With Dev schedule changing, can PTS NA/EU schedule please be more balanced?

MoonPile · April 10

PTS is 2 weeks on the NA copy and the rest of the time (often months) on the EU copy:

That means housing builders on NA only have 2 weeks (if that, pending IRL schedules) to test and build with all of our own items. Primarily:

Stacks of Achievement furnishings (not just 1 pc / tester toon)
Stacks of Luxury furnishings
Crown / Crate items that are not available on PTS

also:
Murkmire and other furnishings that are missing from PTS Housing Editor Crown store (some can be built or bought from vendor, but some cannot be obtained at all)
Pre-built furnishings that only come from writ vendor plans (easily forgotten if you mostly use the PTS Crown store to plan builds)

See also (comments):

Some of that could be remedied by just adding stacks of things to PTS tester coffers, instead of 1 piece per tester. As well as adding Luxury furnishing coffers. Crate items, I'm sure you can't really get around. But they're too expensive to have many of anyway so it's easier to at least plan around (unlike structural and landscaping items that you might need 20+ of in a build, that make up the core).

So, I understand this is not a core use of the PTS, but if possible, it would really help to balance the time more. I've seen others comment that it would help in their respective areas of gameplay (PVE, PVP) also.

Erorah · April 11

PLEASE!!! 3 weeks and 3 weeks is fair.
I do not understand the reasoning behind the NA server never having enough test time allotment as the EU server has.
Explanations?

Fischblut · April 14

I would not care if servers changed more often, if PTS unlocked access to all furniture items (achievement, crown store exclusive packs, luxury, antiquities etc) and all homes (all crown store houses). Please, add all those items for testing, this would be very helpful to decide if something is worth buying and building on live!

Even when PTS is on my home server, I can't finish my perfect housing project because my main character haven't done quests in last few chapters and DLCs, and there is no access to many exclusive items there too

When I test gear, I create new characters on PTS anyway, because they have access to all stuff needed (gear, traits, Scribing, crafting). The real reason why I wait for my home server on PTS is to see if any of my cosmetic items are bugged/changed

I still don't know why lights look so wrong on PTS, and I always check that this doesn't make it to live servers:

James-Wayne · April 14

I was thinking about this today just do it like this

Q1: NA then EU
Q2: EU then NA
Q3: NA then EU
Q4: EU then NA

You could even not do a copy at the start of every cycle but I imagine players want that 3 month update to PTS for the 3 weeks but at least with the above both sides get around 6 months over a year on the PTS.

If you didnt copy at the start and just left it then you save a job from someone having to do the copy first week.

tomofhyrule · April 14

James-Wayne wrote: »

I was thinking about this today just do it like this

Q1: NA then EU
Q2: EU then NA
Q3: NA then EU
Q4: EU then NA

I'd love to have something like this. It's unfair for NA to only get PTS for only 8 weeks a year (and the most unpolished versions of each patch at that), but it's also unfair for EU to always have to wait for week 3 (even if the patches are more set by then).

In the off-seasons, people may use PTS to do things other than straight testing too. I seem to recall that the EU Housing community petitioned for the current system because that allowed them to practice housing builds in the PTS off-season, but that also means the NA housing community doesn't have that option. I so a lot of screenshotting things, and again I can't do anything outside of the two weeks I'm supposed to be testing stuff, so I tend to miss things and have to wait a few months to try again.

MoonPile · April 14

Fischblut wrote: »

I would not care if servers changed more often, if PTS unlocked access to all furniture items (achievement, crown store exclusive packs, luxury, antiquities etc) and all homes (all crown store houses). Please, add all those items for testing, this would be very helpful to decide if something is worth buying and building on live!
...

Agree, this is the crux of it for us in housing! I would be fine if these things were added.

But there are others testing in other ways for whom a schedule balance would be useful too – whatever would benefit most players would be best.

Kelinmiriel · April 15

Even alternating entire YEARS would be better than the current system! It's not fair to the EU players either - sometimes they'd like to try things out without re-building their favorite characters from scratch, or waiting until it's all been out for two weeks.

So give us 2026, please. EU first for two weeks, then NA, every patch. Simple.

Housing is one reason. But also, people like to test builds, try out colors on existing characters, all sorts of things. One of my friends on NA has often expressed interest in trying something out, then we tell him, he missed the two week window, and he's just SO disappointed.

MoonPile · April 23

It's a royal bummer that we also have completely unusable assets for our 2 weeks of PTS on NA:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/8303116/#Comment_8303116

In the 2nd week, even more items textures are broken than there were in the first week. I know they're working on it but it just sucks in addition to everything mentioned above.

MoonPile · April 28

And now it's time for 4 months of EU 🙃

EDIT: Wait, it's still NA this week? :0
We get more time?? Thank you if so! And sorry EU
...or was I confused about the timing / just wrong xD

I've since learned it was due to a bug, but it was really nice to have even just 1 more week of NA.

And now it's time for 4 months of EU fr 🙃

xencthlu · July 31

Adding my voice here. I sat down to try to make a build I'd port to live today, only to realise there was no way I could. During the EU mirror, there is *no* way I can access luxury furnishings that would be critical for this build. Do you know how many furnishings in the game are luxury furnishings? It's a lot. And it turns out I won't be able to access my luxury furnishings, my achievement furnishings, and my antiquity furnishings for *months?*

Come on.

At the very least, there needs to be better parity between NA and EU mirrors. (Sorry? What do you mean the smaller server petitioned for priority and got it? You're serious?) Practically, though, Zanil needs to be available every day with his full stock, there needs to be a box that unlocks every furnishing-granting achievement in the game, and another box that grants 3/3 of every codex. We know there's lux furnishings being added to the PTS we can't test because of the way it's set up right now. Please and thank you.

Two weeks. Good lord.

Soarora · July 31

James-Wayne wrote: »

I was thinking about this today just do it like this

Q1: NA then EU
Q2: EU then NA
Q3: NA then EU
Q4: EU then NA

You could even not do a copy at the start of every cycle but I imagine players want that 3 month update to PTS for the 3 weeks but at least with the above both sides get around 6 months over a year on the PTS.

If you didnt copy at the start and just left it then you save a job from someone having to do the copy first week.

I would love this, with copying at the start. Though, it might make more sense to do:
EU -> NA
NA -> EU
NA -> EU
EU -> NA
Then EU and NA both get first shot at dungeon dlcs (if 4 in a year), NA gets first shot at the trial and 1/2 story dlc (assuming that would be preferable to people who do trials on pts, otherwise flip q2 and q4 so EU goes first), EU gets first shot at the other half of the story dlc.

Of course, doesn’t work if we don’t have 4 quarters a year though.

princesspurpleblob · August 2

Adding my voice here as well - I really wish PTS will stay on NA side longer as well!

James-Wayne wrote: »

I was thinking about this today just do it like this

Q1: NA then EU
Q2: EU then NA
Q3: NA then EU
Q4: EU then NA

You could even not do a copy at the start of every cycle but I imagine players want that 3 month update to PTS for the 3 weeks but at least with the above both sides get around 6 months over a year on the PTS.

If you didnt copy at the start and just left it then you save a job from someone having to do the copy first week.

I wouldn't mind this as long as the cycle period isn't too short or too long!