Those thinking there should be more frigates and less 3rd rates in battles

[Balsafer]

Fleet composition during the Battle of Trafalgar

 

Battle of Trafalgar Fleet Composition

 

British / Franco-Spain

First rates 3/4

Second rates 4/0

Third rates 20/29

Total ships of the line 27/33

Other ships 6 7

 

As you see during the battle of Trafalgar each fleet had a lot of 3rd rates and very few frigates/4th rates

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Trafalgar#The_fleets

[Prater]

That is a fleet's composition though.  That isn't the entire nation's force.  Far more frigates and smaller vessels were doing other things.  However, yes, there should be lots of 3rd rates and 5th rates, and even more brigs and such.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rating_system_of_the_Royal_Navy#Royal_Navy_rating_system_in_force_during_the_Napoleonic_Wars

[Capt. Rice]

Interesting..hopefully they will add more of each type soon.

[BramtheDutch]

Frigates weren't ment for heavy naval engagements like trafalgar, they were ment as a flexibel patrolling/operations force.

So no why would we need more frigates ine port battles if they weren't designed for such engagements.

But what we need is a purpose for frigs in this game because at this stage they are becoming useless, and this is not how it should be.

So we need to find ourselves a purposes for frigates, which offcourse is historacly accurate.

If anybody got idea's on how we can make them usefull again please right them down, I it should be something that requieres speed and flexibility/ patrolling readines, because that is what they were build for.

[Remo]

That is a fleet's composition though.  That isn't the entire nation's force.  Far more frigates and smaller vessels were doing other things.  However, yes, there should be lots of 3rd rates and 5th rates, and even more brigs and such.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rating_system_of_the_Royal_Navy#Royal_Navy_rating_system_in_force_during_the_Napoleonic_Wars

 

Yea sorry Balsafer, he just laid down the truth.

[Remo]

Frigates weren't ment for heavy naval engagements like trafalgar, they were ment as a flexibel patrolling/operations force.

So no why would we need more frigates ine port battles if they weren't designed for such engagements.

But what we need is a purpose for frigs in this game because at this stage they are becoming useless, and this is not how it should be.

So we need to find ourselves a purposes for frigates, which offcourse is historacly accurate.

If anybody got idea's on how we can make them usefull again please right them down, I it should be something that requieres speed and flexibility/ patrolling readines, because that is what they were build for.

 

Well first mistake is allowing 3rd rates to be captured and used freely at 1 durability in port battles and in OW battles. I guarantee you port battles and OW battles will always be filled with captured 3rd rates once everyone gets one. Even when people can make normal 3rd rates. The reason being is even if you have a proper built one if it gets sunk in the PB you can't rejoin afterwards anyways. So with that in mind captured 3rd rates are cheaper(see free), and serve the exact same purpose. Yes they won't have a lot of module slots and no you won't get to choose its wood most of the time, BUT WHO CARES! Guns are guns, ships are ships, and health is health. A captured third rate is better than anything below it. Every so often in the future you will see built ships come in, but ask me if I would ever risk and extremely expensive 2nd/1st rate that only has 2/1 durability in a port battle when I could just use a free captured 3rd rate.

 

The current ship capturing is a complete and total farce, allowing for free PvP with very little to no punishment for losing. I myself use nothing but captured ships in PvP and have not lost a single one thus far, and even if I do I have 3 more captured reno's gathering dust at la tortue. I have not had to invest a single shilling into pvping, meanwhile I have sunk plenty of ships worth actual time and money, their loss my gain.

 

So as to your question, what should we do to make frigates more useful? Well we need to bring back the tier of pvp a bit. Currently its couple fast ships, usually reno's, and rest Trico's and captured connies/3rds. Trico's are the only built ship being used in pvp that I usually notice tbh. Remove the ability to capture 4th rates and higher PERMANENTLY! This way people have to build/risk the best ships or stay in frigates, this will give actual worth to ships of the line, and allow the frigates to be used how they are supposed to be, as small scale ships. Then people who actually want to win deep water port battles can bring built SoL's and actually not have to fight 20+ captured 3rd rates and lose them for nothing.

 

Again I really want to stress that the current ability to capture and crew large war ships is freaking stupid, total farce, and is hurting the game immensely.

 

By all means allow people to take them as prizes, I assume that's what the "Send to Admiralty" is supposed to be for. As for Pirates, change Admiralty to "Scrap for parts" or "Send to Brethren" or something, I don't care, nobody should be able to have free pvp with SoL's. Everyone suffers thus no bias in my suggestion.

[BramtheDutch]

Well first mistake is allowing 3rd rates to be captured and used freely at 1 durability in port battles and in OW battles. I guarantee you port battles and OW battles will always be filled with captured 3rd rates once everyone gets one. Even when people can make normal 3rd rates. The reason being is even if you have a proper built one if it gets sunk in the PB you can't rejoin afterwards anyways. So with that in mind captured 3rd rates are cheaper(see free), and serve the exact same purpose. Yes they won't have a lot of module slots and no you won't get to choose its wood most of the time, BUT WHO CARES! Guns are guns, ships are ships, and health is health. A captured third rate is better than anything below it. Every so often in the future you will see built ships come in, but ask me if I would ever risk and extremely expensive 2nd/1st rate that only has 2/1 durability in a port battle when I could just use a free captured 3rd rate.

 

The current ship capturing is a complete and total farce, allowing for free PvP with very little to no punishment for losing. I myself use nothing but captured ships in PvP and have not lost a single one thus far, and even if I do I have 3 more captured reno's gathering dust at la tortue. I have not had to invest a single shilling into pvping, meanwhile I have sunk plenty of ships worth actual time and money, their loss my gain.

 

So as to your question, what should we do to make frigates more useful? Well we need to bring back the tier of pvp a bit. Currently its couple fast ships, usually reno's, and rest Trico's and captured connies/3rds. Trico's are the only built ship being used in pvp that I usually notice tbh. Remove the ability to capture 4th rates and higher PERMANENTLY! This way people have to build/risk the best ships or stay in frigates, this will give actual worth to ships of the line, and allow the frigates to be used how they are supposed to be, as small scale ships. Then people who actually want to win deep water port battles can bring built SoL's and actually not have to fight 20+ captured 3rd rates and lose them for nothing.

 

Again I really want to stress that the current ability to capture and crew large war ships is freaking stupid, total farce, and is hurting the game immensely.

 

By all means allow people to take them as prizes, I assume that's what the "Send to Admiralty" is supposed to be for. As for Pirates, change Admiralty to "Scrap for parts" or "Send to Brethren" or something, I don't care, nobody should be able to have free pvp with SoL's. Everyone suffers thus no bias in my suggestion.

I am with you on this one, no captured 4th rates or above will help a lot but then we still need more purposes for frigates.

[Tennessee88]

Frigates weren't ment for heavy naval engagements like trafalgar, they were ment as a flexibel patrolling/operations force.

So no why would we need more frigates ine port battles if they weren't designed for such engagements.

But what we need is a purpose for frigs in this game because at this stage they are becoming useless, and this is not how it should be.

So we need to find ourselves a purposes for frigates, which offcourse is historacly accurate.

If anybody got idea's on how we can make them usefull again please right them down, I it should be something that requieres speed and flexibility/ patrolling readines, because that is what they were build for.

 

This, frigates weren't mean for line of battle. Hopefully the devs can find a way to encourage frigate play. 

[jodgi]

I don't even need incentives or grind walls between me and the fat boys.

Frigates is really all I want to play. The big ones are boring and expensive. All they're good for is winning the war and grinding money. I hope the last point will change, bigger=better is silly for profitability in my opinion.

[Mrdoomed]

Frigates weren't ment for heavy naval engagements like trafalgar, they were ment as a flexibel patrolling/operations force.

So no why would we need more frigates ine port battles if they weren't designed for such engagements.

But what we need is a purpose for frigs in this game because at this stage they are becoming useless, and this is not how it should be.

So we need to find ourselves a purposes for frigates, which offcourse is historacly accurate.

If anybody got idea's on how we can make them usefull again please right them down, I it should be something that requieres speed and flexibility/ patrolling readines, because that is what they were build for.

Just a thought but if trade fleets/routes where important and acually had an affect on what a port had in storage it would then make pirates and frigates and corvettes very important in running them down md capture / kill them or to guard the routes amd ships.

I dont even know if the devs could make resources a fixed thing but it would at least give the fast mid sized ships a purpose.

[Reyvar]

Well.. what was a frigate good for in the real world? In the game at least they really aren't that much faster and don't turn much more quickly, so making some sort of mission that benefits from speed more than firepower would be difficult.

In reality I think frigates only existed due to the immense cost associated with ships of the line. They could be more cheaply made and maintained and were used for tasks the bigger ships couldn't be spared for. They weren't necessarily better for a given task, it's more that they were good enough for the task.

The problem is that doesn't translate to the game. At high rank we will all have 1st rates eventually and will have no reason not to use them. Additionally, adding reasons not to use the best ships in the game (ie, negative side effects, costs) won't be received well by players. The truth is we all want to use ships like that, and trying to make it "historically accurate" would mean most of us would never get anything better than a frigate. Fewer than a dozen players would ever use a 1st rate.

Edited February 26, 2016 by Reyvar

[Remo]

I don't even need incentives or grind walls between me and the fat boys.

Frigates is really all I want to play. The big ones are boring and expensive. All they're good for is winning the war and grinding money. I hope the last point will change, bigger=better is silly for profitability in my opinion.

 

I hate when I have to agree with you jodgi.

[Balsafer]

Frigates were not highly used in battles such as Trafalgar. Frigates were used mainly for patrolling they were not used as much in heavy engagements that was the point of this post.

Yea sorry Balsafer, he just laid down the truth.

 

This topic was not about the whole nation it was about port battles and port battles alone.

[Remo]

Frigates were not highly used in battles such as Trafalgar. Frigates were used mainly for patrolling they were not used as much in heavy engagements that was the point of this post.

 

This topic was not about the whole nation it was about port battles and port battles alone.

 

Oh, well then we agree to an extent. Yet for most people I would think Frigates are more important. Not everyone wants to roll around in a tub doing nothing but port battles. Since SoL's should only be used in large scale engagements such as port battles, you don't need as many variants. Meanwhile 5th rates and 6th rates are meant for everything else and thus more variants are important.

 

Not sure if you were talking about have more variants in game. So excuse me if I don't get the exact meaning of this thread.

 

If however you mean "There should be more SoL's in port battles than frigates", you are 100% correct, there should be.

Edited February 26, 2016 by Remo

[Quineloe]

Then add more and more third rates so we can have variety that way.

I can't possibly think of a more dull fleet composition but the same ship 25 times.

[Remo]

Then add more and more third rates so we can have variety that way.

I can't possibly think of a more dull fleet composition but the same ship 25 times.

 

Why? As I said before, even if you add 20 more buildable 3rd rate BP's, people will only use capped 3rd rates.

[Aetrion]

3rd rates were the most common type of ship built for actually doing battle. While frigates were more numerous they weren't meant to go into really big fights where ships were expected to take heavy fire. 

 

From a historical standpoint seeing nothing but 3rd rates and up in a harbor battle actually makes perfect sense, and the European navies tended to have just as many commissioned 3rd rates as frigates. The 74 gun ship was probably the most successful and common warship design of the era.

 

Frigates in those days were patrol and escort ships. They had the capability to engage other ships in combat, but that wasn't  their function. Another really important thing that people tend to forget is that they didn't have teamspeak back then. Operating a fleet of frigates was an essential part of just having communication with far away colonies.

 

 

Why? As I said before, even if you add 20 more buildable 3rd rate BP's, people will only use capped 3rd rates.

 

It's almost like in a game that makes ships disposable people will use the most disposable ships.

Edited February 26, 2016 by Aetrion

[Remo]

3rd rates were the most common type of ship built for actually doing battle. While frigates were more numerous they weren't meant to go into really big fights where ships were expected to take heavy fire. 

 

From a historical standpoint seeing nothing but 3rd rates and up in a harbor battle actually makes perfect sense, and the European navies tended to have just as many commissioned 3rd rates as frigates. The 74 gun ship was probably the most successful and common warship design of the era.

 

Frigates in those days were patrol and escort ships. They had the capability to engage other ships in combat, but that wasn't  their function. Another really important thing that people tend to forget is that they didn't have teamspeak back then. Operating a fleet of frigates was an essential part of just having communication with far away colonies.

 

 

 

It's almost like in a game that makes ships disposable people will use the most disposable ships.

 

Yes but then what the hell is the point of building ships if you can just capture them, and quite easily I might add?

[Aetrion]

Yes but then what the hell is the point of building ships if you can just capture them, and quite easily I might add?

 

What would be the point of capturing ships if you don't get to keep them?

 

 

Bottom line is, the problem here is that the basis of the economy is ships. If the basis of the economy was equipment, repairs, provisions, arms, munitions and crew then capturing a third rate ship that is half shot to mulch and half on fire wouldn't equate to having a free ship to throw at the enemy, it would equate to having just assumed a huge need to buy those goods from other players to even make the thing work again.

Edited February 27, 2016 by Aetrion

[maturin]

Stay on topic, for once please.

[Remo]

What would be the point of capturing ships if you don't get to keep them?

 

 

Bottom line is, the problem here is that the basis of the economy is ships. If the basis of the economy was equipment, repairs, provisions, arms, munitions and crew then capturing a third rate ship that is half shot to mulch and half on fire wouldn't equate to having a free ship to throw at the enemy, it would equate to having just assumed a huge need to buy those goods from other players to even make the thing work again.

 

You get to sell them as prizes.

 

As for the topic, there should be less frigates than 3rd rates in PORT BATTLES.

[Aetrion]

Frigates were not designed to fight in any major battle between fleets though. It was more like frigates were the police, ships of the line were the military. 

[Balsafer]

I'm pretty sure for the most part 3rd rates will be limited to port battles on occassion when Nations have larger patrols about or hunting down flag carriers there will be more. Lets face it some people like big battles and having big ships in them so there is no way around that unless provisions get added that you must have before you set sail.

[Captain Tylor]

They should either increase the mobility of frigates or decrease the mobility of SOLs even more, however unrealistic it might be. 

[jodgi]

Stay on topic, for once please.

You mean staying with historical accounts in relation to a game where everyone's aim is to have fun?