Sapience, cards can be held too closely to the vest.

[Orodbril]

Aragorn, son of Arathorn. Last of the Numenorian Kings' bloodline and heir to the throne of Gondor and Arnor. Too much?

Too bad, that he's tagged on Facebook as Eomer. Just saying ;D

[xrayvisionnw]

Or the Wadens can become Adens.

Yes, but then they'd complain we nerfed their 'W'.

Touche Sapience

[zalladi]

can you rename warden to adventurer please?

Just remembered that an official Adventurer class already exists; in the form of a splendid chicken session play.

[Crell_1]

Just remembered that an official Adventurer class already exists; in the form of a splendid chicken session play.

Cue the Chicken Dev Diary!

[Incognitas]

I'm a little confused as to why the closed beta is starting before pre-purchase. For me a chance at beta-access due to pre-purchase was an incentive to buy it.

There's always been a few tiers of "beta" and fuzziness in meaning Ie, there's Player Council getting first look (not sure if they get to actually log in and test), then Palantir next doing testing, then Real Beta with actual testing from players which has periodic invites instead of all at once, then Preview Beta which is open to everyone.

Remember last year we had trickiness with mounted combat needing more work and the expansion was delayed. Therefore, we really should not rush things, testing should start early and last a long time. One can pre-order any time up to the day of release, and can post-order for the same price any day after that.

[Sapience]

There's always been a few tiers of "beta" and fuzziness in meaning Ie, there's Player Council getting first look (not sure if they get to actually log in and test), then Palantir next doing testing, then Real Beta with actual testing from players which has periodic invites instead of all at once, then Preview Beta which is open to everyone.

Remember last year we had trickiness with mounted combat needing more work and the expansion was delayed. Therefore, we really should not rush things, testing should start early and last a long time. One can pre-order any time up to the day of release, and can post-order for the same price any day after that.

Actually the fuzziness is entirely on the player side. We use the word beta for one thing and one thing onely, Expansion pack betas. For your examples...

Players Council
Palantir private Preview Program
Bullroarer Public Test Server
"insert expansion pack name here" Beta.

[Eartholloth]

There's always been a few tiers of "beta" and fuzziness in meaning Ie, there's Player Council getting first look (not sure if they get to actually log in and test), then Palantir next doing testing, then Real Beta with actual testing from players which has periodic invites instead of all at once, then Preview Beta which is open to everyone.

Remember last year we had trickiness with mounted combat needing more work and the expansion was delayed. Therefore, we really should not rush things, testing should start early and last a long time. One can pre-order any time up to the day of release, and can post-order for the same price any day after that.

The shorter time frame they give for pre-orders, they stand the risk of not getting as many. Keep in mind holiday season is just around the corner & as we get closer to that time, money is gonna get short for many due to the holiday.

[Kaynith]

XD

I've never done that... on purpose. but sometimes I'm so happy when I DC.

but thats why I roll a tank at times :3 the rules are "follow me" and I just run in at what I know I can take. I was in fornost fire and someone was explaining almost every 2nd pull. only about ~7 seconds, but I know I could run to the boss solo and be fine, and I did :3 nearly got kicked but saved soooooooo much time.

Heck *I'D* have kicked ye.

Folks who rush through and tend to get everyone killed, I have very little patience for. It irks me. That, and folks who throw 'noob' comments around. :P

I've been on runs where it's go, go, go, and no one even bothers to answer simple questions about the instance, there's just some level 85 running through pulling the whole screen.

And if they stopped and did that 20 times, it would have added 140 seconds to your overall run time, based upon your own estimates. Wow! 2 minutes and 20 seconds. How could ye ever get back that lost time in your life?

[TinDragon]

Heck *I'D* have kicked ye.

Folks who rush through and tend to get everyone killed, I have very little patience for. It irks me. That, and folks who throw 'noob' comments around. :P

I've been on runs where it's go, go, go, and no one even bothers to answer simple questions about the instance, there's just some level 85 running through pulling the whole screen.

And if they stopped and did that 20 times, it would have added 140 seconds to your overall run time, based upon your own estimates. Wow! 2 minutes and 20 seconds. How could ye ever get back that lost time in your life?

Considering instances are run in 7-15 minutes, an extra 2 minutes is 13-29% longer than it needs to be.

[Kaynith]

Hmm. I guess I'm the only one that joins a group and then waits 10 minutes for it to start then.

Also, some of us do remember Fornost when it took hours to run through there, on a good day, IF your group was competent and played well together. PUGs were nightmares.

I know why they nerfed the instances into little parts, but I can't say I like it or agree with it. It's made impatient folks even more impatient. Typically if I'm in a group doing an instance, one player will ask to go AFK for a few moments, and they either leave them behind or boot them from the group. It's just vicious now, and not a whole lot of fun.

[TinDragon]

Also, some of us do remember Fornost when it took hours to run through there, on a good day, IF your group was competent and played well together. PUGs were nightmares.

Yeah, I remember that too. It was so long that even people above level didn't bother running it because it took so long. That does not define a fun instance.

And no, you're probably not the only one who waits for 10 minutes before starting, but I certainly don't have the patience for that!

[Kaynith]

A fun instance for me, is getting a team together, working as a team, and winning the fight through patience, strategy, and teamwork.

Having one player run in, aggro the whole screen and then run around in circles like an idiot spamming AOEs does not, for me, a fun instance make.

But to each their own.

[TinDragon]

A fun instance for me, is getting a team together, working as a team, and winning the fight through patience, strategy, and teamwork.

Having one player run in, aggro the whole screen and then run around in circles like an idiot spamming AOEs does not, for me, a fun instance make.

But to each their own.

For larger instances, sure. But the smaller ones? The only exciting fights are the boss fights. Attacking three mobs at a time that just melt is significantly more boring than attacking 20 mobs that will still melt. Both are still boring.

[Iozeph]

When you do that, don't forget to add various polymorph abilities. Dog (Warg), cat (sabretooth), bird (eagle), dragon, tree (treant) and hamster (cuddly) would be appropriate.

There is a profession in Anarchy Online called "Adventurer" which is just as awesome as the Warden class and they can morph into these forms for various benefits.
Also, let the new forum be cursed for not having spoiler tags.

And +1 for more information about HD pre-order and release, because "Fall is coming" soon (tm) !

Oh my. I might need glasses. On first glance I'd read what you'd written as,

"Fail is coming" soon (tm) !

[bohbashum]

Heck *I'D* have kicked ye.

don't worry, 1 death and my serious face comes on!!!

but most are stuff I've solo'd before. fornost for example, I can do all the trash being an idiot pulling everything fine, some bosses a little more fun. the rest of the group are just cheerleaders who make it faster then. I really don't need the extra 10+ minites they could do just to explain every mechanism when you can run at it like everything else and complete it fine. tank tank stuff, healer heal stuff, dps dps stuff till it dies. you've been doing it for how long?

the difficulty of many mini-boxes and trash really don't need any more of an explination than how to put ketchup on your plate.

[TinDragon]

the difficulty of many mini-boxes and trash really don't need any more of an explination than how to put ketchup on your plate.

Obviously you've never had to deal with one of those glass ketchup bottles at a restaurant.

[Widoch]

Obviously you've never had to deal with one of those glass ketchup bottles at a restaurant.

There's a smart phone app for that, I'm sure.

[Bel-Astarte]

Hmm. I guess I'm the only one that joins a group and then waits 10 minutes for it to start then.

Nope, you're not.

I figure if you can't wait a few minutes for someone to get an explanation, or be afk for a few, then you have forgotten you're playing with other people who need consideration as well.

I run groups for the people, not the instance, much as I enjoy new content.

[Juakin]

I do not want a repeat of the last 2 expansions where we have had features announced in the preliminary materials cut. Other documents used to make purchasing decisions containing errors. I would prefer these documents be accurate in their reflection of what it is we are to acquire. If that keeps them from releasing the pre-order info so be it. I also wonder how prudent it can be to announce anything more solid than the 'Fall 2013' they already gave us, given that beta testing only just started. Rohan I believe had an approximate 3 month beta and it didn't require the testing of nearly as wide a variety of content.

well i hope that plan is helping players who try to copy characters and fail by being sent to a page that says "you shall not pass" (and also, the page you looking for can not be found). can get help copying characters so we can effectively play helms deep. playing at level 1 will be useless. i was excited to play helms deep. now i am getting angry and disappointed i cant. especially since it took 11 hours to download and 4 hours to set up.

[Crell_1]

well i hope that plan is helping players who try to copy characters and fail by being sent to a page that says "you shall not pass" (and also, the page you looking for can not be found). can get help copying characters so we can effectively play helms deep. playing at level 1 will be useless. i was excited to play helms deep. now i am getting angry and disappointed i cant. especially since it took 11 hours to download and 4 hours to set up.

Character Copy, as with the rest of beta, is a privilege and not a requirement.

I do not see how playing from level 1 will be useless. The whole game has had skills and class traits revamped. The progression replaced with trees. ALL of the content needs testing. From 1-95.

I would advise anyone involved in the beta to KEEP IT IN THE BETA FORUM, so you don't lose your access.

[reiygna]

Keep in mind, Custer had a plan as well....

You say "... translation ..."?

[commodore1]

Think you're kind of missing the point of beta. It's NOT part of the marketing (though its been treated as that recently by players). Beta (Especially closed) is a chance to find and identify bugs and other issues BEFORE its released. Too many treat it as "Free Preview Weekend". Also, the guy in the pic is me. Its nice of them to give me a scar, otherwise I'm just too sexy for my troll.

We all know that mistakes found in beta are hardly ever fixed, even when found early. Most bugs are released because it cost money to fix them or the code wont work otherwise or some other lame excuse. Some people have stopped requesting quality work from this company which is why there are so many negative threads in the forums these days. All it takes is for the player base to start demanding quality work again.<---- see the word again? at one point they were putting out quality work then it slowly diminished to where every expansion people cringe when thinking of how bad this can possibly get. I'm not looking forward to this expansion at all, it reeks of desperation. Something to play for two weeks until they feel the need to nerf something, or until something in a quest line barfs all over the place and progression will be stop while the try to locate the problem that was found the first couple of days in beta. wait until it goes on sale, by then those problems will have a chance of working.

Draigoch anyone? still haven't had a session there that hasn't bugged out! Log in problems keeping you from logging in? never mind that try the umpteen fixes that don't help. You say you cant speak to a NPC to continue the quest line? no worries, did you pay for the fix? Look in the store. Skill trees destroy your character or your concept. never mind that learn to play it all over again.

[Sapience]

well i hope that plan is helping players who try to copy characters and fail by being sent to a page that says "you shall not pass" (and also, the page you looking for can not be found). can get help copying characters so we can effectively play helms deep. playing at level 1 will be useless. i was excited to play helms deep. now i am getting angry and disappointed i cant. especially since it took 11 hours to download and 4 hours to set up.

Due to this NDA violation, I wouldn't worry about it too much.

[demonlotro22]

Due to this NDA violation, I wouldn't worry about it too much.

LOL. Ouch.

By the way are people notified they broke an NDA? or is it just a flip of a switch for their account?

[Kaynith]

Seems to me a good way to tick off the playerbase.

The whole 'NDA' thing is an absolute joke. I'm not in beta. And I can freely say that I'm NOT in beta. But if someone WAS in beta, simply mentioning they were, or honestly seeking to get help with something, is license to boot them from said beta. Yea, that'll win you brownie points.

You want to kick someone from the beta for violating the ridiculous NDA... fine, that's your perogative. But don't go all public with it and rub their faces in the mud here on the forum. Have more grace and tact than that. You know all those new forum guidlines where violations to the terms of service for doing XYZ to PDQ? I'm thinking you folks shouldn't be immune to the rules here either. Practice what ye preach.

I'm thinking ye folks at Turbine take some things way too seriously, and things that ye should take seriously, nowhere near serious enough.

Honestly, I think that kind of public response lacked tact, and was extremly out of line. Since it was a public smacking, it deserves a public apology. Yes, this means YOU, Sapience.

After 15 hours of effort on the part of the customer (yes, CUSTOMER), to test YOUR software for you free of charge, he is then very publicly informed that he won't have to worry about it anymore due to the NDA violation for talking about Fight Clu... err... Beta..

You either recognize where you were in the wrong, or you don't. And if you don't, then that's a large part of the problem.

Honestly, if you worked for my company, (or any I've every worked for) you'd have a 'talking to' at minimum for treating customers like that. These people pay your salary. Never, ever, forget that.

I've participated in many, many, betas in my time. Including the one for Riders of Rohan. Never again.

I don't know why people line up to be hamsters and act like it's a gift from the gods to go out of their way to test some company's shoddy, buggy pre-release software. :P