QA Testing vs. Playtesting

[ArmchairGravy]

I'm going to use a specific example to illuminate a greater problem with QA testing of KSP2. In the most recent update solid rocket boosters were subjected to twice the throttle limit. This meant several of my rocket designs were no longer working. It's obvious this build was not play tested. The focus of the devs so far seems to be with QA testing (does x cause the game to crash) vs. playtesting (do the engines still work correctly). What the game has consistently failed at so far is to show me someone in development actually plays the game.

Edited April 24 by ArmchairGravy

[DoomsdayDuck555]

14 minutes ago, ArmchairGravy said:

solid rocket boosters were subjected to twice the throttle limit.

What do you mean? Your previous rockets had their thrust limiters set to half their values?

[ArmchairGravy]

3 minutes ago, DoomsdayDuck555 said:

What do you mean? Your previous rockets had their thrust limiters set to half their values?

Yes, SRB's in the latest edition have their limiters doubled vs. the published amount. Put a Flea on a command pod, set the TWR to 1.5 in the VAB and it won't leave the launchpad because the actual limiter has been doubled. 5 minutes of play testing would have revealed this.

[DoomsdayDuck555]

7 minutes ago, ArmchairGravy said:

Yes, SRB's in the latest edition have their limiters doubled vs. the published amount. Put a Flea on a command pod, set the TWR to 1.5 in the VAB and it won't leave the launchpad because the actual limiter has been doubled. 5 minutes of play testing would have revealed this.

is TWR set for vacuum? that might make enough difference.

[ArmchairGravy]

Here's the bug report. I'm not saying bugs won't happen, I'm saying easily captured bugs should not have passed a play test. It's pretty obvious they are not play testing the game.

 

[Flush Foot]

@DoomsdayDuck555, what I believe @ArmchairGravy is saying is that if you had a solid-booster that could output 1000 kN of thrust and you chose to limit it to 50%, you'd expect to be getting 500 kN of thrust instead, but the game has decided to apply that 50% value twice (but shows TWR relative to that expected 500 kN output) resulting in only 250 kN of thrust.

[Spicat]

Playtesting is just testing by playing, to see if bugs appear while playing normally.

What you describe is still QA testing, check if a specific thing result in the appropriate behavior.

And they do both, either they missed that through playtest/qa testing (I didn’t even notice it until you pointed it out) or they noticed that and decided that they had no time fixing it before the update (or not important enough to push the update).

[Presto200]

11 hours ago, ArmchairGravy said:

Yes, SRB's in the latest edition have their limiters doubled vs. the published amount. Put a Flea on a command pod, set the TWR to 1.5 in the VAB and it won't leave the launchpad because the actual limiter has been doubled. 5 minutes of play testing would have revealed this.

Have you made a bug report on this yet?

[Flush Foot]

39 minutes ago, Presto200 said:

Have you made a bug report on this yet?

That post cited another post, which is actually a bug report (Solid fuel engines not producing reported thrust -- March 12)

Edited April 24 by Flush Foot

[Meecrob]

"QA Testing vs. Playtesting"

Whatever its called, it is blindingly obvious that only very specific things are being tested/fixed. My guess is that the QA team knows all about the issues in KSP2, but they gotta do what their bosses tell them to do, and their bosses have a different priority.

I know that people on the QA team revert to launch a few times and see their craft get borked. I know they paused the game with a plane onscreen for a few minutes and watched the wheels slowly float away. I know they add more Dv than the game says they need because the game is wrong. I know they are getting good at maneuvering without maneuver nodes or orbit lines. I could go on.

Ask any KSP Youtuber about their experience. Here is Matt Lowne's:
https://twitter.com/Matt_Lowne/status/1779599922628636991

 

 

 

Edited April 24 by Meecrob

[The Aziz]

There's a large gap between finding bugs and fixing them. A bug found, reproduced, recorded and reported is not sent to a dev with "fix now pls" note attached to it.

15 minutes ago, Meecrob said:

QA team knows all about the issues in KSP2, but they gotta do what their bosses tell them to do, and their bosses have a different priority.

How dare they have an organized workflow smh

[Meecrob]

20 minutes ago, The Aziz said:

There's a large gap between finding bugs and fixing them. A bug found, reproduced, recorded and reported is not sent to a dev with "fix now pls" note attached to it.

Show me where I said that finding bugs is the same as fixing bugs.

I said that I think that bugs are not a priority to whoever delegates tasks to the QA team.

22 minutes ago, The Aziz said:

How dare they have an organized workflow smh

Show me where I made any reference to their workflow.

Look @The Aziz, its cool you don't agree with me on most things; echo chambers suck, but could you at least try to understand where I am coming from? Every time I reply to you, it seems that I am having to clarify my point to you because you want to prove me wrong. I'm not here to be "right," I'm here to have a discussion with other individuals who are passionate about KSP and spaceflight in general. The impression I get from you is that you take pleasure in reading how I got something incorrect.

Remember buddy, you never learn if you never make a mistake.