Development priorities 2

[Blood Eagle]

Get rid of the grind ASAP

[kovah]

"Overhaul of War & Peace mechanics and national relations, pirate role and national alliances"   +1

 

It's odd to me.  I found this on Steam the day of EA release.  Everything I read about it stated it was a PvP game.  I jumped right in.

 

I don't mind having NPC ships out there in the OW unless we suddenly have 1000s of other players actually populating the seas.  I don't really mind the missions although I haven't done one in quite some time myself but I certainly used them to get the hang of things early on.  I don't think the AI fleet cutter/lynx for the first little bit is that bad of a thing - if nothing else it teaches you how to maneuver in battle with other friendly ships.

 

It is odd to me to see so many PvE only folks in this game.  It's a PvP/RvR game.  That's what it was advertised as.  That's what it is at heart.  There's an oh so true old saying that starts, "A fool and his money..."  If you spent money on a PvP game that was clearly advertised as such and expected PvE then that's your own fault.  Reality bites?  

 

I'm gonna get ranted at over this but whatever.  Add more PvE content to the OW and guess what you'll get?  More people crying about getting PvP'd while they were trying to PvE.

 

Speaking of rants...   /rant

[Slamz]

My feeling is for the broader, silent majority of the players the real need is for easier access to PvP.  I'm a semi casual, about to hit Post Captain, and I have never once been involved in any RvR (Great Britain on PvP 2).  Not for lack of wanting to, just no idea how to get involved. 

 

Hopefully a better war system may include more ways to participate in RvR. It really can't just be 25v25 port battles and that's it. Open sea PvP right now can be hard to find if you don't know how to look for it and the game can do more to drive it.

 

But I think that's part of the "war" category.

 

The "tournament" category I actually see as a distraction to "real PvP". And we already have the Small Battles / Large Battles system, which is always-available tournament-style PvP and almost nobody uses it (even when it was popular it was 90% basic cutters).

[Taranis]

BTW, I would like to thank the devs for actually engaging the player base in these questions.  Its incredibly refreshing and gives us all insights into the thought process of where the game is headed. 

[Joybringer]

Make pirates - pirates, not just another nation !

[KrakkenSmacken]

Voted diplomacy/pirate.  

 

I reason being that this is the foundation to both resource management and PvE content.

 

How can you build better resource management, when control and conquest of resource extraction points is not understood?

 

PvE in that many PvE activities and missions could eventually be tied into the conquest game. (Sink/Capture 5 traders from Port X to reduce town moral and weaken defenses.) for example.

 

Just because they are PvE missions does not mean they should be separated from national ambitions, which will hinge off the diplomacy/conquest aspects of the game.

Edited March 24, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[Hooks for Hands]

I realize that PvP is your main focus and that's all fine and dandy, but the PvE aspects of this game are rapidly getting out-dated.  We are seeing clans and players with Pavels, Victories, and soon Santissima's, but there is nothing for us to really do with these ships other than fight 3rd rate fleets.  

[The MetaBaron]

Weather effects both in battle and in open ocean, Fog... Darker moonless nights. More variety of wind, with the potential to damage your sails if you leave too many up....  or instances with little wind. Waves that require you to close gun ports, and force you to dedicate crew to pumping out water. With some ships being better at resisting than others.... leading to variety in ship choice based on situation.

[admin]

I realize that PvP is your main focus and that's all fine and dandy, but the PvE aspects of this game are rapidly getting out-dated.  We are seeing clans and players with Pavels, Victories, and soon Santissima's, but there is nothing for us to really do with these ships other than fight 3rd rate fleets.  

 

Join the war - it is the real experience. Age of Sail captains fought real people. You are robbing yourself of this experience.

[Johnny Rotten]

Letters of marque is priority

[OTMatt]

War & Peace mechanics are heavily favored towards clans. While I do agree that it is an important part of the game it still adds nothing to the actual gameplay much like this past economy update. Id rather see crew mechanics because at least that gives both casuals and clans some more meat to their game.

 

Only other thing I could see that could add more to gameplay is a rework of the missions.

[Prater]

War & Peace mechanics are heavily favored towards clans. While I do agree that it is an important part of the game it still adds nothing to the actual gameplay much like this past economy update. Id rather see crew mechanics because at least that gives both casuals and clans some more meat to their game.

 

Only other thing I could see that could add more to gameplay is a rework of the missions.

 

War and peace isn't only for clans, it is for the entire nation.  It takes it out of the clan's hands, which is what we want, because it is way too chaotic right now and nations getting rolled is not a good thing.

 

In my opinion, War and Peace is the most important, even vital, for the game to progress and maintain a player base.

[Captain Boneboys]

I'm sticking to my guns...

 

 Overhaul of resource distribution, labor hours rework, crafting improvements, exploration for resources

 Overhaul of resource distribution, labor hours rework, crafting improvements, exploration for resources

 Overhaul of resource distribution, labor hours rework, crafting improvements, _{^{exploration for resources}}

[Arvenski]

People should bare in mind that currently we are really not gamers but testers. We play because, yes it is a lot of fun, but we shouldnt forget that we have noble purpose.

Which, you might say, is why we're voting in this poll: we've tested the game, and now we get to choose which parts need improving the most. 

[surfimp]

I don't really understand what "War & Peace mechanics" even means, so it's hard to vote for that absent some more concrete definitions.

With that said... anything which provides meaningful RVR activities outside of the "Port Battle Meta" would be a huge improvement.

 

The "Port Battle Meta" is what leads many people (and especially clans) to focus almost all their time on grinding NPC fleets, so they can get 3rd and 1st rate ships to win port battles, so they can paint the map with the color of their faction... at which point, they (presumably) realize how meaningless map-painting currently is, regret the hundreds of hours spent grinding, and go do something else with their lives.

 

I voted for changes to the economy as I believe economic success is what should fuel the ability to acquire large ships, not NPC grinding. I'd like to see a system where map-painting / huge empires became more and more susceptible to being picked apart by privateering, and where attention and resources would have to be paid to protecting trade routes and the ships that ply them. This would make having huge empires become much harder to sustain, and it would give real and meaningful things (in an RVR sense) for small nations' players to do, even if they were operating out of a single national port, or a free port.

 

In the real world, nations fight over access to resources, and gaining (or excluding) access to those resources is what allows a nation to thrive (or causes it to decline). I'd like to see more of that have an influence on the world of Naval Action, because I believe it would give something important for all classes of ships to do, as opposed to just treating those ships as something to be "gotten through" on the way to 1st rates and... boredom.

[randommexi]

nothing worth voting for here...  missing the only thing that REALLY needs fixing right now.

 

RVR.  PB's and how they start and how the end, and everything in between

Edited March 24, 2016 by randommexi

[Ted Nougat]

I have a few thoughts on each choice. My first post, and I'm sorry if it gets long...

 

Hired Crew

 

Hired crew would be interesting. If you ever played an older space exploration game like Starflight, then you can where the mechanic about hiring a ship's master who has a 8/10 rating in navigation giving you better sailing, or a boatswain who had a 10/10 in woodworking making your ship sturdier and repairs faster, would work great.

 

I'd like to see crew stats increase with each battle/mission/voyage/etc. So if you win a battle they get a little of their own XP. You sail X miles, they get a little tiny XP. So the longer they are in your ship, the better they get at what they do.

 

It would also be nice if the crew wasn't tied to the ship. I'd like to have them hanging out in port when not aboard. When you go to undock, load up the 5 (or whatever) key officers and warrants positions with whatever guys you like and head out.

 

Extra double bonus points if it was possible to have your crewmen "learn" while in port, so that over time they become better. That, or be able to pay for their schooling while away. Give them a budget and let them improve over time while you're out.  You'd do this to replaced wounded crewmen, obviously.

 

War & Peace

 

Diplomacy would be good. Right now, the larger clans decide what relationships exist. But there's really no way to convince the other clans or independents to honor it, so it's mostly meaningless. We had a good corp/alliance system in Eve, and it worked well, I thought. Of course, Eve had no concept of "nations" (aside from possibly the factions and races), so I'm not sure how well it would translate here. But it would be very nice to see red/blue/green/white markers on a ship (or ship description) so that we'd all know who to shoot and not shoot.

 

The real question is: Who decides if a nation is in an alliance with another nation? If you do it by popular vote, few will vote. If every clan had one vote, then alt accounts with only one member would ruin that. If you give larger clans more votes, then you have the case where a few people decide things for everyone else. I'm not sure how, but it has to be equitable.

 

Open world PVE

 

This is the one I voted for, purely because I find myself doing more PVE stuff than PVP stuff over the last month or so. My clan is really small and mostly inactive, so all I get are ad hoc groups to go sail around looking for AI ships or do a port battle or whatever -- and all this has been very fun so far! I normally absolutely detest PUGs in a game, but I have to say Naval Action so far has had the most rewarding PUG experience of any game I've ever played. I've also met and chatted with some really nice folks. But getting into a group is fairly rare for me.

 

I hate to say it, but I think we need some form of "looking for group" feature. I see captains sailing around endlessly but have never seen any of their names in faction chat. It would be very nice to find a way to involve them, aside from just spamming faction chat and hoping a few people notice.

 

Epic events would be nice. More varied missions would be nice.

 

Leaderboard

 

I have no use for a leaderboard. It's only interesting to those who want to brandish their e-peen. It's for the kind of people who like to work out in front of a mirror. Not needed. And I don't want to go back to the days of Eve where people would do silly, useless things just to get on the killmail (rather than actually help out in the battle) so they can continue to brag about what an awesome pilot they are. A leaderboard rewards the wrong behavior.

 

That said, you could reward captains with medals as a way to show others their accomplishments. They did this in the real world, too. Something to say, "Yeah, I was there, I did my part, we won" would work well and fit in historically.

 

You could also tie this concept of medals in with the epic events stuff (viz: Nelson's St. Vincent or Nile medals). It would provide incentive to participate I think. 

 

Also, you could give people medals other accomplishments, say for capturing 50 ships of at least their BR. Or for exploring X square miles of coastline. Or for crafting Y number of ships. Or for Z number of hours captaining a certain ship rating. (I really like this idea. You see a 1st LT in a Frigate but he's got his 100 hour 5th Rate medal, then you can be reasonably sure he knows how to sail it undercrewed.)

 

I know there are certain people that will hunt for medals like they hunt for accomplishments in other games. That might be a very good to way get people involved in aspects of the game they normally might eschew, as well as provide a way to get recognition for your skill in a way that leaderboards don't.

 

The trick with medals is to make them visible to other players in-game. I should be in port or on OW and be able to see someone's medals. Then people will want them.

 

Resource distribution

 

I'd like to see resource gathering from buildings provide crafting XP. I'm trying to level up crafting and it's not worth it for me to spend crafting hours getting stuff from my buildings. So I'm just buying stuff and my buildings are full.  Again, my clan isn't big enough to have one person (who doesn't care about crafting XP at all) dedicated to collecting resources from buildings, some that are dedicated to crafting (and who actually get rewarded with XP for it), etc.

 

BTW, I love the buildings, and don't think they need to change. I just think that gathering from a building should give you at least a little crafting XP, or else they will sit there laying fallow for those interested in crafting XP.

 

Other

 

I know nobody asked, but please: can we make make a captain's mission swords a different color than battle swords, and also allow captains to see the mission orders of other captains in their group (which are also a different color)? The inevitable discussions about where everyone's orders are makes the missioning group dynamic clunky. It would also help newer players, because more experienced navigators could show them how to get around.

[KrakkenSmacken]

War & Peace mechanics are heavily favored towards clans. While I do agree that it is an important part of the game it still adds nothing to the actual gameplay much like this past economy update. Id rather see crew mechanics because at least that gives both casuals and clans some more meat to their game.

 

Only other thing I could see that could add more to gameplay is a rework of the missions.

 

If war is bled down into missions, and is constructed in such a way that it is a nation effort, of all player PvE and PvP alike have focus and reason for every individual to participate.

 

If for example your port is under siege, and missions start to pop up along the line of the current missions, but a positive outcome results in an improvement in morale of the town you operate out of, and that morale makes it harder for the opposing nation to mount an attack, say it costs more to buy an assault flag based on town morale, then everyone gets to contribute and participate.

 

It stops being just a clan thing, and becomes an entire national effort.

 

If your wondering what the #@$#@! I am talking about morale for, I have a more complete description of the mechanics in this thread.

 

http://forum.game-labs.net/index.php?/topic/12026-dare-to-dream-whats-your-ideal-port-conquest-system/?p=218574

Edited March 24, 2016 by KrakkenSmacken

[Ruthless4u]

So how is more micromanaging supposed to improve the game again?

[Pigafetta]

Exciting news... cannot wait! Good ideas devs.

[Prater]

What is being micromanaged?

[Roche Brasiliano]

Hum? Wolrd of Warships? NA is looking like it more and more, just centuries after. Im quit to play WoWs, maybe i should quit to play this too...

[Blackjack McGee]

I chose the PVE option not because it is more important than PvP or nation building aspects, but because it impacts all aspects of the game.  We are still in Alpha/Beta and I see the Nation stuff as mostly end game content.  Since a lot of people have done a great job of leveling there are people reaching that point but beginners and the bulk of the players are still involved in the daily grind of leveling and crafting.  Anything that would improve that aspect of the game I believe would have the greatest impact on the future success.  The biggest challenge in the end game/nation building aspect is population balancing for which I don't have the solution.

 

Having said that I am really looking forward to the crew aspects.  I think that would be awesome but not nearly as important as making the grind more interesting and giving more things to do beside grind and pvp.

[Slamz]

Join the war - it is the real experience. Age of Sail captains fought real people. You are robbing yourself of this experience.

 

Ultimately, maybe as part of this next development push, the game has to do more to drive players into the war experience.

 

Right now it's very easy to grind NPCs, show up for port battles and then grind more NPCs. There is little practical reason to go hunting. It doesn't really even hurt the enemy (due to high gold rewards and 5 ship durability). So a lot of people feel justified in just PvE grinding even though it's boring -- at least it gets them the big ships they'll need for the port battles.

 

I hope these new war components can somehow encourage hunting and open sea combat.

[Justme]

What is being micromanaged?

My guess from the options listed it's either the first or fourth choice