Yep. Ripe is the way to go for just about any pepper. I pickled some green pepperoncinis, and they were pretty good, but I ate a few ripe ones off of my plant, and I've decided to let them all go ripe. They're quite sweet and tart, with just a hint of heat.
Now if I could only get my HOTS to grow faster! Still waiting on fataliis, yellow scorps, tabascos, and a mystery red I have... so this is what I'm doing in the mean time.... guajillo and japones seeds. I've tested the japones seeds and they germinated fine. I haven't tested the guajillos yet, but I don't think they'll be any different. They were packaged by the same company (Orale)