Q's about Test... Please excuse my ignorance

[Excedrin]

Hello all,

Please excuse my ignorance about the test server but I am trying to gain some clarity. I did a search and really didn't find the answers. If there are posts that already answer these questions, links to them are greatly appreciated

First off, I don't log on to test simply because I dread the update process going back and forth. I'm on dsl and have fairly good connection but it seems the update process still takes way too long for my tastes.

I've grouped the questions into several Q's paragraphs for ease of explanation of the process regarding the question i.e., some questions are multipart.

Thanks in advance for any assistance...

1. Is there a quicker/easier way to switch between test and live? For example: Copying needed files/folders (not the entire game folder) to a test folder when I wanted to test then copying back the live folders when I wanted to play live. If this is an option, is there a list of which files are typically needed (I realize this may/does change with each patch, but perhaps there are files that are generally not updated each patch).

More Questions:

2. Is there a list of what is needed to be tested, and exactly how these items should work? If there is a list, where is it posted and does the list contain the various files/folders that are affected (see question 1. for length of update).

I'm also confused about the chars on test.

3. Do I create a new char there, or are my live chars there? If it's my live chars and I play them on test, are they impacted in anyway? Example: I don't want to play my level 50 on test if he's available and not be able to play him on live or have anything about him change on live. I read a thread about offering a copy of live chars and I don't understand the impact on my live chars. Let me clarify this before I get royally flamed: I don't want to move my char back and forth from test to live. I'm just trying to understand the process of copying a char if it is offered.

4. I think I read somewhere, that there are no buffing/leveling commands, correct? So if I understand correctly you have to actually level your char on test just as you are playing on live, correct? If that's the case, you can only test what your char level allows you test, correct?

Thanks again in advance for any all positive responses. I have tested on other games in the past but due to the length of update process in VG I have been less than enthused about testing here.

[SwordMage]

Some quick answers (note, it has been a while since I have been on test so I may be out of date; others may correct me mercilessly):

1. its been a while since I have been on test, but when I was, I just lived with the updates.
2. Other than the release notes that say what has changed and give some focus to your play testing, part of the idea of test is to have players just play their game reporting things that they find that are broken. What we have seen is a reluctance to tell test server players too much about the details since they are more likely to find problems acting like normal players without internal knowledge of the mechanisms (there are SOE internal testers who start from that knowledge and test stuff before it gets to the test server). -- Also from time to time, there will be posted requests for specific testing focus (for load testing and to evaluate new mechanisms).
3. In general, the test characters are separate. There is talk of a copy mechanism to allow you to copy (one-way) characters from a live server to test; however, even if that happens, they will become totally separate characters and the test characters will never (TM) be copied back to live.
4. There seems to be a dislike of level buffs on test. The good news is that leveling is faster since there is (usually??) an XP bonus. There has been a bunch of talk about doing something to help with leveling due to the small test server population, but I am not sure where that came out.

[Ysharros]

SwordMage pretty much covered it. I'm going to add my own ramble, however, because I'm a player on Test and I'm only starting to see how unknown and mysterious the Test server & community might seem to the live folks. The more info we get out there, the better - so thanks for asking the questions!

1. I'm a regular Test player and only log in to my live chars occasionally to make sure they still exist; hubby, on the other hand, plays more or less on both. In any case once the big initial downloads are done, the comparison/update processes are usually very quick. (You can shorten the download process somewhat anyway by copying certain directories and renaming them as appropriate for Test - I think there are instructions stickied elsewhere in this forum. I'd try to find you those links but I'm already late for dinner at the in-laws and hubby is shooting me dark looks and tapping his foot. )

Aside from that you can make a shortcut for test itself by copying the VG-live shortcut if you have one on the desktop, and appending " /testserver" to the end of the Target line in the shortcut properties. Don't include the quotes, but do inclue the space before /testserver.

Mine looks like this: "C:\Program Files\Sony\Vanguard\Vanguard.exe" /testserver

2. As SwordMage said, Test is for the most part structured like any other server, and test players aren't usually directed in what they do. To my mind there's a duty to explore, reproduce (if possible) and report any bug you find if you *do* play on test (else, why bother?). Since I enjoy testing and have always enjoyed beta testing in order to help refine a product, it's not an onerous duty as far as I see it, though I admit it's not what every player might consider fun.

There are many ways to set up a test server but this particular one is set up more or less like any other server, and you play as you would anywhere else -- on the understanding that stuff that gets pushed to test may never make it to live, may not be working very well (or at all), may change from day to day or week to week, and that there's no customer support in the standard sense. Getting hit by bugs, crashes, weird stuff and whatnot is part of playing there -- play at your own risk. That said, Test is normally quite stable and its players are both self-reliant and helpful; but if you're the kind who sends a petition if you get stuck somewhere and waits for a response, rather than typing /stuck yes and/or recalling out, the test environment may not be ideal for you. (I mean "you" generically - some players like more support than others, and some are more ingenious than others.)

We are occasionally asked to pay particular attention to one thing or other, or sets of things - recently we were chasing down post GU2 (on Test) items whose level didn't accord with the stats on the item. We've been asked to travel a lot to see how stable chunking and travel are, and to report on crashes that may result. We've been encouraged to dabble or even get serious with diplomacy, and there's a whole guild of diplo-enthusiasts who, while they also do other stuff, feel that one of their primary purposes on Test is to help test any diplomacy stuff that needs testing.

For the most part though, we're self-determining. We play, at our various levels and with our various interests, and as we encounter issues, we report on them. QA and other staff are frequently present on the /test channel and can bounce stuff off us or respond to queries if we're not sure what we're encountering *is* a bug or not.

3. As SwordMage said, Test-server chars are separate from Live-server chars and in general never the twain shall meet. Any chars you may make on Test will remain there and have no impact on any chars on any other server -- the character listing for Test is entirely separate from the live listing, and when you create a new char on Test the *only* server option you have is Test server.

Note that certain live servers have had "snapshots" taken of their chars and this snapshot (chars in a given state with a given inventory at a given moment) was copied over to Test for a limited time -- this was to encourage folks to check out the Test server and GU2 changes before they hit live but *with* the benefit of characters they were familiar with. So far live-copies have lasted about a week before being deleted, but I'm not sure what the situation may be with any further such copies before the merge occurs. (The copies, of course, also allowed SOE staff to test the whole merge process, since they were effectively merging copies of a server with the existing test server pop.)

All I've heard so far about possible copies and/or transfers from live to test is only that, hearsay. Nobody official has (to my knowledge) confirmed anything one way or another. It's a fact, however, that they now have the code & tools in place to do such moves in the future if they so desire. What regulations and what flow might affect such moves is anyone's guess right now.

In short, however: your live chars and your test chars, right now, have zero impact on each other. Bob on Live and Fred on Test are totally separate and will always remain that way. Whether you will one day have the option to copy Bob to Test, and under what conditions, has not been confirmed one way or the other.

4. You're absolutely right. At the moment there isn't any level-buffing on Test that I've seen. There was talk of craft-level buffing and I'm not sure if that happened or not (though I believe it hasn't yet). There hasn't been talk of any adventure-level buffing that I know of - at least not on a general level. I'm reasonably certain that the folks currently testing raiding on Test have been level-buffed, since the applications were open to all. Someone with a level 50 on Live and a level 1 on Test would have to be appropriately "embiggened" for the testing environment.

I'm one of those who dislikes the idea of buffing chars on a test server set up the way this one is, for several reasons. One is selfish: I play and live on Test, it's my home server, and as such I'd selfishly like to progress through it in as "normal" a fashion as possible. I can, however, abandon such preferences if required or if the basic testing paradigm used on this server should itself change.

One less selfish reason is one I've seen in practice elsewhere and which is, to my mind, detrimental to "general all-round" testing of the kind practiced on the VG-Test server we have. Other games have used buffing methods to allow testers to access certain content right away, and that's well and good if the paradigm in those environments is structured towards that kind of testing -- however it does tend to create a "test ONLY this" or a "jump in, check something out, move on" mentality which I believe would be detrimental to the more general testing community which SOE *have* confirmed (QA at least as) that they would like to encourage on the Test server.

Raid testing, the word on most people's lips right now it seems, is only one kind of testing. When a patch comes out, we don't instantly swarm like bees to test each line of the patch notes one at a time -- and yet, in our various levels and abilities, we *do* get through a fair amount of patch content. Someone will notice something not working quite as advertised, maybe, and will ask others on the test channel; others will then try it out for themselves, and so on, till we have a more complete picture of what's going wrong (if it is) or what's going as intended.

I'm afraid I'm never as concise as I'd wish, and certainly not now, but it's hard to explain how Test currently is -- much easier, really, to experience it. Changes made to Vanguard currently tend to impact almost all levels, so you can just as well test changes on a level 10 as you can on a level 50. Level is very very rarely a barrier to testing anything but very specific adventuring (or occasionally crafting) content.

And, after all that, as Sword said, Test almost always has 2x adventuring xp and 3x crafting xp. I can't recall what the diplomacy bonus is, but there used to be one and it may still be in place - others could inform you on that score better than I. You can level to 50 in a few weeks if you're really determined to do so; or, like me, you can meander anywhere between levels 10-35 on a half dozen characters in all three spheres. You'd be amazed how much I *can* test with my legion of alts, even if none of them are 50.

Anyway, best advice I can give after that wall of words is to do the copying, make a char, and come visit. Test is in DIRE need of more regular players who are willing to integrate into the somewhat insular but extremely supportive community we do have. It's a lot like a frontier experience - most folks on Test are of necessity self-reliant, and we're most willing to help those who seem willing to help themselves. That said... peak population has hovered between 20-40 AT MOST in the last few months - we do what we can, but another 50, 100 or even 200 regular players would be a boon for everyone and a huge, huge help to the QA folks who try to catch the bad stuff before putting anything out to live.

Come visit. You might want to stay.

[Excedrin]

Wow, thanks for the great and informative replies

I very much appreciate the explanations to clarify those items for me.

I figured the chars had to be separate but I was confused by a post I read about being able to copy a char from live to test and losing the char on live! That kinda threw me and scared me at the same time.

It sounds like there is a nice little community on test. I don't mind the bugs and problems etc. (heck, we should all be used to them by now in VG )

I'm going to try and get past the update soon (no time frame) and pop in and see if going back and forth from live to test gets better.

If anyone has a link to how to expedite the process, it would be greatly appreciated. I don't have enough disk space to copy the entire folder over, so I was thinking I would put them both on a CD and switch that way.

Any ideas?

Thanks again

[Kulak]

This thread while kind of old still is useful.

http://www.vanguardspheres.com/forum...-tutorial.html

[Ysharros]

Hehe thanks Kulak, that was the thread I was thinking about. I just checked the size of my Vanguard directory, which contains both live and test stuff, and it's a hair under 22 gig - note however that this is the directory and client I've been using since beta last year so there might be a bit of bloat there.

The Test part of things seems to take up another 5-7 or so gig. If you're that short of disk space you're right not to want to gobble it up; I'm not sure how you could finagle it though. Fortunately there are far more finaglish minds here than mine.

[goulian]

Would someone please explain how the double adventure exp "usually" works, and why it does not "always" work that same way? I mean, why is there usually double exp instead of always double exp? Thank you.

[SwordMage]

Originally Posted by goulian

Would someone please explain how the double adventure exp "usually" works, and why it does not "always" work that same way? I mean, why is there usually double exp instead of always double exp? Thank you.

There are times when the devs have turned off the double XP in order to test some XP related content. They usually remember to turn it back on either spontaneously or after the calm and gentle urging of the test community.

[Ysharros]

Originally Posted by SwordMage

or after the calm and gentle urging of the test community.

*snicker*

... that is all

[goulian]

Thank you for your response, Ysharros. Makes sense to me. Hehe.