Prater

They usually patch at the end of the week so when it is an extended downtime it means they are patching. That means new content and trying to tweak existing issues. Expect downtime just about every Thursday or Friday. Luckily for me I am usually at work during the time they patch

What does unsynchronized mean in the damage log?

Demasting a victory (warning, large picture): Shot ID 117, I destroyed the bowspirit with a ranging shot. It showed up in the log as "unsynchronized" Shot ID 144 destroys the foremast Somewhere between shot 156 and 177 I destroyed the main mast Shot ID 208 I destroy the mizzen mast. It shows up as unsynchronized Not shown, I did 100.1 damage with 2 hits to the masts of a brig in this battle, without destroying any masts. (warning, large picture of damage log in spoiler)

If your topgallant gets shot off, the pennant is still there:

Had this happen to me. Chustler aimed as low as he could go, and still could only hit my topgallants because his ship was heeling so much.

Just as long as people have a very strong reason to strike. Why strike if it doesn't really matter? That's why I propose keeping crew and officers if you strike, and not losing as much standing with your nation.

I'm just trying to come up with smaller ships for privateer use/merchant use. I'm basically just naming off random ships. I don't have plans. I think we really need to add a more heavily armed schooner. USS Rattlesnake (1813) 14 gun brig USS Ranger (1777) 18 gun sloop of war USS Enterprise (1799) 12-14 gun schooner America (20 guns) This is considered a type of corvette. Originally a "fast sailing East Indiaman, of about 400 tons. Soon after war[1812] was declared, her whole upper deck was removed. She became a corvette." HMS Port Royal 18 gun brig USS Pickering (1798) 14 gun schooner General Pickering 16 gun schooner? Golden Eagle 22 gun schooner Tyrannicide (1776) 14 gun brig

Thinking about why a player would decide to surrender rather than sink.... Like Johny Reb, I also do not like the reason for surrendering to be lower repair costs. But why would a player choose to surrender over fighting to the death? Someone mentioned to keep officers. I like that idea. Perhaps you get to keep your crew as well and it is hard to "level up" your crew and officers? Perhaps your "relation" or "standing" within your nation doesn't go down as much as well? So you still have access to the same "level" of ship (say Constitution) if you strike your flag before you sink. If you sink you could get closer to getting "bumped down" to Trincomole or even lower or something like that. There are many ways that we could make surrender more preferable than straight up fighting till you sink. And If my ship does get sunk, it should be sunk. It should be like in Eve where when a ship blows up, it is gone and has to be replaced (but ships should not be the main driving factor of the economy). There should be no higher "repair" cost. The cost is to get a new ship, crew, and officers. If players are given ships instead of "buying" them with their own money, then the player will have to convince the admiralty to give them a decent ship, costing "prestige" or "reputation." Perhaps the admiralty gives me a smaller ship instead of that super sweet frigate that I foolishly lost. That said, there should be a very strong appeal for people to take prizes. It should be the main way of making money and increasing reputation for those in the navy. And also, if my ship gets captured, it should now be given to the enemy nation who captured my ship and placed in a pool of available ships. I shouldn't get it back. My nation shouldn't get it back unless there is some kind of trade. 1st rates should be rare, and it should be the desire of every person to capture a first rate instead of sink it, even if you yourself don't directly get it, the bonus to your nation and the prestige and prize money you get from it should be considerable. A way to fix part of the issue of sinking has to do with armor and water intake. Leaks should be the primary thing that cause a ship to take water (outside of storms and collisions of course). Hitting the top part of the side of a ship until all the armor is gone shouldnt cause a ship to sink. It should cause more gun damage and crew damage. Ships will still sink. I can't count the amount of times I have sunk because of leaks. I even sunk once or twice so fast in the victory that I still had 2 repairs left. If shot dispersion is increased, some shots will go high, damaging sails and masts. With the loss of guns, rigging and crew, the sinking of ships should be less common. This can even be implemented in the current team deathmatch games and still be fun. There have been a few times in the current pvp system where I have lost and I just want to hit "strike flag" and surrender so the match doesn't have to draw out for 2 minutes while the enemy has to sink me. All this said, it is still a game. It might not be "realistic" for ships to sink often in battle, but neither is the amount of battles we are having, the speed of ships, reload rates, time within battles, etc. There has to be concessions to game play over "realism" someplace and ships sinking should still be quite possible for gameplay reasons. I do however think we will see ships being captured in open world rather than sunk if prizes are a major way to make money and prestige.

I haven't seen many masts get destroyed since that day and I haven't seen any in the past few days at all. I still don't know how I lost to you in that match. I think I had pretty much full health and you were just a floating hulk yet somehow I messed it up.

Northern, is that the whole damage log? I swear I was the first to fire on you in both games with a whole broadside from a victory and I was using solid shot. I didn't see anyone else fire at you and in both games saw your fore mast go down right when my volley hit you. Im pretty sure at the time your mast went down on my screen I was the only one firing. Maybe my game was lagging and the smoke and sound wasn't registering on my game and someone else was firing but I guess there is no way for me to tell if that was the case or not. That happened to me a few times the last few days where I was taking massive damage but my client wasn't registering broadsides from the ship next to me. But your damage log doesn't show any shots from a victory (42, 32, 24, and 18lbers) and I was the first to hit you in both games or I at least hit you around the time your mast actually fell if other people were hitting you as well.

I had a fight a week or two ago where I was in a constitution fighting a Trincomole and several smaller craft. After sinking the Trin, I boarded a lynx and easily won. However my ship was sinking so I switched to the lynx and then fought a cutter and lynx a bit until I sunk. That was an awesome match. In several other matches I have boarded the enemy, especially when I am going to sink. People usually get upset with me when I do this because it stops damage progression. Currently (as far as I know) we aren't rewarded for killing crew so there isn't any point to boarding or using grape shot when we "level up" by causing sail or hull damage. The only time it is worthwhile is if a larger ship is going to be sunk by several smaller ships. The larger ship needs to board the smaller ships so as to quickly remove ships from combat because it is almost impossible for a smaller crew to defeat a larger crew and it doesn't matter what tactic is chosen. However, if the crews are nearly even, boarding actions are nerve wracking as you have to attempt to guess what the other captain is going to tell his crew to do and you have no indication until the same moment when both of your tactics are revealed. If you choose the wrong thing, it could mean losing the boarding action because you lose just enough crew to tip the balance against you. I am guessing crew moral and quality needs to be added, otherwise it is impossible for smaller crews to win against larger crews. However, such things don't really fit into the sea trials/deathmatch style match.

Chain is for rigging, use balls to demast. So far if I purposefully fire a broadside in the victory above enemy decks I have not failed in knocking a mast down. I did it twice to northern yesterday and also against the ai. If the ship is coming straight at you and you fire into the sails, you have a good chance of knocking a mast down. I haven't failed yet to knock down a mast when using this tactic.

Players can sail through land as well, though on one of the maps after sailing through most of an island with full health I all of a sudden sank. It was the island that has detailed rock formations and vegitation. I've had npc Constitutions miss me. The ai seems to have a weird aiming issue. They either hit exactly at the waterline or miss several yards behind or ahead of you (with perhaps a few shots hitting you at your stern or bow). It doesn't seem to varry at all. If they hit you, they will always hit you (and exactly at the waterline). If they miss, they will always miss. If they partially hit you they always partially hit you for the rest of that match. It's like they are programmed to be either 100%, 25% or 0% every time they fire once the match starts.

You can start flooding (very slowly) well before your integretity is reduced to 0 and you have no leaks as well.

Yep, figured this out the hard way. I sunk in like 15 seconds in the surprise from only 1/3 and stable water. Changed to the other tack and I sank fast.

What are red red leaks vs the white ones?