Lytse Pier

Yeah, we know, but we loved the titles he had ... especially "King of France".

If you only read the boldly emphasized words, you get the message without the fluff. ;-)

Simplicity is greatly overrated by the people that practice it. ;-)

It is certainly not, not even an evil nation with horrible captains if anyone would suggest that. Reticence could be the wiser option in the discussion for many.

You almost had me fooled into thinking they added fishing into the game earlier than anticipated. ;-) Still doesn't beat the labourhours you pirates bring into our clan by giving away 1st Rates. :-)

Just to suggest, I'd make it that not every port reacts the same to hostilities. A big regional port should not feel as threatened by a few ships not reaching its destinations, than for example a shallow water port on the rim of the empires. Instead of using percentages, you could make it in a more numerical presentation of transported/provided supplies and troops, defensive and offensive actions, commendations, etc. This would also make it fun to give a nation to coordinate a strategical investment in a certain area of the offensive or defensive actions of the fleets. So in short: A regional capital needs more supplies and troops towards the front to get worried, expects more offensive and defensive actions to feel threatened, and their governor needs more commendations to get worried than for example a deep water port, which on its turn is less vulnerable again than a shallow water port. This would also account for the lack of order in the pirate area. There are lot of shallow water ports in that area and therefore more vulnerable to aggression on also a smaller scale. My suggestion above would leave that area of shallow ports as a much less stable and dynamic area than for example a more nation oriented area.

Cooperative gameplay will be necessary instead of an elite group of 25 extremely l33t playerz! ;-) Awesome!

Sorry for the late reply, I hadn't checked into this thread for a while. I don't agree. Doing this without a cooperative mechanism means still it is something of trust instead of cooperation. Not having my suggested proposal will probably work for a small group of persons, but not for a large clan that has different playtimes of people. Investing in a small improvement as described above will leave a possibility of players working towards a mutual goal without the threat of being screwed over by a person that is up to no good. The suggested mechanism still leaves the possibility to nick all stuff from a clan's warehouse, but not without a form of compensation. The clan still has to rebuild, but by leaving money in the wallet and having the means to rebuild means it won't be the blow that kills the clan.

I know, but having this treaty makes it more reassuring to shift our focus more into that direction of open world PvP. It will probably be a welcome change of pace for many captains in all of our communities, even for the ones that don't agree with it. ;-)

To hunt you Otto, instead of being occupied all evening sitting in a port waiting to teleport to an area where a flag was crafted against ones nation in the event an enemy fleet actually might turn up. ;-)

To add a little note to the discussion about elements of all communities not abiding by this treaty and their victims starting their whine as soon as their little basic cutter gets ganked around the wrong area: This treaty ensures a period of peace by truce, not a period of safety by truce. Just like in any country that has no war, there will be crime. You can get robbed and mugged by dissidents or criminals, even foreign ones that crosses borders. Sailing a Nation's flag does not mean one is a righteous person, as much it doesn't mean that a person sailing black is a scumbag. Sail smart, always be alert and keep in mind that the ones you know and trust, are the safe haven you deserve.

You couldn't leave it to the text agreed, eh, Kierrip, and had to get it off your chest to say 'our ports' and 'your use'. ;-)Reactions like these are though exactly why many of the Dutch captains *reticently* agrees to the Treaty and predominantly lost faith in making agreements with you guys. I will keep fighting in our community to keep an objective and positive stance towards Dutch-French relationships, but time will tell if mutual respect will drift towards trust again in the future. Formal addendum: Compaignie des Heeren XIX, agrees with the Dutch Consortium's rulings to ratify the Treaty.

It is the most modified game mechanic, because it's a lousy one. Think of what we use the open world mode for. Only 3 things spring to mind. To get from A to B, to tag an enemy ship and lastly, to watch the seagulls. What about making it more engaging to get someone in a battle instance than just a Tag and watching a counter count down? What about making it more engaging to sail into a battle towards a favorable position more based on skill then on sailing in a circle within a certain time span? I can totally imagine joining a battle in a favorable position to get more difficult when time progresses, but impossible to join after x minutes is just sooooo game mechanicy that it takes away from actual immersion. Just a few thoughts to throw in there, to consider that tweaking a broken engine will still leave you with a pimped piece of garbage.

Pose limits and you will smother innovations. --- Lytse Pier, Willemstad, 1716.

Heard the story, seems like an awesome dude, and that coming from a Frisian towards a Groninger means a lot. ???? Looking forward to meet him!

Awesome writeups Skully, thanks for giving me some fun reads!

Love to have it, as many friends or relations have names I have an aptitude to misspell when calling to pm in global chat. ????????

Dutch cheese on Swedish knackebrot with some French wine and a good cold glass of Danish beer. Heaven.

Your presentation was with great flair, respect and dignity yesterday, Tenakha. Not bad at all for a first day on the job as ambassador to the Vereenigde Provincien! My compliments.

Sorry to hear it Hellshammy. Personally I don't know Skrog, but you hopefully he will get back to you and correct the situation. To add to it, the Compaignie des Heeren XIX is selling ships in all ranges in all quantities at guaranteed delivery dates. Just contact our Heer van den Werft: jointventure or our Heer van den Handel: Bosch and they'll hook you up with a fast delivery.

Visual feedback and assault fleet gameplay. Sloops and bomb vessels were used in for example the invasion of Trinidad by sir Abercromby; and sir Harvey a few months earlier. It would be nice if the preparation of the fleet would show in the actual Port Battle and be a part of it, to make it perhaps more distinct from a port raid. In my eyes with a port battle you would actually drop militairy forces / troops at shore to capture a town, defenders should prevent the troops from landing by shooting the landing troops (and attacking fleet) with their fortified gun batteries and defending ships It would certainly give more of a feeling that you are actually gathering and building an invasion fleet instead of filling a mechanic with resources just to get access to a port battle. Size of an assault fleet and not delaying time but size of it. Building an assault fleet uses resources is a good idea, I like that a lot; It costs money and effort. I think it should be the responsibility of the creator of the assault fleet to say when it's finished and ready for combat when it reaches a certain size. A small sized assault fleet with little troops might be easier for the attackers to build, but also easier for the defenders to fend off; the larger assault fleets costs more resources but will be more effective to capture a port. When the defenders hampers the building of the assault fleet during the preparations phase it should not delay time, but it should for example not increase the size the assault fleet or even decrease it, destroying the efforts of the attackers to assemble the assault troops and sloops. Your suggested mechanics for PvP tokens would be great for that. Where to assemble the assault fleets. Assembling and assault fleet should be done from a staging point. I don't know what you devs have in mind, but it would be sensible to only be able to assemble so many troops from a larger settlement in order to sustain a standing group of people. I would use the regional capitals for that. If you have a regional capital that is where you can assemble you assault fleets for the region just to make sure people don't assemble the assault fleets from a safer point far behind the enemy lines and to create more focused points of finding PvP also. Limiting the range of the assault fleets by this all makes sense due to keeping the men provisioned and battle ready would mean a limit to their time at sea. How to sail the assault fleets to their destinations. Sailing an assault fleet should be done in game, in the open world. I understand it could be grieved to hell and back, but so it is with flags now also. The goal could be to hamper the size of the assault fleet before it arrived, hence increasing the odds of a good defense. Just make the sloops and smaller ships harder to hit due to size. A defenders screening fleet consisting just out of Pavels and Santisima's wouldn't even get close to the sloops. More then one staging point It could be considered that in the open world the smaller ports (so not the regional ports) could be used as smaller staging points and in the open world the assault forces could be combined, like would have been done in the Age of Sail. a Commander would pick up his forces at different ports before sailing towards his goal. This could make things interesting in a more strategic way. Allright, sofar my ideas on it. Most important to stress out for me again is that you should not just build a mechanic, but also make it tangible, visible and usable ingame. There is nothing more frustrating for a lot of players to put a lot of effort into building something and not see it return visually in the game back again. Adding the actual sloops and troops to the port battle and see it succeed (or destroyed for that matter) would be extremely rewarding. Good luck and I am looking forward to the implementations you suggested.

I am missing some love for the clan warehouse and the cooperative gameplay it can give by making some smaller changes and additions to it with pricing (see also my signature). Will the API be developed further too to stimulate community built tooling?

Goodmorning Kierrip, Thank you for the follow-up, and clear statement. I wish to thank you and the French Council that a choice for a definitive peace is the basis for the talks on both sides now. Both sides have fought hard and fierce, never forgetting we are all players wanting the same thing. A fair fight, always to win , but never to destroy. Merci beaucoup!

If the voices of reason keep being heard and listened to, we should be enjoying this game hopefully again soon!

We prefer not to fight the French again in a third war since Januari, Alanxo. I am not sure that Dutch players are then going to keep playing the game. That is all there is to it. Like I said, this is between the French Nation and the Dutch Nation player communities. Do we fight 'till one of our player groups says "goodbye game" or do we shake a firm and friendly hand and give it a rest for a while, so our communities can explore different parts of the map, explore some other possibilities of the game, instead of the same little piece of the map we are sailing as of a few months now or turning to other games. You know what we prefer and I don't have to mention we are serious about it.