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Here are my thoughts on how a Civil War Mechanic should work: 2 days to choose a side, 5 days to wage war, 20 day cool down. Within the same Nation, 1 clan Declares a Civil War against another clan via the Operations Menu / Civil War. From a drop down menu select a clan. (Only clans in your nation will show.) An automatic in-game email will be sent to everyone in said nation announcing the Declaration of Civil War from one clan on the other clan. (Clan X Declares Civil War against Clan Y.) All clans within that nation have 48 hours to choose which of those two clans they want to ally with. Any clan not choosing either clan is not privy to the following mechanics. In OW, all players from one allied side will see all players from the other side as "Traitor Player" rather than "Enemy Player". (Plz for the love of God change "Player" to "Captain".) They can attack each other, same as attacking someone from an enemy nation. ??? This battle will instantly close to everyone from every nation? ??? This battle will instantly close to only enemy nations? (The "Battle Side Locked" will prevent those in the Civil War from joining wrong side.) ??? This battle will have standard OW Battle Mechanics allowing enemy nations to join a side? (Would require listing the two Civil War clans in the Battle Info, so enemy nations can choose which side to help) Both Civil War Clans can raise hostility against each others' ports. Only those clans who chose a side can join in these hostility missions for whichever side they allied with. Port Battles will schedule the same as normal (24 hours after hostility completed) The Port Battle Winner owns said port after server maintenance losing 1 level on each Port Bonus. I'm no game coder, but it seems as whatever tag "Enemy Players" have it would be required that those within same nation would be required to have a Sub-Tag 1 (for one side) and a Sub-Tag 2 (for other side).

Consider recent Tribunals, apparently the Pirate Rules of Engagement have finally been defined. Pirates can join both sides of a battle. - obvious mechanic Pirate's own clan mates can choose both sides of a battle. - again obvious mechanic This mechanic does allow for the raising of BR to allow for more Pirates to join the opposing side of the battle. - seen in multiple Tribunals as a legal mechanic Pirates joining the side of the battle they wanted to raise BR on can leave the battle without firing on opposing Pirate side. - seen in multiple Tribunals as not punishable However, No one on any side is allowed to fire on anyone from their same side: No Green on Green firing. - as seen by Ink's Response Here If anyone is seen firing on teammates from their side then they are considered a target by that side and can be destroyed by the side they joined. TLDR: The Pirate RoE is defined as being allowed to join the enemy's side of the battle to raise BR, but cannot fire on the side they join, AND can escape as soon as possible without any Tribunal worthy punishment. Devs and mods can correct this if it is incorrect, but recent Tribunals over the last few months seem to correspond to my statements. How I believe Pirate RoE should work: Open World Battles Only Pirates can join both sides of a battle. Pirate clanmates MUST join same side. Pirates can be targeted by the enemy side AND by any nation joining on the Pirate side. - All verse Pirates on any side Pirate vs Pirate Battles Pirates should be able to tag and attack other Pirates not in their clan. Pirate clanmates MUST join same side. All nations can join the Pirate vs Pirate Battle Anyone from one Nation must join the same side as others from that Nation Pirate Port Battles Pirate Clans should be able to attack other Pirate Clan Ports.

"SAIL HO! Two points off the starboard bow!" This is a place where you can post sightings of enemy captains, or you yourself can post your own location, so people can find OWPvP easier. This obviously is directly related to a few recent posts of captains having a difficult time finding each other in this beautifully vast world, or directly complaining about other captains "hiding" in their safe zones. Here you will be able to find others to hunt. Examples: Someone else posting my location... "Dutch captain van der Decken was recently spotted in his Trincomolee around Cojoro in the Gulfo de Maracaibo between the hours of 09:00 - 12:00" or, Me posting my own location... "You can find me sailing around the Gulfo de Maracaibo between the hours of 09:00 - 12:00. Come get me!" Same thing would apply if a squadron ("clan" title in this game is inappropriate) of enemy captains were spotted, or if your squadron is hunting for other fleets. Feel free to make your post below and I will try to keep this OP updated weekly. FYI, another way you can find OWPvP is by posting in-game Global Chat your location. Either of these ways should ensure those who want PvP will indeed find it. It would have to be assumed that if those wanting PvP do not post here or in game obviously are not truly that interested in finding PvP. Date Server Time Nation Captain Name With Squadron Location 02-18 16:00 VP Hendrick van der Decken Yes Coquibacoa

There was a tagging incident 20 minutes ago in OW. A req + niag tried to tag a herc. 240 BR trying to tag 170 BR and they got a "BR too high" error message. If this isn't a bug then what are we missing or what could have caused it?

It would be nice if "recently killed" players would yield PvP marks IF they are part of an attacking party. Whether revenge fleet or random encounter, I run into "recently killed" players attacking me all the time. It sucks because I have to fight a battle and receive no reward, its just a waste of time. I understand the "recently killed" mechanic was introduced into the game to protect players from being farmed, but if the recently killed player is the one starting the battle, they do not need protection IMO.

Earlier Spain raised hostility at Congrios. A few of us tried to reinforce the defenders in a hostility mission, but @Mr Pellew and myself were unable to join a mission, because the join button didn't appear (We weren't in that battle before). I took a screenshot, but forgot to make an F11 because we were in a hurry to get to another hostility mission closeby, which we could join.

On numerous occasions I have noticed that spawning positions in battles seem somewhat random, even if you stay out from the small circle around the tagged ship. Happens to both PvE and PvP. @Havelock can confirm that I tagged him earlier today, was upwind on him alongside his port beam when timer ran out but when the battle started he suddenly appeared right on my bow, yet I was definitely outside the "small circle" surrounding his ship when the timer ran out. Maybe I've just missed something in Patch Notes about tagging, but its not cool to fight for a good starting position and then getting a rng starting position in battle?

There is a thread in tribunal right now brought by the Dutch about a case where one enemy clan member joined a battle on the Dutch side and the Dutch accuser called Green-on-Green. I don't want this to be a deliberation on the merits/evidence of this particular case. I wasn't there and neither were you. Or if you were, you should join in the tribunal thread. I am not suggesting guilt or innocence. The whole situation was caused by a -- in my opinion -- failed mechanic. Anyway... The accused explanation is that he was joining to just watch because the current mechanic sometimes (and unpredictably) doesn't allow you to join your own nation if one of the friendlies was flying the smuggler flag. We know this "flaw" exists and I believe the devs are working on a fix. The accused says he never fired a shot. @admin Anyway, in the future should we allow enemies to join just to watch or if they joined by mistake, to stay in the battle? I suggest no. Having a known enemy on your side in the battle is distracting even if the other guy just sits there. Since few of us are recording videos of all our battles, it is difficult to prove or disprove that nothing is done to hinder or influence the battle. If nothing else, you have an unfriendly monitor of your battle chat. Yes, the Devs can go back and check shot logs but I doubt they can recreate the battle without player provided video. Regardless, it takes valuable Dev time. Screenshots are limited in their information. I say that while we have the funky mechanic where one can actually join the side of your enemy, we observe a rule against it. It causes too many cases requiring Dev investigation and our ability to prove or disprove green-on-green actions is too limited. If you want to simply observe your nation in battle, sorry. Get someone to stream or record or listen to it on TS. If you join a side by mistake, disengage and leave the battle. It seems like such a rule would be far easier for tribunals to investigate: Accuser: Look, an enemy player joined on our side in the battle. Dev: That's not allowed. Accused: I joined to watch. Dev: That's not allowed. or Accused: I joined by mistake. Check the logs, I left 2 minutes later. Dev: Okay. Fair sails. Obviously there would be an exception for tournament play when a judge or streamer is needed.

I am getting tired of being denied PvP battles because my BR is too low. The Prince is my favorite open world hunting ship, the only downside is it cannot attack 4th rates (including Indiaman) or higher. I understand that a 6th rate shouldn't be able to attack 25 line ships, but attacking 1 Wasa is completely different. Can we find some middle ground here?

I thought I would put up a post since we're getting a lot of questions asking us who is allowed to be killed etc. I think it is wise to clarify it as a diplomatic based discussion This how the rules work Based on the Stance of the nation. NAP/Trade - ANY MILITARY SHIP IS ENGAGEABLE - Traders are left to trade freely. This means the trader is the leader of the fleet. It may have escorts that are military under AI control. Having military player escorts puts you in the engageable status WAR - ALL SHIPS ARE ENGAGABLE ANYWHERE - This is where RvR starts. NEUTRAL - ALL SHIPS ARE ENGAGEABLE. Sailing into national waters and killing is a move towards war. Trading is at own risk. RvR doesn't happen here you must declare a warning of war and the a War Dec. Warning of war can be via diplo channels or forums but a nation should have the opportunity to tell players to change their ways. ALLY - NO SHIPS ARE ENGAGEABLE in any waters. You can ask for fights with them but you shouldn't be trying to gank each other you are friends trying to have fun. So in clarification, unless there is an alliance in place ALL MILITARY SHIPS IN CONTROL OF A PLAYER is fair game to anyone. Doing it in their waters may lead to war but it is still all content. The diplomats should all be enforcing that OW PVP is encouraged for military ships. Traders are only at risk from people at war with them or general pirates. Nation Stances are at this post

We are all very much aware that roe is broken, revenge ganking etc. Could we not introduce into the admiralty store/pirate den a "chest of flags". The chest of flags is basically a chest of different nations flags, enabling players that are grouped up to display any nations flag to interrupt any attempt at tagging or being pulled into combat via an AI tag. Each "chest of flags" is a single use item that are stackable. Works on the same idea as hull/rig repairs. Item weight to be astablished at a later point. The chest of flags is designed to give the chance for the captain to interrupt a player made tag. In the simplest use of this item, when the tag is counting down each player of a party must right click on there "chest of flags" to interrupt the tag. All members of a party must each use the "chest of flags" to interrupt the tag otherwise they are pulled into battle like normal. Once a chest of flags is enabled the user is protected from being attackable for 90 seconds! (again only works against lesser br attackers or AI tags) "Chest of flags" only works in groups say min 5 people. "Chest of flags" can only be used to interrupt a tag from an enermy with less br. Or when AI is attacked and you are pulled in through the stupid roe range. Any attacker with equal or higher br, the "chest of flags" has no use. The "chest of flags" will cost *edit after pm* only 10 combat marks each! Open to extra ideas and suggestions.

Somebody came up with the idea that the tagging circle that we have right now should not go out from the attacker but the tagged ship. That would prevend every kind of splitting fleets abuse that are happening right now. What do you thing about it?

I'm hoping this thread can stay constructive. Please don't bother to use this as a place to whine about how much you hate the idea of a PVE zone in the Gulf coexisting on the same server as PVP. Unless the Devs change their minds, it's going to happen and unless there are things we don't know about its implementation, it is going to cause some pain points. Hopefully we as a community of PVP and PVEers can make some constructive suggestions about how to minimize these pain points. @admin if there is something we just don't understand about implementation, please clarify. BTW, I'm not saying I like all these "solutions" but I'm putting them out there for discussion. Community, please add pain points you see and possible solutions as well, Pain Point: Admin has indicated that players will be able to freely move between PVP and PVE. Also free ports will not exist in PVE zone. Still, assuming all resources can be obtained in the PVE zone, ship construction and resource accumulation can be accomplished in relative safety either by PVP players in the PVE zone or by ALTS specifically created for the purpose. Possible full or partial solutions: 1. Disable the ability to have ALTS or at least make it a huge pain to switch back and forth between characters. While I like this idea, I doubt it would get any traction. 2. Disble the ability to teleport characters and/or tow ships between the two zones. 3. Make some classes of ships or necessary mats not craftable in PVE zone. 4. Sink 'em as they come out. While it may sound like ithe border will be a target rich environment, the (roughly) north-south boundary between zones covers a lot of ocean. Solution: Choke points. For example in order to change your status from PVE to PVP you have to visit a friendly port in the PVP zone in order to "obtain your orders" or whatever we want to call it. Making folks exit the PVE zone through the straight of Florida might be another idea. What other problems do you see and how might they be solved?

I thought about this mainly with defensive tagging and screening issues (small ships wasting larger ships time) in mind. This idea is to open battle instances when ships get into cannon range, because thats when a real battle would have started. This might save a lot of sailing time in the battle instance and bring screening fleets into more danger. BR limit is a resonable restriction to solve screening issues, but it is an restriction and will be annoying in some situations. This could be a natural solution that would remove devensive tagging tactics in addition. The basic problem: People starting battles for the only purpose to escape it again, as fast as possible, or after a certain time. Battle instances are opening, without any combat taking place. What is causing this within the actual ROE system: Ships can start battles at far distances. Ships can prevent escaping over far distances. No additional restrictions to leave the battle instance for the attacker. No mechanics to force the attacker into combat. Proposal: ROE dependant on distance: Open world: After starting the tag timer, the attacker needs to close distance, represented by a smaller circle. Circle size represents effective cannon range. As soon as an enemy contacts the circle, the battle starts. No specific enemy needs to be selected. When the timer runs out, nothing happens. When attack started and enemy is within the circle, battle starts immediately. Larger circle to pull allies, as usual. Battle instance: Opponents always spawn at the same distance within cannon range (~500m), and loaded. Allies spawn depending on ow position. Area control as general mechanic, area size larger than spawning distance. Removed tag mechanic, or damage to sails doesnt prevent enemies from escaping (reasoning: our cannons are much more accurate than rl cannons). Maybe additional escape mechanics, e.g. your bow needs to point away from the enemy, or a short timer after area control is left. Pros: Less pure sailing time in the battle instances, especially for pursuits. Better immersion/realism when colliding with an enemy, instead of crossing each other while waiting for the timer. Defensive tagging not possible. Open world sailing and positioning more important, enemies cant sail through eachother. No enemies spawning / escaping right next to each other. Bow chasers less essential, more use for stern chasers. Screening atleast more risky and difficult. No restrictions/prohibitions. Requirements: Speed boni and sailing profiles need to work in the OW (atleast studding sails/extra staysails wasnt last time i checked). Regarding screening the thought is that ships need to stay so close to the enemies, that these can actually damage their hulls. The attacker is forced into combat, if he doesnt want the enemy to escape. In addition the closest ship would find itself spawning in front of a few loaded SOLs. Optional: The battle instance appearing in the open world could work similar: Instance appears as swords with circle. (~half the size of the actual large circle) For ~1min each ship colliding with the circle joins the battle. Ships spawn depending on open world position with a distance penalty (ca. 200m). Perfect would be a penalty increasing with time, but thats optional. The thought is that the OW position remains important, while players gain more freedom to choose if and what battle they want to join.

The elephant in the room is... the current state of the RoE. As I said in another thread, IMO it isn't horrible, but it isn't good let alone great. People are talking about making the signalling perk standard, but that's just saying leave battle instances open. Doing that raises its own problems. The following are mostly not even my ideas, but IMO are better than what we have now. Fair warning - some depend on others being in place too to keep things balanced. This isn't an a la carte kind of thing. A: Tagging - should not have a long timer. What's the delay for? Give the target a chance to evade? That should happen in the battle instance. If I can get you inside tagging range- you're 'it'. B: Pull circle - its crazy huge right now... based on replacing open timers with some sailing distance in ideal wind? This proposal brings the timers back, but we need a pull circle to ensure that NPC ships/fleets are more than just eye candy. So let's find a middle ground on its size. IMO two thirds of its current size would be a good compromise. All players are also pulled - you can't just blithely ignore the battle off your port bow. C: Battle instance (BI) open/closed? Yep - forget the signalling perk, just bring the timers back. Should be open for at least 10 minutes if and only if point 'D' is adopted in some form. D: Joining an existing BI should not drop you within pistol range of the original battle. That is hugely unrealistic and unfair to the opposing ships. Yeah - war isn't fair. Unfair circumstances are one thing, unfair game mechanics are quite another. joining a BI by proximity at the edge of a 'join circle' instead of clicking on swords. I see this as the only solution to ships not spawning into the BI at pistol range and not on land. Read on. Optional: clicking on swords from beyond join circle could display nations involved, total number of ships and who has BR advantage - no hard numbers. when join circle reached, the BI 'join window' pops up automatically. Join circle size? I'd say the current pull circle size, even if the pull circle is made smaller in point 'B'. I'd also like it to be invisible to try to stop maneuvering for wind advantage, or cut off escape with accelerated sailing in OW. BI join window much like now with BR details and Join/Withdraw options. Join - you join the battle. Withdraw - the battle marker is gone and you proceed on your merry. The BI join window will not go away unless you choose an option, enter port, or sail some major distance away. Spawning into BI puts you to your position and heading on the join circle when BI join window first appeared, NOT where you are when you get around to clicking the Join option. Solves the issue with 'johnny-come-laters' suddenly appearing at <200m with 'prepared' broadsides. New arrivals appearing at the join circle perimeter gives existing combatants time to prepare or flee (if possible). There's still an issue if the battle shifts to where the join circle perimeter is, but I don't see a solution to that without flirting with spawning on land again. E: BR balancing - same as used for current signalling perk, which may need adjusting/fixing. I dunno. If there are glaring opportunities for abuse in this proposal, feel free to point them out. PS - It should go without saying but PvE mission BI's (if not for hostility, geez - not for hostility) are a different animal, they should close instantly.

Why not remove the fight over ports altogether? Maybe its the ports and claiming land that is the whole misere in this game? We should fight over the sea instead. Make the ports fixed but not the sea... Split the map up in zones of control. Make each nation able to plant an amount of battle flags each night. When battles are won, the nation have honor points. When enough points is recieved something happens... The sea changes colour, the leading nation has some bars over their flags - whatever. A lot of discussion about ROE and Port Battles have been too complicated for too long. You need to simplify things and take the perspective of the player: 1. You log in. 2. Take a look on nation chat - "whats going on tonight?" 3. Sail around to find nothing of importance.. 4. Log off. 5. Drops the game when 1-4 has been done for x amount of times. After the log in, the player need some VERY CLEAR TOOLS to lead them toward the action. WHERE IS SOMETHING GOING ON? HOW CAN I FIND A BATTLE? PvP needs to be FUN and addictive. 1vs5 is no fun. PLaying for hours with no PvP is no fun etc... Rethink the OW and make battles happen from the players perspective. Make the map into a minigame where nations fight over like 10 areas or maybe even less... Each area or zone gives some bonusses or honor or something.

This might be the most modified game mechanic until now and I would like to share some more ideas here. I have seen in different threads similar ideas, and here is my total RoE package for a robust, fun and sustainable PvP environment on the open sea. The Concept: The main difference here for the initiation of OS engagements is, that the location is not only factor for determining the allocation of ships in the instance, but also the time itself. So, basically after the OS attacking, the instance is created. And any ship, outside this first initiation circle, would be joining to the instance as reinforcements. Until this point, it is similar to the current system. The reinforcements on the other hand, would be again positional according to their open sea location, but the reinforcements would be relative further away to the engaging ships in the instance. I would like to use here the term cutter minutes, similar to light years, the distance a cutter would cover in one minute. For example, the first joiner would start in that instance 6 cutter minutes away (outer rims of orange circle) from the engaging ships. The reinforcement who joins after one minute of the start of the instance would be 6+1 minutes away (outer rims of green circle); the one who joins after 2 minutes of initiation would start 6+2 minutes away and so on. As a result, the more late you join a battle, the further away you would spawn from the initial battle location in the instance. What would this allow for the game? The open sea battle instances could stay open for much longer times instead of just 2 minutes, which would increase the dynamism and activity of the open sea and rendering it more lively. This would not end ganks, but if a captain is ganked close to a friendly port, there might be a chance for reinforcements to arrive at the horizon On the other hand, it might also lay the groundwork for a good organized gank, using the positional reinforcement. However, the distance to reinforcement point depending on timer (6 + x minutes) would still give a chance for the ganked captain. No BR limits Smooth transition from open sea to the instance Need and thrill of searching the horizon not only in open sea but also in the instance Attack Circle and Timer: The attack circle on open sea could be adjusted. A relative smaller circle and shorter timer, would increase the importance of the open sea positioning and engaging. Keeping the Target in Battle: At the current state, if you land a cannonball from 800 yard distance on the sails or hull and inflict some damage, you would reset the battle timer for the target. In most cases, this would result in a very long and boring chasing situation. The current tagging mechanism also gives opportunity to the griefers. To prevent those, a damage threshold could be applied like the need of inflicting minimum 1% damage to sails (or hull) to be able to reset the battle timer for the target. Similar measures were also taken in PotBS to prevent griefing. Even in the worst gank scenario, this would give the gankers at least several chances to attack the target for resetting the timer, whereas, the target also keeps its fair chance to be able to run away and click out. Instance Join Timer for Reinforcements: The timer for reinforcements could be easily increased in this concept. I would say a time between 5 and 10 minutes might be the optimal point. Ship Polars: Minor changes to the directional speed limits should be made according to the gameplay instead of realism here, I think. This means appointing different best speed directions for different ships, so that every ship could overtake others at a specific direction or similar to that. If we look below graph, Trincomalee curve (orange) is a good example being at some directions more slow and at some directions relative faster. In conclusion, I think all those rules together would render the open world much more lively and active place for PvP and RvR compared to the current situation.

Greetings. Pretty much everyone being in port battles felt irritated by random people joining battle with small ships taking slot of your 3rd and above when you have your members prepared and you bought flag or prepared people for defense.This is my idea how to solve it , short but i hope you will like it. After planting a flag ships joining port battle (crossed swords) should be put in queue.Queue with 1 minute timer that starts after first ship join in.That 1 minute could be taken from 5 minute timer before battle. After queue timer would run off ship placed in port battle could be : -Ships with biggest BR. -Ships with clan tag shared with most ships in queue. -Time joining queue. 1 minute timer for queue should be enough for groups/clans prepared for atack or defense of port , because after flag is planted battle is filled in seconds or in a minute mostly.After queue ends and port battle starts ships that didnt get in should be placed in OW again. What about those joining later?Well if port defense (mostly because atackers should have all ships in togheter near flag carrier) isnt prepared before - all ships should be able to join in, even "randoms". Regards