PTR and Ulduar: An Unfair "advantage"

#0 - Feb. 21, 2009, 5:40 a.m.
Blizzard Post
Ok so let's get serioues for a minute. Why does everyone who signs up on the PTR get to test the content "first". This gives nerds who like to study things an unfair advantage. Whatever happened to just releasing a raid on patch day? Yes, it may be a tad bit more buggy, buuuuut.... WHY release ulduar on the PTR and have guilds clear it on the PTR before it even launches ? It creates a we/they dichotomy between raiders/casuals that polarizes the wow community because the raiders are the only ones serious enough to clear ulduar on the PTR before its released. If I'm wrong, conversely, then whats the point of releasing ulduar on the PTR if players aren't able to clear it and test the content thoroughly.

/rant
/spit
#2 - Feb. 21, 2009, 5:44 a.m.
Blizzard Post
It is a valid concern. We are doing what we can though to thoroughly test the content without giving individual guilds much opportunity to work through every boss:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=15198911211&sid=1
#18 - Feb. 21, 2009, 5:49 a.m.
Blizzard Post
Q u o t e:


Bring up the PTR servers and post the patch notes, thanks. The anticipation is killing me.

I'll compromise and read the patch notes in their entirety out loud, right now. :)
#57 - Feb. 21, 2009, 6:25 a.m.
Blizzard Post
Q u o t e:


Ive always wondered how come blizzard employees just don't test the content themselves? Iam sure you have large numbers of people at blizz who could do this.

It's possible on a numbers level, I guess. There are enough Blizzard employees to test content. The reason there are so many of us though, is that there are an unprecedented number of activities going on every day to keep our franchises going. It would be impossible to gather the amount of internal resources necessary to stress test content the way we do on the public test realms.