19 mln vs 60 thousand - the cost of crew - moderated

[Lannes]

TOO COMPLEX. The game is complex enough already. It is a SUPERB game already. Don't spoil it by making us become clerks trying to do paperWORK and constantly calculating advantages and disadvantages of this or that, instead of playing. It spoils a wonderful GAME. I would not get involved in a game that has become WORK and is stressful.

Edited April 26, 2016 by Lannes

[StandingCow]

This basicly reduces dura by one for lower tier ships.

Don't know if I really like the idea of boarding becoming more important. With the currant mechanic boarding ships are one of the main annoyances in the game. if it is boarding the last surviving stragglers in a battle in fine with it. Me personally: I don't enjoy the gameplay that comes with fleets just kitted out to board other ships. Don't enjoy playing with or against them.

I just hope these mechanics won't lead to a further increase of ganking by making it a vital part of the game and "forcing" people to do it, in order to compete within the game.

Other than that: I don't really know if I am pro or con on the issue of complicating the game further. We sure need to test it.

 

That was my major concern over this idea as well... putting more importance on boarding, in it's current state, isn't something I would enjoy.  I find the rock/paper/scissor element of boarding to be pretty weak gameplay which comes down to who has the better ability to click a button at the last second.

 

Other than that I like the proposed changes.

Edited April 26, 2016 by StandingCow

[Ruthless4u]

I know I will be chastised for this, but my original worry that this game will be for work focused seems to be happening.

To much micromanagement is a bad thing, and please don't throw another game as an example of how it works. I'm sure anyone could do the exact opposite as well.

We might as well start adding ammunition and food limits on ships if we go down this path.

[Hugo van Grojt]

 

More populated nations will have less crew per player (total crew pool of 250,000 for 1000 players)

Less populated nation will naturally have more crew per player (total crew pool 100,000 for 100 players)

 

 

I think this is a very good step in the direction of balancing larger and smaller empires. If you are coding this feature for the crew mechanic, please also consider coding it for "purchase cost of port attack flag" as well. I would like to see that empire expansion becomes more costly as you get more ports, thereby offsetting your advantages you get from more crew/resources from ports.

 

Once a single nation has conquered half of the map, there should be an increasingly high cost in conquering the rest - either by the available crew mechanic or by increasing gold cost for attacking yet another port.

 

Good thinking to protect the smaller nations from zerg mechanics! Keep it up!

[admin]

TOO COMPLEX. The game is complex enough already. It is a SUPERB game already. Don't spoil it by making us become clerks trying to do paperWORK and constantly calculating advantages and disadvantages of this or that, instead of playing. It spoils a wonderful GAME. I would not get involved in a game that has become WORK and is stressful.

 

 

The open discussion of the crew is needed to make such decisions. While officers are definitely needed and will bring extra dimension to the game - crew if it considered too complex or tedious will not get done. But at least we will have a good answer why its not done for future players.

[OTMatt]

You should lose your crew if you lose your ship in battle. Everyone sails Trincomalee, it will be weeks before we can see this gameplay mechanic occur. Rarely will anyone lose all their duras.

Also people who say this is too complex are just unwilling to see the long term goals. With crew costs we see less emphasis on using heavier crew demanding ships and people might actually play with the less popular ships ingame like Cerberus or belles.

[CeltiberoCaesar]

The open discussion of the crew is needed to make such decisions. While officers are definitely needed and will bring extra dimension to the game - crew if it considered too complex or tedious will not get done. But at least we will have a good answer why its not done for future players.

Its a good idea, it would bring a more strategy aproach and a less arcade one. That would force the player to think before risking a big ship ina battle... That will ended up with few big battles, less port attacks and more PvP battle on the sea.

But it will also require more time from the players to invest in the game, it make the game much more grinding and it will also unbalance the game in favour of big nations, the more ports the faster you can grow. That will ended up with everyone beeing nation A or B and instead of having 6-8 average nations we will have 2-3 huge ones. Probably pirats vs british.

IMO...

Edited April 26, 2016 by CeltiberoCaesar

[Hugo van Grojt]

I know I will be chastised for this, but my original worry that this game will be for work focused seems to be happening.

To much micromanagement is a bad thing, and please don't throw another game as an example of how it works. I'm sure anyone could do the exact opposite as well.

We might as well start adding ammunition and food limits on ships if we go down this path.

 

While I understand your concern, I think the devs NEED to introduce crew management/maintenance cost to balance the game and prevent the Santissima creep we see already somehow.

 

- Player Ranks do not work in the long run, because gaining rank is static. Once you have reached max rank - what prevents you from sailing the biggest and most badass ship?

- Crafting Ranks do not work either, once you reach max rank in crafting you can make your own stream of Santissimas (only limited by labour hours - which is a good thing already, but not the final solution)

 

So, we need a system of ship maintenance cost that will force players to make a conscious decision on what ship to sail in Open World. Right now, there is littel incentive to sail a Frigate/Belle Poule when I can sail a Trincomalee/Essex which is the more powerful ship. With crew maintenance cost, sailing Frigates/Belle Poules/Surprise may be significanlty more cost effective. So you make a choice: badass but expensive or cost effective but not the meanest ship in the ocean?

 

This is a very much needed feature, the question is: how can we make it as simple as possible and less of a micromanagement nightmare?

 

Cheers,

 

Hugo

[Justme]

The open discussion of the crew is needed to make such decisions. While officers are definitely needed and will bring extra dimension to the game - crew if it considered too complex or tedious will not get done. But at least we will have a good answer why its not done for future players.

Fair point, but I just hope you guys are able to balance the opinion if the hardcore vs the everyday gamer.

I still think this will end up favoring the larger nations and clans.

[OTMatt]

While I understand your concern, I think the devs NEED to introduce crew management/maintenance cost to balance the game and prevent the Santissima creep we see already somehow.

 

- Player Ranks do not work in the long run, because gaining rank is static. Once you have reached max rank - what prevents you from sailing the biggest and most badass ship?

- Crafting Ranks do not work either, once you reach max rank in crafting you can make your own stream of Santissimas (only limited by labour hours - which is a good thing already, but not the final solution)

 

So, we need a system of ship maintenance cost that will force players to make a conscious decision on what ship to sail in Open World. Right now, there is littel incentive to sail a Frigate/Belle Poule when I can sail a Trincomalee/Essex which is the more powerful ship. With crew maintenance cost, sailing Frigates/Belle Poules/Surprise may be significanlty more cost effective. So you make a choice: badass but expensive or cost effective but not the meanest ship in the ocean?

 

This is a very much needed feature, the question is: how can we make it as simple as possible and less of a micromanagement nightmare?

 

Cheers,

 

Hugo

 

Exactly, the devs need to add a balancing mechanic that encourages players to use less powerful ships in the game. Everyone always resorts to Trincos, Constitutions, and power SOLs and leave behind the rest of the weaker ships.

 

At some point they have to add maintenance cost, it will create more micromanagement but its worth it if players want to see more variety of ships in battle.

[Marten van de Voerde]

Honestly current proposal is anything but complicated for me. You lost your ship? You need to aquire another one. And cannons. And repair kits. Oh, and crew, too. Hope you get enough in your personal stock (pool like labor hours, just not free to use - monies needed).

 

As for faction balance - right now there is simply nothing stoping big clans from using 25 santis all the time. With correctly managed crafting line, totaly sustainable. Smaller factions, not really, sadly. But, if after loosing a Santi you loose a player for next operations coz he needs to gather crew for them, hell, maybe we should sail more Pavels or even Bellonas, leaving Santis to our most trusted captains and protecting them during battles. Giving smaller nations chance to mount an opposition on more equal terms. Especially with mentioned difference in crew availability per number of players.

[Hugo van Grojt]

Exactly, the devs need to add a balancing mechanic that encourages players to use less powerful ships in the game. Everyone always resorts to Trincos, Constitutions, and power SOLs and leave behind the rest of the weaker ships.

 

At some point they have to add maintenance cost, it will create more micromanagement but its worth it if players want to see more variety of ships in battle.

 

AND!  Admin did not say anything about replenishment rates for crew, yet. It is quite possible that replenishment rates for will be so high that everyone can always sail a port-bought 5 dura Surprise/Mercury and can afford to lose that regularly. I am sure we will see that.

 

So, crew limitations only come into play from, let's say, Trincomalee/Essex and up.

 

And the favouring larger nations problem has been addressed by admin proposing the introducting of a coefficient to national crew availability that balances out the larger a nation gets. This means, that it is quite possible that a smaller nation can field bigger and better crewed ships regularly, while a large Empire can field more ships in total, but not necessarily 50 1st rates all the time.

 

Sounds good to me. Now we need to see the same balancing system according to empire size introduced for other things (flag craft cost?) as well and we will have a nice stable RvR

[-Krumpf-]

I somewhat like the idea but would propose instead of limiting crew as a physical commodity of sorts make it a background system where there is a national pool of reserves and have a supply/demand matrix where the larger the nation the more expensive replacements are.  I would rather see crew become a gold sink in the game by claiming some of the battle earnings and actual cost to replace in port similar to repairing damaged ships.  However you decide to do it I will still play this awesome game. 

 

Gold Sink > Time Sink

[BungeeLemming]

dont bother with portbattle mechanics.

This is a thread about crew. Nothing more.

PB system is going to be revisited.

 

 

One thing that this crew stuff will do is making you feel the loss of a Santissima even harder than a Victory (1050 vs 850 crew)

If you loose such a high crew ship you loose the ability to man another one for a certain ammount of time.

 

If you asked me I say this "crew recovery rate" must not be linear.

At first the crew recovers fast, to enable us to man frigates rather quick.

But if I want to sail a 1st rate I maybe have to wait two, three (more or less) full days until my 1000 crew are recovered.

Victory will have a bigger importance than the santissima, altho beeing more powerful in terms of spikepower..

[Hugo van Grojt]

Honestly current proposal is anything but complicated for me. You lost your ship? You need to aquire another one. And cannons. And repair kits. Oh, and crew, too. Hope you get enough in your personal stock (pool like labor hours, just not free to use - monies needed).

 

As for faction balance - right now there is simply nothing stoping big clans from using 25 santis all the time. With correctly managed crafting line, totaly sustainable. Smaller factions, not really, sadly. But, if after loosing a Santi you loose a player for next operations coz he needs to gather crew for them, hell, maybe we should sail more Pavels or even Bellonas, leaving Santis to our most trusted captains and protecting them during battles. Giving smaller nations chance to mount an opposition on more equal terms. Especially with mentioned difference in crew availability per number of players.

 

Exactly, it has been my firm belief for weeks now that the Bellona is not only the most beautiful ship out there but that it also will/should become the "standard" large scale battle ship with rare Pavels/Victories only filling the line as super weapon. 3 Durabilities = more use out of your installed upgrades + more use out of 1 set of crew before you lose your last durability. Makes sense.

 

With crew maintenance cost and other tactical options, the "ultimate" 25 ship fleet setup would then look like this (and I am sure this is what the devs are looking for, as well):

5x Light Frigates (Mortar Brigs, screen for main battle line?)

5x Heavy Frigates (to counter mortar brigs? To counter other frigates? Capture secondary targets?)

10x 3rd Rates (main battle line, pinning force)

5x 2nd/1st rates (heavy hitters, core of the fleet)

 

Any system that brings us closer to seeing fleets like this is a good system in my eyes

[Eishen]

 

Changes to crew

• Crew is a limited resource in ports (cannot be crafted). 
• Crew has to be hired in ports or impressed from enemies by means of boarding
• Crew is provided in certain number per day (a-la labor hours)
• Crew hire cost includes lifetime salary and insurance
• You lose crew when you lose the ship (all durabilities)
• You lose crew completely even if did not lose durabilities if you explode
• You don't lose crew if you surrender (maybe - not sure)

 

 

• You lose crew when you lose the ship (all durabilities)

Does not penalize too much use of captured ships?

 

• You lose crew completely even if did not lose durabilities if you explode / You don't lose crew if you surrender (maybe - not sure)

I  propose losing them when you sink (no matter number of duras) only retaining them if you surrender. That will help to solve suicidal ramming and people removing survival mode to auto-sink.  A fight to the end would mean something and be a more rare situation (as it was).

 

but this should be paired with fully equalizing  a surrendered with a boarding ship , and perhaps giving full XP for captured/surrendered enemy ships.

Edited April 26, 2016 by Eishen

[Michiel QPO]

To me these changes appear to result into just an additional time sink in a game that is currently already catering towards hardcore play. The more you complicate matters in terms of time consuming activities the more you will end up with a small hardcore playerbase that actually has enough hours in a day to spend online

 

Why not try to balance things in a more casual way? If an abundance of SOL’s is an issue then simply make crafting them more expensive/time consuming. Additionally invoke a penalty based on the rate/crew size of a ship. The more crew a ship has, the bigger the penalty on your reward at the end of a mission/battle. You can eventually do the same with the officer mechanics with relation to how many you have on your ship and how big their bonuses are.

 

With reference to balancing of nations, why not let an AI diplomacy decide who you go to war with ? Any nation becoming too large gets hammered because the AI tells every other nation to go out clubbing the big one.

[Hethwill]

Crew replenishment rates should be connected, somehow, some way, to the captain's feats in PvP(!).

 

BR ratios apply with negatives as well as positives in incentive traditional high seas situations and fame, ex. 700BRv150BR and 100BRv200BR

 

Prize Money from player Traders cargo only could also become a feat in itself not tied to BR ratio.

[Babble]

Definitely worth some testing.

 

My only fear is that it will be yet another thing that make people risk adverse to pvp or turn everyone into a rage boarder.

 

 

I think there are better ways to make national resources and money sinks.

[OTMatt]

Dear devs, this is a quite hardcore change to the game. We would need lot of time invested to the game and no one with a normal life would afford such dedication.

The way it looks right now it would be quite a long time before you lose t duras on any of your frigates. Going to a port to push the refill button does not really sound hardcore to me either.

[Michiel QPO]

The way it looks right now it would be quite a long time before you lose t duras on any of your frigates. Going to a port to push the refill button does not really sound hardcore to me either.

In my humble opinion that is only as easy as you make it sound when the nearest port actually still has crew to use for refill. 

[BungeeLemming]

you share one crew with all ships.

you hire lets say 600 men.

They will appear on both, the 1st rate (which is then undercrewed)

and they will appear as many as possible on your frigate. (not overcrewed ofc, only as much as your ship can carry)

 

I dont see the argument where this system is making you klick more than nessecary..

[Coderre]

Please keep in mind, when you only lose crew when you lose your last dura, people will break up/sell that last dura to circumvent the crew loss. Although this might only be an issue on Trinco/Essex and smaller ships, because they are relatively cheap.

 

EDIT: Thought this might be intended (to make big ships harder to crew), but it feels a bit like cheating (breaking up a ship after you lost 4 dura to avoid crew loss).

Edited April 26, 2016 by Coderre

[jodgi]

The way I read admin's OP it is a way to make big ships more expensive, just like what happened when they introduced carriages.

And unless you're a 1-dura fool it sounded like an one-off thing.

So it sounds fine to me, especially since it pushes the burden on the captain and not on the poor crafter.

It's fine if it pushes the game into more boarding. I guess it's a matter of taste but I find the hull bashing uninspiring.

It requires more thought to disable, decrew and board your opponent compared to depleting hp bars. (I'm aware some people feel otherwise; I usually get yelled at when I "lose" the HP race but end up boarding them with a crew advantage..."Fight like a man!" and all that...)

[Jupe]

Time is really an issue here. Sailing to missions takes a lot of time, sailing Back to port takes a lot of time, sailing to gather resources takes a lot of time.... You get the point.

Now about to add more features which takes a lot of time.