Game is bleeding players

[hitem]

if ppl are leaving already they where not ment to play an mmo.

mmo is a usually a 2-4 years investment (you should do some heavy research before playing).

[Ratline]

Roll the servers into 1 minus the PvE then get rid of the XP grind as that was last century game makers who didn't have any better ideas on making a progression game, the thing that should limit you is cash flow to buy and maintain ships, the more money i have the more willing i am to go trash some ships, XP does not depict how experienced i am nor should it anyone else, all that the Rank and XP shows is those that are retired or unemployed that can play all day and push through this imposed grind.

 

Would the people who moan then not simply moan that the 'gold grind' was too much and that they needed those ships quicker? It's a mentality, 'must have X as soon as possible' which ignores anything which does not immediately further that goal, like.. actually playing the game and having fun.

Edited March 15, 2016 by Ratline

[Justme]

Except nobody is forced to trade or craft. It's entirely viable to be a purely combat focused player and do very well.

If your roaming around in gank fleets maybe.

[Mrdoomed]

Would the people who moan then not simply moan that the 'gold grind' was too much and that they needed those ships quicker? It's a mentality, 'must have X as soon as possible' which ignores anything which does not immediately further that goal, like.. actually playing the game and having fun.

Its the ADHD instant gratification, oh oh a shiny crowd. Just like they act in real life they act here.

Best we can do is just ignore them and let them move on. This game isnt even finished and its already very good and just what alot of people have been looking for for years.

A small solid base of players will give the devs a cash flow and allow us to play for a long time.

[Aetrion]

Except nobody is forced to trade or craft. It's entirely viable to be a purely combat focused player and do very well.

 

Not entirely sure how that's supposed to be true. You wouldn't be able to actually afford good ships if you wanted to play the entire game just doing small and large battles for example. 

[Enraged Ewok]

Would the people who moan then not simply moan that the 'gold grind' was too much and that they needed those ships quicker? It's a mentality, 'must have X as soon as possible' which ignores anything which does not immediately further that goal, like.. actually playing the game and having fun.

 

This was exactly my experience from friends who tried Elite Dangerous. "Why is there a grind wall to get a bigger ship? Why do I have to start in a Sidewinder? Why can't I start in an Anaconda?" I don't see any reason Naval Action would be any different if they removed the xp and rank/crew limitations to command ships.

[Slamz]

This was exactly my experience from friends who tried Elite Dangerous. "Why is there a grind wall to get a bigger ship? Why do I have to start in a Sidewinder? Why can't I start in an Anaconda?" I don't see any reason Naval Action would be any different if they removed the xp and rank/crew limitations to command ships.

 

I agree, as long as there's an economy to limit who sails what, with the idea being that while a medium skill player can generally always afford a Surprise, even the best of the best cannot afford to sail a 1st or 2nd rate all the time -- it's too expensive (either in gold or in labor hours or in just the sheer amount of time it takes to physically move the raw materials around to build it).

 

If we imagine this game 2 years from now, everyone will be max level and what I just described will be the reality of the game for 95% of the people who still play it.

 

The current rank/XP system accomplishes nothing except to limit what new players can do. What's the point in that?

Edited March 15, 2016 by Slamz

[Mrdoomed]

If we imagine this game 2 years from now, everyone will be max level and what I just described will be the reality of the game for 95% of the people who still play it.

Here is the biggest problem between players like us that get NA and those that cant .

We can see 2 or 3 years down the road and the time spent between now and then will get us our levels our money our trade routs and our friends amd we will happily play what is available along the way BUT the modern gamer has the " i want to click 1 button be in a match maker style instant skill based battle that when i die i just come right back "mentality. Players cant see tomorrow let alone 2 years down the road. You can see it in almost every critical post made. Rathern than asking or learning from others how to have fun in NA they want the devs to trash all their work and change the game to suit them.

The world is overpopulated with the clicky clicky respawn click click pew pews so i hope the devs sticl it out amd realize many people have been looking for this game.

Edited March 15, 2016 by Mrdoomed

[KrakkenSmacken]

I agree, as long as there's an economy to limit who sails what, with the idea being that while a medium skill player can generally always afford a Surprise, even the best of the best cannot afford to sail a 1st or 2nd rate all the time -- it's too expensive (either in gold or in labor hours or in just the sheer amount of time it takes to physically move the raw materials around to build it).

 

If we imagine this game 2 years from now, everyone will be max level and what I just described will be the reality of the game for 95% of the people who still play it.

 

The current rank/XP system accomplishes nothing except to limit what new players can do. What's the point in that?

 

 

The problem with this approach, or rather the point, is that as a game everyone is or would be able to save up enough currency to bypass the steps along the way.

 

Keep your basic cutter, upgrade to pickle or snow ASAP, farm traders, buy a victory

 

The only reason to not do this now is that XP gains from farming traders is minimal, and you will spend a boat load of time at each level so you may as well have the best ship for it.

 

Just money, and 95% of the game could be skipped.

Edited March 15, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[Ratline]

If your roaming around in gank fleets maybe.

 

 

Not entirely sure how that's supposed to be true. You wouldn't be able to actually afford good ships if you wanted to play the entire game just doing small and large battles for example. 

 

What are you guys even talking about? There is no logic to your replies. Nobody is forced to craft or trade, neither is necessary to do well in the game. You can make huge amounts of gold doing missions, group AI fleet hunting, and yes.. doing pvp. More than enough to keep yourself in ships without needing to trade or craft, especially with the support of a good clan.

[Vllad]

Fair call vllad, 

I should clarify, the portbattle system ie the RVR element rewards the xp grind. 

 

You are quite right it is less relevant in open sea pvp and i do agree with you. I was primarily  talking about  the strategic RVR PVP component. I wouldnt call open sea rvr so much as it has limited strategic value in the current gameset

 

I am not happy with the exclusion of people in port battles either. If you are excluding people you are screwing up RvR. If you can't log in on day one and help support your team then the game is flawed.

 

I will say that open sea's PVP is far more important to the RvR than people give it credit for.

 

Every ship you burn down, every trade ship you take, every port you blockade, every time you create a zone of control of an area in open sea's you do impact the RvR aspects of the game.

 

The ability to maintain a presence and/or resources is predicated more on open sea combat than port battles. On PVP2 open sea combat played a much bigger role for the French being able to survive than the port battles did. The French war with Pirates was long decided on the open sea's well before most of the port battles even took place.

[chappy]

i would agree with u on open sea rvr if durability on smaller ships was less. but in its current guise i really don't feel you have much impact unless you happen to catch a pavel or victory in a cruise you're not knocking much off peoples rsources/cash

[Vllad]

i would agree with u on open sea rvr if durability on smaller ships was less. but in its current guise i really don't feel you have much impact unless you happen to catch a pavel or victory in a cruise you're not knocking much off peoples rsources/cash

 

True,

 

You just need to kill them more often. Which is ok with me. People may be short on cash and as long as they aren't afraid to come out of the port 5 Dura's don't bother me so much.

[Aetrion]

Balance by economy is no balance at all. It just means the people with the most time on their hands get to dominate everyone else.

[kumisz]

How could I (as a partly economy player) dominate you (as a full pvp player) by any means? You will have better combat skills than me, and I can not dominate you in any other way.

 

Or you mean the nation with the better crafting chain (---> more 1st and 2nd rates) will dominate the weaker nation? In another topic, you lot complain about the npc 3rd rates being too disposable and that having more 1st rates mean no edge to the stronger nation, because they will still be sunk by the "free" 3rd rates, and take a lot of effort to be replaced. So now what?

 

Balance by economy is no balance at all. It just means the people with the most time on their hands get to dominate everyone else.

Edited March 16, 2016 by kumisz

[Aetrion]

I never once complained that disposable third rates make first rates meaningless. My stance is: Ships need to be balanced on their merit in a fight and should be available for people to use at will once they earned them. 

[Azzak]

So people that are max rank should be able to sail in 1st rate at will ? 

Considering the grind necessary to earn them, doesn't it mean max rank players will just steamroll those who don't have 1st rates ?

[kumisz]

This would exactly result in the effect you want to avoid: if once the biggest grindmasters reach the rank for 1st rates and would be able to use them without limitations (like loss), the players with the most time invested could steamroll the players with less dedication.

 

I never once complained that disposable third rates make first rates meaningless. My stance is: Ships need to be balanced on their merit in a fight and should be available for people to use at will once they earned them. 

[Aetrion]

This would exactly result in the effect you want to avoid: if once the biggest grindmasters reach the rank for 1st rates and would be able to use them without limitations (like loss), the players with the most time invested could steamroll the players with less dedication.

 

Yea, except the players with less dedication actually have a chance to catch up in a system where you unlock ships rather than having to finance them over and over and over so that the people who grind and stockpile the most continuously stay ahead, rather than ever maxing out.

 

Systems that only benefit a tiny elite are game killers. The upkeep grind would be fine if it was about actual harbor battles and stuff like that, but it isn't. In this game it's about the most basic thing you need to even play, and that's just stupid and totally at odds with providing a good experience to people who just don't have the time to spend hours grinding and stockpiling stuff.

Edited March 16, 2016 by Aetrion

[Warrax]

Lets review why people leave the game ...

 

I left, so I get a say ...

 

... I left because the new patch is ludicrously tedious.  I spend less time worry about my boat or my target.  All eyes were fixed on those stupid increasing and decreasing scales for my sailors.  

 

Combat used to be FUN.  After the patch ... wow, lame.  Tedious ...

 

Boarding was a hassle - screw it.  I left after 10 minutes.

[Warrax]

if ppl are leaving already they where not ment to play an mmo.

mmo is a usually a 2-4 years investment (you should do some heavy research before playing).

 

LOL are you kidding me?

 

I think you left out FUN.  If this game wants to survive - make it fun again.

 

Hello DEVS are you listening ???

You took a great product and turned it into a tedious exercise of "no fun at all"

 

Fix your shitty patch, send me an email when you do that, and maybe one of your Captains would be back.  

(2 to 4 years ... lmao)

 

Cheers.  And (sincerely) good luck.  I would LOVE to come back to play a fun Naval Action again.

[Rigge1988]

Some people purchase early access games, try them out for a while to see if there's potential. Then they stop playing it waiting for more content before they dig in more seriously.

I'd like to think this is what have happened. People who joined first 1-2 weeks from ea-release now just wait for more content.

 

I use to do this too when it comes to ea. But for naval action I feel there's enough to do to dig deep already.

Ofc. Now as I have invested some time into it I fear the soft wipe which may or may not happen.

And as long as soft wipes (gold and assets) might happen I wouldn't say it's worth investing all your time in.

But it's also, on the other hand, individual. Some have no problems at all with starting over collecting gold, assets and crafting blueprints again while some just get tipped off.

 

Im also quite sure once the real release happens we'll see upwards to 3k players atleast on 1 shard.

Dream would be 10k+ players and to expand to a world map. But that's just a dream.

[Raymond Woolstone]

Some people purchase early access games, try them out for a while to see if there's potential. Then they stop playing it waiting for more content before they dig in more seriously.

I'd like to think this is what have happened. People who joined first 1-2 weeks from ea-release now just wait for more content.

 

 

that is atleast the case for me.

this is the second alpha title i bought on steam, and i moust likely will never get into alphas again.

 

the game is simply too early in its life for the avrage gamer to play it. there is no content apart from pvp, and you can get pvp in any other mmo out there that is fully released.

for the pve`ers there is allmoust 0 content. what you can do in pve us, you can do in pvp eu 1 in a remote location in the world.

Edited March 17, 2016 by Nitefrost

[kumisz]

Lets review why people leave the game ...

 

I left, so I get a say ...

 

... I left because the new patch is ludicrously tedious.  I spend less time worry about my boat or my target.  All eyes were fixed on those stupid increasing and decreasing scales for my sailors.  

 

Combat used to be FUN.  After the patch ... wow, lame.  Tedious ...

 

Boarding was a hassle - screw it.  I left after 10 minutes.

 

If you are not undercrewing VASTLY, you dont even need to look at those numbers, unless you want to board. Like, I use my Constitution with 350 or 360 crew, and even then I never lost that much crew that I had to put people over to gunnery from sailing. What are you talking about?

[Jan van Santen]

I play computer games for 35 years now, so I've seen this happen in other games before.

Devs having a brilliant idea and programming great gfx etc, but unable to "think in the heads of players"

End of story: in the best case a niche game for 1K players, in the worst case : servers go down forever.

 

They fail to understand, that it is not their opinion on what is right or wrong in a game, that counts.

It's the opinion and the fun of the players that does.

 

(Example: Devs tell us, it's okay that an AI 3rd rate outruns and outmanouvres your average player owned frigate. Sorry, but the players know that an 18th century 3rd rate should  outgun a frigate, but it shouldn't outrun it)

 

Players having fun  and the word of mouth resulting from it:  those are  the only things that in the end decide about the number of players a game has.

 

No dev opinion, no review, no rating, no hype, no advertising ... will change that.

 

Seeing that the devs are not working to solve the urgent problems of the game but fiddle with fineties like crew management instead, I have told my friends not to buy this game (yet).

 

PvE content is minimal, the game is extremely unforgiving towards new players and it is casual unfriendly.

Edited March 17, 2016 by Jan van Santen