Njord

I agree somewhat but understand their frustration. The free Pandora is a nice gift but it is not like Yacht. Nothing that says "Thank you for supporting the game during EA". You got one dude that got Pandora for free, being an EA tester and another next to him who bought the ship, there is no difference in game. I wonder what seatrials testers will say when Yacht becomes available as DLC.

I would assume that the majority of players in the game aren't teenagers with only pocket money either, I doubt many would have a problem forking up 30-50$ or whatever the price will be...

Not sure what the negative comments are about... how is it greedy or whiney to ask whether or not we can have something truely unique / exclusive and purely cosmetic as small gesture for our support of the game during EA ? Because let's face it, the Pandora itself won't be exlusive or unique at all ( and that is good because no ship with unique stats should ever be exclusive ). I didn't ask for a completely new ship exclusive to EA players, only for a paintjob and maybe a flag. Also I didn't demand or complain, it was a neutral request. Like come on guys, really? I'd rather have Yacht and buy Pandora to support the game.

@admin What is the difference between "Yacht" and "Yacht Silver"?

Everyone realizes the problems caused by alts, that is not the point. The point is you can't do anything about someone buying a second account. So you are saying there is no way I could have more than one phone number? Also dota2 is probably the most alt account infested game I've ever played and it is actually legal to connect the same number to two different accounts. That feature is to improve account security, not to prevent multiple accounts ( which would be an absolute ridiculous endeavour for a free2play title). How would you know what account is whose alt? Even ignoring that there are fake IP programms and everything, there could be two siblings playing on the same PC? You want to visit everyone at their home and ask them about their accounts? Should be obvious, that there is no way to know or police this, even if the devs tried really hard to prevent the extra $$$ coming in.

Hear, Hear! The voice of reason. This is true for me aswell... but only because I can rank up in PvP. I also understand why they want to remove it, despite being promised otherwise. Fine by me. That being said, only rank xp. If the ship xp and books will be wiped too, I am done however ( unless they are removed from the game completely and are not replaced by some similar BS ). I wouldn't even be mad... had a lot of fun with the game and played it more than enough. I simply don't see myself grinding all this shit again for no reason ( new players lose anyways every time, so it's no excuse ).

I agree with you guys, in that the Pandora is nothing special, if you can buy it as DLC but I really don't want to see a ship with unique stats that is exclusive to testers. I'd rather see some reskin like Yacht for Cutter, that is only cosmetic and thus balanced.

Yeah, all this moaning about full wipe and even / fair playing field is kind of retarded, if we consider that the 2 free DLC ships every 24h will definitely not be wiped. So some people having access to the most potent ( not to say massively overperforming in every aspect other than boarding ) 5th rate and also the best shallow boarding ship, while others start in basic cutters is even playing field but testers getting to keep some xp and books is unfair / unbalanced? Bullshit.

Who would still buy the DLCs, if you could just redeem a bunch and let your mates capture them? Only people who want to burn through them in PZ or something similar... I sure wouldn't buy a DLC, if I could simply sail out and capture the ship for free from some noob ( or be given by a mate through his alt... ).

Honestly, regardless of that it should definitely be available to everyone to keep it balanced and fair and with the high price maybe help funding the further development or at least keep the servers running as long as possible ( not sure if you plan on further updating and improving the game post release ). The only thing exclusive to testers about pandora should be as special skin / paint that would not impact gameplay. Cosmetic and prestige rewards / upgrades is always the better choice over those that impact gameplay directly and mess with balance. Entirely out of curiousity, do you already know what the price will be?

Yes, it is supposed to become 24h cd redeem like already existing DLC ships but free for EA testers. And I have to say the 10 bucks it would cost me after release is a rather meager reward compared to the hundreds of hours I spent playing / testing the game. Most games give special and exclusive decals, titles, flags, skins etc. for testers, sometimes with different tiers.

Normally I would agree with this sad truth but for NA it is a somewhat different story. Not only is it a niche game that aims at a very specific audience, there is also this vast map that needs a lot of players on it, to make the "mmo" part work. A mmo without enough players is no mmo, it becomes a online single player game. It only gets worse when we also add the fact, that NA relies on player on player interaction as the major part of content ( not much to do otherwise, if you don't enjoy bashing AI alone or collecting pixel gold that you don't have any purpose for ). So every lost player hurts the game more than people seem to understand or want to admit. If I buy a mmo on steam, log in and see 300 players online worldwide, that would be a immediate refund. And then of course there is also this: All friends that I could get into the game were very hesitant and concerned about the reviews first. The low rating and high entry price, even with 4 DLC's is a real killer for any mmo. If I did not know what a great game NA is, I would avoid it like the plague judging from the steam page alone.

I feel like testers getting Pandora for free is a nice gesture but not really a fitting or exclusive enough reward. That being said Pandora should be available to everyone, not only testers. So I would like to see a special paint for Pandora that is exclusive to EA testers. A paint job with different tiers or several different ones would be even more sick, the more time someone spent playing / testing NA, the more details and colours on the skin. Or simply make it so someone does not qualify for the skin, if they don't have minimum 500 ( just a suggestion that seems fair ) hours of play time on the account. There could also be a special flag for everyone that put more than 1k hours into the game pre release etc. ...

Well, the xp wipe being announced so close to release sure doesn't strongly suggest otherwise. I am glad we can not know for sure... talk about benefit of the doubt. Still, as long as we keep books and ship knowledge I will put up with it.

Yeah, cracks me up every time. It is like you have some poor peasant explaining to someone from the 1% how it would be better if everyone on the planet was poor and everyone started from 0. Can't lose what you don't have, ey? I agree, putting everything on supposed new player after release is walking a very thin plank. Would be better to please and cherish as many as possible of what is left from long term testers first and go from there but as long as books remain untouched I won't quit - not over rank xp. That being said I completely understand people being frustrated by xp wipe, considering it was promised to not get wiped. I only don't care about rank xp wipe because I enjoy PvP and it let's you rank up fast and easily. I think the reason behind this is, that they don't want veterans roaming around in SOLs trashing new players with the new boosted damage only a week after release. So ignoring what was said and promised about xp, I actually think it is better for the game to wipe rank or at least withhold rank xp for 6 months or so. Should be possible with xp redeemables, no?

Good to hear. I don't care about rank xp but I would not be willing to regrind the skill books only "because it's release". Rank xp is gained passively by playing PvP - no problem at all for me. One question tho: I understand "skill books" are the unlocks for the knowledge slots of a ship but what does "book" include? Crafting blueprints etc. ?

The benefit is diversity, additional options and more freedom of choice. What is the downside? 1-4% of the global population forced into the zerg, when they would rather play their own nation? They set themselves up for fail, if they fail. Nobody forces anyone to play for minority nations. For this to be the case, the following has to happen first: 1. New player selecting hardcore nation, despite warning on the nation selection. ( That's pretty stupid ) 2. New player unwilling to change nation after finding out about the situation on the hardcore nation, despite the fact that he has nothing to lose since he is new. 3. New player also unwilling to purchase the forger DLC to make his supposedly bad experience in the hardcore nation change. All new players that I have met / sailed with on prussia are happy with their nation choice and the help they receive from other players in the nation, tho admittedly they all seemed to enjoy PvP, even when losing. Haven't heard of anyone "stuck" in a hardcore nation either to be honest. Personally I would be willing to test how only 3 nations ( GB, Spain and France ) would work out, tho I imagine it would be much more boring. Removing only the 3 hardcore nations is out of the question in my opinion, as it would achieve nothing other than piss people sailing for them off. Prussia and Russia have more RvR power than most other non zerg core nations anyways, so if anything we would have to remove Dutch, Danes, US and Poles as those would be the ones that can compete the least in a large scale warfare of RvR.

Having more than a single HMS Victory is unhistorical, let's remove all except mine. Everyone else can sail the basic 3rd rate ( HMS Bellona can only exist once and is mine aswell btw ) but only after they served their nation for many years IRL time and after being promoted. We also need to have monarchs for the nations and if you don't do as they please, you will be kicked from the nation. Those monarchs will be chosen by admin and can not be changed ( I should be one of them ), democracy would not be historical after all. Pirates are not allowed to be a proper nation and they can not sail anything bigger than a medium frigate, they can not have access to any economy or crafting related mechanics other than smuggling (trading). The list goes on but you get the idea... kind of tried reflecting how egocentric some of you people are. The game has a lot of issues but too many nations is certainly not one of them - if some people don't like those nations they can simply not join them and remove all their ports from the map through conquest. Let everyone who enjoys sailing for those nations be and lubber off to your zerg nations. This is what the store page says about the game: "Naval action - open world multiplayer sandbox Naval Action is a hardcore, realistic, and beautifully detailed naval combat game ..." Notice how it says "sandbox"? It means players make the rules and shape the world in the game, not history books. Notice how it says "realistic", not "historical"? I could have understanding for this complaint, if they had added vikings with longboats and sea monsters but this is simply ridiculous. Naval action with 2-3 nations maximum ( and that is what you would end up with, if you would remove all nations that didnt matter much in the caribbean back then historically ) sounds boring AF.

I am not fond of this idea at all. For a game that is already so lacking in proper balance, this does not seem feasible without ruining nation balance completely. They could, however, give every nation a specific refit that would only drop in the capitals and the "home ports" ( where their clan warehouse is located ) of the 3 leading RvR clans by ports owned in the nation. The refits would have to be balanced properly and every nation would need one. We already have British, Spanish, French and Pirate refits. Dutch refit could give more hold space like banished suggested and Prussians could get "Prussian / Hessian boarders" to reflect their history of superior infantry, for example. US / American refit could give + thickness / armor to reflect their steady supply of heavy woods like quercus virginiana ( live oak ). Every nation would still be able to use every refit, if they can get their hands on it.

Fir/fir/shabby with crooked hull, cotton sails and lead sheathing?

Could be a DLC expansion, that makes the US west coast available and maybe even asian ship types that can only be built on the west coast. Just needs a free town on the west coast, where the asian hardcore nations start from. Could be two completely separate maps or connected. Traders used to sail all across the world and oceans to maximize profits, after all...

I agree with @Sella22, the more nations the better. Maybe we get enough players some day to actually add more parts of the world to the map, like the west coast. The more freedom and diversity in a mmo, the better it is. I agree with you in that having only 3-4 nations would not be very interesting and also limit PvP and RvR targets a lot. The more factions there are, the more conflicts are possible. Sandbox mmo game means the players can decide how the world takes shape, not the history books. GB already has the advantage with most players and their base in the center of the map with Jamaica, give a bonus to Spain that gives their capital some of the best trade routes and it will be historically accurate enough. GB will have most players and Spain most $$$. Every discussion about historical accuracy is pointless anyways as long as we have disney pirates... if anything has to change about nations, pirates will have to become actually hardcore first and we can start any further historical argumentations from there. Best for the game would be to leave nations as they are now, maybe add Portugal.

I don't even mind the GB zerg ruling the server as it is historically somewhat accurate, I just wish the smaller nations had some incentive to fight the empire instead of simply joining it...

Yeah, very true but I would argue not for NA... The small changes that happened in NA were mostly for the better, the game didn't change much but is improving very very slowly. The only significant deterioration in NA is in player numbers, which is understandable given the limited content, time consuming nature of game mechanics and slow paced development.