]

We will see if that continues into release. I don't plan on smoking the hopium with them just yet. They have a long way to go to earning back some of the players respect

Next topic.

Lol.

"Blizzard never listens to feedback"

*Blizzard listens to feedback*

"No. Not like that. #HOPIUM".

Hahaha. Classic. Which content creator is your favourite?

- - - Updated - - -

Lets be honest the people in alpha.. most of them.. aren't actually doing it for free. They have a stream or have videos saying **DRAGON FLIGHT ALPHA**.

How many people do you think are in the alpha? 7? Most people are doing it for free.

[FelPlague]

General curiosity as to why people chose to do something for free where they can actually get paid for it.

You the kinda person to demand girls pay you for sex, cause you could sell your body for money, so why arnt they paying you, and why are they laughing?

people choose to do stuff for free because they have much more freedom that way, and mate, there is a difference between a job and a hobby.

[Flame6]

Why do you do it?
Activision or blizzard or whatever has been doing this for 3-4 expansions now, making people test their game for free when QA is a highly paid job around the world ( well maybe not that much but it's still paid ) . Why are you people doing it for free instead of just letting them hire an actual QA team and stop releasing bullshit untested games ?
Is it that fun to play a bugged game just to see a new spell or class or whatever?
Also doesnt it ruin the new experience for you when it actually launches?

Bro, I know you read some article about Dr Disrespects game and how he's using free testers and its evil.
WoW isn't stealing jobs or being cheap by using community play testers for an alpha/beta. This isn't the same function. MMO's are such large games that without a huge playerbase to test things, its nearly impossible for in house team to "break" stuff before it goes to release. MMO's also have a much more important job of getting things right the first try because of things like in game economies.

These testers aren't anything close to the same as real QA work.

[God Save The King]

Ye but what i'm saying is people are getting paid to do this, and you do it for free.

Beta/External testing is very common in most production based fields. From cars/planes to clothes to software/games, companies regularly work with interested parties to test their products before a general release. For most people, the ability to get a first look and influence your favourite products are enough incentive.

Paid QA testing is quite different from unpaid testing, and I speak from a depth of experience in the field of software development. The people who write the code are aware of what it does, how they mean for it to be used, and therefore often miss edge cases or unusual inputs. The professional QA staff also have their own interpretation of what the product should look like and how to use it. They will often have a robust list of cases they've considered while waiting for the product to be prototyped and built out, along with a general script to follow to hit as many cases as possible. Even so, they will also often miss unusual inputs.

Nonprofessional but deeply interested users are the ideal testing group before generic release. They tend to understand that this is a work in progress and some issues are to be expected. They also tend to play a lot, which helps to tease out unseen bugs/issues. Most importantly, they have no idea how anything is meant to work (and developers are often as vague as possible as to imitate users with little to no knowledge). Which means they do unusual things.

As an anecdote, my team, as a small side project, had to build out an address autocomplete text field around a decade ago, pretty new tech at the time, nothing pre-built that was available for commercial use. We tapped into an international standardisation API to help along and limited the search to the USA. Now, unknown to us, if someone were to type their address perfectly, as expected by the API, for an international address, it would be accepted. We didn't support international users, it was a medical payment portal, so it's not something that would ever be used outside the US. Our validation came from the API, so when it said that some random address in London was accepted, it went through our workflow and generated a letter to be automatically sent and the postage billed to our corporate account. That was not caught by developers or by QA. Both teams did think to try international addresses for autocomplete, but we never tried to force one though manually.

Most developers will have loads of stories like that. Some weird thing that only some random user would even think to do.

[ohwell]

Why do you do it?
Activision or blizzard or whatever has been doing this for 3-4 expansions now, making people test their game for free when QA is a highly paid job around the world ( well maybe not that much but it's still paid ) . Why are you people doing it for free instead of just letting them hire an actual QA team and stop releasing bullshit untested games ?
Is it that fun to play a bugged game just to see a new spell or class or whatever?
Also doesnt it ruin the new experience for you when it actually launches?

Many of the people testing the alpha are YouTubers or streamers in general and they get benefit from it via videos etc so they are getting paid just not by Blizzard.

[Aggressive]

Lol.

"Blizzard never listens to feedback"

*Blizzard listens to feedback*

"No. Not like that. #HOPIUM".

Hahaha. Classic. Which content creator is your favourite?

- - - Updated - - -



How many people do you think are in the alpha? 7? Most people are doing it for free.

You think what you want. And I will think what I want.

O my favorite content creators are Asmongold, Savix, Bellualr, and Zepla(FFXIV).....Your point being. Who I like has nothing to do with how shitty Blizzard treats it's Player Base. And you bowing down to them means nothing. They still need to earn some of their player base respect back

Next Topic.....

[Low Hanging Fruit]

How many people do you think are in the alpha? 7? Most people are doing it for free.

Truth? I don't care. Clearly as much as you do. But the number is fairly small and I imagine the of that a fairly large percent of them are influencers in some way. Beta I suspect that percentage to decrease heavily though. But right now, in the alpha, I don't know the number (either do you) but I suspect they are either linked to the game in some way (work on it), are a close friend or related to someone that works on it (friend or family), are an influencer (highest percentage), and then some randoms sure.. ok (lowest percentage).

[rrayy]

The only problem is that Blizzard is notorious for NOT LISTENING to any feedback that the players give them.

Next Topic.

ONce again, peopl eneed to stop uttering this dishonest nonsense. Blizzard absolutely does listen to all feedback. Not caving to your every whine and complaint does not mean they are not listening. That means they disagree with you. You and everyone else who does it needs to stop equating "not doing everything I want" to not listening.

- - - Updated - - -

You think what you want. And I will think what I want.

O my favorite content creators are Asmongold, Savix, Bellualr, and Zepla(FFXIV).....Your point being. Who I like has nothing to do with how shitty Blizzard treats it's Player Base. And you bowing down to them means nothing. They still need to earn some of their player base respect back

Next Topic.....

NOt giving into everything you want does not = they treat their palyerbase horribly.

They absolutely do not treat thteir players horribly. THe only ones who think that are the entitled ones who demand the game cater solely to them and only them.

[Lochton]

Why do you do it?
Activision or blizzard or whatever has been doing this for 3-4 expansions now, making people test their game for free when QA is a highly paid job around the world ( well maybe not that much but it's still paid ) . Why are you people doing it for free instead of just letting them hire an actual QA team and stop releasing bullshit untested games ?
Is it that fun to play a bugged game just to see a new spell or class or whatever?
Also doesnt it ruin the new experience for you when it actually launches?

Alpha and even Beta are not about playing the game. It is about exploring, learning, experiencing, and sharing said with the developers if you find problems or for that matter, something worth talking about. Inviting a few hundred people to test gets a better result than some 10-20 QAs who don't always think in the same tracks as a player. At least to me, it is how I see it. I've never been in an Alpha but I've been in every Beta WoW has had.