Good morning folks!
I want to set some expectations here. The point of a Playtest is to, well, Playtest things. Unless there's an obvious error in the playtest document (like some of the Paragon corrections that got made), we won't change items in the middle of a Playtest round. That defeats the purpose.
Both an Owner and an ARC member have already stated that this is something we will take feedback into account for and make recommendations at the end of the round.
I'd like to give a clear parallel as to why this works this way. When we first introduced the concept of oversized shields in an earlier round, we had immediate feedback from several Playtesters that this would create an unsafe fighting environment. There are still players who insist that oversized shields make the game less safe and should not be in the system. Despite this, the significantly larger feedback response from other Playtesters was that larger shields worked fine and made the game more enjoyable without safety issues. Based on the collected responses, ARC made a (tentative, and noted as such) recommendation to the Owners to adopt larger shields and the Owners chose to adopt them with a vote.
Similarly, the first time we tried Flurry, we got immediate responses from some Playtesters that it made the game less safe. Players who have used Flurry for some time feel otherwise and the Owners decided to entirely adopt Flurry for this playtest round so that it could be given a fair chance across the Alliance. ARC has not given a recommendation on Flurry yet because the round is still ongoing.
Had we changed either of these items due to the immediate feedback that "it's unsafe" we would not be where we are today. You may agree or disagree with where we're at, but please understand that items need to be given a full Alliance-wide playtest and feedback collected from all participating chapters. To do otherwise is to do a disservice to what is being playtested.
Run through the playtest round, put in your feedback forms, and talk to your Owner directly with your feedback. Those are the same expectations we have given for *all* feedback throughout *all* rounds of playtesting, and there have been significant changes to the 2.0 system directly due to feedback turned in from players thus far.
-Bryan Gregory
ARC Chair
I want to set some expectations here. The point of a Playtest is to, well, Playtest things. Unless there's an obvious error in the playtest document (like some of the Paragon corrections that got made), we won't change items in the middle of a Playtest round. That defeats the purpose.
Both an Owner and an ARC member have already stated that this is something we will take feedback into account for and make recommendations at the end of the round.
I'd like to give a clear parallel as to why this works this way. When we first introduced the concept of oversized shields in an earlier round, we had immediate feedback from several Playtesters that this would create an unsafe fighting environment. There are still players who insist that oversized shields make the game less safe and should not be in the system. Despite this, the significantly larger feedback response from other Playtesters was that larger shields worked fine and made the game more enjoyable without safety issues. Based on the collected responses, ARC made a (tentative, and noted as such) recommendation to the Owners to adopt larger shields and the Owners chose to adopt them with a vote.
Similarly, the first time we tried Flurry, we got immediate responses from some Playtesters that it made the game less safe. Players who have used Flurry for some time feel otherwise and the Owners decided to entirely adopt Flurry for this playtest round so that it could be given a fair chance across the Alliance. ARC has not given a recommendation on Flurry yet because the round is still ongoing.
Had we changed either of these items due to the immediate feedback that "it's unsafe" we would not be where we are today. You may agree or disagree with where we're at, but please understand that items need to be given a full Alliance-wide playtest and feedback collected from all participating chapters. To do otherwise is to do a disservice to what is being playtested.
Run through the playtest round, put in your feedback forms, and talk to your Owner directly with your feedback. Those are the same expectations we have given for *all* feedback throughout *all* rounds of playtesting, and there have been significant changes to the 2.0 system directly due to feedback turned in from players thus far.
-Bryan Gregory
ARC Chair