How do you guys feel about the update?
TappedOut forum
Posted on Oct. 21, 2015, 4:58 p.m. by Murpy
I playtest a ton on tappedout, and I think the new changes made playtesting extremely difficult. I don't really see any upside to the update so far, and it seems to be very buggy. What are your opinions?
What update are you guys talking about? What did it do?
October 21, 2015 5:07 p.m.
Could use some tune ups. Doesn't let you put counters on individual creatures rather it puts them on the whole team.
October 21, 2015 5:07 p.m.
FAMOUSWATERMELON says... #6
The update is that the playtester is different guys.
October 21, 2015 5:09 p.m.
Do not like it at all. The cards are way to small, ton of extra space not used and no way to add +1/+1 counters.
October 21, 2015 5:10 p.m.
avrgeboy123 says... #8
The new style of playtester has been awful in my opinion so far. Cards are too small, very buggy and less space to work with.
October 21, 2015 5:21 p.m.
I have several problems with the new playtester.
You can no longer hide your hand. This was very useful when playtesting against other people. Now we'll have to cover up the hand with a sheet of paper.
You used to be able to click on the "graveyard" or "exile" headings to show a drop-down list of the cards in that zone. From there, you could select a certain card to view and then move to other zones. There is still a drop-down list, but you cannot manipulate it. To get a card out, we now have to manually remove all cards above the one we're trying to reach.
You can no longer type in the name of a card you are trying to find in the "draw by name" menu. Not a huge deal, you just have to scroll down and find it now.
In the detailed card view there used to be individual buttons for putting the card on top or bottom of the library or into graveyard or exile. They have now all been condensed into a drop-down menu. Again, not a huge deal but it adds one extra step for each card when doing a paris mulligan beginning commander games. There is plenty of room in the detail view to fit four separate buttons.
@arctyr You can still easily add counters or change power/toughness to a single card. Simply hover over the card and type q, w, or e, respectively, to add power, toughness, or counters. Type shift+the key to decrease the value. All of the shorthand buttons are listed in the "shortcuts" menu.
Do the site administrators actually view these forums often? Because I would really like to see the hide hand option return as well as easier graveyard/exile accessibility.
October 21, 2015 5:32 p.m.
Is there a way to stop the new playtester from snapping cards into place? I agree that it seems to have a lot of wasted space, and the smaller cards are not an improvement.
Also, having the controls in the upper right is not as good as having them along the bottom.
October 21, 2015 5:34 p.m.
For the record, there are some things that I like.
The smaller cards allow more cards to be on the battlefield at once without needing to stack creatures or artifacts over each other.
With large hand sizes, it used to be that cards would overlap each other to the point of sometimes completely covering up some of them. Now it adds a second row below so that everything is easier to see and access.
Adding a command zone is a nice touch
October 21, 2015 5:37 p.m.
I've noticed that the site has been loading incredibly slow for me today (1 gbps connection...), so idk if that's related but I've definitely noticed.
I agree with much of the above: tons of wasted space and the tiny cards/play space is really annoying. I found it fully functional with one minor issue, however, as I'm used to using the hotkeys (e for counters, q/w for power/toughness, g for grave, x for exile, etc.) rather than all the manual clicking. All I found troublesome was that you can't click on graveyard/exile to get a list of cards and then select a card from that list. Now you just get a text list of the cards and have to move them all out of that zone in order to select the one you want.
October 21, 2015 5:42 p.m.
Site loading slowly for me today.
Also no-one has mentioned it but, in notifications you can't click on peoples names anymore.
When it said "X commented Y"
You used to be able to click on X to go to their profile.
October 21, 2015 5:50 p.m.
canterlotguardian says... #14
ChiefBell I noticed that. Also the active notifications don't go away unless you click on whatever notification is at the top. If you click on any of the other ones, it still displays all notifications as being unread.
October 21, 2015 5:59 p.m.
TeraInferno says... #15
I do like the addition of the command zone through.
Some things that I found are still lacking:
- Not easy to modify the top cards in library as allowed by Sensei's Divining Top or Mirri's Guile
- No way to view detailed preview of cards in library
- Cards too small to read text on them
October 21, 2015 6:02 p.m.
icefire033 says... #16
The new play testing setup is terrible for use on mobile devices IMO. Before I could see everything all at once, now, I have to scroll up and down every time I wish to from looking at the battlefield to looking at my hand.
October 21, 2015 6:04 p.m.
FAMOUSWATERMELON says... #17
ChiefBell That problem seems to be linked to this one, so I think that might be the reason, as well as the site's slowness today.
October 21, 2015 6:04 p.m.
The whole site has been loading slowly as well. I really hope they revert the play testing option to thre way it was before: this new version is atrocious, in my opinion.
October 21, 2015 6:28 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #19
BUT GUYS!
TOKENS WORK NOW!!
NOTHING ELSE MATTERS!!!
October 21, 2015 6:31 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #20
Also, I have not been experiencing slow loading times. In fact, loading times have been faster for me.
October 21, 2015 6:32 p.m.
Looks like any dredge deck is super obnoxious to use with the new set-up. You have to move away all the cards that are on top of the card you're reanimating to select it and do what you want with it. Why didn't they keep the parts that let select specific cards from the graveyard and exiled zone?
October 21, 2015 6:43 p.m.
My issue is that it doesn't all fit into one screen so I have to scroll to see my hand/use functions on the right. Before, it was all located neatly on the bottom.
Also, if you have more than 7 cards in your hand, it doesn't scale cards down anymore. This makes it awkward to playtest decks like Storm or casting spells like Sphinx's Revelation.
It's cool that tokens work now, though. But I definitely liked the older version more, and I'm not sure this is worth the trade-off.
October 21, 2015 6:53 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #23
I just want to put a disclaimer for everyone here:
This playtester has been undergoing feedback for about a month now. However it only garnered a small amount of feedback. Putting it as the default playtester was a move yeago most likely did to be able to get more feedback on it from users as obviously more users would notice things.
Instead of saying "I hate this new playtester" or "I liked the old one" blah blah blah, think of this as a move yeago did on purpose so that everyone can catch all the things that he missed in implementing in this new playtester version. Because let's be honest, one person can not catch everything.
So use this thread and the original thread as a means to let yeago know of all the things he missed, and also use it as a means of notifying him of features that you wish to see that were not in the first one. This new playtester seems to be designed as an improved one, as the two common issues in the first are fixed with this one: the command zone and the token issue.
For those of you complaining about wasted space, please provide screenshots so we can see where space is wasted.
October 21, 2015 6:53 p.m.
Good point, Femme. I'd definitely make the whole thing fit on one page without scrolling, which is definitely the biggest thing. I also don't really like the way cards snap into place so fast, and also how difficult looking through your graveyard and library have become. I think being able to manipulate cards in your library is very important, and this new format makes that so much harder. Also, adding power, toughness, and counters is broken. I do like the way cards drag where you let go of them, the addition of a command zone (although that could be a commander format-only thing), tokens, and the new buttons, although I just use hot keys anyway.
October 21, 2015 7:21 p.m.
Pasius1984 says... #26
I'm not a fan of the new Playtester. I'd like to see the old one back, but just 1/4 or 1/2 the size, for more space. I don't know if it is just me, but it had a better flow, or feel, compared to the new one.
Just sayin'...
October 21, 2015 7:33 p.m.
contracrostipunctus says... #27
The new playtesting is HORRIBLE. For every reason mentioned here and several others. Please restore the old one and exile this half-cooked junk.
October 21, 2015 7:56 p.m.
confunkius says... #28
So it's small, card movement is jerky, and graveyards are basically off-limits. But in exchange, there's a command zone. That doesn't even begin to make up for it. I really hope it changes a lot, because I've used this site's playtester many times a day for a couple years now, but as it stands I just can't use this at all. I can't even think of suggestions other than "Make it like it was before."
October 21, 2015 8:01 p.m.
I was going to post more feedback, but the site is taking minutes to preview things so that's not happening.
October 21, 2015 8:04 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #30
I can confirm that the P/T and counter buttons are bugged as there doesn't seem to be a way to apply them to anything other than the one creature on the field.
Also to note, counters and P/T should be allowed to be added onto non creature cards as well, considering all the different methods we have of making things creatures and putting different types of counters on things.
I also do not experience the need to scroll down. There IS the scroll bar to the left as FAMOUSWATERMELON's screenshot aptly shows, however everything fits on one screen. However, it isn't entirely on one screen as there is just a little bit of the bottom of the boxes underneath everything.
There is still however, wasted space as noted before, but two different kinds. One is that card sizes can be increased to accommodate the full box that they are located in. Currently there is space around the cards that doesn't get used. The hand space could also be larger, as the spaces inbetween the different zones doesn't necessarily need to be there. Finally, if you have multiple cards that create the same token, you get different options for that same token. I have for example, 3 options for a 1/1 green squirrel token.
In the image I provided, the red and green lines dictate sections where we can have increased play area sizes. The blue lines dictate unused space where our cards could be larger for visual accommodation.
October 21, 2015 8:09 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #31
Looks like I have to make a sticky to stop people from saying "exile this half cooked junk".
October 21, 2015 8:11 p.m.
contracrostipunctus says... #32
In the sticky, please include why this was even necessary.
October 21, 2015 8:17 p.m.
canterlotguardian says... #33
Femme_Fatale on the upside, I just got an inspiration for a deck title. :D
October 21, 2015 8:21 p.m.
Femme_Fatale says... #34
The old playtester was most likely designed in such a way that new stuff couldn't be implemented properly without changing a lot of coding, contracrostipunctus. The way yeago appears to have set it now with the new one is that he can easily implement new suggestions should the come forth. Keep in mind that all these issues can and will be fixed, and we will end up with a playtester that is better than the old one. As I mentioned in the disclaimer, yeago already put out a thread asking for feedback on this playtester but hardly anyone was giving out feedback. Doing it like this guarantees him feedback as he now has a much larger user base that is accessing it. Remember, only one person works on the playtester so he can't catch everything.
October 21, 2015 8:26 p.m.
abstractfive says... #36
I can barely use this new play tester on my iPad. Thats my main reason for using this site. I hate the upgrade.
October 21, 2015 8:30 p.m.
isnotverylikely says... #37
I really don't like it... very strange, can't read any of the cards w/out zooming in
October 21, 2015 8:45 p.m.
The_Murderauder says... #38
Very, VERY upset with the new playtester. Like confunkius, I've used the old playtester several times a day for the past couple years, and I find this new one entirely unusable. I realize that some of that is probably just me getting used to a new thing, but some of it is genuine. In vaguely descending order:
The way the cards snap into place. Bad bad bad. Lemme just put them where I wanna put them.
The way the "hand" box extends downward rather than simply having the cards overlap a little. This necessitates frequent up-down scrolling, which is much more of a problem (in my opinion) than some parts of your cards being obscured.
The "move to [zone]" options being in a drop-down menu when highlighting a card rather than being immediately available. Makes a lot of processes that were previously quick and simple now clunky and time-consuming (yes, I realize there are hotkeys).
The aforementioned problems with the graveyard/exile zones being unmanageable.
The "This collection is private" text at the top of the page. I don't think that needs to be present on the playtest page. Being on the edit page is certainly good enough (also contributes to unnecessary page length, thus exacerbating the scrolling problem).
This one's just a small issue, but the command zone being between the library and hand is unnecessary. Being the least used/interacted-with zone, it should probably be off to the side somewhere.
The first three (well, maybe just two) are by far the most frustrating for me. As it stands, I find the whole thing completely unworkable, but if those things changed, I would only be very slightly bothered by the other issues.
Also, to people complaining about card size, I've always been able to use Command +/- to increase and decrease the size of the cards in the playtester, and that still works fine. (I'll admit that the default size on the new playtester does seem to be unusually small, though)
October 21, 2015 9:01 p.m.
rikshawhoward says... #39
Not a fan. Can't manipulate the graveyard and I have to strain to read the cards. Mousing over them is cumbersome and impossible on any device that's not a computer. Guess I'll try something else for a while.
October 21, 2015 9:02 p.m.
The_Murderauder says... #40
This may be a dumb question, but is there a way for one to keep using the old playtester while this one undergoes its development?
October 21, 2015 9:10 p.m.
StUrzasBeard says... #41
I really liked the old version of the playtester better. It just looked more finished. The card sizes were adjustable. Maybe tokens didn't work but transforming a 2-faced card did, although tokens very rarely had text on them so it didn't really matter. Even worse, when you transform a card and restart a new game the card you x-formed is still blacked out and you have to mouse over and hit the space key. Searching for decks by hubs works now, that's nice.
October 21, 2015 9:55 p.m.
See, Femme, your screenshot seems to indicate the playtester takes up the whole screen. And while this may be true for you, this is what I get in Chrome (46.0.2490.71):
But Firefox (41.0.2) gives me even more wasted space between playtester and disclaimer text (notice the scroll bar which wasn't present in Chrome):
So, I think the reason feedback is so all over the place (with a common theme of NO THANKS YOU) is because people are having drastically different experiences. I'm pretty sure we're using CSS to auto-size the page elements on the playtester so I think it's just getting the right settings in place as deck pages load "full" size (regardless of browser/resolution) and will rezise accordingly as you zoom.
October 21, 2015 10:33 p.m.
Went to edit that comment but it looks like every time I try to update it I get the Ornithopters splash screen error. So there's something, if verified by another user, is worth looking in to.
Anyway this was the edit tacked on to the last sentence: ...deck pages (as an example of a page that everyone interacts with who uses this site) load "full" size (regardless of browser/resolution) and will rezise accordingly as you zoom so it's just a matter of time.
I know that I'm itching to run some tests with Game Day coming up this weekend, and the new playtester in its current state will make that less effective... maybe others who have said OUT WITH THE NEW IN WITH THE OLD!!! are trying to prep as well...
October 21, 2015 10:39 p.m.
You can raise power and toughness of creatures and add tokens, but it is not as easy as it was just to add +1/+1 tokens.
October 22, 2015 12:48 a.m.
UniqueUserID says... #46
I was wondering why the playtester changed. For some reason I thought there was a error/bug and the admins just rolled back to a REALLY old version of playtester.
I gotta say... I hate it. Can we have an option for the old version please?
October 22, 2015 7:55 a.m.
It seems the general consensus is negative and I agree. I prefer the old playtester
October 22, 2015 7:59 a.m.
mickalopagus says... #48
how do i make the cards bigger i cant see them.
that is like 99% of the reason i come to this site is to playtest decks.
October 22, 2015 9:01 a.m.
It's awful. A lot of wasted space, and I can't change the size of the battlefield to accommodate 3 rows (which is how I play, creatures/enchantments and artifacts/lands) And the cards are too small.
Why did they change it?
October 22, 2015 9:14 a.m.
I for one, welcome our new playtester overlords.
I enjoy the new playtester because:
You have a lot more hotkeys, you can basically not use a mouse.
Cards do not overlap when they are more than 7 - even with the smaller cards I can still tel what they are and I can + and - to increase card size.
Most pertinent problems:
You used to be able to click on the "graveyard" or "exile" headings to show a drop-down list of the cards in that zone. From there, you could select a certain card to view and then move to other zones. There is still a drop-down list, but you cannot manipulate it. To get a card out, we now have to manually remove all cards above the one we're trying to reach.
Lots and lots of wasted space.
Seeming lack of unison between different browser experiences.
Arvail says... #2
I dunno. Playtesting on TO has always felt pretty terrible to me. I've resorted to exporting the decklists to cockatrice and playing local games instead.
October 21, 2015 5:03 p.m.