Port battles

[admin]

Lets discuss the rules for the port battles and the rules for their arrangement, rewards and spoils. (temporarily ignore whats going on inside and focus on how they are arranged)

 

Key issues to solve:

• No PVE to PVP. We are against grinding NPCs to get the port battle opportunity
• Timezones have to be taken into account
• Night flipping problem must be fixed fully or partially - when a committed group of players conquer a series of ports at 4am against defenseless enemies
• Guild wars 2 WWW/Tol barad situation have to be handled - when 3 warring groups run around the map conquering castles avoiding each other to maximize rewards
• Port loss must be painful, but not devastating
• Variability of ships in port battles

 

Here are our proposals for discussion

 

Shallow water harbors will only accept light ships for port battles. (A-la our sea trials small vs large pvp rooms)

 

Port vulnerability

• Port is only vulnerable during certain time slot
• Port can be freely attacked during that time slot
• The time slot is determined by the defending nation
• Once port is captured the attacker can change the time slot to a more convenient for them

Method of attack - two options

 

• POTBS style (with automatic teleport into the battle lobby for defenders and attackers) - easier for both parties to attack and defend. 
• Physical travel to port: attackers and defenders fleet have to physically travel to the port location and enter the battle, creating a lot of logistical problems, that could be interesting or frustrating or both. 

Announcements

 

• Port battle can be announced long before so everyone is ready
• Or port battles can be announced 1 hour before the port attack starts, increasing the need for constant scouting, reporting and monitoring large fleets on the open map. 
• Partial fog of war on port attacks. We can force attackers announce the intention to attack the port 1-2 days before but not give this information to defenders openly. Instead a battle correspondence rare loot item can be generated that can only be captured from boarding players or high level npcs. 

Port battle invites

Here is where we need your help:

If there are 300 brits and 100 swedes are willing to join today's port battle for Basseterre - how do we determine who is invited and who is not invited? 

 

(remember - that judging by sea trials and wot and many other games with random force composition) having more random players can actually increase the fun and sometimes frustration. Inexperienced players must be able to participate in such events effectively or they will leave the game.

[nornica]

Physical travel can be dangerous option because the player fleets can be stopped during sailing to port, stopped by troll players in other ships so they wont arrive in time to battle.
Teleporting should be involved only if the limit of ships in port battle will be equall. We already have small nations that for example have 10 players online at the same time, and they are biginin a port battle with nation who has 50 people online.
The only chance to win such battle is when other nation ships wont arrive in time.

Teleporting to port battles will stop people from far away sailing, I can just sit in a port and wait for port battle invite. When some poor fool will sail few hours to mexico to attack my port.

The idea with loot item information is pretty cool. But have no idea how it will work in game, for sure the item should be dropped more than ship report letter (offtop: their drop rate should be increased, and they info should also have amount of players fleet included).

And personally I never like the POTBS port battle system, with all that waiting and stuff. My playtime is totally random, and sometimes I have no idea what I will do next day or next week when port battle will happen.

And what about blockading a port before battle? we are getting rid of that option?
Damn I need to drink few beers and in the evening I will come back with some decent ideas.

[Lord Hood]

I must confess that I prefer the sound of actually sailing to the destination rather than the automatic teleport to it to enter the battle.  Reinforcements entering the battle and then making their own influence et cetera. It would also promote working together as a defending/attacking nation would have to be prepared to deal with the opposition, coming together beforehand.

[Harry White]

Perhaps if there is going to be an invite to the battle, so no players have to travel there, other nations could get one too, maybe 1 hour before the fight starts to the lowest BR side of course, this could make for some interesting agreements on the diplomatic side of things and also make hired guns more of a thing as they could get in contact with the nations treasurey, organise a price to be paid once victory is taken. making them want to fight and win more.

 

I personally don't mind the idea of an invite as long as it is within a certain range, I wouldn't like to see a whole fleet teleport down for a fight then be back out of reach, I also think that if you go to one of these fights via teleport, you are stuck there, if you die you go to the nearest neutral or friendly port, if you win, you are sat in the port you capped and have to travel, the teleport to capitail should also be reset when they use the other teleport, to stop instant traveling everywhere. I agree with Nornica, we have already seen lone lynx players being ass hats stopping engagements, and I know the BR only allows for big ships to start a fight, but if it meant victory at the battle, some one would sacrifice their Victory to slow down the enemy flagship and even out the odds.

[MikedaBike]

• No PVE to PVP. We are against grinding NPCs to get the port battle opportunity
• Timezones have to be taken into account
• Night flipping problem must be fixed fully or partially - when a committed group of players conquer a series of ports at 4am against defenseless enemies
• Guild wars 2 WWW/Tol barad situation have to be handled - when 3 warring groups run around the map conquering castles avoiding each other to maximize rewards
• Port loss must be painful, but not devastating
• Variability of ships in port battles

 

How about if a port battle had to take place over a period of time, several key battles, several wearing down of defence levels, for example a 24 hour period. This would allow more players to partake and cover all timezones?

It would also do away with the night flipping probs. So Ports could have player defence fleets and how about one set of battles against player controlled land guns/towers, maybe once the battle started they could be an hour/2 hour match that folk could join in on then a pause to re-group allowing newer players to log in and have there crack? This might even allow traders to run supplies in to the fleets too??

 

if it was a 24 hour battle it would also stop any quick take over of a whole chain of ports.

 

Numbers/times ideas all up for grabs, just a quick thought on some of it.

 

Edit if it was over 24 hours or some lengthy time players could travel and not teleport too, which is a bit of a slippery magical slope.

Edited June 26, 2015 by MikedaBike

[BungeeLemming]

I believe that the game should not go with magical teleports to a battle.

 

A Portbattle consists of more than only the battle itself. The attacker and defender have to get a fleet together which then has to enter the "danger zone". Most likely they will already battle outside the port on the open sea. Which is actually very historical.

 

The portbattle per se may only consist of the defenders who are left in the castles and landbatteries to fight off the enemy fleet.

Landbatteries are very dangerous since they can heat their ammunition which results in a very high chance of fires on the attacking fleet.

The portbattle can be reinforced as long as the defender still has someone to defend. Or the attacker retreats (can be done by a majority vote which is surveyed by the fleets captains).

The garrision has to be defeated as well.

The attacking fleet has to defend their landing boats which are fragile to any kind of ammunition fired at them.

 

 

That would be a minimalistic sandbox approach.

 

Let the real fleetaction happen on the open sea. Maybe when there are more than "enter number here" ships of the line involved the battle timer will increase to 2 hours. So huge linefights with long preparation time such as forming the line, getting the wind advantage etc. can be possible

[Paraclete]

Woot! Finally the core of the game.

The manner in which we enter a port battle is of less interest to me than how we trigger a Port Battle.

Could the Admin outline that for us.

PVP within a given distance from port?

What if the port defender refuses to PVP?

 

Port Battles should not be open to everyone. Captains that put in the most effort most should be invited first. If the invite is not accepted it would go to a player in the second tier/round of players involved in port contention.

 

A new player should aspire to and work to join Port Battles not be swept in by lottery.

 

I would prefer a couple days notice to allow me to arrange my schedule (set alarm clock) to be able to attend. One hour notice is going to encourage the night flippers.

 

Will the economy have to be in place before introducing PBs so there is a logic to which ports are chosen for capture?

 

What happens after capturing ports?  How will a win be determined? Will the map reset?

Edited June 26, 2015 by Paraclete

[Snoopy]

My $0.02:

 

Attacker has to sail via the open sea (prevents map being flipped in an hour).

Ports can only be attacked by fleets that have flagged themselves as invasion force (say) 1hour before attacking a port to get an opportunity for diversions and scouting. Light ships/new players get a real meaningful role (maybe ++xp for a ship that scouts ships from the 'invasion force' fleet). Add the ability for any captain to produce those letters with whereabouts of enemy ships.

 

Defender gets an inferior but credible force that magically teleports (players from the escort/fleet duty queue/pool?) to prevent attackers waltzing into an empty harbour (or spawn bots if no players are available). Ships on the defending side that are near can join port battles. That way, defenders who have smoked the attackers intention may be able to intercept/delay assemble a defensive fleet which is large enough to see the attacker off. Inderdiction/delaying reinforcements becomes a thing for attackers.

 

I am all giddy in my culottes here

[LeBoiteux]

Landbatteries are very dangerous since they can heat their ammunition which results in a very high chance of fires on the attacking fleet.

Some archaeological facts about french XVIII-th century cannonball ovens :

- their start-up took an hour before being operational,

- a bad weather could diminish their effectiveness,

- one has to hide smoke from these ovens to avoid potential detection (ovens could become a target),

- their use required about 10 men,

- with one oven, one could heat 60 cannonballs at the same time,

- handling was dangerous (of course...),

- it took 35 minutes to heat a cannonball.

 

PS : "Tirer à boulets rouges" (that is "to fire heated cannonballs") nowadays means "to lay into someone" in french.

Edited June 26, 2015 by LeBoiteux

[Malucomaf]

good come

 

I think we should go sailing to the port of battle, with a minimum time for arrival;

 

As for nations help themselves, I think it could be the criterion of damage, the nation that cause more damage to enemies is in possession of the port;

 

The prinicipio's it, the rest I think I agree at least to be tested.

 

good winds to all.

[BungeeLemming]

Attacking an enemy port should request a lot of planning/ preparation.

The attacking force may have to escort troop transporters which are meant to fight a kind of boarding battle on land.

Such vessels have to be built, an army has to be recruited and finally you have to escort the troops to their destination.

 

Land batteries and the garrison may be a tool to buy the defenders time. As it was in real life.

 

 

@LeBoiteux:

preperation time: a good point but when you consider the time a ship needs to actually sail into the range of a land battery I think the gunners only had to fire a few salvos with normal rounds.

Heated ovens stand behind walls which means they aint a very easy target.

 

Lets say the reload of such big guns (24-42pd) took about 2 minutes (including the careful handling with cannonballs):

a typical battery of 6 guns can heat 10 shots per cannon.

That means you can provide 20 mins of devastating fire. then you have to wait 15 mins until the first cannonball is ready to get fired.

To mee that sounds like a buff which can be translated into a game reasonably easy and with good background

[ulysse77]

I like the idea of a serie of engagement that add to a total warscore a la crusader king or eu, i also like the idea of sailing to battle but maybe we can make the radius quite large.

Edited June 26, 2015 by ulysse77

[admin]

I like the idea of a serie of engagement that add to a total warscore a la crusader king or eu, i also like the idea of sailing to battle but maybe we can make the radius quite large.

 

The problem with the series of engagement is incomplete player control. Not everyone have lots of hours to play and if you found good time for port battle it will then depend on others. 

 

Lets say you devastated the enemy in the first battle. and have to log off. Then you come back and find out that your nation lost all other engagements taking away your victory.

[BungeeLemming]

.. but its an MMO after all.

You cannot rely on sole actions to win the grand scheme..

Players should be forced to build teams and act as a force rather than an individual.

And if the enemy has three fleets and you can only field one or two you are not very well prepared. And should better not think of caturing that port in the first place.

 

Once you introduce the feature of capturing ports you will see clans/guilds/societies focus on certain areas which they want to control. The Antilles may be a heavily engaged fighting zone. Thats proven to happen in the current test.

[James Blei]

1. Portbattles Teleport              : NO, there is much more Realistic to sail to the PB,with all the Fleet Tactics ,Logistics and Scouting

2. Timezones - Nightflipping : The Idea from MikedaBike is not bad. 24h PB-Battle-Timer, with more Key-Battles. But when ? every 4 hours ?

3. WAR-PEACE                             : Whats about the Relationship between the Nations ? English Players attacks France Port - Relation between ENG and FRA chance to Warstatus. When come Peace back ? After some 

                                                                days  without aggressive Actions between this Nations? Whats with the NPC-Traderoutes between Ports ? This can generate some nice Scenery´s.

4. Announcements                    : After the Player(s) attacks a Port a Global Report and a 10 hours Timer starts. An extra Warstatus Page would be nice. With all the Infos about Warstatus between Nations and Port under attack etc.

5. Port battle invites                  : PB should have a max. Cap 100 vs 100 in each Key-PB (Stress-Test can give more Infos about how many Ships can fight without FPS Issues). Invites goes out from Higher Rank to Lower, 2 hours

                                                               before the Key-Battle begins.

6. Warzone                                     : Should a Zone around the Port be closed for PVE and PVP Battles when the first Key-Battle begins and only open for Players they comes late to the PB ? Can he jump in it ?

 

I am looking forward to when Tradegoods, Trade-Loots and PB hits the Server for testing.

 

[D. Federico de Gravina y N]

Questions:

 

the defenders, they are going to have gunboats?

 

The battle map, is going to be real?, i mean, I we have to defend Santo domingo, the port´s map is going to be historical?

[nornica]

Maybe having ability to join battle being in area, not exactly in port, but in some range of it.
But then again to make it work correctly the map would be nice feature or marker on top of a port seein from veery far away with distance. Example: you can join battle if you are 100nm (numbers are totally random, i don't know how much is it in game on OW lul) from the port.

Or split map in regions. And all ships in region can join battle.

Gunboats at last! xD

[SYN_Bloody-Bandy]

Questions:

 

the defenders, they are going to have gunboats?

 

The battle map, is going to be real?, i mean, I we have to defend Santo domingo, the port´s map is going to be historical?

 

THIS!!!

 

Ports would have had coastal defenses and shallow-draft near-shore gunboats (ie not ocean-going vessels) with BIG guns.  These gunboats would use sea anchors to create a stable firing platforms and act like artillery as they sat in shallow water.  Perhaps only for AI defenses to help even the odds???   There is a lot of opportunity to create very interesting tactical battles if the developers are interested in exploring this aspect.

 

Part of the interest of a port battle, to me, would be the confines of the harbour and weather gage influencing these tactics etc.

[Bart Smith]

About realistic sailing towards port before battle...what a mess could be this when rest nations pvp players will camp port and sunk/grief and frustrate future participants of port battle? Well if i have to sail few hours toward port and get ganked nearby what fun will be that? 

 

Invitations - on early game stages system from ranks could work well. Priority for high ranked Admirals and Commodores but later when more poeple level up? Not sure here - fully random invites would be not fair. So far im up for few encounters and summary results form them gave final score who win port battle. That allow most players who interested in RvR participate. Lets say huge ships battles will give more points at the summary - economically correct - lost/sank more expensive ships = more influence for score. That could lure more players to RvR instead few same "core" pvp/rvr faces like was in PotBS. I like idea how shallow waters ports battles will bring ship size cap - more fun and variety fighting in small ships plus all those "realism" lovers love it:) As well in future - Not sure but if guild can control port, members of that guild should get priority when invites out.

 

Forts etc - not sure how will be determine how strong forts could be and what damage they can deal to attackers. Again maybe should be connected to goveror feature or economy (more taxes = more money in port to upgrade)

 

Port Vulnerability - not get how this could work. You saying :  "The time slot is determined by the defending nation"  - so in theory US players will set up time frame for them convenient making impossible for EU players...

 

Grinding - i like idea no NPC fleeting/grinding near port - so boring at the end...

 

Questions: how exactly we can make port battle will take place? By pvp? ...any ideas? How long port battles will last - 2 hrs? Map will be reset after certain time/nation win?

[Nathaniel]

Attacking an enemy port should request a lot of planning/ preparation.

The attacking force may have to escort troop transporters which are meant to fight a kind of boarding battle on land.

Such vessels have to be built, an army has to be recruited and finally you have to escort the troops to their destination.

 

While i generally like your ideas, they seem to involve a lot of additional content creation, including mechanics that need to be build from ground up, some representation of land combat, not to speak about models e.t.c. While they serve more realism, i wonder if they are really so necessary considering the developers production limitations and if we shouldn't better concentrate of what is relatively cheap to build: more abstract port battles centred on naval battles, not logistic operations. That's what this game makes best, after all.

 

 

 

You cannot rely on sole actions to win the grand scheme..

Players should be forced to build teams and act as a force rather than an individual.

And if the enemy has three fleets and you can only field one or two you are not very well prepared. And should better not think of caturing that port in the first place.

 

Yea, but that's why we have dozens of ports in the game. A dedicated guild/group that put enourmous efforts in capturing a port should capture it, without relying on some random players having to finish the fight deep in the night. That doesn't mean that that wins the war. An organized effort from other players/guild/groups in other timeslots or in battles happening simultaneously. If the others fail one captured base in the enemy heartlands will not mean much in the overall efforts.

 

 

Maybe having ability to join battle being in area, not exactly in port, but in some range of it.

But then again to make it work correctly the map would be nice feature or marker on top of a port seein from veery far away with distance. Example: you can join battle if you are 100nm (numbers are totally random, i don't know how much is it in game on OW lul) from the port.

Or split map in regions. And all ships in region can join battle.

 

And what will we do if 40 ships gather in the dedicated area but the battle can only harbour 25?

 

 

I really think we should focus more on the querstion admin asked, because it seems crucial. While PotBS had very fun battle, it couldn't deal convincingly with the invite mechanics. And i really can't imagine at the moment how this can be solved without making invites absolutely random on the one side and without preventing casual players from ever participating in a battle on the other side. To the devs: i really think you should stick to the option you discussed earlier this year. Giving the leader of the clan/fleet/society that organizes the attack the ability to decide who get's in. While having casual players in a battle might really make it more unpredictable and fun, having your dedicated players, who spent a lot of time and effort for organizing the attack/building an impressive fleet/getting into voicechat on time locked out of the battle will just lead to a guild becoming desinterested in the fight and leaving the casual players to fight  for themselves and get sunk and frustrated. I've seen plenty of this in PotBS. Which surely doesn't help anyone. Experience tells me that when a society has got 10 or 15 of it's members in, a clan leader will be glad to ask for help from anyone that wants to participate.

 

The problem of course would be if we see societies with online numbers beyond 30+ players. Which at the current state of the game is unlikely but will become probable with a growing playerbase. I think the answer to this could be to create port capturing mechanics where a lot of battles happen on the same time. For example we have 90 ports dedicated to three different timezones, where the 30 ports in a timezone have to offer a port battle in a tight timewindow of three hours. That would on the one side give dedicated groups the choice where to strike, on the other, there would be plenty of options for casual players to participate in the other port battles, which would probably become even more fun if the defenders are forced to deploy their main forces against the organized attackers in other, more strategic ports. More than that, the organized guys on boths sides will be dependant on the casual players in helping them out in this less strategic battles, maybe even sending some guides/officers for helping them out. A system like that is not without it's downsides, but i really can't see another way without making the RvR effort ultimately meaningless and uninteresting for organized groups because of the unpredictability of an invite system. You could of course split the slots, like giving 15 slots to the admiral of the attacking clan/fleet and distribute the 10 others in a lottery to everyone who has signed up. That however could give an unfair advantage to factions with a lower population overall and those nearly no random/casual players (like Spain for example). But maybe that isn't so unfair at all and can be seen as an underdog buff?

 

Edited June 26, 2015 by Nathaniel

[Bart Smith]

You never satisfy all - so devs have to well balnce this feature and we are here to tests and share what we like or dislike . And i know - its VERY hard task for them...

[Nathaniel]

That's why they asked us for suggestions that could help carve out a common ground

Edited June 26, 2015 by Nathaniel

[Marlinspike]

Port capture should not be a function of a single instanced port battle because of all the problems it creates, as described.

 

Port capture should be a function of a blockade, say, 24 hours (or more?) as suggested by MikeDaBike

 

This requires the attacking nation to have the wherewithal to assemble a fleet of players that can stay on station for the duration of the blockade. I imagine shifts being organized to make sure the blockade is manned. There will be times when the blockade is weaker because not enough players can cover a given shift. When a port is blockaded, a general announcement goes out stating "nation x is blockading port y with a force of z that will be completed in x hours."

 

The defending nation needs to assemble a fleet to break the blockade. Thus we have a battle when the defending nation tries to break the blockade.

 

I also think that port capture should be two phases:

1. blockade that renders the port neutral 

2. settlement -- the nation that has the most outposts in the port determines how the port is flagged.

Edited June 26, 2015 by jimbursch

[Nathaniel]

Port capture should not be a function of a single instanced port battle because of all the problems it creates, as described.

 

Port capture should be a function of a blockade, say, 24 hours (or more?) as suggested by MikeDaBike

 

This requires the attacking nation to have the wherewithal to assemble a fleet of players that can stay on station for the duration of the blockade. I imagine shifts being organized to make sure the blockade is manned. There will be times when the blockade is weaker because not enough players can cover a given shift.

 

The defending nation needs to assemble a fleet to break the blockade. Thus we have a battle when the defending nation tries to break the blockade.

 

I also think that port capture should be two phases:

1. blockade that renders the port neutral 

2. settlement -- the nation that has the most outposts in the port determines how the port is flagged.

This approach creates more problems than it solves.

 

In a nutshell:

 

1. The most durable side will win, not the most organized or skilled.

2. It encourages overlong playsessions which wear you out extremely. Look at Guild Wars 2. There was a similar system favouring 24h presense. At the start of the game i was part of a super-hardcore organized force which played against similar minded enemies and tried to mantain a nearly 24h hour presence to beat the foe and clinge to one of the top spots in the world rankings. I don't need to point out that after two months every side that took part in this "who stays longer on" arms race was completely exhausted and uninterested in the system.

3. For the players that see such playsessions as madness but still want to see the fruits of their success the proposed system will also fail. Because they will never see this fruits. Again, this happened in Guild Wars 2 on a lot of the mid-rating servers. Guilds came online, did some conquering, only to see it completly destroyed in the beginnings by a small group of night cappers. Do you really want that large war efforts will be decided by the side who can bring as many Siberian/Austrialian/Korean players as possible on, that can destroy the enemy's day's effort without any resistance?

4. You make blockades the centre piece of this strategy. Which is historical, i grant you (though not in this smaller caribbean ports). But read any diary/letters of captains serving in blockades. What is "blocakde" a synonym of? Complete boredom. Why do we want it in a game?

Edited June 26, 2015 by Nathaniel

[Marlinspike]

1. The most durable side will win, not the most organized or skilled.

 

To be durable, a side would have to be more organized and skilled. The side has to be organized to man the blockade with sufficient force defend against the counter attack. You are correct that the most durable will win if there is no counterattack. 

 

2. It encourages overlong playsessions which wear you out extremely.

 

We can do whatever we want with our playsessions; we don't have to participate in a blockade if we don't want to. A player can decide to devote some time to manning a blockade for his nation a little or a lot. And there is always the chance that there will be a battle in the blockade if the other side decides to have a go.

 

 

Guilds came online, did some conquering, only to see it completly destroyed in the beginnings by a small group of night cappers. Do you really want that large war efforts will be decided by the side who can bring as many Siberian/Austrialian/Korean players as possible on, that can destroy the enemy's day's effort without any resistance?

 

I see your point. Successful nations will be 24hr operations, which means recruiting players across all time zones. I think this is the nature of an open world. I need fellow team players  in Asia/Australia/Europe/Africa/Americas. 

 

4. You make blockades the centre piece of this strategy.

 

Blockades and blockade breaking, which are battles.

Edited June 26, 2015 by jimbursch