Rotate the beta testers!

[IvaQuaL]

why would you want to remove the current beta testers (except to apparently "get back at them")

[PHISH]

Originally Posted by [AE] 5316 *TKZ*

You guys miss the initial post. its not to ADD testers, its to rotate them out, essentially keep the same number.

Didn't miss it... the act of adding people, ie new accounts and access, and bringing them up to speed on bug reporting, random gameplay features, console settings, closing out their duplicates etc is what incurs a load on the devs. You don't avoid that step by rotating people out. Cycling through testers as you suggested is ten times worse than straight adding them because instead of even keeping some experienced testers who have learned the existing issues and don't need to be coddled anymore, you wipe them out and bring in all new ones incurring all that setup time, time bringing them up to speed. Why would you kick them out for new people right when they became most productive? Silly, but I didn't think it was a serious suggestion.

[GeoKill----->]

Originally Posted by tu!

i hope you are j/k...pretty sure that kid was banned for hacking in tfc...

hackers don't need a head start...

Uumm This is Fortress-Forever not TFC

[[AE] 5316 *TKZ*]

Originally Posted by PHISH

..long post... edited out to save space.

Well, you could set up a moodle course to instruct new testers how to get things set up, and cover basic bug reporting (in Mantis I think somebody said? mantis is a pain..)


http://moodle.org/ < Moodle. Good stuff.

[Circuitous]

Originally Posted by Toffee

For example, bringing any people with scripting, mapping, moddelling skills who would be able to develop any custom things for the time of release is surely a good thing too.

Check me out!

Seriously, if any of you have scripting/mapping/modelling/animating skills, for God's sake, click that link. Make yourselves useful.

[Scuzzy]

Originally Posted by Circuitous

Check me out!

Seriously, if any of you have scripting/mapping/modelling/animating skills, for God's sake, click that link. Make yourselves useful.

Is that programming post current? I thought Mulch, Defrag, and Dospac were pretty much it lately.. do you really have 20 C++ devs still on staff?

[Pixel]

I'm not worthy.

[nodnarb]

Originally Posted by Scuzzy

Is that programming post current? I thought Mulch, Defrag, and Dospac were pretty much it lately.. do you really have 20 C++ devs still on staff?

It didn't say it was only c++ devs... there are 24 total devs.
http://www.fortress-forever.com/devteam/

[Ihmhi]

Originally Posted by Bean

Sometimes you add new people, and the semi-active devs become more active.

Did not really happen... 20 or so new people showing up was not enough to pull all of the devs out of hiding. All jokes aside, new people does not change the fact that devs have a thesis or a summer project or someshit due.

Originally Posted by Bean

On top of that, sometimes a new person starts as a tester and becomes more involved and plays a greater role in the development of the mod (maybe freeing up devs to work on other things).

Already happening.

[Cosides]

Lost 95% of my intrest for this game

Takes waaaaay tooo looooong

[Scuzzy]

Originally Posted by nodnarb

It didn't say it was only c++ devs... there are 24 total devs.
http://www.fortress-forever.com/devteam/

In the United States I couldn't tell a client we have 20 "devs" unless each of them was coding. Support staff, media artists, etc may be considered part of the overal project development team, but they aren't individually referred to as "devs" here. Sorry, Lang thing...

I was always under the impression schoofta was the high commander, didn't know Phish was in that position... boggle. Sorry bout that Phish.

[Ihmhi]

Originally Posted by Cosides

Lost 95% of my intrest for this game

Takes waaaaay tooo looooong

The longer the journey, the better it feels to be home.

Originally Posted by Scuzzy

I was always under the impression schoofta was the high commander, didn't know Phish was in that position... boggle. Sorry bout that Phish.

I guess we do have a leader...

Ouch... the devs lost 8 programmers over the years? Yeesh...

[Bean]

Originally Posted by Ihmhi

Did not really happen... 20 or so new people showing up was not enough to pull all of the devs out of hiding. All jokes aside, new people does not change the fact that devs have a thesis or a summer project or someshit due.

True. But I didn't mean the inactive devs. They wouldn't even know if a new person was there or not. I meant the ones that have theses or summer projects due, yes. Because most of us, even when we have theses to write, take time to goof off and play a game or waste time in some fashion (you can't work all day). My point was that adding people can add to the excitement and fun of FF again so that they have more desire to work on it.

Already happening.

If anything, this supports my point. Regardless, PHISH is probably right that they are too close to release for this to be worth it so I'll defer to him.

[mervaka]

Originally Posted by [AE] 5316 *TKZ*

Well, you could set up a moodle course to instruct new testers how to get things set up, and cover basic bug reporting (in Mantis I think somebody said? mantis is a pain..)


http://moodle.org/ < Moodle. Good stuff.

what part of phish's post did you not understand?

[SmellyCat]

The bit where he doesn't get to test.

[mervaka]

seriously, why the fuck take experienced beta testers down? because they're better at the job? its like those automated "noob only" servers where you get booted once you get a good score..

stop crying. when more beta testers are needed, more will come. i'm still on a sort of hiatus (i said i would be back last sunday, but something came up) but i'm by no means off the list. whats the point?

[SmellyCat]

I think everyone other than [AE] 5316 *TKZ* is aware of the poor logic, Merv. Chill your nips. :P

[[AE] 5316 *TKZ*]

Originally Posted by mervaka

seriously, why the fuck take experienced beta testers down? because they're better at the job? its like those automated "noob only" servers where you get booted once you get a good score..

stop crying. when more beta testers are needed, more will come. i'm still on a sort of hiatus (i said i would be back last sunday, but something came up) but i'm by no means off the list. whats the point?

Really, calm down darlin'. No need to get the panties in an uproar. Was just an idea to give the community more involvement.

[IvaQuaL]

can you answer my question (why could you possibly want to remove current beta testers and not just add more) ? i'm really curious and kind of confused about this

[Ihmhi]

As for the "beta testers getting more involved part", the best way to do that is to blackjack your friends who know C++ and Source SDK code and force them to apply for dev work at gunpoint.