Wind Scale, wind effect on a Ship

[Destraex]

old navy if anything in this game becomes turn based it will be a major turn off for me. Especially since the open world will be about "catching stuff" and many people playing at once.

Having to wait for everybody to make moves would be tiresome indeed.

[lyn]

knowing me id be sailing in bad weather just because

[Johny Reb]

i dont think he was proposing a turn based game, just a mechanic to implement wind and wind shifts.

[Edward Vernon]

I was surely NOT suggesting turn based, although I can see now how you might think I was. It is just as Johny suggests merely a simple method of applying weather in a reasonably realistic way which is also relatively simple. SO...for example if area xyz has weather differing from it's "normal" prevailing conditions 10% of the time then say each hour or 4 hours or six, whatever really, then an RNG says yea or nay with a random probability of 0.1 of it being yea...and a change in weather occurring.

 

Good God...Turn Based ... NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

[Baggywrinkle]

knowing me id be sailing in bad weather just because

 

Welcome to the real world

 

Baggy

[Hugh Latham]

How about mirroring the real current weather across the map? There would be seasons and route changes to adjust to them. I have been playing potbs for years and I suppose I will play this game years, too, so I will experience changing seasons. Then there is the factor of opposite seasons in the southern hemisphere.

[Robert Danforth]

I just want to echo what others are saying in support of variable winds. I think not to do so is a mistake.

[Krasimir]

Why no weather forecast for a hours up to day ahead in a region around you (There can be a man on the ship who know this stuff)? That way you can plan that chase or port battle or even if you should sail off?

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

How about mirroring the real current weather across the map? There would be seasons and route changes to adjust to them. I have been playing potbs for years and I suppose I will play this game years, too, so I will experience changing seasons. Then there is the factor of opposite seasons in the southern hemisphere.

 

Yes, but, I'd like them to implement it in a way that does not allow me to pull a weather report on WeatherUnderground and use that to plan ahead.  Captains at the time had only a barometer and the way the sky looked/winds acted to determine how the weather was going to shape up, and I'd like that recreated here.

 

Why no weather forecast for a hours up to day ahead? That way you can plan that chase or port battle or even if you should sail off?

 

See above.  I shouldn't have detailed weather information to use to plan anything. I should have access to recent barometric history (rising, falling, holding, etc) and recent observations of wind conditions to use.

[Krasimir]

I was imagining guy on board with skill on weather forecasting you could increase through experience and items like super rare barometer found in treasure for example etc... and sort of weather station in the ui like this u see next to compass in that photoshop play:

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

Let's avoid "magic" barometers.

 

You're right, though, in that you could have an immediate forecast mechanic, and basing it on crew or officer skill sounds pretty intriguing.  Not a bad idea overall, as long as it's fairly vague and usually inaccurate.  

[Krasimir]

Let's avoid "magic" barometers.

 

You're right, though, in that you could have an immediate forecast mechanic, and basing it on crew or officer skill sounds pretty intriguing.  Not a bad idea overall, as long as it's fairly vague and usually inaccurate.  

I agree. And about the barometer or other such instruments i was not thinking about "magic" but rather instrument accuracy in %, like you have cheap and abundand ones as well as rare, expensive and more accurate items.

[MarcoRossolini]

Totally in agreement with those who want Variable wind direction, although I understand the dev's position, it's not an age of sail game if the wind doesn't change.

 

A compromise could be that the wind doesn't drop below a certain point, as I can understand being becalmed would not be too fun for gameplay. Maybe keep the wind at a manageable level of say 6-7 knots at a minimum (and who knows how fast you could get going with a good storm)... It would just feel wrong to be in a storm and still operate at the same speeds, the alpha I can live with, but in the open world it would be wrong.

[Hunter]

This game definitely needs variable wind strength. Like several people have said, just put a minimum cap on the wind strength, F1 or F2 or something like that, and make it relatively infrequent that it goes that low. It's already quite strange to have the same wind speeds in the calm map and the storm maps that we have at the moment.

[Robert Danforth]

Totally in agreement with those who want Variable wind direction, although I understand the dev's position, it's not an age of sail game if the wind doesn't change.

 

A compromise could be that the wind doesn't drop below a certain point, as I can understand being becalmed would not be too fun for gameplay. Maybe keep the wind at a manageable level of say 6-7 knots at a minimum (and who knows how fast you could get going with a good storm)... It would just feel wrong to be in a storm and still operate at the same speeds, the alpha I can live with, but in the open world it would be wrong.

 

I want variable speed, not direction, in most cases. There are some areas where the wind does shift based on season or time of day, but it's never terribly radical (not like it is currently in the test).

[Henry d'Esterre Darby]

I wouldn't say it's "never" terribly radical, but given no adverse weather or fronts in the area, changes are generally more gradual than currently modeled.

[MarcoRossolini]

I want variable speed, not direction, in most cases. There are some areas where the wind does shift based on season or time of day, but it's never terribly radical (not like it is currently in the test).

Whoops, mistype there, I meant speed as well.

[NeonsStyle]

I would also like to see not just the wind direction, but the wind speed, and some variability in it from one map to another in arena mode.

[sudobee]

I haven't seen any discussions on this so I'm starting this topic for discussion. Obviously the direction of wind has a huge effect on where we can travel and how fast we can get there in the open world game. Traveling back and forth across an island system for commerce or war could become quite tedious if the winds aren't well thought out. I think this might be an area where some compromise between reality and game play must be made. With full realism, heading to an upwind location would be an arduous undertaking requiring slow sailing and lots of tacking or long detours to better winds.

 

I have a few ideas for a wind that might work well and hopefully find the balance between game play and realism. While battling against the wind weather is an important part of sail and something I want to experience I fear it may come at the cost of boring game play and drive players away from the game.

 

Prevailing winds

The idea here is to adopt what have in the real world across the globe to a smaller system across and island chain like the Caribbean or whatever other map we get in open world. The down scaling of the real world weather system adds realism and depth to navigation. This sort of system would allow travel in all directions but we would need to decide whether to tack into the wind or detour around into better winds. I quickly drew in some wind lines on this island map so you can see what I mean.

 

Seasonal winds

Basically changing wind direction over time to facilitate travel in all directions. This is probably the furthest from reality but makes travel predictable and dependable. Simply changing the wind direction by 90 degrees every hour or two. This would make planning journeys and trading routes

 

Dynamic winds

A system where wind direction and speed vary over time completely randomly. This could be a map wide variation or be localized so that winds on one side of the map are different to the other. This could be fun or tedious depending on how you look at it as it would add the need to constantly change tack and make planning your voyage difficult. This could be extended to include gusty wind.

 

A combination of the above

Using prevailing winds as the main base for wind direction across the map, allowing for a good real world parallel and some dependability on wind direction for planning travel. Add to this a seasonal shift over time where the prevailing winds shift over time in a pattern, so that where a prevailing wind may be northerly then it would shift from northeasterly to northwesterly back and forwards over a 'X' hour cycle. Add further depth again by adding some randomness to the strength of the winds. Tying all this together with the weather system so the strength and variability of the wind is matched with calm or stormy seas would make for a very immersive experience.

[mouse of war]

I would definitely like to see variable winds - within reason. It is always going to be a balance between realism and game play.

 

Dynamic changes in wind direction and strength could add to the gameplay and realism but I wouldn't like to see calms where nothing much could happen.

 

And I would love to see some really big storms

 

and sharks

[Furfy]

Haven't cared too much about seeing sharks since i was an extra in "Jaws" - one of the few things i remember from the '70s.

 

But winds and storms, yeah...

[Wicked Mouse]

Personally I think global wind and weather mechanics should be a significant part of the game. So yes that could mean that when you want/need to travel to a location that you could face unfavourable winds.

[Tom Pullings]

Fascinating work.  I'll be quite interested to see how the devs work this out.  I do hope the actual requirements of accounting for the prevailing winds works its way into OW in some fashion.  

[Johny Reb]

I like this idea. It has been talked about in many posts. You just have to dig past the first forum page to find it.

[sudobee]

I see my thread 'Winds in open world' got merged into thread. I think I dismissed this thread in my searches because the OP is mainly focused on wind strength, its only once you drill down that you find some mentions of direction and trade winds.

 

I understand admin's point on having static wind strength for game play purposes and agree that dead calms are no fun but nothing is said about direction and the impact this has on traveling across the map. With open world being almost a year further along in development since that post, could we possibly have some developer insight on what we are likely to see for wind in open world?