Posted by Crowley on September 13, 1999 at 08:28:24:
In Reply to: A response. Or a rant. Take your pick. posted by SphereMaker on September 13, 1999 at 04:01:05:
..at the lack of understanding you seem to have for the collateral damage testing in this manner would have caused.
Yes, you would learn the strengths and weaknesses of the class, and what was powerful, and what was not. However, the sheer amount of damage that would be caused is mind-boggling.
An analogy that comes to mind for me would be testing a prototype Army Tank by sending six of them into downtown New York City, and seeing just how much of it they can destroy before they are stopped, then performing analyses on how the machine performed in a real combat situation, etc. Sure, you'd learn all its strengths and weaknesses, but at what cost?
Furthermore, when it came to questioning whether or not the class was too powerful, aka, could kill too easily.. it would be much easier to judge that based on the efforts of newbies and non-pker types than it would from the efforts of hard-core killers.. after all, the argument then would come down to trying to figure out if their successes were due to their "skill" at killing, or that the class is overpowered/unbalanced/etc.
Lastly, I also think you're being naive if you really think that all the Imms place the players on the same level as them. Some of the Imms hide it better than others, but the overall average arrogance of the Immortal Staff as a whole is simply staggering.
You're a good Imm, and I think you mean well here, but you're showing a surprising naivete if you don't think that people who care first and foremost about their pk ratio and their position on the all-time pk list are good choices to test a class, *particularly* when the rest of the mud has no similar chance. If you really wanted to test a class like conjurers, there are numerous alternatives to both your original idea, and the concept of trying to test it on a test port.