Could A Big Beta Be Bad?

[Bulletdance]

Hey guys. I was reading a little about the whole yearly subscirption promise thing Blizz is trying and something occured to me. I wanted to know what all of you thought since I haven't done a beta myself. Since it's presumed there will be a lot more people in the beta as blizz promised keys to so many people now a large portion of the community will see MoP content before it's release. At first it sounds great,but I realized that cata's biggest problem was people getting bored or saying there isn't enough content. So with so many people expericing beta that's the potential for a lot of players to get bored with MoP sooner than they would have if they didn't see the content before the release. It's entirely possible MoP will have so much content it won't matter,but what do you guys think are they shooting themselves in the foot or is this as great as it seems at first glance?

[Vephriel]

I think there's only a very small portion of people who play through a beta rigorously. A large number will be stopped just at the initial download if they feel it's too much of a hassle to install. Others just take a precursory glance around at the new content, and once they've had their sightseeing fill they won't spend much time in it. Since nothing you do is permanent, there's a good deal of people that won't invest a serious amount of time in that. The actual number of testers that fully go through the beta and try to find bugs, and play through everything they can, is quite small in grand scheme of things.

I imagine they'll be staggering out the invites in waves as well, instead of pouring it out all at once to the large amount of people who signed up for the Annual Pass. There's also probably many people who signed up who didn't care about the beta perk, they just wanted either the mount or Diablo III.

Honestly, I don't see it being that different from other betas. Though there's the potential for there to be a large capacity, I highly doubt most will get too involved. As for myself, I tend not to look at too much of the content when I'm granted beta access. I'll certainly take a look around at some of the new zones, and most likely will try out the Pandaren starting area, but other than look for some new pets I don't want to spoil myself so I just take a peek around really.

[Congafury]

I doubt people will get terribly involved into the Beta testing; Speaking of myself, I might try out the monk class to figure out if I'd want one for myself, see the zones and maybe look for some rares and new pets, but to be honest leveling in beta to level after the release again? No, thank you:)

[Lisaara]

Even if a lot of people did, more people to test it, the better, I think. Beta is meant to be pushed to the limit. Usually theres a good number of things not caught til it hits live servers when a lot of people can play it. So if a lot of people play beta, more things are likely to be caught before hitting live.

But like others said, I doubt others will be that big into it. Even myself I wont be too heavy into it.

[Galaxy]

I totally agree. I, for one, am in the pool where "why work hard if I can't keep what I worked so hard for?" The sad thing is that results in hardcore stuff being missed that neeeeeeds fixing. But, I'm not going to go in, get my stable full of pets that are new and rare, and then hit level cap, and then do it again. I'd be too bummed. Too much like backsies.

SO! I don't My guild is hardcore, though, and probably the raid team will want to do the top raids just so we can slam them when released.

[Slickrock]

There's a flip side to this. A large beta will keep people around that might otherwise bail to another game.

Myself, I will do all my exploring fun in the beta. Once it actually launches, I'll be down to business leveling, taming rares, and profiting from the AH.

[Slickrock]

I totally agree. I, for one, am in the pool where "why work hard if I can't keep what I worked so hard for?" The sad thing is that results in hardcore stuff being missed that neeeeeeds fixing. But, I'm not going to go in, get my stable full of pets that are new and rare, and then hit level cap, and then do it again. I'd be too bummed. Too much like backsies.

On the other hand, in beta you can still go explore and find new things as they add them. That's what I'm excited for. By the time it launches, there will be 57 posts here on how and where to tame all the new rares.

Speaking of that, I'd like them to add some wandering rares. Ones that could show up any place on the new continent. Effectively make it impossible to camp, so only the lucky and prepared find them. (Not all the rares, but this would be nice for a few of them. )

[Galaxy]

True, but I can do that after release, too, AND keep everything I've worked for. Maybe I'm just not excited about being first? I dunno Though, if I do wind up having to do it for the raid team anyway, I certainly would be posting findings here!

....please let there be a battle bunny to tame....

[Bulletdance]

Oh I would love a bunny!! I don't do Beta generally because the technical downloading stuff scares me and I like to have that woooooah moment when I first log in. Though I'm strange because I'll certainly read every spoiler and look over every screenshot I find. Maybe a big beta will be really good because it means a lot of people to find rares! (come on rooster pet too...what? You know the hilarious name options alone would make it totally awesome!)

[Vespias]

From what I think I see, a couple of the higher zones may not be opened for beta either. At any rate, as everyone mentioned only a small portion will actually go through full testing of the game. I'll just be looking for new tamables!

[Kerafirewing]

I don't know if it will be a bad thing or not. Likewise, perhaps this will help people be ready for it on release and keep people in who might otherwise leave.

As for myself, I plan on trying to rip it apart. I want to go through the panda starter zone and the higher level mainland pandaria. I want to try to find as many things wrong as possible BEFORE it gets to live. We don't need another screw up like with worgen and goblin not having stable masters. (Just a tidbit but had a GM talk about this although nothing about fixing. Just mentioned it was something I didn't like with worgen and they mentioned it was a problem with both them and goblin. And I did not mention goblins. I did say I hope it was fixed in Pandaria though.)

I'm looking forward to the beta as it will be my first and for me at least, it will not ruin anything and if things are done right, will make me all the more ready to play it on live. I'd also know that any glitches or bugs I found that got fixed I helped get fixed before it caused problems on live; helping to make the game more fun for everyone, in the beta or not. Plus I'd love to help add to those 57 posts on where new hunter pets are or new cool stuff aside from pets.

And I like the random rare movement idea. Would just have to make sure it came up at the right level instead of having a level 90 rare show up in the 85/86 area and killing everyone. THAT would be a challenge tame in my book.

[Worba]

As others have said,

1) the primary goal of a beta is to flush out bugs, and more testers = more bugs caught pre-live

2) however the greater number of players won't have the interest in actually sticking with it after the first few major glitches / crashes; once they've had themselves a slightly choppy, clunky preview of things to come, they're going to realize "hey waitasec - all this time i'm putting in is just for fake gold and exp - i need to get back to the live game!"

So yeah - more beta participants = good in my view.

[Galaxy]

True enough... I do remember when Cata released that I screamed at my monitor "WHY WASN'T THIS CAUGHT IN BETA!????!?" quite a few times. I think that's how I got carpal tunnel: shaking my fist in frustration at the screen.

Meh. Stop convincing me to do beta. Stop. Darn unintentionally persuasive arguments. I wanna find and KEEP my battle bunny. *folds arms defiantly*

[Morven]

I'll certainly copy my main over and make sure to test new class mechanics and the like. I'll probably also try levelling pandarens to make sure stuff works for the first few.

[Demonicow]

ive never had the pleasure of getting into a beta before closest i got was a private server so im excited to even get into a mop beta how fun it would be lvling and exploring the zones and it would be really cool if i came upon some rare spawns and even better if there are tamable hydras