Repair Kits, Swivels, and Officer skills.

[Slim McSauce]

here's what I think should happen with these 3 things with as little words as possible.

Right, so, repairs..

Repairs are filler,  they add meaning where there is little meaning at all. They are in admin's words, a money sink. One that directly competes with PVP and doesn't add anything to crafting or eco. You will seldom ever find someone selling repairs outside a capital or FP. Repairs artifically limits where PVP can take place and how often just as if not more severely than the availability of ships. Economy wise they're irrelevant and an awful time/effort for profit.

Now, repair kits!

So instead of crafting a load of repairs and lugging them around with you everywhere you go, you craft repair kits! Why are these better you might ask? Well see you can have different tiers of repair kits. So say every port sells a basic repair kit. This gives 3 repairs in every battle with a charge of 100 repairs. You buy one of these, you put it in your hold and you don't have to worry about repairs for however many battles. Then there's a crafted repair kit, this gives you the same 3 repairs every battle but with 300 charge instead of 100. You have less to worry about as you can now get repairs anywhere, while at the same time buying crafted ones is rewarded with better quality of life. I call these "hold modules" and in the future I ship inventory space could play a much bigger role with them.

Swivels..

Where's my goddamn swivels? No I'm not talking about the derpy LGV refit with 3/5 knowledge slots. We don't need marines to fire at close by ships so xebecs can't hug 1st rates anymore, we need swivels! How did I not realize this before? A low cost fun alternative to kill crew with! It's perfect!. But wait, all we need to do is model it for all ships...dang. Well that's not that difficult for what you're getting out of it! I think everyone is just dying to have swivels on all their ships. This could be made into another tiered system, where an expert crafter may put extra slots on his ship for more swivels, a nice bonus for the effort!

Officers..

Bring back officers for relevant skills! No more fleet 1-4, give me 1-4 officers that I can outfit and award with medals of recognition! They can learn valuable skills that accumulate BONUSES over time! Maybe,,, even reward you with a random perk or knowledge that is active while you're sailing with him!. Skill points like vitality, command, agility and intelligence that you allocate through battle XP. I think people would enjoy this extra layer of customization very much! It doesn't have to be OP if it's fair and not something you buy outright but earn.

fin, thanks for reading! If you agree or disagree with any ideas here, let me know and lets have a dialog!.

 

 

[AeRoTR]

I like 3 repairs every battle, but 100 and 300 kit size too many for me. I would go 12 to 24 kind of numbers. But you can take more kits slowing you drasticaly. 

I like officers. 

I like to see crafters with much more ability. Should be difference between a crafter who crafted 10 SOL and the one who crafted 100 SOL, remove the RNG. 

[John Page]

I like the ideas here. Especially the repairs. Swivels will have to be carefully implemented though.

[Slim McSauce]

38 minutes ago, AeRoTR said:

I like 3 repairs every battle, but 100 and 300 kit size too many for me. I would go 12 to 24 kind of numbers. But you can take more kits slowing you drasticaly. 

I like officers. 

I like to see crafters with much more ability. Should be difference between a crafter who crafted 10 SOL and the one who crafted 100 SOL, remove the RNG. 

12 or 24 that's pretty much 1 battle, what I want done is so that you can fight anywhere and not have to worry so much about the sail back for repairs which is a huge time sink for me. I enjoy some RNG and some deliberate action, I don't like how crafting offers little to no advantage to notes (which I've been using a lot lately because crafting is such a drag)

[Aster]

For the hugging problem, personally I would like to see a system where a ship can fire muskets/grenades at an enemy that is close to it. The damage should be based off of how high your boarding prep is. The idea being that if you have a small ship hugging down a first rate the first rate can turn on boarding prep to damage the small ship hugging it but the draw back would be he would take extra crew loss by them being exposed.

For officers I think it would be interesting, but the ai is so dumb and frustrating sometimes.

[Slim McSauce]

2 minutes ago, Aster said:

For the hugging problem, personally I would like to see a system where a ship can fire muskets/grenades at an enemy that is close to it. The damage should be based off of how high your boarding prep is. The idea being that if you have a small ship hugging down a first rate the first rate can turn on boarding prep to damage the small ship hugging it but the draw back would be he would take extra crew loss by them being exposed.

For officers I think it would be interesting, but the ai is so dumb and frustrating sometimes.

I would too but coding wise that's a whole 'nother system that needs to be implemented and tested. Swivels are here now and ready to be worked on. It's not ideal but it's a start. Like paints swivels are ready to be implemented.

Edited August 12, 2018 by Slim McSauce

[Tiedemann]

17 hours ago, Slim McSauce said:

Right, so, repairs..

Now, repair kits!

For me this is all about supply and demand. I like the current system where I have to balance the amount of repair  I bring with speed drop I'm willing to accept. I craft and buy repairs/rum for my self and the clan. I don't see an issue with how the current repairs work, but I find it annoying/game breaking when I'm in a distant port and there is no access to repairs. They should be made more available when they are so vital for gameplay.   

Do you guys remember how all ports in game where filled to the brim with iron ingots, iron fittings etc, only paying 1 gold fore more because the current stock in storage was 5-20.000. This was a broken eco feature where AI port would pay for and consume crafted materials, and crafters looking for easy gold would load up 4 indimans and sail around dumping it ports all over the map.
Suggestion: This broken eco experiment could be used for supplying all ports in the game with repairs and rum. Make all ports that do not drop repairs and RUM pay consuming prices for them, and then disable the port consumption so they stay there and are available for players in need. Give better access to repairs for all players and give trader-crafters purpose/content. Also more traders all over the map, but most likely only at times when hunting player presence is low.. 😀 

18 hours ago, Slim McSauce said:

Swivels..

Regarding Swivels I them as ideas, but I don't get how they will work in game.. Will they be used in battle when sailing close to enemy or only as a boarding bonus somehow?

18 hours ago, Slim McSauce said:

Officers..

Totally agree with the officer suggestion! Would be nice to command multiple officers with different skills instead of having to reset my officer perks all the time! But should maybe force us to pay periodically officer salaries per officer with combat marks. I know it's a grind, but now the officer perks represent the only stable consumption I have of combat marks. With out it I don't need combat marks and it is the main reason I do PvE. When I do PvE I often en up bringing other friendly players, or some enemys jump my battle. So this provides content for other players.   

[Slim McSauce]

@Tiedemann

As they are now with the LGV refit you being the one aiming and firing, not AI. This will require a balance pass but it's exactly what we need when it comes to smaller ships having their way with larger ships with a bonus of being realistic and a mildly interesting feature for all to enjoy. Imagine shooting down into a herc from your buc with grape loaded swivels mounted on the deck, and in the mizzen tops? Who needs marines at that point.

I won't speak much on economy because we're still waiting on some kind of update there...but officers are something I miss, and using combat marks to upgrade them are a great fit.

 

 

 

[p i t]

21 hours ago, Aster said:

For the hugging problem, personally I would like to see a system where a ship can fire muskets/grenades at an enemy that is close to it. The damage should be based off of how high your boarding prep is. The idea being that if you have a small ship hugging down a first rate the first rate can turn on boarding prep to damage the small ship hugging it but the draw back would be he would take extra crew loss by them being exposed.

For officers I think it would be interesting, but the ai is so dumb and frustrating sometimes.

Unless they have Determined Hugger....

 

Honestly, thought it should be a whole other firing system, like we see for other games where you can fire main guns (cannons) or secondary(muskets). It could even be as simple as another number key that fires all at once and has a cool down.

[Old Crusty]

I believe that repairs are to much a part of the game and the amount that a player can use during battle abuses any sense of realism.  

1. Nobody should be able to do rigging repairs at full sail. Way to dangerous for the crew and can you imagine trying to replace ropes, pulleys, and canvas while at full sail?

2. Repairs should take longer and you should only be able to repair hull, and rigging once per battle. I have been told that when a quarter of your side armor is gone is when you should start using your first repair. If you only had one repair per battle the decision of when to use it becomes more critical.

repairs as they are now can make battles go on to long and rob a player of victory.

[Slim McSauce]

4 hours ago, Old Crusty said:

I believe that repairs are to much a part of the game and the amount that a player can use during battle abuses any sense of realism.  

1. Nobody should be able to do rigging repairs at full sail. Way to dangerous for the crew and can you imagine trying to replace ropes, pulleys, and canvas while at full sail?

2. Repairs should take longer and you should only be able to repair hull, and rigging once per battle. I have been told that when a quarter of your side armor is gone is when you should start using your first repair. If you only had one repair per battle the decision of when to use it becomes more critical.

repairs as they are now can make battles go on to long and rob a player of victory.

Repairs are a bit much, and should be toned down so real skill can shine through, and not who can dps brawl the hardest, which don't get me wrong isn't bad, it's just not as fruitful to out play your opponent only to have them repair and run off. What I like is a suggestion someone else made not too long ago to put a limit of 3 repairs in battle, but you can use them anytime with no timer inbetween. That I think is a great way to do repairs because it gives so much play for what it is. You can either pace repairs out and play safe or bomb all 3 for an epic last stand or a sneaky getaway. It's really up to you how you use those 3 repairs, everyone is on the same playing field so whatever happens is a result of your action, not how many repairs you brought which is no fun.

As for battles being fought at full sails, devs already have the right idea by upping the turn rate. Now what they need to do is put a slight accuracy decrease when at full sail, add a slight buff to reload speed and accuracy when at battle sails, and make main sails catch fire when caught above a burning ship. Fire is extremely unrepresented in the danger it was for your ship to be aflame when at sea, we're just not doing it justice, and it would really add so many gameplay elements by just aligning with not all, but some realisms that this game falls short of. These battles are so close to being a near perfect representation of ship combat they just lack a few key details and it's like you never have to touch these ships again once you balance them out and get the meta just right.

Like it or not OW is taking the lead here, economy is gonna be the first major change to meta..ever, I think. It's pretty huge. Lets all come at it with an open mind, though I don't think there will be many complaints when everyone get their hands on this new build. It looks solidly full of content, improvements all around. Let's see if it's the winning formula, shall we?

[Raf Van Boom]

This problem could be easily solved without any musket fire really, magnify the damage high calibre guns do to lower rate ships at ranges less than 25 metres. 32 lb ball > your 7th rate ship. Even if one of your 32 pd balls hits the target it will take serious damage.