Preble

Dear Developers (@sterner @admin), Very much enjoying the game. Bringing to your attention the following issue: In the first mission of the U.S. Barbary Coast campaign chapter, USS Constitution, upgraded with heavy hull III, sustains an inordinate amount of personnel casualties in combat against xebecs, armed with 6 pounders mounted well below the level where they could hit plausibly hit crew aboard Constitution's gun or spar decks and unable to penetrate Constitution's hull. That Constitution would proceed to lose 70 of 450 men within a few broadsides against such a weak opponent defies reality--especially when her real-life combat results against a peer frigate (HMS Guerriere) resulted in just 7 killed and 7 wounded, or 6 killed and 9 wounded in action against a pair of light frigates (HMS Cyane and HMS Levant). Kindly correct this. Many thanks--

@admin I understand previous concerns about coordinates being a means of dispatching reinforcements/revenge fleets, and I further understand the issue of wanting to maintain some imprecision. To solve the navigational problem I think a mark on the chart made every game hour or so would represent precise fixes, and would together would create a voyage track history that would give players a realistically precise sense of their location and direction without unrealistically excessive information that could be used to harm gameplay through ganking/camping etc. Dangerous Waters has a good example of what I'm talking about with the "Show History" feature in the right-click menu of the 2D map.

F11 is the bug reporting feature and isn't designed to be used as a navigational tool. Using it as such along with trader tool triangulation and third party maps are workarounds for navigation calculations that should be able to be done in-game. The crews of real ships would know how to do take celestial fixes and would do so regularly--due to the nature of OW and the UI it's not possible for the player to take star shots on their own (which would be a kind of silly premise that would make the game overly work-intensive and unplayable). Since ships had dedicated navigators to tell the captain where they were, navigation processes should be aggregated and simulated through the hourly track chart, perhaps supplemented by coordinates (perhaps updated hourly like the track chart as opposed to continuously). Not proposing we get rid of the protractor--it's a good feature to determine headings, but it's not particularly useful without known positions, either on land or out at sea (we have the former when we're within line-of-sight; I'm arguing that we should have the latter too). Agreed. Only point where I would differ is that of increasing uncertainty the longer you're at sea, since the accuracy of celestial fixes is independent of that factor as opposed to things like time of day and weather. Everything else, preach.

Dear @admin, As you and the team finalize the Open World UI, I'd like to make the case for bringing back the feature which gives the player's latitude/longitude coordinates in the map, as was in place before one of the previous wipes. Historically, mariners could plot their position with a reasonable degree of accuracy using celestial navigation. This was obviously not perfect but by the time of the period of the game (roughly 1750-1820) navigators had at their disposal both chronometers and accurate almanacs (for example, The American Practical Navigator, which was published in 1802 as an update to several preceding works on practical navigation). These were the key instruments for reliably accurate open-water navigation (which had by that point been practiced effectively, though with less certain accuracy, for nearly three centuries). The current system of the protractor and line essentially forces players to only sail from one plotted point to another, generally forcing players to hug coastlines in order to maintain visual points of reference as their only means of knowing their position is by line of sight and dead reckoning. This is particularly important for when players quit the game while at sea in the OW--since ship orientation can change on the next startup (and plotted course and position disappears) it's impossible to know exactly where you started in the last instance. This discourages long cruising voyages (which given the speed of travel can practicably only be accomplished across several game sessions), and more importantly, discourages players from attacking targets of opportunity out of sight of land when such an attack would take them off their plotted course to their next visual bearing. This is harmful to gameplay dynamics for PvP and especially for PvE, and as stated previously, is ahistorical. It would be salutary to bring back the coordinates feature, and perhaps alter/augment it with a periodic mark on the chart made, say, every game hour, to represent celestial fixes taken at a realistic frequency. This would give players greater freedom and confidence to cruise and engage beyond sight of land as was the historical norm of the period. Many thanks for your kind consideration.

Dear @admin, Would be grateful to know when the developers are planning to release the new and updated model of USS Constitution. Looking forward to seeing their recent beautiful work applied to such a marvelous ship. Cheers--

Call clans "squadrons." Mainly an aesthetic thematic suggestion, but such a naming convention would open possibilities for a new clan structure, with different types of clans depending on size and function. For example, naval squadrons and trading companies. Naval squadrons could have the equivalent of player ranks depending on size, e.g. detachments, divisions, squadrons, fleets, and even regional stations, Trading companies might start as import/export shops and progress on up to full-on East India Companies (or West India Companies, since it's the Caribbean). Clans/squadrons/companies could then potentially have their own internal rank structures and chains of command, with subunits to match, for their player members (so a port might be conquered by the 1st Frigate Division of the British Jamaica Squadron, etc.).

Reposting this from an earlier topic on this subject... The recent national rework that saw most ports revert to neutral control was perhaps logical for PvP but makes little sense for PvE where port conquest is not an option. My perception is that PvE is more of an environment for players who generally operate outside of clans/groups and on their own--much as single cruisers (frigates, sloops of war, commerce raiders) did in the Age of Sail. As such, the national structure is more important to PvE than PvP, which is now experimenting with a much more clan-centric model that explicitly requires conquest. It would be great if the PvE server could see ports revert to national control and orient itself around the activities of cruising warships rather than battle fleets. This could harness the open world by including historically realistic trade routes (the British, for example, sent their convoys outbound from the British isles to Barbados, to Jamaica, and homeward bound from Jamaica to Belize, around Cuba by the Florida Strait, and across the Atlantic by way of Nassau and Bermuda) for commerce raiding, and adding new categories of missions like convoy escort and attack (which would encourage players to take more full use of the open world map by sailing longer distances), and single/multiple-ship (i.e. not fleets) port raids (which would deliver goods and prize money, and possibly ships in the case of a cutting-out expedition). These would require the restoration of national control over ports, and in the case of the long-distance commerce-related missions, a means of plotting positions on the chart with a similar resolution as can be accomplished with a sextant and chronometer in open ocean (so something similar to, perhaps slightly less accurate than the previous GPS-like system, but much more accurate than the current, rather unhelpful dead-reckoning only method).

Hi there, Noticed that in the Admiralty tab, under" PvP Rewards" there is now a "USS Constitution note." What is the difference between this and the "Constitution permit" in the permits section? Many thanks--

@Barberouge, thanks so much for your reply. Grateful for your and other developers' attention on this issue. Passing along an interesting article about the advantages and relative costs of Live Oak vs. White Oak, from the USS Constitution Museum during the restoration that is just now concluding: https://ussconstitutionmuseum.org/2016/06/09/the-cutting-edge/

Great points on Diagonal Riders. Not sure whether Live Oak would impact stability, as the weight is distributed through the frames of the ship (and my understanding is that the bulk of the frame is closer to the keel). Might come back to the idea of reducing hold space? I think the key part is making sure there's a premium for a superior wood. It was historically quite rare, which is part of the reason why the U.S. six frigates were so special. I think the game currently does a good job of reducing the number of places where it's available, and players can't produce it themselves. Would be grateful for your thoughts--

Hi there, The recent national rework that saw most ports revert to neutral control was perhaps logical for PvP but makes little sense for PvE where port conquest is not an option. My perception is that PvE is more of an environment for players who generally operate outside of clans/groups and on their own--much as single cruisers (frigates, sloops of war, commerce raiders) did in the Age of Sail. As such, the national structure is more important to PvE than PvP, which is now experimenting with a much more clan-centric model that explicitly requires conquest. It would be great if the PvE server could see ports revert to national control and orient itself around the activities of cruising warships rather than battle fleets. This could harness the open world by including historically realistic trade routes (the British, for example, sent their convoys outbound from the British isles to Barbados, to Jamaica, and homeward bound from Jamaica to Belize, around Cuba by the Florida Strait, and across the Atlantic by way of Nassau and Bermuda) for commerce raiding, and adding new categories of missions like convoy escort and attack (which would encourage players to take more full use of the open world map by sailing longer distances), and single/multiple-ship (i.e. not fleets) port raids (which would deliver goods and prize money, and possibly ships in the case of a cutting-out expedition). These would require the restoration of national control over ports, and in the case of the long-distance commerce-related missions, a means of plotting positions on the chart with a similar resolution as can be accomplished with a sextant and chronometer in open ocean (so something similar to, perhaps slightly less accurate than the previous GPS-like system, but much more accurate than the current, rather unhelpful dead-reckoning only method). Many thanks--

Hi there, It seems that with respect to the Live Oak Framing and Diagonal Riders ship qualities/refits, the developers have sought to create a statistical tradeoff between increased hull strength and reduced speed. I'm not sure this is necessarily historically accurate. Live Oak is certainly an extremely dense material, and diagonal riders do add additional weight, but a ship's speed depends on hull form as much as, if not more than overall weight. In the case of the most famous live oak-framed ship with diagonal riders, USS Constitution, these characteristics played a key role in not just strengthening the ship's ability to resist enemy fire but maintaining the shape of the hull over time--which allowed her to be a remarkably fast vessel (fast enough to escape 5 pursuing British warships in a dead calm at the start of the War of 1812). Moreover, Constitution's partial-sister ships, which were also Live Oak-framed and had diagonal riders, had speeds that varied significantly: USS United States was notoriously slow, while USS President and USS Constellation were renowned for their swiftness. If the developers are looking for a statistical tradeoff, it may be more realistic to increase expense and labor time when working with Live Oak, as the wood was notorious for wearing out carpenters' tools more quickly than any other. As for diagonal riders, the tradeoff may come in the form of reduced space in the hold--as indeed these additional frames lay over the main frames of the ship and marginally reduce hold volume (pictures of Constitution's hold will demonstrate what I'm talking about in this regard). If there is a metric for it, both refits can also increase total ship weight--the same way gun armaments presently do in-game--which would have some more limited impact on speed than what is currently modeled for ship design characteristics. Many thanks--

Hi there, In PvP it is possible to get starting capital relatively quickly to crew ships and buy guns by selling combat marks. This does not appear to be an available option in PvE. Starting capital is essential to getting players set up in their preferred modes of revenue, whether via raiding or trading. It may be advisable to either increase players' starting funds or set up a bank where players can get loans so as to kickstart merchant trade or get them out into the world on the redeemable ships. Many thanks--

Hi there, Could you please bring back the position tool in the map screen? Mariners in the 18th century would have been able to get a fix at sea with a reasonable degree of accuracy using celestial navigation, sextants, sun shots and the like--it wasn't all dead reckoning like the present in-game system. Without this tool players cannot take long cruises and end game sessions out of sight of land lest they come back and not know where they are--which given navigational technology in the game period, is ahistorical. Many thanks--

Hi, gang, I'm actually asking about the Naval Action model rebuild--thanks so much. (Old Ironsides' restoration in Boston is very exciting and I hear she'll be back in the water soon!) Cheers--