In our sights.

[William the Drake]

Along with more possible 1st person vantage points, I was thinking of one in particular that may come in handy in the midst of battle, as well as some other cannon abilities that would diversify the battle experience:

 

Cannon View:

Take the view of one of the ships gunners and aim down the sights of one of your cannons. this will allow the player to get a better picture of where his guns are aimed. This view would also give the player a more detailed aiming reticle/HUD. 

 

The camera would take the view of the middle-most cannon on the ship. So on a ship with 3 gun-decks it would be on in the middle of the second deck. Smaller ships with just 2 (top-deck and gun deck) would be seen from the lower deck, below decks.

 

Perhaps further down the development road, this view will allow you to see the crews below decks working the cannons while reloading. Watching the cannons being rolled out and the gun ports opening and closing.

 

 

Toggle Fire-at-Will:

From what I have read, I am still not sure if each individual cannon will be on its own reload timer or if it will be collective. If it is in fact on an individual basis, this toggle would have every individual cannon fire as soon as it is reloaded on the the mark where the redicle is placed. This will allow for slight ammunition conservation as well as a small accuracy boost to the cannon's fire.

 

Cannon Spread:

We should have the ability to decide how spread out our cannons are aimed. From wide to attack multiple ships in a line or a crowded group, or to focus fire in on a very close area. Also derived from EIC, to start their would be three options: Wide ,moderate, and tight.

[admin]

 

Cannon Spread:

We should have the ability to decide how spread out our cannons are aimed. From wide to attack multiple ships in a line or a crowded group, or to focus fire in on a very close area. Also derived from EIC, to start their would be three options: Wide ,moderate, and tight.

 

Can respond on the last point.

We have this feature - cannon spread -  implemented already.  

[Ned Loe]

hmmm... cannon spread, I thought it was accuracy... no? the closer it is together the more accurate u shoot? the more it is spread the less accuracy and shots you get on the target... so you can not spread fire, you can only make more shots miss the target.. am I correct?

[William the Drake]

hmmm... cannon spread, I thought it was accuracy... no? the closer it is together the more accurate u shoot? the more it is spread the less accuracy and shots you get on the target... so you can not spread fire, you can only make more shots miss the target.. am I correct?

 

The cannons spread would be the area in which you would wish your cannons to fire and your cannon balls to land. The accuracy of your guns would be the ability for the shot to stay true to its trajectory, other than going outside the determined spread or too high or too low.

 

For example, I aim for the middle of a ship, with a tight spread. My spread ensures that I do not hit the rest of the ship (Say if I was focusing on the ships's magazine, hoping for a crippling shot) and all my cannons are focused on a smaller point. The accuracy ensures that the shot does not go too high, flying into the rigging, or too low, into the water, as well as any other deviations from the determined trajectory. In revers, a wide spread would allow me to deal general damage (perhaps If i did not know of any weak points to focus on) that will also have the affects of accuracy that the tight spread would have.

 

This is what EIC showed and seems to add a bit more diversity to how you play, giving you more options on how to attack an enemy. I am not sure if this is/will be true for NA, but I hope it is.

[Johny Reb]

Thanks admin for implementing a cannon spread idea. I was afraid this game was gonna shoot like Wind of Luck in which each cannon ball from each gun was only able to fire perpendicular to the ships hull. It didnt work well in closed beta in my opinion.

 

I dont like the idea of reticule at all!!! To unrealistic. I dont want to feel like I'm in a video game. I want to feel like I'm sailing a ship, even if its 3rd person.

 

I do think its imperative that "fire as you bear" orders should be able to be given. After selecting the order, then maybe a reticule would be necessary to choose a point to aim for but I think more realistic approach would be to have the player fire the first shot and the rest of the shots will follow its trajectory.

 

Just a suggestion, as I'm thinking about this (randomly) right now... If the game is designed to recruit crews then it would be interesting if each crew member levels individually(or at least each gun crew) and therefore a crew member could be killed and a new green recruit would have to replace him. Higher level guncrews would have an accuracy modifier that would say... pull the cannon ball a very small fraction in the direction of the closest ship, improving accuracy. Buying with real money, tokens allowing quicker gun crew leveling could add to your revenue and be worthwhile for the player. Crew members could also be trained in different areas such as accuracy, or speed.

 

Sorry for the added thought. Probably should have put that paragraph in a different thread

[admin]

hmmm... cannon spread, I thought it was accuracy... no? the closer it is together the more accurate u shoot? the more it is spread the less accuracy and shots you get on the target... so you can not spread fire, you can only make more shots miss the target.. am I correct?

 

you can move your cannons right and left

and you can wait for you cannons to be aimed more carefully

 

so if you dont aim the spread will be bigger

[Rudi Starnberg]

I'm not sure I really like the idea of personaly controlled cannons, I feel that a captain should be worrying about other things than the exact aim point of a gun (especialy given how inacurate smoothbore cannons were anyway). I think all that is needed is the ablity to designate targets and then some modifiers.

 

So you point your mouse over a ship and press the target button. Then you can choose from a few options: aim high/mid/low (maybe also foward/mid/aft, although I'm less sure why you would want to do that) and aim carefuly/balanced/shoot fast. So put those together and you could quickly make suitable orders for any engagement range, then leave you gun crews to it while you focus on the bigger picture of the battle and keeping your position properly. Maybe you could also give such orders to each deck of guns seperately, although again I struggle to think of many situations where that would really be much use, I suspect it would add more bloat than its worth. Ammo types should also be selectable of course, although probably in a seperate menu to reduce the chances of misclicks in the heat of battle.

 

On topic of gun aiming, do you intend to have a minimum depresion for guns? So would it be possible for a very low ship to lie under the guns of a frigate if it can get close enough?

 

Also do you have any plans to model the interactions of wave's with gun ports, e.g. will we see ships strugling to open their lower gun ports in heavy weather? This might be hard to implement and unreasonably fustrating for players, but on the other hand it's one of the few situations in sail combat where the lee ship has the advantage, since his ports will tend to be raised up out of the water, so I feel it maybe warrants some consideration.

[Ink]

I'm not sure I really like the idea of personaly controlled cannons, I feel that a captain should be worrying about other things than the exact aim point of a gun (especialy given how inacurate smoothbore cannons were anyway). I think all that is needed is the ablity to designate targets and then some modifiers.

 

I'm 100% with you on that but the devs already said the game will be with personal aiming so we have to deal with it 

[BungeeLemming]

Isnt this worth a question to devs rather than a post in this thread?

 

For the gunnery I can tell you its just fine.

And I am confident that they will add more to the gunnery topic when the development goes on. There were really good suggestions and until now devs are really happy with all the nice proposals from the community.

I do not feel that I am overstrained in the fights right now.

The management of guns, sailing and yard trimming gives you something to do, other than just klicking your mouse over certain skills. It makes sure you have a goal in the game. And the goal in a naval combat game should be to be the best Captain around.

I will strife for it and I am certain to NOT suck out hehe.

 

Everything they implemented thus far is a very nice concept with a goood fundament. And i DO like it.

If you played "Sea Dogs 1&2" you may have an idea about complete control of your ship