to join the testserver you had to write a comment on a blog (the one from the guy who made these little sro-comic guides) and if you were lucky you got an account.
when you made a character you could choose your weapon/gear on a website (i think only one time per account) and then these items will be transfered to you account with all stats 0%
there were 4 different account types, from normal accounts (whih got sos weapon and last tier set (no accessorys) to special accounts with sun+7 weapon+shield(if needed) and 10dg set ( i think normal sun+0 set)
These accounts had differences in silk/sp/gold ,too.
Normal accounts got 1000 silk, 1mil sp (per character) and 50mil gold (per character)
dunno how many silk/sp/gold the other accounts got
and for alchemy: don't know what they changed but maybe i'll test it later for you
