Datruth wrote:I would be lying if I said i bothered to read all of your post.
You probably should read OPs post then, because nothing you said is remotely on point.
On topic; The whole "the content is 10 years old and everyone is familiar with it"-argument is so incredibly poor. Reading strategies for an encounter or watching a video of it, is vastly different than learning the fight in practice. For reference, look at raid releases on retail today. Tactics and videos of the fights flourish on the web immediately or even prior to release, but people still struggle doing it (on mythic).
Furthermore, content is scripted differently on each private server. There's a ton of small variances and unique details between each server that add up to create an overall experience very different from what Blizzard produced back in the day. Using the same setting and NPC models doesn't replicate Blizzards scripts.
I think the OP presents a great idea in having volunteers test new content with developer assistance the entire way. Have the testers fill out a short form to gather some intel on their vanilla knowledge, make sure the testers are from as wide of a range of guilds as possible, and don't let them test unsupervised. "Recruiting" 40-80 testers from a server with as high a population as Nostalrius can't possibly be an issue, although it'd certainly be more work from the administration to form the testing team.
Personally I feel like the open PTR was already a failed experiment. The amount of plain abuse by guilds was disheartening. There were several streams up every day of guilds practicing the same bosses, wiping intentionally so they could improve on their kills, shit some guilds weren't even testing BWL, they just went out and practiced Kazzak and Azuregos instead, all while streaming and openly confessing they didn't give a fuck when asked why they weren't even doing BWL.
I realize the players who care about the competitive aspects of this game are likely an extreme minority on this server, but I'm certain raid releases would be much more fun for the entire server if every guild didn't scrutinize the content beforehand. You might actually get content that'll last for more than a few hours before it's cleared that way.
