Brig should be the starting ship

[Slim McSauce]

11 minutes ago, Barbancourt (rownd) said:

Seriously?  It isn't that hard, and it doesn't even take very long.  If you're "dumping full broadsides into the ocean" you need more time in a 7th rate to correct that error rather than trying to "fix" it with more decks of cannons.  The Brig is crap and I'm sure it made quite a few players quit. 

 

Point is your on a tiny, odd sailing class of boat that hardly has any business or relation to any of the other ships in the game that certainly isn't fun or easy to sail, and we expect new players to do combat in that for their first few levels? The brig may be crap but its a whole hell of a lot better than a cutter, lynx, or privateer that are only useful in very narrow circumstance.

[Sir Texas Sir]

7 hours ago, admin said:

Exam will be hard and will challenge the player. It will be in the safe tutorial environment, but if player finishes it he will be able to sink 60% of players on the forum

But than most of the players with half a clue of game mechanics can do that too.  Man it hurts so bad when you catch some one and they get stuck in irons and can't get out. You almost don't even want to board them or sink them cause you feel so sorry for them until you notice they are Rear Admirals lol

2 hours ago, Blackjack Morgan said:

Any chance you could do something similar for all ships? Like when you have over 4,000 hours played but you still need to "unlock" every ship skill slots you want to try sailing....it really sucks and accomplishes nothing. Maybe, just have a ship skill unlock by Tier of ship? Like you unlock all slots for all 5th rates or all 4th rates.....instead of needing to do it for each individual ship in those classes? I''ll send you a Christmas card this year if you make this a reality!

I always thought the 5th slot should only be unlocked through PvP.  You can unlock it early if all you do is PvP, but than it shows that the person is a mast of there ship if they get all 5 slots unlocked they should have a special paint for that ship they can use to let folks know they have a special master ship.     Though making any thing based on in game time isn't wise. You can sit and fish for 4K hours and never do any combat.   I wouldn't say unlocking the skills for nothing, unlocking them is the reward in it's self.

2 hours ago, Flinch said:

And 100% of Americans

I'm going to go more with 60% of all players, I seen some pretty bad players from all nations and I know some very very good players that are now in that nation.  So I really wouldn't poke fun of other nations.  Now if your talking about american players....well seems that is a bit rude and maybe it's the stupid EU server ping but I sank my share of EU, AUS and other national players too so can't say all of us are bad.  Hell many of the other national players I sailed with couldn't even figure how to get out of irons.  There are carebears and bad players from all walks of life.

Edited February 17, 2018 by Sir Texas Sir

[Blackjack Morgan]

1 minute ago, Sir Texas Sir said:

But than most of the players with half a clue of game mechanics can do that too.  Man it hurts so bad when you catch some one and they get stuck in irons and can't get out. You almost don't even want to board them or sink them cause you feel so sorry for them until you notice they are Rear Admirals lol

I always thought the 5th slot should only be unlocked through PvP.  You can unlock it early if all you do is PvP, but than it shows that the person is a mast of there ship if they get all 5 slots unlocked they should have a special paint for that ship they can use to let folks know they have a special master ship.     Though making any thing based on in game time isn't wise. You can sit and fish for 4K hours and never do any combat.   I wouldn't say unlocking the skills for nothing, unlocking them is the reward in it's self.

I'm going to go more with 60% of all players, I seen some pretty bad players from all nations and I know some very very good players that are now in that nation.  So I really wouldn't poke fun of other nations.

Well point is really that you can grind NPC's and still completely suck in PvP.....the grinding out ship unlocks for EVERY SINGLE ship serves no purpose than add to the boredom of the game. Making something a timesink for no other purpose than to try to help newer players makes no sense really. Make leveling rank longer if need be but unlocking every ship is pointless.

[Barbancourt]

3 hours ago, Slim Jimmerson said:

Point is your on a tiny, odd sailing class of boat that hardly has any business or relation to any of the other ships in the game that certainly isn't fun or easy to sail, and we expect new players to do combat in that for their first few levels? The brig may be crap but its a whole hell of a lot better than a cutter, lynx, or privateer that are only useful in very narrow circumstance.

It is good experience to capture traders with them, and you can use those resources as a noob.  Lynx also used to have the best bang-for-buck loot - not sure if that has changed. 

 

[_Masterviolin]

The usefulness of any ship or class of ship depends upon your personal opinion. Some folks think the low gunports and heel of the 7th rates renders them unplayable. I personally think they're great because they can go upwind fast and are dirt cheap, and i am sure others feel the same way. 

There are "broken" ships, where very clear faults means they are not well suited for play or need tuning, and there's everything else- ships that have both good and bad qualities but still have some uses. Just because we, used to sailing frigates and SOLs have come to find 7th rates less exiting does not mean they should be virtually removed from the game. Know the difference.

[Slim McSauce]

8 hours ago, _Masterviolin said:

Just because we, used to sailing frigates and SOLs have come to find 7th rates less exiting does not mean they should be virtually removed from the game. Know the difference.

No one's calling for the removal of 7th rates, and no one is saying they can't be used as combat vessels. The fact of the matter is that a 7th rate is not a good starting ship and doesn't represent the ships that are overwhelming used in NA (square rigs)

Just because you find the 7th rates "useful" (whatever that means) doesn't mean new players find it "fun" and there's plenty of evidence pointing to the latter, and there's empirical evidence that points that no 7th rate for aft rigged ship teaches new players how to sail square rigs; corvettes, frigates and lineships. They don't represent whats best about NA therefore we aren't putting out best foot forward to new players who need to be stimulated early on to lock them in for those key first few key hours. Giving them this sort of joke vessel and telling them to fight among actual ships of war is laughable.

Go do BC missions for 3 hours and tell me how much fun you have.

Edited February 18, 2018 by Slim Jimmerson

[_Masterviolin]

1 hour ago, Slim Jimmerson said:

No one's calling for the removal of 7th rates, and no one is saying they can't be used as combat vessels. The fact of the matter is that a 7th rate is not a good starting ship and doesn't represent the ships that are overwhelming used in NA (square rigs)

Just because you find the 7th rates "useful" (whatever that means) doesn't mean new players find it "fun" and there's plenty of evidence pointing to the latter, and there's empirical evidence that points that no 7th rate for aft rigged ship teaches new players how to sail square rigs; corvettes, frigates and lineships. They don't represent whats best about NA therefore we aren't putting out best foot forward to new players who need to be stimulated early on to lock them in for those key first few key hours. Giving them this sort of joke vessel and telling them to fight among actual ships of war is laughable.

Go do BC missions for 3 hours and tell me how much fun you have.

I must again, respectfully disagree. The seventh is a perfect starting ship. They are cheap and easily found in markets, clans can easily provide them to their newbie clanmates. They require only an hour or so to be unlocked. Their high speed and upwind sailing capabilities means they can sail with their veteran counterparts in their Endys and the like, whilst able to escape superior foes. They can have an active role in any PVP squadron as scouts, and perhaps even taggers. The Brig meanwhile is slower and lacks those sailing qualities. They take a little more time and skill to master, and have absolutely no place in any PVP. Anyhow, why rush to get noobs into the square-rigged ships? Whether one learns manual sails as a fresh noob or slightly more experienced noob should not matter- either way when they want to move on, they need to learn.

Would a noob prefer learning the ropes of the game in a ship that can, at the very least have some use in PVP squadrons and clans, that they can come to master quickly? Or be relegated to the weakest square-rigger in the game, utterly useless for any PVP whatsoever? Even if we went ahead and made the Brig the "starting ship", the noobs would leap and bound to get ahold of a nice 7th, and clans would immediately turn out lynxes, privateers and such for their newbies. I still recall the early days of OW when we all bummed around in Basic Lynxes, I would honestly prefer having those as the newbie starter ship than the cutter- but recalling my previous reply, that is a matter of personal opinion

The old fore and afts may not be the meta, but they have much use. I think it would be unwise to abandon them so quickly for those shiny 5ths we all adore. 

 

Edited February 18, 2018 by _Masterviolin

[Slim McSauce]

2 hours ago, _Masterviolin said:

I must again, respectfully disagree. The seventh is a perfect starting ship. They are cheap and easily found in markets, clans can easily provide them to their newbie clanmates. They require only an hour or so to be unlocked. Their high speed and upwind sailing capabilities means they can sail with their veteran counterparts in their Endys and the like, whilst able to escape superior foes. They can have an active role in any PVP squadron as scouts, and perhaps even taggers. The Brig meanwhile is slower and lacks those sailing qualities. They take a little more time and skill to master, and have absolutely no place in any PVP. Anyhow, why rush to get noobs into the square-rigged ships? Whether one learns manual sails as a fresh noob or slightly more experienced noob should not matter- either way when they want to move on, they need to learn.

Would a noob prefer learning the ropes of the game in a ship that can, at the very least have some use in PVP squadrons and clans, that they can come to master quickly? Or be relegated to the weakest square-rigger in the game, utterly useless for any PVP whatsoever? Even if we went ahead and made the Brig the "starting ship", the noobs would leap and bound to get ahold of a nice 7th, and clans would immediately turn out lynxes, privateers and such for their newbies. I still recall the early days of OW when we all bummed around in Basic Lynxes, I would honestly prefer having those as the newbie starter ship than the cutter- but recalling my previous reply, that is a matter of personal opinion

The old fore and afts may not be the meta, but they have much use. I think it would be unwise to abandon them so quickly for those shiny 5ths we all adore. 

 

Before I continue I must say the devs have decided, and I agree with their decision. I think you're wrong, and you're using your experience as an established player to justify a 7th rate as "good enough" for PVP, easy to master and you even go as far as calling the brig weak, weaker and more useless in PVP than a lynx or privateer and that you want new players to go out and PVP in a lynx. You use excuses like "they have a role as scouters, MAYBE even taggers" and you say square riggers like the brig are slower, lacks sailing quality and have no place in PVP. 

You forget that the brig, navybrig, merc and rattlesnake are the MAIN shallow water PB ships, not aft rigs. You say the noobs need to learn how to play, what does a noob learn in a aft rig? How to use the 4-5 other aft rig ships. What does a noob learn in a brig square rig? How to sail pretty much every ship in the game, how to manual sail, depowering, heel control, reverse maneuvers. It all transfers to the top, unless I'm mistaken and there ARE aft rig frigates and SOLs than its the 7th rates that are utterly useless at teaching a new player.

Finally I detest your perspective from a "noobs" POV. It sounds like you yourself have affinity for 7th rates from your own nostalgia. You seem to think this means getting rid of 7th rates all together and its not. NA has a problem with keeping new players interest, we have many thousands of sails and very little active player base from those sails. I remember once hearing a stat from the admin, something like 50% of people don't make it past the cutter. So maybe while looking at tutorial and new player experience, we take a look at the cutter itself, what about it isn't keeping players interested? Maybe its the fact that when people see pictures and videos of this game, they see large, lumbering ships packed with guns blasting at each other. Then when they come in we plop them down in a teeny tinny dinghy looking boat and tell  them to shoot AI for a few hours so they can buy a new ships, then they lose that one and are back in  the teeny tinny POS that flat out isn't very useful hence you hardly see them in PVP...ever

Want real, valid evidence? Look at NAL. How many people do you see back tracking to play the cutter again? How many times did a brig who got snuck into your match absolutely demolish your cutter? Now imagine that but with real consequences of you just lost your privateer and now you have to buy another one over and over again just so you can finally get out of these useless fishing boats and get into a proper snow or navy brig. Something actually viable for light PVE. No brand spanking noob in a lynx is EVER encouraged to go and throw it away trying to do PVP where if a ship wants to get away from you they just sail downwind...

 

 

[Nelsons Barrel]

On 17.2.2018 at 3:03 PM, admin said:

 M&C exam will give a player a permanent free light frigate. So a player can just jump into action whenever he is needed for scouting, chasing, screening.

Am I the only sane person who sees here the same old trolling loophole that we had to deal with, just the same changed from a trolling basic cutter with no BR to a 'light frigate' that can be thrown away anytime?

[SKurj]

1 hour ago, Never Surrender said:

Am I the only sane person who sees here the same old trolling loophole that we had to deal with, just the same changed from a trolling basic cutter with no BR to a 'light frigate' that can be thrown away anytime?

 

ooo hang on it does say permanent.....    i dunno if thats a good idea...   Good catch...

Edited February 18, 2018 by SKurj

[_Masterviolin]

5 hours ago, Slim Jimmerson said:

Before I continue I must say the devs have decided, and I agree with their decision. I think you're wrong, and you're using your experience as an established player to justify a 7th rate as "good enough" for PVP, easy to master and you even go as far as calling the brig weak, weaker and more useless in PVP than a lynx or privateer and that you want new players to go out and PVP in a lynx. You use excuses like "they have a role as scouters, MAYBE even taggers" and you say square riggers like the brig are slower, lacks sailing quality and have no place in PVP. 

You forget that the brig, navybrig, merc and rattlesnake are the MAIN shallow water PB ships, not aft rigs. You say the noobs need to learn how to play, what does a noob learn in a aft rig? How to use the 4-5 other aft rig ships. What does a noob learn in a brig square rig? How to sail pretty much every ship in the game, how to manual sail, depowering, heel control, reverse maneuvers. It all transfers to the top, unless I'm mistaken and there ARE aft rig frigates and SOLs than its the 7th rates that are utterly useless at teaching a new player.

Finally I detest your perspective from a "noobs" POV. It sounds like you yourself have affinity for 7th rates from your own nostalgia. You seem to think this means getting rid of 7th rates all together and its not. NA has a problem with keeping new players interest, we have many thousands of sails and very little active player base from those sails. I remember once hearing a stat from the admin, something like 50% of people don't make it past the cutter. So maybe while looking at tutorial and new player experience, we take a look at the cutter itself, what about it isn't keeping players interested? Maybe its the fact that when people see pictures and videos of this game, they see large, lumbering ships packed with guns blasting at each other. Then when they come in we plop them down in a teeny tinny dinghy looking boat and tell  them to shoot AI for a few hours so they can buy a new ships, then they lose that one and are back in  the teeny tinny POS that flat out isn't very useful hence you hardly see them in PVP...ever

Want real, valid evidence? Look at NAL. How many people do you see back tracking to play the cutter again? How many times did a brig who got snuck into your match absolutely demolish your cutter? Now imagine that but with real consequences of you just lost your privateer and now you have to buy another one over and over again just so you can finally get out of these useless fishing boats and get into a proper snow or navy brig. Something actually viable for light PVE. No brand spanking noob in a lynx is EVER encouraged to go and throw it away trying to do PVP where if a ship wants to get away from you they just sail downwind...

One does not need "nostalgia" and an "affinity" for sevenths to recognize their value. Perhaps you might consider that the reasons why 50% of people don't move on past the cutter is because of other reasons, like the ones they always complain about in steam reviews- bad UI, lack of tutorial (until recently!), 'dev bais", etc. I have never seen or heard of anyone dropping the game because they didn't like the cutter, that would be strange as within a few engagements they should have the money to switch into a different seventh. It would be like quitting War Thunder because someone didn't like the starting Russian tank. No one buys this kind of game because they expect to be in the coolest looking ship ever within a few hours, if they do, then they're in for a shock. No game works that way. 

I don't really think this would eliminate the sevenths because clans and players would very quickly realize its far easier to use sevenths until they have the rank, guns, money to step up into better 6ths. I also think the most likely reason we see so few sevenths is because there are so few new players. 

Hell, this is all rather pointless as the tutorials all use the brig. Players have unlimited access to practice of square sails and the like on it. That would leave little use for having the starter brig other than participating in shallow PBs- which will never happen because clans will stuff them full of the best PB ships, not allow noobs in the worst ship for a PB to weaken their fleet. 

[Slim McSauce]

Just now, _Masterviolin said:

One does not need "nostalgia" and an "affinity" for sevenths to recognize their value. Perhaps you might consider that the reasons why 50% of people don't move on past the cutter is because of other reasons, like the ones they always complain about in steam reviews- bad UI, lack of tutorial (until recently!), 'dev bais", etc.

Or it could very well be the cutter, which is an outlier type of ship in a game about square rigged vessels fighting for historical land. We could remove all 7th rates and the game would still be good, and people probably wouldn't ask for them to be added too much because they simply aren't that relevant to the game. Almost a subsection of NA that 7th rates occupy. They have almost no use in combat besides fighting other 7th rates. Outside that they just don't fit the meta. So its like new players play a really weak version of NA as apposed to if they started in a brig where they can jump right into anything and be on the same plane. Then if they want they can hop down into a 7th rate to travel around the map in or something.

[_Masterviolin]

1 hour ago, Slim Jimmerson said:

Or it could very well be the cutter, which is an outlier type of ship in a game about square rigged vessels fighting for historical land. We could remove all 7th rates and the game would still be good, and people probably wouldn't ask for them to be added too much because they simply aren't that relevant to the game. Almost a subsection of NA that 7th rates occupy. They have almost no use in combat besides fighting other 7th rates. Outside that they just don't fit the meta. So its like new players play a really weak version of NA as apposed to if they started in a brig where they can jump right into anything and be on the same plane. Then if they want they can hop down into a 7th rate to travel around the map in or something.

I simply cannot understand this extraordinary animosity towards seventh rates, the idea that NA is "about square rigged vessels". Naval Action is a game about the age of sail, and sevenths have a part in it like the rest of them. I could very well devote another paragraph to further exacerbate the point that a Brig would be useless in every area of the game to a noob in comparison to the flexible sevenths, yet I would be repeating myself further. It would appear the two of us have very different ideas about the sevenths, and about the new player experience- that is very well and I shall leave it at that. 

[Rikard Frederiksen]

On 17/02/2018 at 2:03 PM, admin said:

They can of course buy or cap a light ship and participate in shallow waters fighting, learning shallow ships. This will allow us also to make light ships historically strong in some things as we wont need to balance them for silly progression for rookies anymore.

Now this intrigues me. I'm awfully curious to know what you chaps have in mind.

This tutorial/examination business: what happens, I must ask, if a player fails this M&C tutorial 'examination'? Do they have to keep trying until they succeed? Or will they start at a lower rank with a 6th Rate? I'm glad that you're taking steps to solve the issue of new players & square-riggers, but I still have some reservations about this 'examination' thing. I'm sure once we have the information it will all fit into place but until then it seems a little peculiar, especially the claim that it will be really hard to succeed on.

[Slim McSauce]

3 hours ago, _Masterviolin said:

I simply cannot understand this extraordinary animosity towards seventh rates, the idea that NA is "about square rigged vessels". Naval Action is a game about the age of sail, and sevenths have a part in it like the rest of them. I could very well devote another paragraph to further exacerbate the point that a Brig would be useless in every area of the game to a noob in comparison to the flexible sevenths, yet I would be repeating myself further. It would appear the two of us have very different ideas about the sevenths, and about the new player experience- that is very well and I shall leave it at that. 

I don't hate 7th rates, I just don't like them 

Maybe because I was forced to sail them when I was a newb?

Edited February 19, 2018 by Slim Jimmerson

[_Masterviolin]

30 minutes ago, Slim Jimmerson said:

I don't hate 7th rates, I just don't like them 

Maybe because I was forced to sail them when I was a newb?

I can see where you're coming from there. Sailing the Snow many, many years ago was kinda painful for me as I couldn't really participate in my clan's operations most of the time (back when i was SLRN), now I really can't get over it xD I would take a Rattle over that any day. Though I'm sure everyone else would too. 

How can anyone hate NA ships anyway? Even the Connie with its crappy performance is lovable, being so nostalgic and looking so grand  this time period's sailing ships really are the best of maritime history. 

[Barbancourt]

I need to get back to finally unlocking that 5th slot on my Yacht 

[Tomasso il Fortunato]

We all started with BASIC CUTTER. I gained xp fast and grown-up verry fast . New players should start missions and grow up like us .

[Tomasso il Fortunato]

Its possible and easy .

[John Jacob Astor]

On 2/17/2018 at 6:03 AM, admin said:

They can of course buy or cap a light ship and participate in shallow waters fighting, learning shallow ships. This will allow us also to make light ships historically strong in some things as we wont need to balance them for silly progression for rookies anymore.

Looking forward to finished tutorial with my eye on that frigate.  But I am very curious about the intended direction of 7th rates.

I've decided I actually like my privateer.  And am attempting to take traders brigs with it.  Got chewed up by the first.  Nearly got the second but screwed up with the wind so it got away. 

[Tomasso il Fortunato]

New players will find 7th rate as a good ship to start , by makings missions you grow-up your xp and rank and you will be allowed to buy more ships , make a fleet and go to combat . I think the 7th rate is perfect as initial ship .

[Tomasso il Fortunato]

We all passed through it.

[GrubbyZebra]

My only real complaint with the basic cutter is that unlike every other ship, the cool-down timer  for hull and rig repairs is separate, meaning you can use both at the same time. This was quite a surprise when I got to my own ship and realize I had chosen the wrong repair type because I could only use 1.

I think the cutter is a great first ship. Light and nimble, packs a good punch (esp. with 6pdrs mounted), and doesn't require any manual sailing unless you get in irons.

The downside is the tutorials are built around the brig, so not much from them sailing-wise will transfer to the BC. In my mind, the progression would be fore-aft rigs (cutter, lynx, privateer)>hermaphrodite rigs (Pickle, Prince de Neufchatel)>Snows/2-masted Brigs (Brig, Mercury, Niagara, RH)>Ships.

Maybe split the tutorials up to teach handling for each type? I dunno, but would hate to see the fore-and-aft rigs and hermaphrodites get any less attention than they already do. They are arguable some of the most fun ships to sail and fight in.