CJFlint

Ya know I watched the Hearts of Oak trailer and it looks pretty neat. Although they only show screen shots, it looks pretty good. It would be pretty interesting if that panned out because it appears to be completely made by moders. I'm wondering if it will be free.

I here ya Bert. Yeah if it takes them that much time to get problems solved and things are that difficult, I really don't think they should charge any fees what so ever. Not even for BS store items. But instead do a donations type set or crowd fund raising. Pay if you want to help type of thing. But charging any kind of money for something then having a super long turn around time to fix stuff is kind of lame. Because when you charge people you become somewhat liable. I pretty much stopped playing right before 2.11, but returned a few time since. I decided to uninstall a couple of months ago, just not feeling anymore.

Yes true. Agreed Also, they should have their feet held to the fire a little bit. They have or had a really loyal player base, many of whom were some of the most pationant I have seen in a video game community, the best group of players a game company could ask for. People from all over the world. If you have a game were people like that are spending much of their free time playing, paying money to play. Sometimes more them 100 dollars. Then play loyally for years.Then you have to deliver period. You cant just put out half hazard balance patches, or add fishing and call it good. You owe it to them. What I think happened is POTBS was developed with attention to detail, and pride. But I think SONY may have been way more concerned with making a profit then keeping their player base happy. Adding content and updating the game would have cost to much, so they didn't bother. They did just enough to string players along. Then when the game stopped making a profit, after they milked their cash cow dry, they prob threatened to cut it. That's when Portalus took it over, former devs from FLS. At this point the game it self was at an all time low, they have a really hard up hill battle. Currently from what I understand they have a really small staff and maybe having a tough enough time just keeping the game and site up and running, let alone adding new content. One thing I would explore with potbs, if I had any say is crowd funding in the form of donations, play to win will not work at its current state. To keep it going and improve it. And also make it open source or somewhat open source so people from the modding community could update it them selves. Almost like a community effort to keep the game alive. Their are some vary talented modders out there and.....many work for free. Here's an example. One game that flopped is Silent Hunter 5, which came from a really successful series with die hard fans. It pretty much flopped because it was rushed to fast to release. The game had a great concept but stuff was missing, and it was quickly written off so ubisoft cut funding. People pretty much wrote it off as a failure. This game flopped right out of the gate, it was sad for many. There was only one patch, then they gave up on it. Then "Subsim" community modders went to town and made tons of mods for it. Its amazing what it looks like now with mods. There is now realism mods, graghic changes, ui, new features sound effects ect ect. With out mods its not worth playing, with mods its the best silent hunter ever. It rose from the ashes, because the fans would not let it die. So tapping the modding community may not be a bad idea for POTBS at this point.

Well regardless, In POTBS we saw a steep learning curve when it came to group pvp. I saw port battles fall apart into complete confusion, most of all on the pirate side on tiggy. Really poor teamwork and a lack of command and control, on the tiggy pirate side. It really caused me to question the role pirates in that game and if pirates should even be in RvR in the 1st place. On the brit side I did RvR with decent results, good with some loses. On the pirate side I did not do RvR for the most part because it was just terrible team work, and did not feel like replacing Herc or PHerc dur points every battle. I think command and control is really needed the most when you have 20 + vs 20 + players. Like I said earlier, unless a group worked all the time together they probably would not fair well. There was no doupt a huge gap between good group pvpers and bad ones. To many people would get discouraged and not even bother. On the pirate side I quickly learned that our faction did not do well in RvR, and not to even bother unless it was a port were I had econ. In my time playing POTBS I saw some of the best results mainly playing national and the complete worst mainly playing on the pirate side. Now there was a few good 6 groups on the pirate side, but not enough. Most of them were re-rollers. Part not all, just part of the reason for the failures that I saw mainly on the tiggy pirate side, were due to lack of command and control. LOL one person on vent said trying to get the pirates to work together, is like trying to herd cats! lolol Learning from that, I see a real need for a decent command and control system for anything above say 2 vs 2. Its really needed for bigger battles were its a port battle type fight, were there's 20+ vs 20+, it just is.

Confusion could easily cause the who group to get sunk in potbs. I'm sure maybe we don't want to admit but we all probably have seen port battles and group fights go south. Some but not all of the time I think some of the group failures and loses were due to POTBS it self not having a decent command and control system, and the players not able to use voice com or understand the game exploits. With this said a good command and control system built in with and voice com built into the game would help with the pvp population and help with some of the confusion that happens. It would close the gap a little between good pvpers and not so good pvpers if were comparing to POTBS, in regards to group pvp. Even if we only get some sort of command and control system, without voice com that would still be good. Solo is a whole different can of worms. Also I don't like having to compare your use examples from POTBS so much.....but the game had so much good about it, and so much bad about it that its hard not too. Naval Action is going to be a age of sail MMO, and there's really not much else to use examples from. There things to be learned both good and bad from POTBS.

Also not I'm saying these things because I'm "bashing" POTBS, its based off what I read and heard. I had a good run with that game and it will have a special place. Its more my own personal choice to stop playing because I'm personally not satisfied with the way things the past year have been heading with them, same with a lot of us. If there still is people who are having fun with POTBS more power to them.

POTBS is not pay to win.....for the most part, but it will most certainly be. That's how they intend on paying for the game development. They did not use the word pay to win, but it is certainly what they meant. The devs said it on the forums, and its already starting to happen. I hate to break it to ya. This based off what I read from the devs on there site (which is down), and I heard it from players last time I logged in. They are going to set up levels of subscriptions and add a bunch off stuff to the B.S. store. So you would have to get either a subscription and buy items from the B.S. store (ship deeds consumes ect ect), or both, in order to stay competitive with other players in the game from the sounds of it. Some of this was already in effect last time I logged in (new bs store content). I not going to get into a debate about it, its just were they are intending to take it. It was in the fine print on there dev log on their site. Maybe not so fine print lol

My suggestion is to put a command & control system in place for group pvp and group missions or anytime players are grouped. This will help in issuing commands and orders to fellow team mates, with speed and clarity. Orders like waypoint, attack, defend, block, spike, speed, formations ect ect It will cut down on confusion "fog of war". Who ever is the group leader or "wearing the hat" will be the leader, there will be no 2 people fighting for control. POTBS had no command and control built into the game what so ever. Players used chat or 3 rd party voice com like vent or team speak to relay orders and info back and forth. So there became a huge gap between good groups and bad groups. The best groups fighters played together all the time, knew how to work to together, use 3rd party voice software, had good character builds for group fighting, and even new how to exploit the games broken-ness to their favor (which is the truth lol). There was even x teaming involved in some cases (anything to win mantality). They made their own command control. If you did not know this, no matter how good you were at pvp you would have allot of trouble in group fights, and end up very frustrated with your teammates. The reason is simple, because command and control was never put in game. If you did not learn the tribal knowlege how you would fail. So it wasn't always the players fault for losing, it was the games as silly as that sounds.

GWX was a amazing mega mod, it added so much more content to SH3. I was sad to see the 3rd party team break up, imagine what they could have made for SH5. I agree there is a ton of nice mods for silent hunter 5. They released sh5 way to early, and without mods its just not good enough. So anyone wanting to play it should look into modding it. Speaking of which I need to go to subsim,com and see if there is any new ones lol I added a few really good mods to sh5 and found its now really realistic and much more immersive. SH4 I loved too. The Trigger Maru was similar to the GWX mod, but for american subs. There was a major difference between american submarines and German subs. I found the american subs to be much larger with more crew. American subs were not able to go as deep as German subs. But they made up for it in a in better sonar/radar, and more torpedo tubes. The TDC I found to be more effective, on the last sub I sailed it was able to do a active sonar/tdc shot. Meaning it could effective destroy a ship with out using the periscope, great for foul weather. American subs although I did not find as challenging as the German subs, mainly because the enemy you faced in the game. Germans submariners had a much tougher job, were for the american submariner of WW2 it was a turkey shot allot of times. Silent Hunter 3 it gets harder and harder through your campaign. Silent 4 US submarine's it seemed to get easier and easier. Which I think reflected reality. I think I loved both SH4 and SH3 both equally. Both had 2 vary different prospective's of WW2 submarine warfare. You really have to be on top of your game to survive in SH3 and 5 later in the war. Because the hunter became the hunted. I think the developers of Naval Action should take a look at silent hunter 3,4 and 5, mods and the subsim.com community because to me it is the best naval simulation (PC Game) out. I truly think so. Rise of Flight is a challenging game for sure. During WW1 airplanes were only really around for about 10 years, and the game does a great job showing that. They are really corky airplanes. I love it! I'm really looking forward to see how Naval Action turns out. Sounds like the devs are doing a really good job so far!

Silent Hunter Series is the best naval sim I have seen. I got played silent hunter 3 with the GWX mod. Did you try that one? Silent hunter 4 I played with trigger maru mod. I enjoyed it vary much. Silent Hunter 5 I did not like so much at 1st, but its 10 times better now that I modded it. I just recently picked it back up again. Rise of Flight is just a wonderful flying sim. I love it!

Did you have an Alt Named "Buddy Teach"? I played British for almost 2 years. Then Switched to the Pirate faction. On the Brit I played in "3 Sheets to the Wind" society only. On the pirate side I played in Shadow Fang, Crows Nest, Plague Bringers, Real Pirates and my own society Equipo Del Hispaniola. I bounced around allot, until just starting my own soc. Well its good to see a new age of sail game in the works. It will be cool to see some former potbs players here too. Over time I realized more and pirates in POTBS I think were represented. When I say represented I don't mean treated unfairly, I'm talking more about there roles in the game. Pirates as a faction were expected to take part in RvR "nation conquest". This made zero since to me what so ever. Pirates were NOT a nation and should have not played a role in national conquest other then disrupting shipping. The pirate faction should have had much different end game objectives, or even there should not been a pirate faction period. Being a pirate should have been a status you get for pirating ships, and doing bad deeds. Now the developers may have had there reasons for setting up POTBS that way in the beginning. Whats cool is from the sounds it naval action is going to have a more accurate depiction of pirates and privateers in the game...sounds like the age of sail game we have been waiting for!.

7 accounts is quite a few, I had 3 alts. Were you tiggy or roberts? I really didn't play too much during the new Portalus era. I stopped playing active after the 2.11 patch, but I did log in from time to time. From what I know they are short staffed, that could be why they didn't look into it. If you paid any kind of money they should have at least investigated your accounts to see what happened. From what I remember, In the Sony era they would ban for a duration 90 % of the time. They also could ban players from using chat too. Most of the time it was like a 3 day ban. Sometimes 30 days sometimes even longer. I got a few 3 day bans and forums warnings. The GMs never wanted to perma ban me ever. They seemed to be good sports. I would raise hell, but it was never dishonest. Mainly me having to much fun playing a pirate. One time the brit players put a price on my head, while we were flipping bartica lol For me mainly it was me having fun, ruffle some feathers and wanting a good laugh. I will say I never laughed so hard playing any video game ever. The crap talking on the forums and area chat were just epic, just pure comedy relief lol For me looking back POTBS was not prefect, but a really fun game. It was also complex there was allot to learn. Both PvP and Econ was an art, that took time to learn. Now that I'm done I say was a Jack of all Trades, master of none. I will say POTBS did a great job of adding allot of dif aspects to the games. I wanted to see it all. There was a real freedom there, we could play anyway we wanted. The last time I logged in (a month ago) I was told by a few people that potbs was steering toward "pay to win". This caused me to go WTF, and then I uninstalled. That was the final nail for me. It was almost insulting. So they updated there BS store with "pay to win" items/ships, and that's how they were going to fund it I guess. To me this is ok if it is a newer game with a ton of promise and content being added on a regular. This is not the case with potbs right now, there is no real new content other then that stuff. It should remain F2p with option of captains club. But having to buy items/ships from the BS store just to stay competitive is lame, with the games current state. If they need money that badly then just do the public radio thing and ask for donations "to save the game", instead of this new pay to win crapola. They would be surprised how many would. Then do a grass roots effort. Or better yet just role back the patches about 1/2 to 2 years. But the way it has been ran the last 2 years we can count on they will not do it period.

POTBS was the answer to allot of my dreams of a cool age of sail / age pirates game for a while. I always loved 15th century to the 19th period of history, probably more then any other period. I remember really being exited to about it when I 1st started playing. I was an instant fan. That's why when it started to head south it hit me harder, then say another game of a different genre would have. Seeing the one bad patch after another was vary disappointing. It was sad to see the developers and SONY lose touch with what the game was really about over time and floundering around. Well I'm pleased to see Naval Action is coming along. The reality is it will probably be a while though, I'm having patience. Lets face it there's not that many Age of Sail games really MMO or single player. So in way they are the light for us age of sail game players. Remember POTBS was released in 07ish. Regardless good or bad patch's its a dated game now. CPUs have advanced quite abit since 07. The CPU tech out now are way more powerful in 07. If the developers of Naval Action do it right, and utilize all the new next gen technology. Get it right historically. Really dial in the combat, exploration, crafting / econ and give it that age of sail sense of adventure. We will have one cool game. So its important to be patient and be supportive. Who knows maybe POTBS will at some point have an over haul or really turn around. Ya never know. Currently it really dosn't look likely, so speaking for myself there is no point in beating a dead horse and just to remember the fun, the people ect ect.

It was great game for a while. I think the pvp had a really got people going because of the cost of losing. Kind of added a realness to it. It also was a game that worked of peoples egos. Area chat smack talking was epic lol Even on the forums, there was a great deal of crap talking. I had allot of fun lol When I 1st started playing the red zones had no rules, seal clubbing was rapid. I remember being chased by pirates, it was more of thrill then other games I played. After that I was hooked. I enjoyed late night close 1v1s. PvP was exciting for allot of us. Was it a prefect system....not at all. Was AVCOM boarding broken....yes. Was there balance issues...yes. But it was still fun! I think the biggest error they made was messing with balance every patch, instead of really working to improve the game and adding content. It really didn't help anything, they really lost me after a while with all of that. I always said you think the other class is OPed, then make an alt. Don't QQ about balance all the time. The reason for the QQ, was the high cost of losing was high and hurt egos. That's what 80 to 90 % of the forums chatter was about. Balance was never going to get fixed anyways. Ever. Well we all know that now. One of the things they did really well too, was the player ran economy. After a while I really dove into it. I really enjoyed that any thing ship wise, ammo, consumables, outfitting and the ships them selves, were created by players. So there was almost a kind of economy comp and warfare too. Really cool! There was a great international community as well. Interesting people from all over the place. It really was fun for a while. There was a new optimism for a while, with the new owners (which were the same people running it with SONY)....for a while. But then as it turns out they seem to be steering toward a pay to win format now...ugg. But I think the chance for them to really fix or update POTBS came and went. Its really a shame. I really wanted to see it be brought up to date graghics wise, AVCOM boarding to be fixed so it could be fun for everyone not just people who knew how exploit a broken system and new some content. A over-hull. Or even a POTBS 2 lol None of it ever happened. Its ok there is Naval Action being built and there is allot of new games out and being worked on. Time to move on for me. I had as much fun as I could with it.

I have not played EVE yet. I hear that one is a pretty good MMO. The interesting thing about the wing commander series was the concept and the story. The story, concept and idea of Star Citizen has been around for quite a long time. Cris Roberts didn't have the means to do it in the 90s, but now has the tech to do it now. Its like his dream to make it. Crowd funding to me seems a little risky, but in the case of Star Citizen it could vary well turn out good. The thing is if you got a dissatisfied player who pumped $100s into a game, they are going to cry allot louder not getting what they want. Then someone who paid 30 to 60 dollars. They really have to deliver and best of luck to them. I'll will play it for sure, I'm yet to sign up though. Those ships look pricey, I'm going to need to see some more game play footage footage 1st lol

I uninstalled POTBS about a month ago. I lost all faith that they are going to turn it around. What really put the final nail in the coffin was people saying it was going "Pay To Win". I'm completely burned out of it. I will say it was a fun game for a while though. I always liked the pvp, and player driven economy. But they really have not changed a dam thing in years other then bad patchs, a few ships and BS store items. Its just not worth any of my time anymore. Hopefully naval action pulls through and turns out great. Sounds cool so far. To me it sounds like it going to be the Age of Sail game I always wanted. But I really don't want to have to high of expectations. Its a video game after all.

1)I think the foul weather pictures are and the deck pictures look great. I like all the pictures, looks like its coming along nicely. I would like to see crew on the decks which is probably coming, also would like to see window transparency. The Victory 1st rate would really pop with see through windows. 2)PC Gamer and IGN. I use steam and gamers gate as well. Allot of my game knowlege comes from being a life long gamer. I have been playing games since the commodore 64 lol. I don't always go off of reviews to decide whether I'm going to buy a game or not. I will say sometimes think word of mouth on forums or nerdy people (PC Gamers LOL) just talking at lunch, or like on here can go a long way too. It creates an early buzz and a die-hard early adopter fan base. I think just having active developer/player dialog is a vary good thing and I think it will go a long way. I say no matter what happens or how big or little Naval Action becomes, keep the open dialog going. Because too many games lose touch with players and drift off track. I will add too once the game is put out, don't just rely on the forums for feed back have optional surveys and contact people in game too. There are so many that don't bother with forums, that don't get heard.

Can of worms has just been opened lol Did you play Wing Comander series back in the 90s? For its time it was probably one of best games out for the pc at the time. Privateer was an RPG that was way ahead of its time. Cris Roberts was a master video game developer back in the 90s. He kind of disappeared for a while though. Like over 10 years. I have to say I was vary pleased to see he is back! I will say this LOL I'm not paying 100s to help develop game unless Im like a stock holder and can make money off it. I think your right about that, maybe people are having really high expectations and that they may not be able to deliver on all of it. It looks nice so far. But if they dont get it right they are going to P.O, allot of gamer's that paid 100$$ pre release. Cris Roberts has quite the imagination, so Im sure it will be pretty cool. Wait and See I guess. I think Cris Roberts placing a huge bet on this one. Best of luck to him

Just give it some time, Rome 2 has many patches coming. I enjoy that series too. They just released to early. AI is getting better with every patch. Give it a few months, they will get it together. Bannerlord is a complete remake of Mount and Blade. So its like mount and blade 2. I'm exited to see it. Mount and Blade I thought was a corky insanely fun mid evil/ period game. The campaign mode was great fun, a little crud but fun. PvP was amazingly fun! I love the music lol I think Bannerlord hopefully will be less corky, better graffic's more options and fun.

I agree, it will turn out great. It just has post release bugs, and stuff that needs to be ironed out. It will be fixed. Its already improved and is running smoother since release. I'm looking forward to see more of the DLCs they got coming too. I'm pretty sure they rushed it out the door for release, a little to early. Here's another thing for players to consider too, is I'm pretty sure it is more demanding on PCs the Total Wars before it too. With these next gen games coming out, you got to have some pretty beefy video cards and proc. I got SLI cards and I can hear my fans running hard when I play it. Almost sounds like it wants to fly away lol So for older pc's its got be pretty ruff, with frame rate issues and performance issues, to add onto post release bugs. Also anyone been checking out the new Mount and Blade Bannerlord in the works?

Rome 2 to me is a great game game. Just be patient they have a ton of patches and DLC coming. I think I have 4 of there patchs so far and have already noticed quite a bit of difference. Mainly I just want to see a little more eye candy in the campaign map (videos), just needs some more excitement. My impressions of the battles in campaign is early on they are a little bit blan, but after gaining technology is probably the best mass battles I have ever seen in a game. Pretty cool to see siege equipment mounted on ships. Having a blast with it! I love that they added amphibious assault to this Total War. I love the different battle views, you can get right in close or some way out to almost a satellite map. I want to see Rome 2 with "City View", that was in the 1st Rome. The city's are amazing and I would like to see them close up during peace time too. In a nut shell Rome 2 just needs to fill out some more with patches and DLC. Another thing is, I found a hidden gem Mafia 2. I always been a huge fan of Martin Scorsese, and read Mafia 2 was a true to life game about the mafia and really cool historical interpretation of the 1940s and 1950s. Its a some what linear sand box. I have been really enjoying it so far. It starts of in the dead of winter, its pretty convincing, with icy streets, cars covered in snow, the sound of trains, ect ect. Really good immersion. There is a main character Vito and 2 others that you can play (DLC) Jimmy and Joe.

That's a good idea, to make certain effects optional. You know, I can see ocean visuals might more challenging to recreate in a game, just because all the variables. It it can be done though. I was a Silent Hunter player for a few years. Silent Hunter 4, was one game that got it right with a few mods. Trigger Maru mod and ocean foam, made it pretty stunning. I think allot of it has to do with light creating water reflection, and how things react to it.

Sounds good. I think if there is going to be economy and crafting it should come with risk. Convoys systems reflect reality, they have been used all through history to get ships through dangerous waters. Just pure hypothetical. Say if Naval Action was to make a player ran economy (which would be cool). Say you have a flute or some sort of transport ship. It would be really cool to be able to request an escort from fellow players, that would insure safe travel to point a to b for a price. The only way they receive there pay, is if you make it to were your going safely. Or even be able to jump in a group (convoy) were escorts are paid a price for safe arrival. A system built right into the game. This would be an interesting way to get economy motivated player to work with more pvp oriented players. It would also present a challenge for pirates or privateers. Might be a pretty interesting game of cat and mouse on the side of conquest. I also enjoy the idea of adding smuggling as well. I would like to see economy meshed with pvp.

Hi I'm going to give you my 2 cents based on my own life. I have done my share of boating child and adult also served in the marines for 4 years. I spent 6 months on a gator freighter ship (LHA). Which was a helicopter carrier out on the south pacific. Currently my brother and another guy go sailing. Now with this said I will say this. Some of the nicest visuals or views I have ever seen were while at sea. The south pacific on a good day were truly stunning even on a drab LHA. Same with the northwest, its stuning to be out on the water in good weather. No reason to drab it down for war effects. The colors on the clouds during sun set were amazing. But on cloudy days everything seems grey, sort of gloomy drab. More so then you would see on land, due to cloud and water reflection. The water turns grey because of cloud reflection, kind of like that band of brother picture. If you want to do it right, I would say base it on weather conditions, location in the world and time of day. Not a global effect. If I had to chose I would say realistic, but not too Desaturated. Edit: Those 2 movies are based off of land combat and may not be the best examples. Water and cloud reflection is huge if you want to get the oceanic look. Is there a way we can see images from the game with these atmospheric or de-saturated applied? To compare?

I just started playing Rome 2 a couple weeks ago. I enjoyed the game so far. The battles once you gain technology are pretty cool. I like the way you can zoom to a kind of close up over head of the troops and manual control over individual artillery units. I also liked the diplomatic view and strategic view both battle and campaign map. I really like the combined navy/army attacks one can do. The city's in the battle were really well done. There were also some things I did not like about it. At first glance it seems to have way more features then before, but the reality is there isn't really other then new views. Other then pretty new campaign map, seemed like something was missing. I want to be able to micromanage settlements and have allot control what the direction of the faction every aspect if I want. Mideval 2 had more control settlements, but after that one the devs saw it as being a burden on players and watered it down. I think they should have done the different. They should and the micro management to it, with option of auto-manage. Sounds corny.....but were's the campaign map animations and videos......I want to see my spy at work...like a little video of him or her knocking someone off...Just gereral campaign mile stone videos.I also want see my settlement in 3d....what they look like without being in battle....I know wishful thinking lol So I'm not completely happy with Rome 2 mainly on the campaign map side of things, but I still think its a good game. They said they are going to patch Rome 2 and add DLC more then ever before and from what I read its going to be allot. So that is pretty cool news.