Slim McSauce

Your favorite 5th/6th rate should already have a few slots unlocked. Besides that, choose your ship and master it. Everyone starts with the one ship they really love and can afford to sale. The ship you're most comfortable and familiar with sailing is the one you'll take to PvP. For me that was Renomee, for others it may be a larger vessel.

Dead fish do not swim mate!

So I was thinking about ships logs and their usefulness, and they're not very useful at all. You can activate one and get no battles just on timing alone. The battles you do get may or may not be the battles you are looking for, and by the time you get there it may be over. Point is ship logs don't really do much to facilitate combat the way they should. So I figured why not come up with a way that everyone can find combat in a way that doesn't require sailing for hours on end searching along large expanses of ocean. Why not improve ship logs to include current sightings of enemy shipping in friendly waters. Or better yet some kind of bubbled heat map so you can see what areas are hot and popping off for people to go. This isn't limited to the ship logs. There should be some kind of indication where to go for battle. See the effect patrol zone has. It's a simple circle that offers reward and the promise of combat and people sail to it for that very reason. But there's only one patrol and the feature is sort of half baked in that it doesn't pit opposing nations in any way. It's just a free for all for anyone who cares to sail to it and spend time there. But that time spent could be had defending or attacking portions of coastal waters that matter to your clan or nation. Like we know the effect that circle has for those who see it on the map. So why not translate that into something greater than a side-attraction, or last resort? So many good changes, but map play is still nonexistent and NA still feels empty. Please consider the use of such things.

Simply a page to look up current fleets in your nation. Info would include leader, member count, and area of operation. Fleets can be open/private. Open fleets allow anyone to join without requiring the leader to send out invites. This would make it easier for players of similar mind to team up and coordinate within the game.

Subtle and immersive, +1

The redeemables don't carry over, the tutorial rewards don't carry over either anymore I think. If you haven't done the tutorial then there's still opportunity to receive some items.

It would be cool if victory conditions were implemented and defeated nation would get absorbed by the victor, and towards the end of the current campaign it was like two giant alliance between coalitions. That would be totally sweet and better than just a periodic reset.

That's much better than what it is now. Ports having pre-determined bonuses makes things interesting. resets not so much, but it may be necessary to save defeated nations

NNOOOOOO SWEEEDEN

That's sort of the point. If the looting mechanic disrupts the flow of battle what even is the purpose? Choose between winning a battle and keeping the loot. That's a choice I would rather not have to make, especially considering what drops from sunken ships can be so valuable and the whole point of a battle.

Why not add a grapple button to pull wrecks towards your ship? I've been playing Shogun 2 now that I have time at home, ships in that game shoot one grapple as a tether and use it to swing around you, I've seen this effect in Sea of Thieves also.

I like the idea of the change, but I'm afraid the DM side of things will hold it back. For one, ships did not sink from damage to the gun decks, only below the water line. Masts did not fall unless their rigging was compromised, even chopped from the base a mast would still stand as long as it was supported by the rigging and everything else. It's a good step, but unless you see through to it that you fledge it out all around then it may fall short and end up another half-baked feature that spoils over.

Well there are limitations on what can be done, but I think it's a must to attempt at a solution. I would compromise if every ship had the option to fit swivels. Swivels along the deck and in the tops, that you shoot like regular cannons (but not tied to cannons to avoid the accuracy bug) It's enough to give the function served by small arms fire, and maybe effectiveness could be determined by combination of all boarding mods a ship has. So everything from musket count, grenade bonuses, and anything else related would influence the power, reload, penetration, etc of the guns It's not perfect but a very general solution to just get a glimpse of what we're missing.

Maybe what you're asking is not the right question. Just because you buff some numbers doesn't make the game authentic. You're asking for boarding mechanics, not musket buffs but actual musketry as you would hope to see.

Normally muskets would be going off at all times when in range, regardless of being locked into a grapple. This game only simulates half of what muskets really did, same with boarding cannons.