Slim McSauce

Drama doesn't really create content in any significant way. It's more of an act only those already invested are interested in. If drama created content NA would have no shortage of it, but chart numbers show stagnation for many months. Has anything substantial been added as of late that could be considered significant? The only thing that comes to mind is DLC macro transaction which tore big chunks out of the eco game. When was the last considerable step forward for NA? It wasn't port bonuses, it wasn't gold ships. It wasn't extra currencies. Not really seeing anything ground breaking. So maybe that explains the lack of growth. As for the topic, mast resistence is already almost nearly zero-sum. All it takes is an any combination of mast mods to become immune in a battle of equal tonnage. Though it could be a useful investment in shallow battles where mast are flicked off anyways thanks to oversized carronades.

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All bonuses are sugar, really. The ships themselves are balanced. Wood types, mods, even books are decadence for the fantasy crowd. We never needed any of these things (See NA:Legends) or classic NA; just authentic combat. That's all that's neccessary for a good game.

It's not the best timing, one must admit.

Hyper accurate/gyro stabalized guns.

Jump points like E.V.E across continents. Set coastal sailing speed back to a natural <15 knot state. Open ocean travel is not a strength of NA

Servers can't be split at this point. I don't have to remind anyone the old US server. The game DOES have too many nations and not enough coalition. If you did split servers, the problem gets worse because you have half the population spread between the same number of nations. The source of the issue is TIMERS. Timers take the spread of playerbase of 12ish nations and multiplies it. It's just too simple of a fact that no one clan can be available for all hours of the day, and the same can be said for some nations even. So what really can be done? Obviously alliances are a start. I think that can be agreed on? It should be at least. Timers, PBs and Hostilities should be looked at next. We've had these battles for YEARS with very little in the way of alterations. They're the same from what they were, even before the Open World part of it. I think we're about due for an overhaul, because everything we do is for the port, essentially, that's the goal of regions It's not going to solve much to split up the playerbase further between servers. The problem IS split between nations and through timers. The solution is coalencing these aspects, so players can have RVR at any time without that time granting advantage to any one side. So maybe get rid of timers all together and make PBs into PCs (port campaigns). Something which would take place over the span of many battles, perhaps days of conflict scored in a manner that doesn't reward zerging and avoiding certain timeslots.

Denying a free fight? Does that really happen? Lol

The only thing spoiled is the taste in someone's mouth when they sail across the map only to find the game forgot to mention there is no way to smuggle themselves into a port.

- You will respect everyone and not use such posts in this forum. Warning issued - Hethwill, the moderation team

You think everyone is the same and they'll pick a nation with most ports instead of taking it into consideration to join the underdog, or the nation that is neither top not bottom. Also difficulty levels fall apart outside starting zones. You can't definitively say any nation is easier than another. ALSO labeling nations in such a way would actually lead to what you say, people picking what the developers call "easy mode nations" because a new player would be led to believe that is accurate when it's not. An actual map of active territory is more accurate than going off difficulty levels which is just mere speculation and theory.

I wouldn't put it in the chat, I would put it on the map. NA still has a problem of conveying what's actually going on to the point that if you were to curiously log in, you would see almost nothing indicating wars, conflict, relations, or events. To someone who didn't spend the initial 2-3 hours of tracking chat for call outs and kill reports, you would assume nothing actually happens in the game world and that the only thing taking place was idle chatter, pure chance sailing encounters and the odd PB.

lets be honest, it's about pooling a fleet of ships that anyone can pick from or only certain people can pick from with restrictions so when pvp afronts and people are scrambling for fits you can assure your clan is well prepared in predictable and well suited crafts for the task at hand. The mere transfer of ship is an underselling of the value a feature like this has.

The combat in NA falls a bit short and is held back by some technical limitations, such as being unable to support deck combat that old total war and new UA titles feature. That's a tough critique because we know it's the technical limits that are the reason for that, but of the design for gunnery, I think the ease of aiming, use of gyro stabilization and the overall accuracy of the ship's guns created a dilemna of; how do we balance damage models when skilled player can land their entire broadside on a single masts? Not by chance but a very effective, almost too effective result of just how point-and-click ship to ship gunnery is in NA, and how it detracts from the total accurate representation of the combat. As for the rest of the combat model, it varied from update to update and from the point of the introduction of the structure bar, onwards had various flavors and too me the best era was the one with the most balance, which has to be the months after austerity which fielded many variety of roles. Then gold ships were introduced and ships which had upsides and downsides became homogeneously better than their counterparts. You can make a case that individual ship balance doesn't compete on the same level as group balance, but I liked when there was more certainty about the capabilities of the ships you faced. Too many variables and stat chasing widened the gap further, beyond reasonable for the setting of the game. Combat could have definitely gotten better treatment if that was the only focus. 7/10 OW was a disaster and I'm not sure if anything but a list of mistakes could be drafted from it....4/10 Overall 6.5/10. The engine is out of date and the technology behind NA is obsolete. sorry to say, further development for NA would be charity. Nothing to be gained at this stage. ;c new game time!

I think NA had a good run for a niche mmo inspired and created by an indie dev studio located somewhere deep in the Ukraine territory. World politics aside I think they did O.K with the combat, presentation and all. O.W. being an unmitigated disaster. I would have rather had the combat instance fleshed out completely more than anything. Storms would have been cooler than the OW since in this game's development that was an actual choice that had to be made weather or not we can include those conditions into the shared server space. Decisions like that don't put you in a good position. O.W could have been done a lot better, and I mean A LOT better. It was all about the map and people looking at it and knowing exactly where to go. All the information one would need should have been right there on the map. Map tools and lack of insight gained from the map was really draining though it really captured the days at sea feeling NA:II should take a page from the UG:/UA:AoS playbook and ditch the eco for logistics, take a serious crack at being a platform to expand on.

Automatic tow to nearest port after every battle. More emphasis on initial tags instead of repeated ones aimed at delaying for reinforcement. It's already unrealistic that after sails hundreds of km in battle you're let out in the exact same spot you were tagged in. Though from a realism standpoint tow to port doesn't quite hit the mark, its certainly more efficient from a design standpoint to get players to commit entirely on a single tag. There's already in incongruency where a ship can be faster in battle, but slower on OW which causes a lot of problems. In my opinion there is no ideal to be reached, this iteration of Naval Action cannot be made to work to a degree that is satisfactory because the engine wasn't designed with Over World initially in mind. NA was designed as an Arena game first and foremost and it shows with how incompatible the two instances are. Lots to learn for the successors to not make the same mistake, but as for MMO's this has been one of the better ones despite it's flaws. Don't consider me writing anything off, but know that all good things come to an end.

Yep I feel as if both are sort of lacking from one another. What is war without the occasional peace? Accommodations should've been made from the beginning, because the option to be a civilian merchantman, or recreational non-combatant is not there on the War server. The game assumes everyone is at war with each other at all times, which imo isn't good sandbox. Mutual duels on Peace is not toxic because there is not a culture obligating you to take the battle. I think it would be beneficial as an option.

If you're still excited keep going. If you're like me you've achieved whatever it was you wanted to achieve in NA. For me, there's no content worth grinding out the hundreds of hours, I've had all the battles, I've seen the war and in the end no one wins. When people get to the point where money is not an issue, and their ships outmatch the average by 20+ percent in all aspects, they continue to take joy from it. That wasn't me, hitting the top is boring. The rise was the fun part, but once you hit the top you may realize what's up there is unsustainable.

I agree, let the games begin!

When the first green on green battle is had because someone broadsides another for not leaving their battle, and that person decides to fire back, potentially sinking their aggressor in self defense, who will be in the wrong? The rules on this need to be laid out because it's only a matter of time.

Though I hate to knock NA, you can tell it was and is too ahead of it's time. Before we even had combat mechanics down we had an Open World and were running into all the problems associated with it, which have served to be nearly impossible to truly resolve due to engine limitations. I'm just glad to see the assets being used to their full potential. Ultimate Admiral:AoS is looking to be quite the flagship title for Gamelabs. I will definitely be considering picking it up full release.

Then comes the issue of once warning is given, an all out green on green battle happening which possibly sparks the beginning of green on green clan or even nation conflicts. None of this being mechanically supported in game would spell disaster, friendlies joining other friendlies, giving them warnings to leave and then sinking each other claiming rights to loot, XP, or battle join rights.

Sorry but this makes no sense. Why would pirates have a Nation, let alone a discord? You're an outlaw privateer, not a member of any collective force. -1 from me.

How toxic of him to steal your loot, though you are on the same side you should be working together. I would petition to your admiralty to have him labeled as a thief and a pirate to be taught a lesson. This should be possible in the sandbox. It makes more sense than having a pirate "nation"

You know, most of the idea's that have turned sour were not proposed by community but were implemented by surprise. Thing's that nobody asked for or even thought to ask for. The suggestions that reoccuringly show up in the forums, periodically by different types of player each time drumming up moderate support without fail are the ideas that are bouncing in the collective minds of NA players. Those are what we all want but how often do we have to ask before we get it? Is it even possible to count up how many threads have been made on raids and such? New mission types, blockades? It one patch to implement the most standard of pvp and economy missions and the effect of the change was so great we almost couldn't handle it. If each patch adding something new each time instead of trying to rewrite what's already in we would've had a killer game by now. Ideas that drum up hype and make people viscerally excited get no serious attention. Everything we get is to fix some problem. Port bonuses was suppose to save RVR. RVR is flawed in a different way, it's not accessible. It's shallow and repetitive and is dictated by clans and not nations. Battles have no dynamic to them, no landings, no supply logistics just the same groups of people playing COMP style NA. RvR somehow, although being the entire reason for Open World NA comes out as the same placeholder carryover from the original NA before OW. It's stale as can be, yet people want to "save" it. Not compatible!