Balancing one item at a time
I think we're all in agreement that, while there were some interesting ideas introduced in NCs last balancing project (2.2), the implementation was god awful.
It's great having a test server to try out things the devs have fixed or introduced, this is a huge leap forward. However, I'm worried that our next balancing effort is going to go the same way as 2.2... i.e. one big bang fix that'll make it all ok.
In an effort to combat this, why don't you try an "item spotlight" strategy for releasing new patches. Instead of fixing things in one big bang, focus on one item per patch. That way stuff can be tweaked based on the real world faster (tighter focus = faster releases, right?).
Dunno if that's even possible in the current code base, but I figure anything closer to a more continuous release process the better.