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Suppression and stun


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I think this game could use a few more tactical choices and consequences when it comes to battle damage and gunnery.

So here are some proposals which can be grouped under the general concept of suppression and stun effects from incoming fire. (If you can't tell, I'm a big ArmA player.)

I'm not talking about true suppressing fire or people actually being stunned. The general idea is just that taking effective fire will momentarily disrupt anything a crew is trying to do. There's a cloud of dust, a loud noise, some minor splinters, one or two men being wounded in a dramatic and disturbing fashion... all this is disruptive and distracting.

So here are some ideas:

Taking a well-aimed broadside (ie, receiving 60% or more of the maximum possible damage from what the victim's own guns are capable of) should:

  • Interrupt the enemy's loading process for around 5 seconds.
  • Interrupt the traverse and elevation change of the enemy's guns for around 5 seconds.
  • Disable ranging shots for 5-10 seconds.
  • Delay sail changes by 10-15 seconds.
  • Decrease yard rotation speed by 200% for around 5 seconds.
  • Prevent boarding initiation for around 10 seconds.
  • Initiate an audio cue to indicate the disorder among the crew. It should end when they get their act together.
  • Perhaps the reload timers, gunnery arcs and yard UI could also flicker or flash red to indicate disruption.
And now some modifiers:

  • Broadsides of grapeshot that disable more than 3 men should have all of the above effects. But they also affect sail changes, yard rotation and boarding initiation for twice as long. In addition, they interrupt the loading process of upper (spar) deck guns for twice as long.
  • Raking fire always has these effects (as compensation, the actual lethality of raking fire could be reduced).
  • Losing a lower mast, topmast, or bowsprit has all of the above effects, but does not affect main (lower) deck guns.
  • Use of Survival focus cancels out these effects to prevent unfair stacking of debuffs.

I think this sort of thing would make the gameplay a lot more interesting. Suddenly you have to think about the optimum time to fire, using patience and cunning. Right now the only good strategy is to fire as fast as possible in order to maximize reload rate.

Save your broadside for when the enemy is about to tack, and you can mess up his maneuver. Likewise, the first player to land a good hit will receive an advantage, and perhaps be able to shoot out of the enemy's broadside arc while their gun traverse is still stunned. This will make the initial approach to close action more tactically interesting.

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I really like this concept of wait for the opportune moment to fire. This usually spawns the counter discussion of "magic" skills. I think your idea is a great alternative to "magic" skills because it is chance coupled with a bit of skill. I am sure they are working on mechanics that add flavor to ship combat, because let's be honest spacebar hammering OR aligning "magic" skills in order (key 1 key 2 key 3) is boring and tiring. These ship combat mechanics should use a little of everything but above all strategy, much like chess over checkers.

 

-Cannonball

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there is also an element wondering for realism sake how long between shots crew would normally have to recover. I.e. Realistically some crews took 3 minutes to reload!

In which case a mere 5-10 seconds shouldn't be too serious a handicap.

 

But you can bet your ass that it will make players a lot less willing to get hit. They'll start doing anything to avoid it and pummel the enemy first.

 

That's a big part of it, actually. Getting creamed by 24-pounders should do more than play the same old sound file and spray low-res dust all over the screen.

 

It's like an ArmA mod that I play with, that causes you to fall down when you get shot. Those split seconds of getting back to your feet and scrambling to cover are the most butt-clenching moments of any game ever.

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I think this idea is worth exploring but I have some upfront concerns.

 

First, I think it may limit the style of fighting.

Second, it may just be annoying if everytime you get hit you can't turn worth a darn.

Third, whoever gets the first solid shot will have a decidedly greater advantage especially if they have a much higher reload rate.

Forth, balancing small ship fire against a large ship. If a brig hits the Constitution with 60% of its shots it shouldn't cause a cease in firing at all probably since thats only like 6 balls or something.

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THIS IS NOT PIRATES OF THE MAGIC BURNING CARDGAME SEA :angry:!

 

In real life suppression would only occur usually on land, at sea you know that ducking inside a wooden crate is not going to help your life and it will only lead to enemy victory, you have no hard cover therefore suppression doesn't have much of an effect.

 

Stunning is also rubbish, your own ship would be firing a lot of shot and while you would feel hit the only real stunning is if one of your gun crew is killed and then a cannon should load slower anyway (1 less gunner).

 

Moral is also silly, in most line ships you wouldn't know who is winning, be able to see the enemy through the smoke or even care less, the smoke and sounds would turn you into a machine that does what it is designed to do... load and fire.

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Wow, if two guys think think this is magic, it's not even worth arguing with you. The only way to help you is to put you in a rowboat on a pond and start throwing rocks at you while you try to do logic puzzles.

Your mention of realism is farcical. Like all those modders who implement realustic ballistics and lethality to all the guns in an fps and wonder why it turns into a sniperfest with no relation to a real firefight.

I'll admit it's a radical idea that would need testing, though. So on the reasoned responses.

First, I think it may limit the style of fighting.

Second, it may just be annoying if everytime you get hit you can't turn worth a darn.

Third, whoever gets the first solid shot will have a decidedly greater advantage especially if they have a much higher reload rate.

Forth, balancing small ship fire against a large ship. If a brig hits the Constitution with 60% of its shots it shouldn't cause a cease in firing at all probably since thats only like 6 balls or something.

In reverse order, yes, we would have to balance it by ship type. As in, a ship takes 60% of the damage from its own potential weight of metal. In that case a brig would have to rake Constitution to make an impact on crew cohesion.

And maybe you're right that this proposal would put too much importance on the first broadside. The devs will hate that. But I like the idea of the opening shots being a game of chicken. Right now there is no drama unless you are squabbling over the weather gauge. Maybe the reload debuff is too much.

Also, I never proposed a turn rate debuff. The penalty to yard control would see you bleed a little extra speed, though.

If it is considered, the effect should lessen after the first shots as the crew "hardens" to the action - for the gun crew an action involves no strategy except doing your job to try and stay alive.

Everything about taking effective fire makes your job harder. That's an objective, scientifically measurable fact.

But I agree with the thrust of your post. Rather than have the suppression effect taper off, I would rather have an increasingly long cooldown for non-raking, non-grape debuff effects. So you can't get stun-locked by multiple ships.

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Such short term stuns are a great idea, but will create a "first shot" problem. In most cases a player (especially a rookie) will not recover making the rest of the combat unimportant time sink. This will make players a lot more cautious. And increase combat distance. 

 

For the raking fire only - this might be a good idea, but needs to be tested.

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I'm concerned about scenarios where it's 2v1 like two Constitutions against a Bellona or Victory. Right now it's possible to defeat the 2 Constitutions if you manage the situation correctly but lose if you don't.

 

In this stun scenario the Bellona could be stunned by the first Constitution and then stunned again by the fire from the second. By then the first would have had enough time to reload and maneuver to again stun the Bellona. I think many times this would result in an almost impossible and frustrating situation for the single ship. One of the Constitutions may get stunned but it could recover while the other is engaging the Bellona. For the most part they could maneuver to avoid taking a 60% hit when working in tandem.

 

I'm not discounting the entire idea, but I don't like the thought of the scenario above.

 

 

Such short term stuns are a great idea, but will create a "first shot" problem. In most cases a player (especially a rookie) will not recover making the rest of the combat unimportant time sink. This will make players a lot more cautious. And increase combat distance. 

 

For the raking fire only - this might be a good idea, but needs to be tested.

This it would definltely do. I'd imagine the majority of battles would be reduced to long distance and chain shot with little diversity.

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Leviathan, I agree that stun lock from multiple vessels should be avoided.

Just another point to make. A lot of people are acting like I am proposing a morale-based feature.

But a lot of this really has nothing to do with combat psychology and subjective human reactions. Much of it is entirely physical.

You can give your crew magic videogame pills that make them immune to fear and stress. But when you a member of your gun crew gets cut in half and you need to scramble for the slowmatch that he dropped, that's still going to cause an interruption in whatever you were doing. And then an 18-pounder rolls crack against your ankle, the gun captain is momentarily blinded by flying sawdust, and the midshipman commanding your battery gets elbowed in the face and knocked down.

And meanwhile people tell me that only crew death should affect the ship. What death? Do you imagine that you've killed someone each time the crew HP bar takes a hit? A fantasy world where the lethality rate of a black powder weapon is 100%?

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I think crew casualties and morale levels could probably be a measure used to effect a targetted ships behaviour if all such acts are programmed to cause an effect.

 

Also I have not noticed gunnery or sail drill being adversely effected either through tiredness or loss. Often only the first two or three shots at best were fired as a broadside, after this independant fire was often used due to faster guncrews being held back when waiting for all to load. (Yes in smaller vessels space bar hitting would reflect this, but in the larger vessels you simply wouldn't be able to spam the space bar fast enough, to reflect this)

 

Another thing I have noticed is that Ball doesn't seem to cause too many crew casualties, even when you double shot at close range into the hull. Perhaps something that is being gauged atm by the devs.

 

And what happened to mixed grape and ball loads ? not used often but undoubtebly an option for the bloodthirsty close up captains out there, and would definitely effect crew losses to fire, which would have effects that the OP has listed.

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It is an interesting idea Maturin and worth discussing.

 

I just think that if the devs do consider the idea it needs to be approached from a gameplay perspective strictly. Normally i'm all for realism but if this concept is taken too far it could break the current dynamics between the different ship classes and throw everything out of balance (I know this isn't your intention). At the same time if the effects are too minimal then there is no point in adding them at all. It will be a tricky thing to balance taking into account all the different ship types and combat scenarios possible to avoid situations like I described above.

 

What about stuns in the form of visual disruption? Perhaps some screen shaking that intensifies with the amount of shot being taken? No idea if that would kill FPS though. It may be a terrible idea but figured i'd throw it out there.

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Another thing I have noticed is that Ball doesn't seem to cause too many crew casualties, even when you double shot at close range into the hull. Perhaps something that is being gauged atm by the devs.

Fire some up the stern and see what happens to the crew. Crew loss from stern damage may be a tad OP currently. Firing directly into the side of the hull doesn't kill many crew at the moment. The good thing is the devs are always watching, listening, and adusting.

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In which case a mere 5-10 seconds shouldn't be too serious a handicap.

 

But you can bet your ass that it will make players a lot less willing to get hit. They'll start doing anything to avoid it and pummel the enemy first.

 

That's a big part of it, actually. Getting creamed by 24-pounders should do more than play the same old sound file and spray low-res dust all over the screen.

 

It's like an ArmA mod that I play with, that causes you to fall down when you get shot. Those split seconds of getting back to your feet and scrambling to cover are the most butt-clenching moments of any game ever.

 

What I am saying is that say you are the Santisima Trinidad being targeted by 4 ships at once (really happened and yet she put up a good fight for a very long period of time). I think there is either enough time between shots even from 4 ships to recover and return fire OR the crew is fine and keeps firing even as the balls come in.

Not really a fan of the idea.

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Line ships definitely will suffer from such stern stuns unless there is a good cool down (invulnerability) after such event. 

But agree that such feature could be done in a fun way and can add some depth - like shooting the tracks in WOT.  

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Jack Aubry would require his crew to "hold" fire while manoeuvring for the maximum effect from that all important first broadside - why not us?

 

Imagine two first rates dancing for the best first shot - closer, closer, closer - and all hell breaks loose!

 

The ghosts of the Glorious First of June would be proud!

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Admin, I was about to mention that this idea is most useful for raking fire and grapeshot.

Especially the latter. It will give us a tactical tool, and not just a pre-boarding procedure.

Effects from roundshot to the broadside could be minimized.

 

I like the idea of stunning during grapeshot as it is designed to kill crew. It would definitely take them a moment to recover from being hit with it. As for raking fire I think that having your cannons taken out by it is enough of a hinder in fight ability. 

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I think it is an bad idea you cannot stun an petson on reall life. This us more fantasy a tank is way different then a ship. You cannot compare the two together in any way. Loads of people from potbs are looking forward towards this a game whitout stuns and all those things it will start whit this then another and another. After that it is messed up.

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I think that having all of those effects, on all of the crew, is a bit much.

Instead, I'd suggest that some of those effects occur, on some of the crew, depending on where the ship is hit.

For example, if you take hits near the front of the ship, near the waterline, this is hardly going to effect the top deck gun crew at the rear of this ship. Similarly, it's not going to effect those handling the sails very much.

The way I'd like to see it work is for the supression from hits only effect the local area, and simply just make the local crew a bit worse at doing their job. The surpression caused should scale with the damage taken. (I.e. A few 6pdrs won't do much, but a full broadside of 12pdrs will do a lot more to effect the crew.)

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