Server Copies to Test for Update 2 Testing

[Himmel]

Hello!

Over the next few weeks, various live servers will be copied to the Test Server in order to allow players to check out the new features that are coming in Game Update 2.

- Only the characters and their personal inventory are being copied.
- The characters will only be on Test for a little while, then removed.
- There will not be (unless announced otherwise) any buff bots or "blue frogs"

I encourage all the natives on Test Server to help welcome all our new guests and make their experiences on our little server as enjoyable as possible.

--Himmel

[Ysharros]

Himmel, how is this going to work in terms of chars-per-server quotas? Say you have 4 chars on test already and 7 on LiveServerX, will only a few get copied? If so, will there be a choice? I'd be grateful for more details if you have them and are allowed to divulge them at this point.

Not that I have too many chars or anything...

[Wulfkiller]

What if all my test slots are full?

[Demila]

And what happens if you have characters already on test that have the same names as you characters on Live?

And why are you not going to copy Bank contents, only Personal Inventory.

e.g. as a level 500 Diplomat I leave the majority of my best diplomacy gear in the bank. If I wanted to test out the Diplomacy parts related to guild halls I might find myself unable to do so if the gear I happened to have with me at the time that my character was copied did not include the right combination of high level presence gear for the stations we have to parley.

[Himmel]

The mechanics are being managed by the operations team. I do not have much of the information, but my best guess (official term) is thus:

- If you have too many characters, I think your max limit will be exceeded for you. Devs can have unlimited characters; this may be what they plan to do here as well.
- If your live character names are the same as test, your live character copies will need to be renamed on login (your live character will NOT be affected)
- The reason not to copy anything but inventory is unknown; my guess would be for simplicity, or so live players can't destroy the Test Server economy (stop laughing).
- Regarding items left in the bank... I recommend keeping an eye on the SOE forums for when your server will be copied, and make sure to pick up your best stuff beforehand. Once your character is copied, you can put everything back in the bank.

And remember, We want everyone to get a chance to test Game Update 2 with their live toons. Once that server's time has expired, the live copies will be deleted to make room for the next batch!

[Demila]

Originally Posted by Himmel

- The reason not to copy anything but inventory is unknown; my guess would be for simplicity, or so live players can't destroy the Test Server economy (stop laughing).

Actually I did wonder if the items being brought to the test server would effect its economy, and that is definitely not a laughing matter.

When the complete server copy to test was mentioned, the person seemed to think that you would be using a completely separate temporary test server. That would certainly be the safest thing to do and would eliminate any potential for harm to the economy of the normal test server.

I just have to visit the bank and see exactly which items I will need to keep with me for now.

[Ysharros]

I suspect what Himmel meant was that there isn't really an economy on test right now. There are just too few of us to provide much of a flow, and a large part of the exchange of goods is done directly via the global /test channel. I'll put stuff up for sale when nobody around wants/needs it, but it's fairly infrequent.

If and when the test population rises on a more permanent level (aside from these time-limited copies) I'm sure the economy will grow with it. It's not that test players don't want one, more that with a few dozen regulars, there's far more direct barter than there is selling through the broker. (And another reason folks need to "/join test" or better yet "/autojoin add test" - if you need something or want rid of something, that's the place to be. It's /guild, /worldsay and /ooc all rolled into one on a tiny server. )

That said... if these copies are time limited, it makes little sense to dump stuff on the broker since the goods may not sell before those chars are deleted; and even if that happens, we're not forced to buy anything. Test broker prices vary from a few coppers to live-like prices to the frankly-laughable prices one sees everywhere (live or test). The coppers-only prices may vanish - every time there's been an influx of people, I've seen the coppers-only stuff (brokered effectively as a courtesy in a sparse economy) be snapped up and immediately rebrokered much more expensively -- I find that a little irritating, but I also know buy low/sell high is a perfectly valid tactic on live servers, and folks coming in to Test aren't telepathically informed that copper pricing is a courtesy and not broker-idiocy.

Anyway thanks for the extra info, Himmel. I was dreading the contortions I might have to go through soon, since my live chars are on Shidreth and I believe it's one of the first to get copied over.

[Aredhel]

Yup! Shidreth is the copy cat.

I can't wait to give the new stuff a shot, so, Ysh....find me! I'll check it out this afternoon.

[Ysharros]

Eh, you find me! I don't even know your char names!

This is assuming Test will be back up today. I'm pretty sure nobody at SOE wanted to pull an all-weekender just for a test server (though if they did, my bad ), so it may be some time before whatever Troo and Ald and Bog and the other sneaks made asplode is fixed. I'll check now and then but, sigh, I guess I may as well do some chores.

[Alderian]

Hey, it's not like I have exploding arrows I can shoot through the internet at sony or something! geez