Ask Slashdot: What To Do In SW:TOR For Just 3 Days?

rodrigoandrade writes "I've been invited to participate in the beta testing program for SW:TOR. However, EA's giving out 3-day passes to most testers. A few people are receiving passes for longer periods. Mine will be from Friday 5am through Monday 12am (CST) (i.e. Sunday evening). Since it's a frakking 10GB download (almost 2GB for video alone) I'll use for only 3 days, I'd like to make the most out of it. If you're an experienced beta tester, please post some tips travel-guide style on what I should do, quests I should take, places to visit, etc. TYIA. May the Force be with you!"

Comments

Okay, I'll ask first:

[Anonymous Coward]

What is SW:TOR?
(Yes, I can google it, but shouldn't it be explained in the summary?)

Re:Okay, I'll ask first:

[aicrules]

It's something that EA is giving out 3-day passes to for beta testing. It consists of a 10GB download and contains quests.

Re:Okay, I'll ask first:

[Tridus]

Star Wars: The Old Republic. A MMO being made by Bioware.

At the very least they should link the acronym to a wikipedia entry or something.

Re:Okay, I'll ask first:

[Oswald McWeany]

SW:TOR

I think it is the
Sweaty Women:Tournament of Raspberries

Kind of a cage death-match scenario where they have to kill each other by blowing raspberries on each other.

Re:Okay, I'll ask first:

[SleazyRidr]

The kind of nerd who sees TOR and thinks of a secure routing protocol, rather than some game inspired by a kids movie?

Re:Okay, I'll ask first:

[PopeRatzo]

Sweaty Women:Tournament of Raspberries

Kind of a cage death-match scenario where they have to kill each other by blowing raspberries on each other.

I would so buy that game.

Re:Okay, I'll ask first:

[Reverand Dave]

More like a virginity preserver

No

[hansamurai]

I'm in the full beta test, not just weekend, and unless your TOS is different, there will be no discussion here. All beta testers can admit is:
1. The fact that the game exists
2. The fact that you are in the beta test

So yeah, umm... just try it out?

Re:No

[Nanosphere]

*waves hand* You don't need to see beta information. This isn't the beta you're looking for. Go about your business. Move along.

Re:No

[Hatta]

They should release a Star Wars version of Tor, to enable people to talk about SW:TOR.

Re:No

[debrain]

Sir –

How does a signature relate to an agreement? A signature is evidence of the requisite intention to form, and execution of, a legally enforceable mutual promise, commonly known as a contract.

Clicking a button signifies the requisite intention and execution, and is substitutable for a signature. What matters is the intention, and that there has been execution.

With intention on both sides, and some form of execution of the terms, contracts become legally binding - by click or otherwise. This isn't exactly novel, see the 12 year old case: Rudder v. Microsoft Corp., 1999 CanLII 14923 (ON SC) (this case, and in particular the principle of adapting legal certainty to adapt to technological advances was affirmed by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2007).

Please stop spreading the nonsense that a contract is unenforceable because it was executed by way of the click of a button. Judges don't think that, and so you shouldn't.

Of course, there may be stray jurisdictions with different opinions – seek out and retain a lawyer for advice.

Re:No

[debrain]

Sir –

> I've always been curious how companies know *who* clicked the button.
>
> Do they rely on psychics?

It's a great question. Usually in litigation a person being accused of violating an electronically executed EULA is asked under oath whether they did or not push the button and whether they understood that clicking on the button was agreement to some terms. The statements under oath serves as evidence, and the standard of proof is generally balance-of-probabilities (i.e. it's more likely than not).

There are some arguments that expand agreement:
- agency (i.e. whomever did click it was acting on behalf of the accused)
-perfection by performance (i.e. the contract is enforceable because one used the software), and
- equity (i.e. one benefitted by using the software or by evading the contract's terms).

The above, along with other law, may expand the "who" beyond merely an act to the intention to enter the contract (or to avoid the terms, being a species of fraud), or to make the question of whether the terms themselves were agreed to irrelevant. Mind you, the consequences change depending on the conclusion as to what wrong has been committed (breaking the contract, avoiding entering it, benefitting from the software/service without a contract).

There are weird "edge cases" that certainly would not result in contractual or other responsibility, but generally most people click the button and admit it or are unable to portray an honest, plausible story that exculpates them (dishonest people aren't usually the brightest).

In any case, practically speaking these EULAs are consumer contracts that are enforceable for small amounts by threatening your credit rating (which is a nuisance to fight) or with the spectre of expensive litigation. Strong consumer protection legislation can (should) help alleviate the unfairness by way of abusing credit ratings and fear/consequences of consumer rights litigation.

NDA

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't this still under an incredibly strict NDA?

Re:NDA

[aicrules]

I cannot confirm or deny that.

Re:NDA

[Exitar]

Fun factor? In a MMORPG?
MMORPGs are not games, they are a job!

Um...

[AngryDeuce]

I would sit in the cantina and tell everyone how you were into Star Wars before it was cool and how Star Trek is better anwyays...

Re:Um...

[Dunega]

I would sit in the cantina and threaten to kill people with a tray. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sv5iEK-IEzw

WoW trade

[Avatar8]

Sit in WoW trade chat spamming how SW:TOR is going to kill WoW while you wait for the EA beta servers to respond.

Weep

[Bieeanda]

Weep, because someone reported this article to EA and you've both lost tester privileges and received a dire nastygram (+5 vs armchair lawyers) from EA's legal department.

rodrigoandrade

[aicrules]

Thank you for using a name that is nearly identical to the one you used to enter the beta. You will no longer need to spend any time downloading the game as your beta pass has been revoked for reasons that should be entirely obvious to you at this point.

Re:rodrigoandrade

[bigstrat2003]

The NDA explicitly permits you to disclose a) that there is a beta test, and b) that you are a part of it. So he hasn't broken the NDA.

Re:rodrigoandrade

[SharpFang]

He gave:
- download size (albeit wrong)
- beta participation lengths, dates and habits concerning giving them out
- beta access method (timed password)
- method of participation (invited)
- in-game task system (classic: quests)

Well then...

[iCEBaLM]

There is a testing program, and I am participating in the testing program.

That said, some of the details in the posers question are false.

Where to ask

[Divide By Zero]

While you're downloading the mammoth client, ask this question in the Beta Tester forums on Bioware's SWTOR site. There, people who have been in the test for a long time can give you tips without fear of violating NDA.

- In beta

[h4x0t]

Um. Play 1 class as far as they will let you.

Report bugs in a coherent manner.

Have fun and tell your friends if you like it.

The stuff is the best

[Quiet_Desperation]

Go do the things at the place.

skip it?

[vlm]

If you're an experienced beta tester, please post some tips travel-guide style on what I should do, quests I should take, places to visit, etc. TYIA.

Places to visit: Take the kids to the park and have a picnic, leaves are beginning to change and most of the mosquitos are dead where I live. Take (your) spouse to romantic dinner. Find a museum and look at artifacts for awhile. "Interpretive centers" mostly suck. Stay away from tourist traps in general.

Good quests, easily accomplished in 3 days: learning everything you need to pass the entry level ham radio license in your country. Another good quest is setting up IPv6 and completing the entire hurricane electric "sage" testing program. Set up a simple, crude mythtv system for the pure fun of it. Set up an asterisk voice pbx and fool around with all the features.

Travel guide style? Rick Steves to the rescue.

Oh you meant a SW:TOR beta tester, not just a guy who tests software in general. Oh you meant inside SW:TOR not just a long weekend. I still say skip it, the MMORPG bubble is over and poppin' and after SW:TOR is just a memory (probably pretty soon) you'll look back and wish you did something useful that weekend. What could you go with 10 gigs of downloads that would be more fun? Well, probably almost anything else. Even 10 gigs of spam emails would be fun to data-mine or graph or analyze.

Re:I would ask them why only 3 days

[muffen]

Preordering was not going to give you a better chance of getting into beta, it was going to give you early access to the game, and it will still give just that.

Not opening up for everyone on the same day at the same time might not be the dumbest of ideas, one can assume that servers will get hit pretty hard at start, don't see why this is a problem. It's fairly clear that the first weeks to month of an MMO decides its popularity, very few games have survived or come back from an initial disaster.

Pulling back on how many people can beta it? Seems like everyone is getting beta access these days, should they maybe just open up free playing for everyone until release?

I'm looking forward to the game anyway, and if it becomes a "star wars galaxies mess" I will happily play it, because I think that vanilla SWG is one of best MMO's ever created.

Try the bizarre stuff

[Registered Coward v2]

What might you do that's not within the "norms?" can you run through walls - find a way to get an unfair advantage through quirks in the programming? I'd look for things that can ruin the experience if not fixed. That's what adds value to a beta test - finding the bugs that no one thought about.

Re:Try the bizarre stuff

[jandrese]

Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to discover stuff like that in 3 days. It's hard to break mechanics when you barely understand how they work. That's why I hate ultra-short betas like this, it's almost impossible to give good feedback, especially since you're stuck doing the level 1 content that has been beta tested to death by the legions of other 3 days testers.

Face it, a 3 day beta is basically just a demo in disguise.

Suggestion.

[gallondr00nk]

Hunt down and destroy the ancestors of Ja-Ja Binks.

Re:I would ask them why only 3 days

[Tridus]

Well, Bioware has still never made a "bad" game. Dragon Age 2 is more in the "steaming turd" category.

Thermal Detonators.

[CFBMoo1]

Get as many of them as you can if they exist and run around to people setting them off. Be sure to type "Ssssssssssssssss...." in chat before it goes off and make sure you are wearing as much green as possible.

As an experienced QA tester...

[Anonymous Coward]

All the showstoppers have been found already. Since we're in beta (I'm in too), directed tests are out, unless you really want to feel like one of the minimum-wage guys they force to do the same thing over and over again. If you're feeling playful, you could try to break collision detection and get out-of-bounds, try to cheat, what-have-you.

Developers love nothing more than for you to test edge cases. If you find something rare or unusual the typical response (even internal) is "designed that way" or "working as intended." :V

Focus on the beginning and end of actions and quests. The middle is usually tested to hell. Achievements are usually rife with bugs, so pay special attention to ones that count quests and kills, and make sure they're tracking yours.

They're also worrying quite strongly about polish (and rightly so). If you see something that bothers you, say something! (And try to make it eloquent and to the point about why it bothers you.) Awkward animations, equipment placement on your character model (I can't tell you how many bugs I've filed over weapons and shit that clips through a model's hand in weird ways), missed, early or late sound cues, missing visual effects (just about everything you do should have one)... See what happens if you get a bunch of people together in one place and spam emotes. Used to crash WoW servers that way. In fact, one of the best things to do in beta is get together in a group and do the random shit you have planned. Testing is usually done individually or in small groups, which is why the beta is going to be big: they want stress testing like you wouldn't believe. So feel free to spam.

Above all, document what the hell you're doing! Be detailed to the point of insanity if you feel like someone won't be able to exactly mirror your actions leading up to an issue.

The Road Not Taken

[Jellodyne]

Swing by Tosche Station and pick up some power converters.

Re:I would ask them why only 3 days

[DavidTC]

No shit. And, as others have pointed out, it's not just a server thing. They might have enough servers and yet still not want every single person in the world creating their character at the same time and heading out into the same newbie zone. Just because the servers can handle 500,000 people doesn't mean they can handle 200,000 in the same room, and even if they can 'handle' it it still might be quite unusable for the players.

And you're right, practically every single MMO I've heard of seems to have died in the first week. There's always something that didn't scale correctly.

So trickling people into the sever is quite possibly the sanest decision I've ever heard of for an MMO.

Plus, restricting access to a new product, if done to a small extent, increases hype for it. Restricting it too much just pisses people off, but if people can get in within a month or so, it's fine.

Re:I would ask them why only 3 days

[Xugumad]

Do you remember when Square Enix released nothing but brilliant games?

Seen FFXIV?

That's their second MMO. This is Bioware's first. I'm not saying it will be terrible, but I am saying I'm not holding out a lot of hope here.

My Bioware history is a bit wobbly, but have they even released multiplayer games before?