The Geth

If you're at 350, you shouldn't be gaming. End of story. Kindly consider dredging your connection out of the shitter before you attempt anything further. Also, in what world is 128<100?

128 constant, boi. And when my ping spikes (which it does quite often), I have issues alright, but it's in sailing and gunnery, not with boarding. Again, if you're relying on the last-second switch, newsflash: you're doing it wrong, son.

This really is not how you win a round of boarding combat. If you're relying on changing your selection at the last second, you're already doing something wrong. And tactics aside, everything in the game is ping-dependent to varying degrees. We can never hope to fully balance gunnery or sailing for players with poor connections. It's not the dev's responsibility to make up for a player's connection being awful.

Yeah, no. Try boarding combat between players in lineships that both have marines 15 and you'll see differently.

"Unless, of course, I wanted you not to believe the truth, even if I told it to you." Think of it more like Liar's Dice: a game of deception. But that assumes you have enough crew and prep; if you don't, you're as good as sunk already.

You're repeating yourself, I'm afraid. If you have a problem with how Elite AI perform, that's for the devs to address. The boarding minigame is not at fault.

That's quite alright, m'dear! You're precisely the kind of person that makes my combat mark grind so easy. 😉

Well I mean, yeah. Elite AI don't play by a lot of rules, we know that. In gunnery and sailing and durability, too. Boarding is no different; adjust your tactics accordingly.

As someone who makes ~95% of their PvP kills through boarding, I must say that you have a point in that it's not exactly immersive. It's always felt like a stopgap minigame, but it's also rather unlikely to change. As Greg notes, it's a lot like chess. Once you understand it, you can throw some boarding mods on and roflstomp your opponents, both AI and players. Prep early, prep often, and have the crew advantage. Send false signals to enemy players with your focus whistles, have boarding focus on before the battle starts, etc. Don't beat yourself up if you're having trouble learning it. It's not easy. Cheat sheet here, if you're looking for one, but it'll take practice before it becomes second nature.

As @Eyesore says, you'll be able to recoup the 1000 doubloons reeeeeal fast. That's 1 good PvP kill's worth. Even AI combat ships in the open world frequently carry upwards of 500 doubloons in their hold. And actually, 1000 doubloons for 50 x 32pd carronades is not an awful deal, especially when considering just how easy doubloons are to accrue. That's like saying you could get 150 x 32pd carronades for the price of one labour contract. I saw a labour contract in Tumbado today listed for 150k reals, which would make each carronade worth 1k reals. And that's marked-up, as all things at Tumbado and LT are. You did pretty well, I think!

As a Prince main, this piques my interest to nigh-obscene degrees. @admin, pls.

Well that's possibly the most retarded thing I've ever heard. That clan clearly wasn't worth your time anyway, if they're that prone to hysterical paranoia.

So what I'm hearing is that hard-coded, official in-game diplomacy is a solution to the issue of RvR's relative unpopularity. And personally I'd agree, but this raises the question: does @admin plan on (re)implementing such a thing? It's not in the roadmap, at least.

Wait, there's a limit? Why, though? Even having one at all seems arbitrary and unnecessarily restrictive.

Here's my Brandenburg copy, as promised! It's a bit silly, really; hilariously overpowered for its displacement. This is by far the best option I've been able to come up with for the Pre-dreadnought Conflict mission. Perhaps not as fun as my monstrous armoured cruiser design, but it's at least pretty to look at.

My masterpiece is complete. This monstrosity is the best balance of weight, cost and overall capability I've been able to devise for the CA option in the Pre-dreadnought Conflict mission. I personally still prefer my Brandenburg copy to this (will post that with stats later), but where's the fun in just two funnels? Actually, where's the fun in any design with less than five, amirite? 😜

Same here.

Great post, the points you make are really quite sensible. The tradeoffs you've mentioned also seem reasonable enough for serious consideration. This does deserve developer attention.

Actually, negative roll angle causes your ship to roll less, as far as I can tell. Pretty sure it's a good thing; easier to aim guns while underway, harder to be holed below the waterline, etc. Additional Ballast is an upgrade that purely trades speed for a decreased roll angle, for instance.

I'd be inclined to go with this definition, though it would be great if a dev could provide clarification. I've always been told that increasing the "jib" characteristic improves your top speed while sailing upwind (basically making your ship more triangle-rigged), while improving mainsails does the same for leeward sailing.