Bach

I don't think you can exempt that docked 3rd and higher rates. Currently outpost tax tops out at 50k. Which isn't all that much. So we all buy an outpost on every front, capture a free 3rd rate and let it sit there till we want to use it. This allows a Zerg nation to flex its muscle on all front at all times. It also allows each player a half dozen free rate ships or more. As such I think we should tax those ships stationed in ports. They still have 700 crew on them to be fed.

I was thinking of this the other day. NA is as Zerg centric as any sandbox game. That's just natural. In EVE all ships are built and have one dura. This is a big deterant to huge all top end ship zergs. Doesn't stop them but it makes the Zerg make up more mixed than all top end ships. In NA all ships are capturable and building them under the current Econ is fairly easy. So NA zergs are essentially high tech zergs that are largely free to minimal costs. Leaving very little deterant to Zerging. In real life the Spanish armadas weakness was the huge cost and build times to put a Zerg together. As such it suffered from being poor in quality and high cost. Once it was broken there was no replacing it by the Spanish. I wouldn't mess with the ship capture mechanic. It's one of the best parts of the game. So what I suggest is to put in a reason for a nation not to over Zerg their neighbors without it costing them. What if there governments had to pay for maintaining a Zerg? It would be a realistic deterant. This could be seen in game simply as a tax levied on everything a player in that nation. The rate of such tax would fluctuate with the number ports and rate ships docked by the whole of the nation. Government has to pay colonial forts upkeep, soldiers and hundreds of man crews. So say the dominant map team zergs ports greater than a number X. They get a progressive tax hike for every port they own > X. Players that own rate ships get a personal tax increase for each rate ship they have docked in game. The end result is owning ports you don't need gets expensive. Capturing third rates and staging them all over the map gets expensive.

I'm curious. What actually happens if Marell just decides to sink the players cutter? I believe it's just negative xp? or is there something more?

I wouldn't be opposed to the third nation in one battle option if the game engine can handle it. Basically I look at it like this: A French Cutter sailing the Channel spies an English frigate going after a fat merchant. Well it's better that cargo go to the bottom than fall into British hands to be used against us. So the cutter charges in and sinks or boards the merchant. I'm sure in real life this happened a time or two. The mechanic preventing the British frigate from firing on the French cutter isn't all that realistic. As far as the argument regarding the Purge, I was monitoring that last night and it was mentioned that they were observing green on green rules. Which just means the green on green mechanic needs looking into and possibly adjusting. It's an Alpha. That's what we are supposed to be doing.

Oh it was. Mostly a lot of jokes on TS and fun all around. No one took it all that seriously at all so it became a lot of light hearted fun. Not so much for the pirates though. Some were typing stuff in local that would make a sailor blush.

To be fair, if the pirates were not trying to PVE all the time this tactic wouldn't have worked so well. But it sure was fun. I spent most of the night sailing a privateer but actually began to regret it as the basic cutter proved more advantageous. The Priv is just too specialized upwind. Good for boarding but in the end a free basic cutter is just about as good and is faster downwind.

I just don't get it. Why join the Yanks?

Whom is the WIS representative and do you gents have a website?

Spain isn't dead until Spain decides it's dead. It's almost impossible to totally remove anyone from this game that doesn't want to be removed. The problems I have been noting is that a lot of us are still walking around with POTBS paradigms that simply need not apply here. I'm playing France in PvP2 and as you might have noticed we have a similar Zerg problem. The first thing we realized is a lot of the French were solo mission running near the Capitol. Basically they had all their leveling, money and Econ in one basket. Similar to POTBS everyone was essentially just solo grinding fleets (mission grinding in NA) with the mentality that you needed to level up to compete. Which in POTBS was true. So once the pirates took half of all the home ports these players were totally demoralized. But in truth they did this to themselves by putting all their eggs into that one basket. Money - I make more money off pvp against pirates and the occasional trader NPC than I have ever made in missions. Yesterday we sunk 5 of 6 pirate frigates in our brigs. It was 760xp and around 17k gold. That's just one fight. Granted a long one but still. XP - there is no point leveling up past the ships you intend to use in this game. Unlike POTBS a level 7 captain in a cutter has nothing on a well skilled level 1 in the same cutter. Once you can sail a Cerb get off the leveling ladder and have some fun. Owning ports - conquest is the name of the game only for those that choose it to be so. There is no map winner here and no map reset to wait for like POTBS. But the ports aren't really that important. x3 good Econ ports is enough to feed and entire squadron. The rest are just nice to have. If you can't defend a territory in one part of the map just move to one you can. There is far more strategy and play style potential in NA than POTBS. Your not beat. Your morale is just low. Contact Slamz in game (pvp2).We'll help you out.

Actually, most of us were inclined to ally and eventually fight the USA. Somehow we've gotten 180 degrees away from that. Good point on the trader teleports. It would force them to have to cover the free cities on the battle front. I don't think you need the Capitol for material production. It's only real value is to kick start new players joining the nation. In a game that is essentially "capture the flag" the Capitol is generally considered an indicator of your level of success. At least it is to an observer just joining the game. Simply ask this question to any person that noticed and bought the game today and joins France. On their own and after looking at the map he'll probably reroll. It won't be any different for pirates. So as a nation there should be some responsibility and pride in the Capitol. If you don't have that then none if the strategy stuff I mentioned matters. As for the USA not getting flags to the Antilles, we both no it's inevitable. If they actually got organized and planned they could be on our doorstep in three days and there wouldn't be a lot we could do about it.

I'll have a go at this. Serious like too without the trolling stuff.#1. True. But shallow ports neutralize the advantages of firepower and economy. A smaller less advanced force with higher captain skills can do more harm to a game super power anytime you can force them to fight for shallow water. I think the Devs were wise, knowing when this game goes live, that the pirate nation will likely always be a nation in transition as players constantly join the game pirate and quit. All those shallow ports in the Bahamas would account for this human nature effect. It's just that in the Alpha we're all playing for keeps because we're the more serious players. One of the attraction to the southeast corner of the map for Purge was the presence of shallow water ports. Which allows us to be more competitive despite the French xp lag. #2. Yes. But part of this is by player want and not necessity. We all want to sail the big ships but supporting them and making full use of them requires more of a national team style. Otherwise it's just a big NPC hunting machine that event ion some wolf pack is going to sink. The big ships are all shiney sparklies at this stage of the game. #3. Perhaps, but I have been finding this economy extremely flexible. More often than not I just sail captured ships. Trader NPCs are enough to sustain shallow water vessel production. There is only a need for a solid production base if you want a special frigate with dura on it. I have to hand it to the devs. It is much harder to completely stop an opponent in NA vs deep space EVE. #4. No argument here. #5. I would go along with this 100% except for one aspect. You have advertised the heck out of where your production base is by taking so many ports. One or two inconspicuous ports and a side deal with the locals and you can secretly produce fleets. There is no doubt in the super powers minds right now that they will have to take the Antilles to stop pirate potential counter strikes to the North. Further it advertizes you are teleporting in your best ships. If it were me, I would surround MT, assign clans to blockade MT to just bottle up your ships. If I combined the blockades with the port timers I could make the amount of hurdles you had to go through to mount any counter offensive more complex than the average player would want to deal with. #6. I can't totally agree to this one based on my answer to #5. A teleport based supply chain has Achilles heals that don't play well with any kind of mass attacks to the enemy rear. The routes are to few and predictable. A numerous enough opponent could possibly cover them all. A dispersed hidden supply chain, similar to WW2 German, built around the fringes of multiple fronts would be much harder to stop. I have to admit, I love the strategic potential of this game.

This is how I saw it at Kingstown as well. The Pirate momentum was going well up until that turn back and then you lost the momentum. It gave the French time to build up at Towers 3 with a wind angle for a fighting withdrawal to tower 4. This is where the tide turned as the Pirate advance stalled. Boucaniers... I like it! It's got a ring to it.

I like this idea. It wouldn't remove a Zerg nations advantage but it would temper it down just a bit.

Monsieur Mountbatten, you should endeavor to contact Kiefer Cain.

I could suggest a few things. Playing against zergs in EVE was always my thing. Without getting into specifics basically what Slamz eluded too. You have to scramble things up for them. Anyway, given the current state of events and you choosing to be our enemy Zerg I'll have to show you how it's specifically done in game.